5 ms·

How does one go about finding movies that are public domain? Would also be nice if the was a form for others to add new additions and a citation link. Not sure

How does one go about finding movies that are public domain? Would also be nice if the was a form for others to add new additions and a citation link. Not sure if this is available once you register and login, if it is then it'd be nice to not need to login for it.

shakna 7y ago
> How does one go about finding movies that are public domain? With extreme difficulty. There are quite a few lists of films that have fallen out of copyright, or were never registered correctly, but even those often contain elements, like the soundtrack, that may continue to hold copyright. Secondly, what is Public Domain in one nation may well not be in another. I know of several films that are public domain in Australia, that won't reach public domain in America for another fifty-seventy years, and vice versa. Legally speaking, if you're broadcasting for everyone without checking where they live, such as through the registration form, you can and do run up against people willing to litigate you to death over a film made in the 60s that hasn't seen mass broadcast since. Finally, finding out who owns copyright of a work can be extremely difficult. A company can go under or get carved up, and various trademarks and copyrights can be passed around - often to different people, and occasionally, the copyright can be lost in that mess or owned by an entity that no longer exists. It's still not public domain - but nobody knows who should be angry at you if you broadcast.
- abstractbill 7y ago
  Is there an easy way to donate money toward this work? I would do that in a heartbeat.
  - shakna 7y ago
    There's only really two organisations I know of who actively try and dig down into this stuff and give it back to the public. (There are a lot who just accept the legal risks and ignore what rules there may be.) The Internet Archive [0], and TorrentFreak[1], with the former being the more active in the area. My own knowledge comes from more selfish, commercial, reasons, in that I've tried to use PD content to kickstart my site's collection. (To be clear: Not affiliated with the parent of this thread in any way shape or form.) If you want to donate - I'd highly recommend the Internet Archive, but they do have an American slant to what they attempt to give back. That is, if it isn't PD in America, then it might not be the best fit for them. [0] https://archive.org/ https://archive.org/ [1] https://torrentfreak.com/ https://torrentfreak.com/
- WalterBright 7y ago
  > nobody knows who should be angry at you if you broadcast. I suggest the law should say to successfully assert copyright infringement, your current contact info must be on file with the US Copyright Office, or your copyright is unenforceable.
  - shakna 7y ago
    Unfortunately in the age of international copyright agreements this would only make sense if the work originated out of the US.
  - Something1234 7y ago
    Copyright applies to any work that you produce with intellectual value by default. You don't necessarily have to register it for it to be protected. The big issue for me with copyright is how long the term is and how it can be assigned and theres no details on who actually owns it. I would say a limited time without registration would be perfect. Then an extended time period if you register it. The registration would then include all the individual parts that make it up.
    - WalterBright 7y ago
      > Copyright applies to any work that you produce with intellectual value by default. I know. That was a mistake.
      - deleted 7y ago
        [deleted]
  - Sniffnoy 7y ago
    I think implicit copyright does have some advantages -- it means if you put up, say, a T-shirt design on the internet, because you had an idea and thought it was neat, not expecting it might be worth registering, other people can't (legally) just start selling that T-shirt without paying you. Basically I think it's not great if amateurs have to go to the trouble of always explicitly registering minor things just in case something catches on. But obviously it has the giant problem you say, that so many works are locked behind copyright snarls. A system of mandatory explicit registration would have the huge advantage of making things much easier to track. Here's a compromise idea I've had: Retain implicit copyright; however, unless a copyright is explicitly registered, it cannot be sold, nor exclusively licensed (i.e. if you license it to someone, but haven't registered it, you cannot legally bind yourself not to license it to anyone else). And then any sales or exclusivity agreements would be tracked by the registrar. So, under this system, if you need to know who to talk to regarding a copyright, then for explicitly registered copyrights you can consult the registrar, while for non-registered copyrights the answer is always the original creator. This does still leave the problem of finding the original creator in the latter case, but it's still much better than it being unclear who to consult at all. It's possible there's some big hole in this I'm missing, but I'm hoping that this compromise idea would capture much of the upsides both of requiring explicit registration and of not requiring it. (Not that such a thing will ever be implemented anytime soon, but...)
- DanBC 7y ago
  > It's still not public domain - but nobody knows who should be angry at you if you broadcast. Point Break (1991) is a good example of this. Here's an article from someone who wanted to show it at a festival and couldn't work out the rights. https://www.bfi.org.uk/news-opinion/sight-sound-magazine/comment/point-break-not-coming-cinema-near-you https://www.bfi.org.uk/news-opinion/sight-sound-magazine/com...
- kej 7y ago
  Idle curiosity: what are some of the "films that are public domain in Australia, that won't reach public domain in America for another fifty-seventy years, and vice versa"?
  - shakna 7y ago
    Nosferatu is the first that comes to mind that can illustrate the differences. It was considered to be in the public domain by 1930 in most countries, but thanks to Florence Stoker who attempted to hunt down and eradicate the film at every turn, it becomes public domain in the US probably in 2041. It could be even later, depending on a few small things.

