Wikisource:Copyright discussions/Archives/2010-08

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Egyptian Copyright Law
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Futurist Manifesto

 * I deleted the restored page, the content was a header and Wikisource welcomes appropriate, freely licensed translations.  Cygnis insignis (talk) 14:07, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Author:Karl Marx
{{closed|1=deleted ResScholar (talk) 10:43, 18 August 2010 (UTC)|text=

The German Ideology
This work, originally by Marx, was translated in part by E. J. Hobsbawm, who was born in 1917. I see no indication that any of the translators have released this into the public domain or licensed it.—Zhaladshar (Talk) 17:40, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
 * One would assume that this work wasn't published first in the US, so it isn't coming into the classification of no copyright in certain years. That being the case (and that evidence is not produced either way) I am leading towards delete. — billinghurst  sDrewth  13:28, 26 March 2010 (UTC)
 * What is the date of publication? Yann (talk) 21:28, 18 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Marxists.org has a misleading reference to it in its Marx Engels Collected Works section, which is a 1975-2004 work. It's linked to from the Collected Works table of contents, but when you get to the work, it says the source of the transcription is from a different 1968 edition.  This work is by Progress Publishers, a Moscow English-language publisher, which is known to at least sometimes copyright their works.  According to BookFinder, the translations of The German Ideology are 1968 revisions of translations, the revisions accredited to Salo Ryazanskaya, of a 1938 edition published by Lawrence and Wishart.  Both publishers are acknowledged in the Collected Works section as the source of the translations, so the 1975-2004 edition and the 1968 edition may be nearly identical.  But regardless, the late date of the revised translation indicates it's a URAA restored work, even if the Soviet Union was a life-50 country.  ResScholar (talk) 19:20, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

Preface to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy
Salo Ryazanskaya was apparently very busy. In 1970 he also translated this work by Progress Publishers. This snippet from a 1971 Lawrence and Wishart publication shows this book is the same work from a publishers' arrangement, though he is not credited. This view shows a sample of the translation from the same book that matches our version. BookFinder has a number of the 1970 editions that state it is a first printing. The URAA restoration rationale is the same as that of above. ResScholar (talk) 15:23, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

The Holy Family
This is a 1975 Progress Publishers (Moscow) second revised edition of a 1956 translation by Richard Dixon. Apparently marxists.org has a fair use rationale for using these texts. Both editions are URAA candidates. ResScholar (talk) 08:51, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

A Curve Ball from Marxists.org
It turns out that Marxists.org is not claiming fair use on these texts. Rather, they make the following (interesting) claim:
 * The Former U.S.S.R. did not abide by copyright laws until 1973, so works published in the U.S.S.R. before that date are public domain.

Does anyone know if this assertion has any legal status? The tit-for-tat nature of the rationale strikes me as bogus (and it doesn't apply to the 1975 The Holy Family anyway). ResScholar (talk) 09:50, 16 August 2010 (UTC)


 * The Soviet Union did have their own copyright law; as mentioned they did not join an international copyright treaty though until 1973 when they joined the Universal Copyright Convention. Copyright law of the Soviet Union has a very detailed account.   While most material would have been published without a copyright notice, and thus PD in the United States, that would have all changed with the URAA restorations.  By that time, the Soviet Union had broken up, and so the law in the successor nations needs to be looked into, the country which best applies to each work.  Almost all of them had joined the Berne Convention by that time, and had retroactively restored copyright to 50 pma (including Russia), so that is the most likely line to look at.  (Russia later extended to 70 pma, non-retroactively in 2004, and then retroactively in 2008, but those were after the URAA was applied and so would have no effect on U.S. status.) Carl Lindberg (talk) 15:43, 16 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Carl, you have quite a breadth of knowledge as well a depth in copyright law. In the course of this job, I'm always picking up something new.  Much thanks to you.  ResScholar (talk) 10:43, 18 August 2010 (UTC)

They also quote a statute which may be of general interest to this site:


 * Any second term subsisting on October 27, 1998 is extended an additional 20 years (i.e. applies to works published on that date in 1923 and later -- For a work renewed in 1952 (© 1924), it is restricted from the public domain until 2019).(Making the entire copyright restricted for 95 years from date of publishing) [Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act] (Public Law 105-298; aka 95 year rule)

They claim this means copyright registrations made before October 27, 1923 would have expired and would not have been eligible for the 20 year extension from 75 to 95 years. ResScholar (talk) 10:00, 16 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Copyrights expire only on the following January 1 these days, so any work first published (or registered) anytime in 1923, and which had its copyright correctly renewed, was still under copyright on October 27, 1998 and thus had its copyright extended. Works published in 1922 or earlier had expired on January 1, 1998, and remained public domain.  It is indeed that law which created the current PD-1923 line; U.S. expirations were thus "frozen" for 20 years, and we are still inside that period.  It's not October 27, 1923, but rather January 1, 1923.  Carl Lindberg (talk) 15:43, 16 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Yes that's pretty basic stuff, but through its cutoff date not pertaining to any relevant date in prior law, the quoted edict fosters the impression there was in plain sight an exception of which somehow everybody failed to make use. Okay, just making sure we weren't being left out! ResScholar (talk) 10:43, 18 August 2010 (UTC)}}

Adventure (Smith)
This section may just contain one work, but I will add others if I find more.

