Can I release all my copyrighted works into the public domain upon my death? I would like all my copyrighted works into the public domain immediately upon my death (rather than the current United States law specifying that it will be released 70 years after my death). Is this possible to do, for instance by putting a statement to that effect in my last will and testament? To clarify, I would like this to be for all works not otherwise specified in my will, including those unpublished. For instance, if I scribbled something on the back of a napkin that becomes valuable after my death, I want it to be in the public domain instead of retaining copyright.
Under US copyright law, all works are protected by copyright except for US Government works. The concept of "public domain" is not legally well-defined, and is used colloquially to refer to government works, works whose protection has expired, works available to all, and works not copyrightable (such as scientific laws or old software). Under older copyright law, releasing a work without the copyright symbol effectively put the work in the public domain. One can simply say "I dedicate this work to the public domain", and that is typically taken to be enough. CC0 purports to do this (using more words). However, as far as I can tell, author rights under European law are so strong that it is simply impossible. Releasing works into the public law has to be consistent with other aspects of the law. If you grant an perpetual exclusive right to copy and distribute to a publisher, their right does not go away on your death (a right which they would not have with a real public domain work). A problem is that an author who makes such a dedication (a bare license) could revoke the license and reassert their copyright. They could be estopped from making that argument. As property, your heirs would inherit the copyright and could (try to) revoke the license. Presumably the courts would not allow them to pursue ostensive infringers. Nevertheless, your plan is neither trivial nor bullet-proof.
This would likely be considered a derivative work. You would need permission from the copyright holder to make it, especially if you intend to distribute it for profit.
You might be able to use a site like the Internet Archive to preserve the TOC even after the site is shut down. The real liability trap here is if the site does not have the authority to give you this license. If a user uploads a photo that they do not own, and you use it, you are infringing the copyright of the original owner. Innocent infringement is not a defense to liability (although it may reduce damages in some cases.)
Yes. The copyright owner of a work has the exclusive right to "reproduce the copyrighted work" or to make "derivative works" of it. 17 USC 106. Copyright law is older than the photocopier, and it applies to copies made by means of any technology. If your intent is to duplicate the protected work, whether you do it by tracing, photocopying, or even freehand, you are infringing that right. It is possible that you could squeeze into one of the copyright exceptions, such as fair use, but these are much narrower than people tend to assume they are (especially outside of the U.S.), and they boil down to: "Well, yes, I copied your copyrighted work, but..." The bottom line is: is it copyrighted? Did you copy it, in whole or in part? Then, unless you have a very good reason, you've infringed the copyright. Whether you do it by means of tracing paper, jellygraph, or iPhone doesn't matter.
Why would the method by which you transfer a item that has a copyright impact the copyright? You buy a new book at a new bookstore, a used book at a used bookstore, a used book at a garage sale, someone gives you a book, you find a book on the sidewalk, you steal a book from a store, you buy and download an ebook, you give an ebook to someone on a USB stick, you download an ebook via Bittorrent. The author's copyright - as well as the design copyright, and any book company trademarks - does not change in any of those scenarios. Copyright around most of the world - read Berne Convention (Wikipedia) - says that copyright exists at the moment of creation of a work, i.e. a work that you say is "100% yours". This has nothing to do with the way the work may be transmitted or stolen or downloaded. A work in the public domain can still be copyrighted in terms of cover artwork and design, annotations, etc. Read Welcome to the Public Domain - Stanford Copyright and Fair Use Center You can say someone "owns" a book in the sense that they might have paid for it or it is personal property and one could justifiably call it theft if someone took it from them, but "owning" the physical or electronic copy in any sense doesn't mean you own the copyright. Read the copyright notice on a book or ebook; you get a license to read it, not ownership of it. Read What's the difference between Copyright and Licensing? - Open Source Stack Exchange. Sure, the TOS of a network can specify the ownership/licensing status of the files shared on such network. They will almost all explicitly say not to upload or share anything that will violate the copyright of that work. The TOS of a network could possibly say that anything that is uploaded is automatically licensed to them. A network could demand the reassignment of copyright upon upload, but that would have to be outlined in the TOS and is not simple. See Copyright Ownership and Transfers FAQs - Stanford Copyright and Fair Use Center.
