alt.hn

1/2/2026 at 1:42:16 AM

Happy Public Domain Day 2026

 https://publicdomainreview.org/blog/2026/01/public-domain-day-2026/

by apetresc

1/2/2026 at 7:53:53 AM

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 as an actual "let's implement it now!" thing.

by neiman

1/2/2026 at 5:13:10 AM

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.

by tombert

1/2/2026 at 7:46:36 AM

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!

by neiman

1/2/2026 at 2:58:15 AM

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?"

by gxqoz

1/2/2026 at 4:16:11 AM

> 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

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Metropolis_(1927).webm

by bawolff

1/2/2026 at 3:36:44 AM

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?

by beerbajay

1/2/2026 at 3:54:02 AM

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!

by emodendroket

1/2/2026 at 5:16:59 AM

Since it is the holiday season, reminds me of "It’s 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.

by flomo

1/2/2026 at 5:43:15 AM

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.

by Mountain_Skies

1/2/2026 at 6:00:51 AM

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)

by flomo

1/2/2026 at 5:46:35 AM

I mean yeah that would certainly be possible.

by emodendroket

1/2/2026 at 5:19:37 AM

>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.

by boomboomsubban

1/2/2026 at 5:30:11 AM

> 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?

by qingcharles

1/2/2026 at 3:13:22 AM

> 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.

by bpodgursky

1/2/2026 at 7:12:40 AM

Standard Ebooks added a bunch of newly-US-PD novels: https://standardebooks.org/blog/public-domain-day-2026

(I’m happy to have contributed three to the launch this year, hope you enjoy them.)

by robin_reala

1/2/2026 at 7:15:45 AM

Which three did you contribute and how'd you pick them?

by raybb

1/2/2026 at 7:37:14 AM

I did Kafka’s “The Castle”, Agatha Christie’s “Giant’s Bread”, and Stella Benson’s “The Faraway Bride”.

Been meaning to do a Kafka for a while but the Gutenberg editions are later translations that aren’t 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 “works Standard Ebooks wants for public domain day” back in October. We’re reasonably organised about this.

by robin_reala

1/2/2026 at 2:40:04 AM

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?

by marc_abonce

1/2/2026 at 2:53:47 AM

There's a copyright for the music itself, but then each recording has its own copyright. Fun, isn't it? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sound_recording_copyright_symb...

by ronsor

1/2/2026 at 3:04:57 AM

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.

by smegger001

1/2/2026 at 7:35:27 AM

That is a nice movie, BTW.

by golem14

1/2/2026 at 4:09:12 AM

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.

by atmavatar

1/2/2026 at 3:02:40 AM

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.

by dexterdog

1/2/2026 at 5:07:03 AM

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.

by Guestmodinfo

1/2/2026 at 5:24:57 AM

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.

by Vespasian

1/2/2026 at 5:49:31 AM

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.

by TheDong

1/2/2026 at 5:22:13 AM

This is a tech forum, you don't need to act smart because you know piracy exists. It is an interesting question.

by flomo

1/2/2026 at 6:31:41 AM

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

by chr-s

1/2/2026 at 3:30:08 AM

The Swallows and Amazons series is wonderful! Highly recommended.

by nevster

1/2/2026 at 5:33:30 AM

I adored the BBC TV adaption in 1984. The theme still lives rent free in my head all these years later.

by qingcharles

1/2/2026 at 5:51:05 AM

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/

by shevy-java

1/2/2026 at 7:50:07 AM

I'd be happy if the original 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.

by visarga

1/2/2026 at 5:55:18 AM

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).

by ronsor

1/2/2026 at 6:54:34 AM

PG Wodehouse is public domain now!

by fromaj

1/2/2026 at 2:50:08 AM

Related:

What will enter the public domain in 2026?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46117112

by ChrisArchitect

1/2/2026 at 5:22:11 AM

I really like this subthread:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46118808

> I love the original 14+14. I’ve 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.

by echelon

1/2/2026 at 6:04:45 AM

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.

by TheDong

1/2/2026 at 5:32:14 AM

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.

by flomo

1/2/2026 at 4:25:37 AM

> 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.

by shmerl

1/2/2026 at 6:27:41 AM

And Zamyatin’s _We_ was even a few years earlier. Great artists steal.

by eloisius

1/2/2026 at 7:25:59 AM

Here is a link for people who don’t know about it (it’s not too obvious but “we” is the actual title): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_(novel)

Published in 1924, it’s a short read, I would recommend, I personally find it more compelling than Orwell’s work

by dgellow