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Originally Posted by RSaunders
Frankly, in the book world we are better off than the music world. Though copyrights are far too long, there is a substantial volume of useful writing with expired copyright. We have an organized effort to collect it in Project Gutenberg. Music doesn't have lots of pre-1913 recordings to work with. My iPod has never played a piece of public domain music.
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In the UK, a music "performance copyright" (ie a copyright on a recording) only lasts for 50 years, rather than the lifetime of the author + 70 years, as is the case for books. That means that any recording made before 1957 is now in the public domain in the UK. Because the PD "limit" is now encroaching on the start of pop music, etc, there was a concerted campaign by the music industry here to try to get the law changed. Thankfully, the government refused.