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All of Orwell's works are in the public domain in Canada and Australia, and can be obtained in multiple formats, from Project Gutenberg Canada or Australia: ht

• getoj 3y ago
  Note that none of these sources are by any means the complete works of Orwell. Much of his writing was done in newspaper columns that were never collected during his lifetime or, due to resistance from his widow, for many years after his death. The true complete works was published in 20 volumes in 1998, of which the latter 10 volumes were content previously not published in book format (afaik). Unfortunately, though understandably, this set was a small run and mainly ended up in the hands of collectors and academic libraries. Anyone who has access to it would do the world a great service by scanning and uploading it to libgen or similar.
  • barrysteve 3y ago
    What would be the service in that? Let people keep their works exclusive if they so wish. We don't publish the formula for Coca Cola, but somehow an author (or his estate) has less entitlement to his own work, than an a flavour technician at Coca Cola. Stop cheating the rules. It makes me not want to write, not want to work. The strongest desire I have for an authoritarian leadership is to keep sticky hands and brazen heads off works, that took a lifetime to make. People say we don't need the wrath of god, but we also don't need the double standard of "secrets for me, openness for thee".
    • Thorrez 3y ago
      He published them in newspapers. They weren't secrets. Trade secret laws and copyright laws are different things.
      • barrysteve 3y ago
        Who cares what he did, once open, is not always open. Youtube has deleted 50% of it's videos since 2015. Do I have the right to reach back into those profiles and undelete them, and republish their deleted videos? Yes trade secret laws and copyright laws are different things, true fact established. If we're living under the rule of law and not an authoritarian society, you have to justify pilfering copyrighted works, which you conveniently, didn't.
        • Thorrez 3y ago
          I agree with you that rule of law is good. I think the copyright length should be reduced. But you're right, that just because I believe copyright length should be reduced doesn't give me or anyone else the right to infringe copyright. However, you seem to be trying to use copyright to enforce secrecy on a non-digital item, which doesn't work. Someone who owns that rare book can put in a library for anyone to come by and read. Using copyright to enforce secrecy on digital items (Youtube videos) partially works. The reason it doesn't fully work is because there are exceptions for fair use.
    • lazzlazzlazz 3y ago
      Yes, we should allow Orwell to keep his works private (that is, printed in newspapers for the public as he did himself) and not public (that is, in the hands of the small number of private collectors who would be interested in preserving these works). Incredible example of doublespeak!
    • getoj 3y ago
      We’re not talking about private correspondence or unpublished drafts here. Orwell clearly didn’t want these works to be secret, given he published them in the newspaper. His widow wanted them forgotten because she wanted to control his image. He is a controversial figure whose ideas changed a lot over the course of his life. After her death, they were collected, presumably with permission from the family. That they are not in wide circulation now is because they are voluminous and obscure, so there is no market to sell them. I certainly am not interested in reading all of his book reviews and political reporting. But many more people are interested in reading them than have the university connections required to do so. There is nothing to be lost and everything to be gained by making the complete works available to anyone for free, or even for a normal amount of money. But no publisher is going to because it’s not profitable. That’s fine, they don’t have to, but that fact undermines any argument that a volunteer who does this archival work is somehow acting immorally.
• WillPostForFood 3y ago
  It would not be legal for American residents to access the above. Why would it not be legal to access it? It isn't being reproduced, distributed, performed, publicly displayed by the reader. What would the violation be?
  • robjan 3y ago
    Not a lawyer but most countries have the idea of secondary or contributory infringement where if you compel, induce or cause someone else to infringe copyright you have committed an offence. It's probably very hard to prove.
  • deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
• aaronbrethorst 3y ago
  Though really, things are getting, if you will excuse the expression, rather Orwellian with copyright 'If you want a picture of the future, imagine a MSCHF Big Red Boot (patent pending) stamping on a human face – for ever LOL' — George Orwell, I guess?
• wodenokoto 3y ago
  I don’t keep a close eye on US copyright law, but didn’t they stop extending it a year or two ago?
  • input_sh 3y ago
    Most of the world pretty much standardized on life + 70... for everything published around 1980s and later. We just made a bunch of shit up arbitrarily for things published before that conclusion was reached. Some countries backdate life + 70 to works published before life + 70 was a thing. In the US it's 95 years after publication for anything published before 1978 (and life + 70 for anything published in or after 1978). So, Orwell remains under copyright in the US because his works were published <95 years ago, before life + 70 started applying. For a hypothetical author that published something on January 1st 1978 and died the same year, that work would enter the public domain in 2048. If the same work was published just a day earlier, it'd enter public domain in 2072. Another conclusion one can reach from this is that life + 70 rule itself is under 70 years old, so no work actually entered public domain that way, and in the US no work will enter public domain that way for the next 25 years.