Copyright Term and the Public Domain
Copyright Term and the Public Domain
It is not at all uncommon for an instructor to comment to us "Well, I only use things in the public domain" and be referring to items that are merely freely available on the web. These are not the same thing. Remember that the vast majority of content on the web, though freely available, is protected by copyright. The copyright term is very long and, because the copyright laws changed several times throughout the 20th century, with changes to the law sometimes being retroactive, it can be very challenging to figure out if a given piece of content created in the 20th century is in the public domain or not.
If the content was created/published before 1923, it is in the public domain. Things that are in the public domain may be used without limitation.
For material published after this date, it gets really complicated.
This chart, Copyright Term and the Public Domain in the
Works Created by the Federal Government
Works Created by the Federal Government
Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute
Works created by the Federal government (and some state governments, but not Oregon) are not subject to copyright. This applies to works created by employees of the United States government in the course of their duties. Unfortunately, even this seemingly simple idea has a lot of complexity when you start examining it:
- Works produced by contractors or freelancers employed by the government are likely to be copyrighted.
- Works produced by some agencies (eg. the post office) may be subject to copyright.
- Government websites regularly feature art and imagery that were purchased or licensed by the government. Do not assume that because it is on a government website it is not subject to copyright.
- The government can own copyrights that are transferred to it.
- Logos of government agencies might be subject to trademark law even though they are not copyrightable.