Quote:
Originally Posted by teh603
Not really. Its more like someone parking a vintage car in front of your house for six months, and then the county (or whichever body does such things) going through the proceedings to have the car declared abandoned....
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This is an incorrect explanation of this particular case.
The works in question are still in copyright in the foreign nations where they were first published. The US
should have protected these works decades ago, but failed to do so because it was not upholding its obligations under the Berne agreement.
The works in question did not reach their expiration periods, nor was it negligence on the part of the copyright holders. It was the US government's actions that resulted in the works not being protected.
In addition, the URAA was written such that in order to restore the US copyright, the copyright holder is required to take action. Orphaned works don't wind up getting protection.
No one "fixed up" those works, they just accessed and/or distributed them for free.