Please help me find a book.

[Nate the great]

I want to convert the work of Stanley Weinbaum as my next project. Fortunately, most of the copyrights have lapsed.

The only stuff that might still be in copyright is an anthology called The best of Stanley Weinbaum. I can't find an accessible copy.

Does anyone have it? If so, can you tell me what titles are in it? Thanks.

[JSWolf]

If you use Book Designer to do this, please download and setup the Book Cleaner files.

Here's a link to some short stories you can put in one volume.

http://manybooks.net/authors/weinbaums.html

[Nate the great]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

If you use Book Designer to do this, please download and setup the Book Cleaner files.

Here's a link to some short stories you can put in one volume.

http://manybooks.net/authors/weinbaums.html

Those are all on PG. I have them already, and yes I was going to put them in one volume.

But most of his work is not yet on PG, it is on PG Australia. The work may or may not have been in copyright in the US. This forced me to learn how to do a copyright search. I only found the one record, which means that the others have not been renewed when the law changed.

[JSWolf]

if we go by life + 70 in the US, then they should all be PD in the US given that he died in 1935.

[Nate the great]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

if we go by life + 70 in the US, then they should all be PD in the US given that he died in 1935.

That is a good general rule, but some of his work was not published until after his death. Thus, you don't know who owned the copyright. The publisher might have owned the copyright, which would mean the 95 year rule might apply. Also, his widow is still living, so she might have still held the copyrights on them.

This was not a simple case.

[JSWolf]

I didn't know you could leave a copyright in a will to someone else to keep it going. That just seems wrong to me.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

if we go by life + 70 in the US, then they should all be PD in the US given that he died in 1935.

US copyright law is... "not straightforward" would be a kind way of putting it .

In every country in the world EXCEPT the US, the works of someone who died in 1935 would indeed be in the public domain. In the US, the situation is more complex. Wikipedia sums it up nicely:

Works created in or after 1978 are extended copyright protection for a term defined in 17 U.S.C. § 302. With the passage of the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act, these works are granted copyright protection for a term ending 70 years after the death of the author. If the work was a work for hire (e.g., those created by a corporation) then copyright persists for 120 years after creation or 95 years after publication, whichever is shortest.

Copyrightable works created before 1978 that had not entered the public domain in 1978 received protection for the § 302 term above with the exception that those copyrights would not expire before 2003. Prior to 1978, works had to be published or registered to receive copyright protection. Upon the effective date of the 1976 Act (January 1, 1978) this requirement was removed and these works received protection despite having not been published or registered. However, Congress intended to provide an incentive for these authors to publish their unpublished works. To provide that incentive these works, if published before 2003, will not have their protection expire until 2048.

All works published in the United States before 1923 are in the public domain; works created before 1978 but not published until recently may be protected until 2047: Sec. 303.

For works that received their copyright before 1978, a renewal had to be filed in the work's 28th year with the Library of Congress Copyright Office for its term of protection to be extended. The need for renewal was eliminated in 1992, but works that had already entered the public domain by non-renewal did not regain copyright protection. Therefore, works published before 1964 that were not renewed are in the public domain. No additional copyrights will expire (thus entering the public domain) until at least 2019 due to changes in the applicable laws.

So, it depends whether or not his copyright was renewed or not. If it was, it won't enter the public domain in the US until 2019 at the earliest. Note, however, that it IS in the public domain everywhere else in the world.