MobileRead Forums - View Single Post - What If the Copyright Act of 1909 Was Still Law?

L.Urquiaga · 01-05-2011, 01:25 PM

but I've thought for years that the way to solve this is to create a rebuttable statutory presumption that the year of publication is the author's year of death. Then set up a voluntary registry for authors (or transfer copyright owners on their behalf) to record title, contact and biographical information. Allow only actual damages for non-registered authors.

That way, if you want to know if a book is protected, do an author search (include a web search requirement as well) - if you find the author, you can either contact him/her or at least know whether they're alive or dead. If they're not listed and the book was published over 75 years ago, go ahead and use it as if it were public domain.

I'd also love to see a statutory licensing arrangement for material that was published more than 28 years ago*, out-of-print and "unclaimed."

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* For the person who asked about the term of years: the original US copyright act of 1790 set a term of 14 years, which could be renewed by the author for a total of 28 years. The 1909 act doubled that to 28 years renewable to 56. And the 1976 act adopted the life+ standard used in Europe. You'd have to ask the Europeans where they got their numbers :-)

01-05-2011, 01:25 PM	#80
L.Urquiaga Junior Member Posts: 2 Karma: 10 Join Date: Jan 2011 Location: Provo, Utah Device: Android Phone - plus Nook, Kindle, iPad, & iTouch in department	Not that anyone will listen to me ... but I've thought for years that the way to solve this is to create a rebuttable statutory presumption that the year of publication is the author's year of death. Then set up a voluntary registry for authors (or transfer copyright owners on their behalf) to record title, contact and biographical information. Allow only actual damages for non-registered authors. That way, if you want to know if a book is protected, do an author search (include a web search requirement as well) - if you find the author, you can either contact him/her or at least know whether they're alive or dead. If they're not listed and the book was published over 75 years ago, go ahead and use it as if it were public domain. I'd also love to see a statutory licensing arrangement for material that was published more than 28 years ago, out-of-print and "unclaimed." ---- For the person who asked about the term of years: the original US copyright act of 1790 set a term of 14 years, which could be renewed by the author for a total of 28 years. The 1909 act doubled that to 28 years renewable to 56. And the 1976 act adopted the life+ standard used in Europe. You'd have to ask the Europeans where they got their numbers :-)