Quote:
Originally Posted by Billi
As a short rule, the works of all authors who died in 1941 or before, are in the public domain in the life+70 countries like Australia. So, of your two examples Chesterton (1874-1936) and Shaw (1856-1950) the first one is in the public domain in Australia, the second not.
Another possibility is to check whether you find works of the authors in question in Project Gutenberg (Australia).
Our own library here generally follows the copyright law of Canada which is one of the life+50 countries. So you will find books here that you are - strictly speaking - not allowed to download because the authors are still in copyright in Australia.
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Hi Billi
In Australia our copyright is the 50 year post death rule up until 2005 - when the Act changed because of reasons of 'Free' Trade between Aus and US. (Read we were held to ransomon this matter and a number of others, imo)
So therefore - if the author died pre 1955 then the work is out of copyright.
The change to 70 years post death was not retrospective.
As a result of your comments I have highlighted that aspect in my OP - to make it clearer.