shakna 7y ago

> How does one go about finding movies that are public domain? With extreme difficulty. There are quite a few lists of films that have fallen out of copyright, or were never registered correctly, but even those often contain elements, like the soundtrack, that may continue to hold copyright. Secondly, what is Public Domain in one nation may well not be in another. I know of several films that are public domain in Australia, that won't reach public domain in America for another fifty-seventy years, and vice versa. Legally speaking, if you're broadcasting for everyone without checking where they live, such as through the registration form, you can and do run up against people willing to litigate you to death over a film made in the 60s that hasn't seen mass broadcast since. Finally, finding out who owns copyright of a work can be extremely difficult. A company can go under or get carved up, and various trademarks and copyrights can be passed around - often to different people, and occasionally, the copyright can be lost in that mess or owned by an entity that no longer exists. It's still not public domain - but nobody knows who should be angry at you if you broadcast.

abstractbill 7y ago
Is there an easy way to donate money toward this work? I would do that in a heartbeat.
- shakna 7y ago
  There's only really two organisations I know of who actively try and dig down into this stuff and give it back to the public. (There are a lot who just accept the legal risks and ignore what rules there may be.) The Internet Archive [0], and TorrentFreak[1], with the former being the more active in the area. My own knowledge comes from more selfish, commercial, reasons, in that I've tried to use PD content to kickstart my site's collection. (To be clear: Not affiliated with the parent of this thread in any way shape or form.) If you want to donate - I'd highly recommend the Internet Archive, but they do have an American slant to what they attempt to give back. That is, if it isn't PD in America, then it might not be the best fit for them. [0] https://archive.org/ https://archive.org/ [1] https://torrentfreak.com/ https://torrentfreak.com/
WalterBright 7y ago
> nobody knows who should be angry at you if you broadcast. I suggest the law should say to successfully assert copyright infringement, your current contact info must be on file with the US Copyright Office, or your copyright is unenforceable.
- shakna 7y ago
  Unfortunately in the age of international copyright agreements this would only make sense if the work originated out of the US.
- Something1234 7y ago
  Copyright applies to any work that you produce with intellectual value by default. You don't necessarily have to register it for it to be protected. The big issue for me with copyright is how long the term is and how it can be assigned and theres no details on who actually owns it. I would say a limited time without registration would be perfect. Then an extended time period if you register it. The registration would then include all the individual parts that make it up.
  - WalterBright 7y ago
    > Copyright applies to any work that you produce with intellectual value by default. I know. That was a mistake.
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
- Sniffnoy 7y ago
  I think implicit copyright does have some advantages -- it means if you put up, say, a T-shirt design on the internet, because you had an idea and thought it was neat, not expecting it might be worth registering, other people can't (legally) just start selling that T-shirt without paying you. Basically I think it's not great if amateurs have to go to the trouble of always explicitly registering minor things just in case something catches on. But obviously it has the giant problem you say, that so many works are locked behind copyright snarls. A system of mandatory explicit registration would have the huge advantage of making things much easier to track. Here's a compromise idea I've had: Retain implicit copyright; however, unless a copyright is explicitly registered, it cannot be sold, nor exclusively licensed (i.e. if you license it to someone, but haven't registered it, you cannot legally bind yourself not to license it to anyone else). And then any sales or exclusivity agreements would be tracked by the registrar. So, under this system, if you need to know who to talk to regarding a copyright, then for explicitly registered copyrights you can consult the registrar, while for non-registered copyrights the answer is always the original creator. This does still leave the problem of finding the original creator in the latter case, but it's still much better than it being unclear who to consult at all. It's possible there's some big hole in this I'm missing, but I'm hoping that this compromise idea would capture much of the upsides both of requiring explicit registration and of not requiring it. (Not that such a thing will ever be implemented anytime soon, but...)
DanBC 7y ago
> It's still not public domain - but nobody knows who should be angry at you if you broadcast. Point Break (1991) is a good example of this. Here's an article from someone who wanted to show it at a festival and couldn't work out the rights. https://www.bfi.org.uk/news-opinion/sight-sound-magazine/comment/point-break-not-coming-cinema-near-you https://www.bfi.org.uk/news-opinion/sight-sound-magazine/com...
kej 7y ago
Idle curiosity: what are some of the "films that are public domain in Australia, that won't reach public domain in America for another fifty-seventy years, and vice versa"?
- shakna 7y ago
  Nosferatu is the first that comes to mind that can illustrate the differences. It was considered to be in the public domain by 1930 in most countries, but thanks to Florence Stoker who attempted to hunt down and eradicate the film at every turn, it becomes public domain in the US probably in 2041. It could be even later, depending on a few small things.