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on Gopher (inofficial)
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COMMENT PAGE FOR:
HTML Happy Public Domain Day 2026
publicdebates wrote 1 hour 11 min ago:
For 67k more:
HTML [1]: https://archive.org/details/texts?sort=-downloads&and%5B%5D=me...
publicdebates wrote 1 hour 10 min ago:
Most ironic find:
Catalog of Copyright Entries, New Series. Part 1, Group 2: Pamphlets,
Leaflets, Contributions to Newspapers or Periodicals, Etc. Maps 1929:
Vol 26 No 1-12
HTML [1]: https://archive.org/details/catalogofcopyri261libr
bentley wrote 56 min ago:
That was already public domain twice overâuncreative catalogues
of data arenât copyrightable in the United States (see Feist v.
Rural), and works of the U.S. federal government arenât
copyrightable in the United States.
mmsc wrote 2 hours 21 min ago:
Metropolis becoming public domain in 2026 couldn't be more perfect,
since the film is set in 2026.
It is eerily similar to our times, too, unfortunately.
NoiseBert69 wrote 3 hours 21 min ago:
I bought the Public Domain Review Book. My guests love it!
smallnix wrote 5 hours 3 min ago:
Interesting that EU is becoming stricter than US with growing life
expectancy.
Life + 70 can mean the work is protected 120 years (publish at 40, dies
at 90)?
neiman wrote 5 hours 6 min ago:
I recently made a radical proposal of public domain rules; It's
inspired by GNU software licenses. It goes like this:
1. Anyone can use anything that is in the public domain.
2. Any creation that uses elements from the public domain is also,
automatically, in the public domain.
3. Activate retroactively: When the first book in a series (for
example) gets into the public domain, then the whole series (and
franchise) becomes public domain.
(3) depends on what the initial rule is for something to get into the
public domain.
P.S: It's a thought experiment, not an actual "let's implement it now!"
thing.
tgv wrote 1 hour 24 min ago:
#1 is known to be problematic in open source, so it would need
qualifications. #2 is so broad, it would make practically anything
PD. And there's no reason for #3. It might even be implied by #2.
ivan_gammel wrote 3 hours 51 min ago:
That would make any movies based on stories in public domain
impossible, because it would destroy all financial incentives to make
them. No, derivative works should be on their own terms.
neiman wrote 3 hours 39 min ago:
A few questions:
1. People still do software based on the GNU license. What's the
difference?
2. I'm a mathematician - math is not copyrighted, yet it's still
being done.
3. Is it really so important for society that copyrighted movies be
based on old stories? Won't society benefit from new stories and
characters?
To be clear, I don't propose to really implement it. But the
existing system also sucks. I'm thinking that maybe incorporating
such an idea into the existing system - limiting what you can do
with public domain work - can be beneficial.
dspillett wrote 1 hour 35 min ago:
> 1. People still do software based on the GNU license. What's
the difference?
The GPL family of licences are significantly different from
Public Domain. There is still the option of relicensing for
commercial use, for example, which is moot under a public domain
status. Though some¹ treat the GPL as PD anywayâ¦
MIT might be a more valid comparator, so to answer the question
from that PoV: Money. Many OSS contributors do it to scratch
their own itch, or for some definition of âcommunityâ, the
cost of contribution is generally low (or feels like free) and
they don't need anything back. Some are supported by donations or
sponsorship but not the majority. Those in commercial
environments are supporting projects (by contributions or
sponsorship) that are useful to that commercial interest, so
there is a benefit there but no need for direct payment (they may
get payment for support and/or consulting services or via
subscriptions for a paid-for hosted instance of whatever).
Someone making a film of a book, or a licensed
sequel/prequel/other, unless they are doing it for love or just
shits & giggles like some fan-made efforts, generally needs/wants
to make profit from it, especially in the case of film/TV which
can have a large up-front cost - that is unlikely to happen if
the new derived work is automatically public domain.
> 2. [â¦] math is not copyrighted, yet it's still being done.
Not for Hollywood level money, it usually isn't :)
> 3. [â¦] Won't society benefit from new stories and characters?
