Is a photo that is in the public domain in US also in the public domain in other countries? I want to use a photograph that is in the public domain in the United States. However, I would be sending a document with this photograph around entities in Europe. I know that just because something is in the public domain in the United States, that doesn't mean that it is in the public domain in other countries. Can I use this photograph or not and what decides this? This is the photo in question: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Rowing_at_the_1988_Summer_Olympics.JPEG The "Permission" field in the "Summary" section details what I'm talking about.
Under US law, the particular work is not protected by copyright, being a government work. Therefore, an infringement suit in the US would go nowhere. Under the Berne Convention Article 7(8), the term shall be governed by the legislation of the country where protection is claimed; however, unless the legislation of that country otherwise provides, the term shall not exceed the term fixed in the country of origin of the work This is acknowledged via EU Directive 2006/116/EC, Article 7: Where the country of origin of a work, within the meaning of the Berne Convention, is a third country, and the author of the work is not a Community national, the term of protection granted by the Member States shall expire on the date of expiry of the protection granted in the country of origin of the work, but may not exceed the term laid down in Article 1. So unless there is a special provision in the country in question, the shorter of the protection-time of the country of origin and that of the country of lawsuit prevails, i.e. zero in this instance. No jurisdiction in Europe appears to have created a special exception to the effect that government works are subject to copyright protection.
This has yet to be specifically decided in the federal courts. The Post Office can set &quot;rules of conduct&quot; for its facilities. Prohibiting photographing is plainly a restriction on one's First Amendment rights, and it is established beyond question that a government cannot issue / enforce a blanket prohibition of public photographing. Someone would have to take a case to court to determine whether this limitation on First Amendment rights passes the relevant level of judicial scrutiny. The rationale (as set forth by the USPS) is that such photographing may be &quot;disruptive&quot;. One can perhaps analogize the right to film police with a new-found right to film post office, following from a right to public oversight over the government. DHS gives general guidance of its own (with a pile of redacted stuff), directing you to 41 CFR 102-74.420. Permission is thus required, until the courts find that to be an unconstitutional restriction (I would not expect there to be such a finding). But it is not unthinkable that the courts could at some point so rule. The YouTube aspect of the question is irrelevant: if you have the right, you have the right, and it doesn't derive from nor is it blocked by an intent to distribute on YouTube.
In Canada, no: linking does not reproduce any part of the original. In Sweden, Spain and according to the EU, no: communicating a link does not communicate anew the work to the public. In the US, it isn't as clear, but generally, linking is not per se infringement, usually because no copying happens.
The relevant concept is dedicating a work to the public domain, that is, saying in the work something like "This work is dedicated to the public domain". I understand that this isn't entirely reliable in European civil law. The preferred alternative is to license it to the public. However, you have to decide how "free" you want the work to be made. The normal state of affairs, where you do nothing and just rely on copyright law, is that you have the sole right to allow copies to be made and derivative works to be created. Thus if someone were to make a derivative work based on your composition, they would need your permission: but then they would have the right what they created (such as a translation). If you just abandon your property right to the work, you impose no obligation on others, and a person can freely create a translation (which is now their property). If you execute the right public license, you can allow people to use your work as long as they include that license in their versions. A fairly common public licensing scheme is the Creative Commons licenses. That article gives a decent summary of relevant rights and how particular licenses correspond to configurations of permissions. I would say that the most difficult thing to do is to figure out what you don't want to happen, and pick a license that matches that interest.
You can take pictures of any buildings if you are in a public place, and can freely use such photographs without consent of a owner or designer of that building. [Japan Copyright Act, art. 46] BTW, external appearance of buildings in U.S. Armed Forces facilities are NOT confidential under US-Japan Security Treaty and related statutes enacted in Japan.
The images and text are copyright (if they are). What Google does with them is fair use/dealing. It works like this: if Google's bot can find them then you (the owner) have put them on the World Wide Web presumably because you want people to see them, effectively you have put them on public display. Google is assisting you in that endeavour by enabling people who are looking for what you are displaying to find it. Their use of your material enhances its value to you which is a rock solid defence. If you don't want your stuff on public display then a) don't put it on a public part of the web - there are plenty of private cloud storage facilities or B) stick a file in your website that tells bots not to index it.
&quot;Public domain&quot; refers informally to copyright status, usually works whose protected status has expired. A list of names, addresses and criminal offenses is &quot;factual&quot;, not a creative expression, and is not subject to copyright protection. You may be thinking of &quot;public record&quot;, which is closer to an relevant expression. Typically, as instantiated in Washington state under RCW 9a.44.130 ff, a person convicted of certain offenses is required to register with the county sheriff, and that registration is thus a &quot;public record&quot;. Under a separate law, RCW 4.24.550 disclosure is allowed &quot;when the agency determines that disclosure of the information is relevant and necessary to protect the public and counteract the danger created by the particular offender&quot; – in other jurisdictions disclosure may be mandatory. The specific information to be disclosed is &quot;name, relevant criminal convictions, address by hundred block, physical description, and photograph. The website shall provide mapping capabilities that display the sex offender's address by hundred block on a map&quot;. The Public Records Act does not exclude disclosure and copying of that information, so it is a public record in the sense that it must be disclosed on request. Every state has its own laws implementing this desideratum: all states have such laws, they vary somewhat in details.
You need permission from the copyright holder(s) to make the prints at all unless it falls under some fair use doctrine or is a work in Public Domain. If permission is granted, it would presumably involve you paying money on some negotiated basis. An artist might flatly refuse to give permission to your plan to use their art as a component of your art.