Lethe
Like one of his recently deleted works way on the top of this page, this translation of Baudelaire is reported to have been first published in Smith's Selected Poems (1971), a good argument for deletion. ResScholar (talk) 05:56, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

The Empire of the Necromancers
Both of these works first appeared in 1932 editions of Weird Tales. According to the Wikisource page for this periodical, all of the 1932 editions were both copyrighted and renewed. ResScholar (talk) 06:25, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

The Demon of the Flower
This first appeared in the December 1933 edition of Astounding Stories. Astoundingly, this magazine's copyright was renewed, February 6, 1961, renewal no. R270596. ResScholar (talk) 07:21, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

For trivia buffs, it's now owned by Condé Nast Publications, who bought original publishers Street & Smith in 1961. ResScholar (talk) 07:44, 5 August 2010 (UTC) (correction: 1959. ResScholar (talk) 07:48, 6 August 2010 (UTC)}


 * Arguing against myself now, didn't a court case say that if there are heirs to the originator of the work, only they can renew it, not the publisher? If anyone knows off hand, let us know, otherwise I will do some checking. ResScholar (talk) 08:25, 7 August 2010 (UTC)


 * I read the Copyright Office Circular 15 and Copyright_Act_of_1976 and I'm still a bit confused. My best guess, based on those and some other stuff I've read, is that contributors to a magazine can renew their own material separately ("in the case of any other copyrighted work, including a contribution by an individual author to a periodical or to a cyclopedic or other composite work, the author of such work, if still living, or the widow, widower, or children of the author, if the author be not living, or if such author, widow, widower, or children be not living, then the author's executors, or in the absence of a will, his or her next of kin shall be entitled to a renewal and extension of the copyright") but if they don't it will be renewed with the periodical ("in the case of [...] of any periodical, cyclopedic, or other composite work upon which the copyright was originally secured by the proprietor thereof [...] the proprietor of such copyright shall be entitled to a renewal and extension of the copyright in such work"). However if the copyright was not originally owned by proprietor, if first publication rights alone were sold, then I don't believe they could renew the copyright (source: accumulation of junk knowledge). I know that the Weird Tales files that would tell us what Weird Tales bought the copyright for and what they just bought first publication rights for have been lost.--Prosfilaes (talk) 22:13, 7 August 2010 (UTC)


 * We'll never know. If we ask the heirs, they'll say "we already have a preferred public domain outlet on the internet; why are you trying to chisel away at the commercial restrictions we'd like to place on all of them?"  And if we ask Condé Nast, we'll get a form letter, if anything: "the people who would have been able to answer your query have left the company, and the records that contained that information are not at our disposal." It's nice that our contributors like to have a complete collection of their favorite author here, but from time to time they're going to have to do their own legwork if they want that.  ResScholar (talk) 08:58, 14 August 2010 (UTC)


 * The question may be even thornier. Apparently, renewal rights will automatically be "vested" in the publisher if the author is still alive when the initial 28-year term expires; if the author dies before then though, publishers must get the rights re-transferred from the heirs, otherwise their renewal has no effect.  Apparently there was an interesting question if the author died after the renewal application was filed but before the January 1 date where the initial term expired; it seems as though court cases went both ways.  The 1992 copyright law clarified that the rights vested upon the renewal application, but not sure that would affect things before that time.  There is a Patry article on it here giving the history, and another article here, both written because of Roger Miller Music, Inc. v. Sony/ATV Publishing, LLC (a 2007 decision).  Some earlier cases on the basic "vesting" principle are mentioned here.  Naturally, we have this situation here -- I think the author died after the renewal was filed, but before the first term completely expired on January 1, 1962.  Thus, if authors die before the renewal applications are made, it appears that such renewals do not serve to renew the copyright in the original author's actual text, unless rights have been explicitly re-assigned by heirs (difficult to prove).  But if the original author is still alive, then it would appear that publisher's renewals are enough to keep copyright going, although (per circular 3) it may be considered to have an "erroneous name" on the copyright notice thus limiting infringement penalties if they got permission from the publisher.  On balance... I'd guess delete on this one.  Not valid for Wikilivres until 2012.  Carl Lindberg (talk) 14:44, 18 August 2010 (UTC)

Boys Telling Bawdy Tales
All six of these are listed as having first publication in Selected Poems (1971) as well.

I do believe that's all of them. ResScholar (talk) 08:23, 5 August 2010 (UTC)}}

Before two portaits of my mother
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