!@!Re: [Upd-discuss] a longer term strategy for promoting the public domain?

[Michael Hart]

On Tue, 24 Aug 2004, David Basskin wrote:

>
> On Aug 24, 2004, at 12:50 PM, Michael Hart wrote:
>
>> 
>> On Mon, 23 Aug 2004, Lars Aronsson wrote:
>> 
>>> Michael Hart wrote:
>>>> I would write a letter to every government in the entire world,
>>>> asking if there is a home for shorter copyrights to counteract
>>>> the longer copyrights being imposed by WIPO et al on the rest
>>>> of the world. . .perhaps suggesting a home for the public domain.
>>> 
>>> Sorry, I didn't understand what you meant here.  Could you explain
>>> again what the question to those governments would be?
>> 
>> The basic question would be:
>> 
>> "Is there a possible home for the public domain in your country?"
>> 
>> Or for a public domain center. . .virtual or bricks and mortar.
>> 
>> 
>>> I think that we could do more digging into the 1923-1953 era.  Some
>>> authors who died in this period might have noone left to defend their
>>> extended copyrights, which means we could get away with digitizing
>>> their works before those 70 years have passed.  This is on the edge of
>>> taking a risk, which I know PG's experts would advise against.
>> 
>> Actually we are doing massive work to establish a record of which
>> copyrights were not renewed. . .this would eliminate most risks.
>
> It might eliminate risks in the United States, the only territory which had a 
> regime of copyright renewal. Canada, for instance, has never had a regime of 
> copyright renewal. It's always been life of the author plus 50 years. 
> Likewise for most other territories.
>
> Hello, Americans! "We Are The World" is just the name of a song.
>
> David Basskin

I think you are missing the point, hopefully unintentionally.

The reply was to a message specifying PG.

While Project Gutenberg is multinational, _I_ can only post
books that are public domain under US copyright law. . .so
my expertise, and thus my answer, is mostly relevent to US law.

However, we also cooperate with other public domain listing
services that work under various other copyright laws.

In fact, we are in the process of setting up our first
Project Gutenberg Consortia Center which is expressly
designed to assist the distribution of materials that
are public domain under specific copyright periods.

Since the original Project Gutenberg is located in the US,
we are limited to posting works that are public domain in the US.

However, we are also working on a Project Gutenberg Consorta Center
for each of the other major copyright periods: life +50, +60 and +70.

Obviously I can't personally run such sites, unless I keep moving from
one jurisdiction to another to keep them going, so my own expertise is
mainly US copyright law, about which I know hundreds of times more than
I ever wanted to know, believe me.

However, it IS time to set up the other Project Gutenberg Consortia Centers
so that when Australia, for example, gets hit with their new copyright
extension from +50 to +70, their work can be preserved for the remaining
"life +50" countries.

The first PGCC site will officially open on November 4, but you can test
it out at:

gutenberg.us  [contains eBooks in 104 languages]

Obviously it is only intended for works that are public domain in the US,
or those copyrighted works for which we have permission to redistribute.

Project Gutenberg of Europe will hopefully be testing a similar effort
next year, which will include two sites, one for +50 and one for +70.

We are also working on starting a Project Gutenerg of India for +60,
which will also swap with Venezuela.

Then we hope to move on to the remaining copyright periods around
the world.


Thanks!!!


Nice To Hear From You!


Michael


Give FreeBooks!!!
In 33 Languages!!!

As of August 25, 2004
~13,612 FreeBooks at:
http://gutenberg.net
~1,388 to go to 15,000

We are 1/3+ of the way
from 10,000 to 20,000.

Michael S. Hart
<hart@pobox.com>
Project Gutenberg
Executive Coordinator
"*Internet User ~#100*"

If you do not receive
a prompt reply, please
resend, keep resending.