Yes, it certainly would IMO. But it turns out there is less easy
money in that. People flock en-mass to works based on familiar IP
more than they do to original works, for better or (often) worse.
To paraphrase MiB: A person is classy and appreciates original
good art, people are a bunch of dumb consumers of fast food for
the mind.
Original works do sometimes smash through that barrier of course,
they then often become the new IP that a bunch of derived works
are based on so in several years time they are part of the cycle
makers of new original works are competing with.
> 3. Is it really so important for society that copyrighted
movies be based on old stories? [â¦]
No. But it is important for the entertainment industry, for the
reason noted above. What is good for society isn't necessarily
the same as what people are willing to pay for, and what is good
for the producers of works (away from those doing it purely for
their own satisfaction or sense of artistic vision) is what
people are willing to pay to experience.
-------- [1] Onyx, makers of the Boox line of GPL violating e-ink
devices, to name one of them², see comments on [1] for more
discussion about that.
[2] I pick them out from that small crowd because I might have
been interested enough to buy one of their products were it not
for this issue. Unfortunately many buyers are unaware of the
matter, or are aware but don't care sufficiently for it to change
their buying decision.
HTML [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41412582
ivan_gammel wrote 3 hours 2 min ago:
>People still do software based on the GNU license. What's the
difference?
The right question to ask is what do they have in common, and the
answer is nothing but an artificial legal construct of IP. To
write public domain software you need a computer and 2 sqm of
space (or even less) that you occupy while working. Material
resources needed to shoot one movie are one big reason you need
financial model.
2. math is irrelevant here, has nothing in common with movies or
music
3. yes. Itâs our culture and our history.
robin_reala wrote 5 hours 47 min ago:
Standard Ebooks added a bunch of newly-US-PD novels: [1] (Iâm happy
to have contributed three to the launch this year, hope you enjoy
them.)
HTML [1]: https://standardebooks.org/blog/public-domain-day-2026
raybb wrote 5 hours 44 min ago:
Which three did you contribute and how'd you pick them?
robin_reala wrote 5 hours 22 min ago:
I did Kafkaâs The Castle, Agatha Christieâs Giantâs Bread,
and Stella Bensonâs The Faraway Bride.
Been meaning to do a Kafka for a while but the Gutenberg editions
are later translations that arenât actually public domain. This
is the first time a Kafka novel has entered the US PD.
The other two I picked from the list of âworks Standard Ebooks
wants for public domain dayâ back in October. Weâre reasonably
organised about this.
fromaj wrote 6 hours 5 min ago:
PG Wodehouse is public domain now!
chr-s wrote 6 hours 28 min ago:
We're getting into the 1930s now - the sound era and the start of the
Golden Age. Here's some recommendations.
The Divorcee - Norma Shearer won best actress for this performance of a
sophisticated woman. She evens the score after her husband has a brief
affair, and as this is pre-Hays code, she isn't punished for it.
Hell's Angels - produced by Howard Hughes, is worth watching for the
dogfighting stunts alone. 4 people died filming them.
Holiday - Inferior to the later Hepburn/Grant remake, but still a solid
rendition of the play.
L'age d'Or - Luis Buñuel's surrealist showcase
Animal Crackers - the Marx brothers, it's still funny
shevy-java wrote 7 hours 8 min ago:
Everything should be in the public domain.
I am aware that this is not realistic, for many reasons, but just like
Richard Stallman, or the right to repair movement (e. g. Louis
Rossmann) being vocal about it, or scientists who will prefer to
publish with open access rather than be subject to the greedy Elsevier
paywall, after the public already paid for the research - we need to
strive for ideals here. So, all must be in the public domain. I
actually think it should be without delay; seems usually the waiting
time before it gets into the public domain is ... 75 years? Or any
number where I am definitely no longer alive. So that is bad.
Thus - public domain the everything. \o/
dinkumthinkum wrote 5 hours 0 min ago:
How is that a good ideal? As far as I know Stallman, not that he is
objectively correct, does not claim all software should be in the
public domain, he just has what amounts to a strong personal
preference and advocacy. The idea that someone would not be able to
protect a work that they toiled creating is pretty repugnant and
while i will probably be massively downvoted, this i the view held by
most reasonable people.