I want to use a couple of lines from "What is life?" by Erwin Schrödinger as quote on the front of my thesis. Would i need permission for that form publisher or would that be convered in fair use? There are close cases of fair use, but this is not one of them. This is unequivocally and clearly fair use. It is a brief excerpt of a much larger body of work, it is for non-commercial use by a student, and it is for educational and academic purposes (presumably to advance science). Also do i need to attribute the quote properly Yes. This is necessary both because of the moral rights of the author under E.U. copyright law (assuming that works by Erwin Schrödinger are still in copyright), and for reasons of academic ethical considerations. It is still in copyright, because he died on January 4, 1961, which is 58 years ago. So, in countries that protect copyrights for the life of the author plus 50 years (the minimum required by the Berne Convention) this is out of copyright, but in countries that protect copyrights for the life of the author plus 70 years (e.g. Germany), the copyright is still in force until January 4, 2031. Also, even if the work were out of copyright, as a matter of academic integrity, you would be required to attribute the quote in an academic thesis in any case. Quoting someone without attribution in academic work is considered plagiarism, and could result in your thesis being stricken and also in your degree being revoked in a serious case. Government ministers in the E.U. have been forced to resign over plagiarism in their academic work as students in recent years. This is taken much more seriously in Europe than it is in the U.S.
Those posts are talking about making a modified copy of a copyrighted work. The key word is copy. You are not making a copy. Copyright is not about how a physical embodiment of a copyrighted work is treated. You can burn a book and shred a newspaper. Neither of those actions is making a copy. Also, cutting up a newspaper and pasting a picture on your wall has nothing to do with any “derivative works” issue.
First Sale Doctrine One of the rights a copyright holder has is an exclusive right &quot;to distribute copies or phonorecords of the copyrighted work to the public by sale or other transfer of ownership, or by rental, lease, or lending&quot;. 17 U.S.C. 106(3). This is distinct from the reproduction right they have to make copies or derivative works. So, absent a licence, you can neither make the model nor distribute the model. If you are operating under a licence, that is a legally binding contract between you and the copyright holder. If it says that you cannot give away models, then doing so is a breach of that contract and a breach of copyright for which you could be sued. However, if you did sell or give away the model to a third party, that would be a lawful transfer of title in the object itself, even though it is a breach of contract. An innocent third party (i.e. one who has no knowledge of the breach) would be a lawful owner and could do what they liked with the object and, under the first-sale doctrine, is not bound by the licence. If you were to die, the executor or administrator of your estate would be bound by the terms of the licence (whether they knew about them or not), and if they breached them, they would be liable for that breach. If done in good faith, they could seek indemnity from the estate, but if the estate has insufficient funds or has been finalised, they would be personally liable. This is largely theoretical as the copyright owner would have to pursue their claim so promptly that unless they were actively monitoring the death notices for anyone who ever downloaded their model, they would miss their chance. A third party who received the physical model from the estate, either by buying it or being given it as a beneficiary, would own it and have first-sale doctrine rights. Although originally a US concept (Bobbs-Merrill Co. v. Straus 1908), it is my understanding that the first-sale doctrine has since spread to all common-law countries. The last was Australia in Calidad v Seiko Epson [2020] HCA 41. ... the public ... The above analysis presumes that the people you are gifting the models to are &quot;the public&quot;. This may not be the case where the models are distributed to a small circle of people like family and friends. In that case, there is no general right of distribution, and the copyright owner would need to rely on their right of reproduction. That is, in making the copy in order to give the object away, you breached the licence. This becomes problematic when your decision to give away the object happens later, possibly years later, possibly after you're dead. So, it might not be a problem for the executor or administrator to distribute the object to a beneficiary, but it might be a problem to sell it at a deceased-estate auction. The former is not distribution to &quot;the public&quot;; the latter is.