Quote:
Originally Posted by Ninjalawyer
It hasn't actually worked that well. There's an interesting article here from Techdirt that describes the problem in more detail. You're minimizing how difficult it actually is to check the status of copyright on works; the problem is that the records themselves haven't been scanned and aren't searchable. So the result is that no one is bothering, and the works are effectively being lost. |
This is not true. Distributed Proofreaders scanned the records and proofread them, at least for non-periodical written works, and the results of this are used at the
Stanford Copyright Renewals Database, but it's not authoritative in the courts. You'll still need to go to the Library of Congress to check the records if you get sued.
Also, there are cases where there are name changes that cause problems. At least one magazine serial got pulled from Project Gutenberg because the novel was copyrighted under a different name. Project Gutenberg has stopped giving clearances for post-1923, but they intend to allow post-1923 clearances again after they finish vetting their copyright clearance rule changes for this class.