UberFly wrote 1 hour 59 min ago:
As someone married to another who has toiled her life away creating
I totally agree.
visarga wrote 5 hours 9 min ago:
I'd be happy if the original expression remains protected but
abstractions are open to reuse. Right now a work blocks more than its
specific expression, a whole space is forbidden around it, like fan
fiction. In other words what is needed is freedom to build on top of
existing works.
ronsor wrote 7 hours 4 min ago:
Author's life + 75 years (basically infinity) for works owned by
individuals.
95 years for works owned by corporations (long enough to become lost
and/or irrelevant).
tombert wrote 7 hours 46 min ago:
It sucks that the copyright period in the US is so ridiculously long,
but it still makes me happy to see stuff finally entering the public
domain again.
I don't care much about Betty Boop and I don't really care about Pluto
and Mickey all that much, but I'm very excited for The Maltese Falcon's
novel being available, since I think that that one could actually be
adapted into something pretty modern.
Also, All Quiet on the Western Front is very arguably one of the very
best movies ever made, and certainly one of the very best of the 30's
if nothing else, so I am very much looking forward to fan restorations.
renegade-otter wrote 5 hours 11 min ago:
The copyright period is long? If you are Disney, you can get it even
longer because the U.S. Congress will do it for you:
HTML [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Term_Extension_Act
euroderf wrote 2 hours 44 min ago:
Yup, any time a friend gets all misty-eyed about Disney, remind
them that Disney is the main driver behind absurdly, abusively long
copyright.
Mindwipe wrote 2 hours 13 min ago:
No they aren't.
This is an internet myth pushed by certain sci-fi writers doing
incompetent research.
Disney were certainly in favour of the US's most recent copyright
extension, but the main driver of it was the need for the US to
move to a similar period to the EU for international treaty
reasons.
The EU had moved to Life+70 years as a model because it unified
to the longest period in the block when it unified the copyright
period across the entire EU, under the logic that no copyright
owner should have their term reduced as a result.
The longest period in Europe was Germany, and Germany's long
copyright period was the result of lobbying from local German
publishers, nothing to do with American companies.
It's really a bit of US exceptionalism to think Disney had much
to do with it.
tialaramex wrote 1 hour 35 min ago:
The parity excuse is always trotted out, but notice that nobody
actually does parity. That US law doesn't deliver the same
thing as the existing EU law, it just increases all the US
limits with "parity" offered as justification.
That's on purpose to allow the same parties (if not called out
by the public) to run to the EU to demand more "parity"
increasing the EU limits too. Back and forth forever.
zozbot234 wrote 1 hour 59 min ago:
I'm not sure that this is correct. Spain used to be life+80 (a
copyright term that dates back to 1879) and this got reduced to
life+70 (but only for authors who die on or after late 1987, so
this is a long way from affecting PD status) with EU-wide
rules.
bryanrasmussen wrote 1 hour 41 min ago:
the exact details of EU copyright rules and lengths are
probably difficult to work out, at least as difficult as
saying what the laws are regarding what constitutes a felony
in the United States, since that really depends on what state
you're in.
But I would have to say that yes, it is mainly the EU that
drives longer copyright, because EU copyright is not based on
a model of doing things to help society but because there is
a moral right of ownership that is possessed by the creator
of a work. This of course explains why often something is out
of copyright in the U.S but still under copyright in the EU
but I don't think I have ever heard of the reverse applying
(I'm sure HN can come up with an edge case though)
neiman wrote 5 hours 13 min ago:
I don't care much about Betty Boop either, and I do care, like you,
about The Maltese Falcon - but mostly I think that a version of The
Maltese Falcon starring Betty Boop is definitely something I'd like
to see!
Popeyes wrote 2 hours 28 min ago:
I've been bad... but I'm not all bad, boop boop de boop!
shmerl wrote 8 hours 34 min ago:
> Insatiability
> The nation becomes enslaved to the Chinese leader Murti Bing. His
emissaries give everyone a special pill called DAVAMESK B 2 which takes
away their abilities to think and to mentally resist.
