Copyright Aid

The settlement we are requesting is not a retrospective license fee, but damages outlined in the law of the Copyright, Design and Patents Act 1988, namely Section 97, part 2: (2) The court may in an action for infringement of copyright award such damages as the justice of the case may require. So b...

Obviously Etsy is a US website, but is that enough to even give a US court jurisdiction on this matter? As the seller is based in the UK, and the production of the items and the bulk of sales happened in the UK, surely it could only be litigated here? Having a literal handful of US sales doesn't cha...

redacted info provided... they’ve replied explaining that the hidden info as to who/what I’ve infringed will become available shortly... So they haven't actually explained what it is you are supposed to have done that is an infringement? Have you contacted Etsy to ask what they were told? Surely it...

I believe there's a similar dispute around Sherlock Holmes (a reverse situation where all of Doyle's books are public domain in the UK, but the latter ten aren't in the US). This relates to the last ten short stories (not books),which were published between 1924 and 1927, however eight of them have...

I'm a little surprised by the notion that a film director would not count as an author under the 1911 Act, not least because it is rare to encounter a film where the director hasn't imposed at least some changes on the script during the filming process. In fact, Laddie et al, at least in the Third E...

Why would The Pleasure Garden have lapsed in the UK after the end of 1957? The film was released in 1926, but at the time films were protected as dramatic works and as a series of photographs, so either death plus 50 years or creation plus 50 years. The transitional Savings in the 1956 Act (Part II ...

13B(7) was, of course, only introduced to the 1988 CDPA by the 1995 SI. However, it does leave that glaring anomaly that there are a mass of films that are PD in the US that aren't being exploited as such in the UK. Is this simply a case of nobody wanting to take the risk? I do recall that there was...

I would tend to agree that if Night of the Living Dead has no copyright in the country of origin, then there is nothing to reciprocate. However, if a film of US origin has lapsed there due to "normal" expiration (i.e. after renewal and thus 56 years), I'm much less convinced that the UK wo...

This is the US proclamation for 1891 (starts at the bottom of the first page):

https://govtrackus.s3.amazonaws.com/leg ... -Pg981.pdf

I think we can say at least that if the US PD status is due to expiration (especially - where relevant - after the first 28 year term), it may well still be protected elsewhere in the world. Night of the Living Dead is something of an exception, given its lack of US protection on a technicality. I w...

AndyJ wrote: ↑Mon Oct 18, 2021 3:07 pm The Companies House listing for Permission Machine makes interesting reading.

The accounts certainly are.

I also need to slightly disagree with the analysis in your second point about copyight in films generally after 1 June 1957. Prior to the 1956 Copyright Act, you are right that the only protection which was available was to the individual elements such as the dramatic work, sound recording, music, ...

A very long winded way of saying the film is also definitely in the public domain in the UK. I would have to disagree. In the first instance, the 1891 bilateral agreement between the US and the UK means that UK law treats US works as if they are UK works for copyright purposes. Secondly, the 50 yea...

Am I the only one raising an eye-brow at the publishers not being aware that such a photograph would be long out of copyright?!

I would think that the absolute first port of call would be the successor companies for the products advertised, and in most cases they would probably be happy to approve neutral use for no charge. Some companies maintain their own historical archives, and so may be able to supply better versions of...