Interesting. That's quite a bit before 1984 was written.
eloisius wrote 6 hours 32 min ago:
And Zamyatinâs _We_ was even a few years earlier. Great artists
steal.
dgellow wrote 5 hours 34 min ago:
Here is a link for people who donât know about it (itâs not too
obvious but âweâ is the actual title): [1] Published in 1924,
itâs a short read, I would recommend, I personally find it more
compelling than Orwellâs work
HTML [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_(novel)
echelon wrote 8 hours 41 min ago:
Perhaps most famously, "Betty Boop" is now public domain: [1] Just like
with "Steamboat Willie" Mickey, it's only the very first iteration of
the character.
HTML [1]: https://reason.com/2026/01/01/betty-boop-enters-the-public-dom...
nevster wrote 9 hours 29 min ago:
The Swallows and Amazons series is wonderful! Highly recommended.
qingcharles wrote 7 hours 26 min ago:
I adored the BBC TV adaption in 1984. The theme still lives rent free
in my head all these years later.
gxqoz wrote 10 hours 1 min ago:
I've always been curious about what it means for a movie to enter the
public domain. A few years ago I sent a mail to Planet Money in what I
thought would be an interesting hook but never got a response:
"Hi Planet Money, today is public domain day. I see that Fritz Lang's
classic Metropolis is now in the "public domain." I was curious what
that meant at a practical level for a German language silent film.
If Planet Money Movies wanted to release their own version of
Metropolis, how would they do it? Can you just go to Amazon, buy the
Blu Ray, and somehow release your own? What about the anti-piracy
measures on the Blu Ray? What about the work that Transit Film did in
restoring the film from the original negative? Does that count as some
sort of newly original work? It's a silent film and a foreign film. How
does the soundtrack and translation work?
If you have to make a new copy from the original reels, what if someone
is hoarding them? Does that mean you could buy all the copies and
prevent someone from releasing a public domain version?"
qingcharles wrote 7 hours 29 min ago:
> If you have to make a new copy from the original reels, what if
someone is hoarding them?
This is a legitimate problem in public domain releasing. If you're
trying to release a really good public domain version then you might
need access to very high quality source materials. With a movie it
would obviously be nice to scan the camera negatives. If the studio
has those negatives in a vault, then you're cooked.
Didn't Bill Gates or some others buy up thousands of old artworks and
put them on ice so they could paywall the scans?
boomboomsubban wrote 7 hours 40 min ago:
>What about the anti-piracy measures on the Blu Ray?
In the US, bypassing DRM is a crime even if the intended use is
legal. There are exceptions for things like criticism and
accessibility, but I don't believe they'd be relevant.
Maybe it'd be as simple as selling your new copies as "for review
purposes" and it'd be legal, I'm not sure.
zozbot234 wrote 1 hour 42 min ago:
The ban on bypassing DRM only applies to copyright protection
measures, and if a work is in the public domain there is no
copyright protection on it. It does unambiguously affect fair use
of copyrighted works, but just dumping fully-PD works that happen
to reside on DRM-protected media ought to be OK.
bawolff wrote 8 hours 43 min ago:
> If Planet Money Movies wanted to release their own version of
Metropolis, how would they do it? Can you just go to Amazon, buy the
Blu Ray, and somehow release your own?
Yes.
For example, wikipedia has a copy of Metrpolis and that's basically
what happened
HTML [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Metropolis_(1927).webm
emodendroket wrote 9 hours 5 min ago:
Amazon Prime Video in fact has multiple low-quality versions of some
films that have accidentally found their way into the public domain
due to negligence of rightsholders, like John Wayne's McLintock!
flomo wrote 7 hours 43 min ago:
Since it is the holiday season, reminds me of "Itâs a Wonderful
Life", which everyone thought was in the public domain, and it
became a christmas tradition because it was all over the place.
Well, eventually they dug up a copyright on some of the soundtrack.
Mountain_Skies wrote 7 hours 16 min ago:
That's an interesting angle. Wonder if that part of the movie
could be rescored with something in the public domain so the
rescored version could be distributed freely. It also reminds of
the Commodore 64 game for 'Blade Runner' which was oddly stated
to have been inspired by the soundtrack rather than by the movie
itself. I've seen claims that they couldn't get a license to do a
video game based on the movie, so being inspired by the
soundtrack was a workaround. That never seemed legally grounded
to me but copyright, especially the components of musical
performances, gets really strange sometimes.
flomo wrote 6 hours 59 min ago:
Thinking about it, there's just no business model in rescoring
"It's a Wonderful Life". You want to get into a pricewar with a
studio?
Anyway, hollywood hated this situation and was glad to see it
under control. The issue is now viewing is pretty limited. NBC
made it a prime time event.
(Mentioning some commodoretard's 'theory' on copyright detracts
from your post, imo. They just didn't bother going after him)
emodendroket wrote 7 hours 13 min ago:
I mean yeah that would certainly be possible.
beerbajay wrote 9 hours 23 min ago:
A work being in the public domain just means that if somebody claims
that they have the copyright and sue you for distributing that work,
you will prevail in court.
Restoration itself does not grant a new copyright. Other elements
included in a restoration may be copyrighted e.g. new music or the
graphic design of intertitles. A new translation is also
copyrightable; essentially it's only the "original elements" that
enter the public domain. Working around the anti-piracy measures of a
blu-ray might be a crime, idk, but that's irrelevant to the copyright
discussion; once you have a copy even if it came from an 'illicit'
source, you're free to copy & distribute as you wish.
But yes, you need to acquire a copy first; if you can't find a work
at all, how would you copy it, practically?
bpodgursky wrote 9 hours 46 min ago:
> If you have to make a new copy from the original reels, what if
someone is hoarding them? Does that mean you could buy all the copies
and prevent someone from releasing a public domain version?"
This part at least, yes. A work being in the public domain doesn't
mean someone is obligated to help you redistribute it.
ChrisArchitect wrote 10 hours 9 min ago:
Related:
What will enter the public domain in 2026?
HTML [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46117112
echelon wrote 7 hours 37 min ago:
I really like this subthread: [1] > I love the original 14+14. Iâve
heard proposals for exponentially growing fees to allow truly big
enterprises to stay copywritten longer, like 14+14 with filing and
$100, another 14 for $100,000, another 14 for $10M, another 14 for
$100M. That would allow 70 years or protection for a few key pieces
of IP that are worth it, which seems like an okay trade off?
I've always been a fan of this, but here's a great detraction:
> I think would diminish independent author rights. Quite often, a
novel will become popular only decades after publishing, and I think
the author should be able to profit on the fruits of their labour
without wealthy corporations tarnishing their original IP, or
creating TV shows and the link with no reperations to the creator.
Fantasy book are a good example. A Games of Thrones was first
released in 1996 but had middling success. It was only after 2011
that the series exploded in popularity. Good Omens main peak was ~15
years after release. Hell, some books like Handmaiden's Tale were
published in 1985 but only reached their peak in 2010. IP law was
originally to protect artist and authors from the wealthy, but now it
seems to have the opposite intent.
This is a very solid point. Works sometimes only become popular
decades after their initial release.
Perhaps a way to protect individual artists would be to limit the
number of copyrights held by a particular entity. The more you
aggregate or hold on to, the steeper the cost to maintain the
copyright. I'm sure loopholes like "we're a holding company of
holding companies" might be invented to counter this, but if we tied
this to real people rather than corporations it might work.
Copyrights shouldn't last longer than humans.
HTML [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46118808
TheDong wrote 6 hours 55 min ago:
I don't think it should be taken as obvious that authors profiting
off old works is a deserved right or positive.
Game of Thrones was originally published in 1996, but the more
recent books are more recent. I think that GRR Martin's books
would be giving him sizeable profit, even if someone else were able
to make GoT fanfiction in the same universe, and the GoT TV Series
would still have to pay him to use the more recent copyrighted
books, not just the settings and characters from the original.
There is already intrinsic value in having written the original
work, and that intrinsic value will make you the best person to
consult on a TV adaption or make sequels, even if the original work
is public domain and in theory anyone could adapt it.
If an author makes something 20 years ago, doesn't build on the
universe any more beyond that, and is unable to compete in their
own universe they built against other authors once it goes public
domain and becomes popular, well, then tough luck for the author.
Let's look at how this works for software: every piece of
open-source software out there is something that in theory another
company could take and sell as their own. Red Hat Linux is Open
Source, so sure anyone can make their own... and yet Red Hat can
sell consulting services and new versions of it because they're the
only group with proper expertise there.
> limit the number of copyrights held by a particular entity
Entities are unfortunately quite easy to fake and difficult to
define in a fool-proof way.
If you can still license copyrights, then holding companies would
become the norm. Like, right now LucasArts owns StarWars, and
LucasArts is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Disney, but if we had a
limit on how many copyrights an entity can hold, Disney wouldn't
acquire LucasArts, and would instead pay for an exclusive copyright
license.
flomo wrote 7 hours 27 min ago:
It's an interesting discussion. Also, a lot of stuff from the 19th
century only became famous after copyright expired (and only
sometimes was the author able to profit from this, other times they
died in poverty.)
28+28+... might be a better model. I know there's a bunch of decent
stuff from the 1990s which will never again have any real economic
value, but would be fine for soundtracks or tictoks or MAME or etc.
marc_abonce wrote 10 hours 19 min ago:
How does copyright work with recorded music?
The article mentions that Charlie (Bird) Parker's music is now public
domain in most of the world (life + 70 years), but most of his records
are collaborations with other artists like Dizzy Gillespie who died
much later, less than 50 years ago. I also wonder if that even matters
if the records are owned by corporations.
In those cases, how would I know if a record is public domain or not?
atmavatar wrote 8 hours 50 min ago:
The records themselves are likely still copyrighted due to the
collaborations, but you are free to record your own performance of
the songs on said records.
dexterdog wrote 9 hours 57 min ago:
You don't. It's all nonsense so unless you are planning on doing
something official with the material just pirate it. Copyright went
far beyond lunacy decades ago and should be ignored if possible.
flomo wrote 7 hours 37 min ago:
This is a tech forum, you don't need to act smart because you know
piracy exists. It is an interesting question.
Guestmodinfo wrote 7 hours 52 min ago:
I wonder why should Tesla , who wanted to give us free electricity
lost all his patents (time ran out in those times) while he was
still living. And these rent seeking entities get to keep their
copyrights for far too long. Are they more important than Nikola
Tesla?
Someone would retort that patent is not same as copyright. But
really dude that's all just made up stuff by politicians and
corporations.
In the end Tesla died pennyless and these corporations and entities
get to hoard all the human creativity till what it looks like an
eternity for my meagre life span.
TheDong wrote 7 hours 10 min ago:
As a society, modern humanity has decided that capitalism is more
important than free electricity, even if it saves lives.
We have enough electricity that everyone in the USA could have a
generous free allowance.
We've decided it's better to charge for electricity, and if an AI
company can pay for it to train models, but someone freezing to
death in their home cannot pay for it, that capital is a signal
that the data-center should get the electricity, not the dying
individual.
This isn't a matter of copyright, this is a matter of how we
structure society.
Vespasian wrote 7 hours 35 min ago:
Patents can hold up economic development of certain industries
much more than copyright. Which can have huge implications if
they are on fundamentals.
For example commercial 3D printing (using FDM) was likely
significantly stalled until the relevant patent expired.
Culture is of course important but there can always be new
successful Alternatives.
ronsor wrote 10 hours 6 min ago:
There's a copyright for the music itself, but then each recording has
its own copyright. Fun, isn't it?
HTML [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sound_recording_copyright_symb...
smegger001 wrote 9 hours 55 min ago:
Sort of like how the movie Charade staring Carry Grant and Audrey
Hepburn is public domain (due to failure to file back when that was
required in the 1970's) but the soundtrack is not. So the music is
in the pubic domain only when played in the movie but played
separately the music is still protected.
golem14 wrote 5 hours 24 min ago:
That is a nice movie, BTW.
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