Copyright status of an author&#39;s letters published posthumously? I am writing Lovecraftian horror short fiction. I know I can use Lovecraft's material written 1923 and prior. However, I would love to use parts of the genealogy he noted in some of his letters. These letters, and others, were published in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selected_Letters_of_H._P._Lovecraft_IV_(1932%E2%80%931934) in 1976. The letters themselves were written from 1932-1934. Are these letters considered in the public domain, as unpublished works (by the author) written 88 years ago? If not, when would they enter the public domain?
Publication after the author's death is still publication. As you can see in this excellent chart this work is copyrighted for 95 years after the publication date under US law. If it had never been published, it would be protected by copyright for 70 years after the death of Lovecraft, the author (a term which has now expired). However, statements of genealogy would be facts, and as such are not protected by copyright. limited quotes to support those facts would be appropriate in a work of non-fiction, and would normally be permitted as fair use under US law. Such quotes would probably not be appropriate in fiction in any case. The exact wording of the genealogy would probably be protected, but not the relationships (who is the parent of whom, etc).
The notice has a lot to do with legacy requirements in the United States to claim the copyright to a work. Up until 1989, the copyright notice was required. Today, the statements are mainly maintained to protect against "innocent infringement" which might reduce what a content owner can get in court. What exactly do those terms entail? That the owner stated owns all rights and you may do nothing with the content. My biggest concern is this: by writing that, is the company claiming to own everything on the website, even potentially copyrighted user-submitted material? That's exactly what they are doing. Depending on the terms of the specific site, content contributors generally either assign copyright to the site owner or license the content in a way that allows the site owner to do exactly what they want with it. Site creators with the smarts or money to do it right/get someone to do it right usually state something like: Copyright [Site Owner] and contributors. Other sites (like this one) state specifically what they hold the copyright to: site design / logo © 2015 Stack Exchange Inc THIS IS NOT LEGAL ADVICE. CONSULT AN ATTORNEY REGARDING YOUR SPECIFIC SITUATION.
Is the superhero American Crusader in the public domain? I have insufficient knowledge of the actual practice of individual and corporate owners of rights in superhero characters to protect their rights in individual characters to provide a definitive answer the first part of the question about American Crusader without extensive research. Copyright Considerations The character debuted in August 1941 to April 1944, published by Better Publications, and lots of works from that date are still not out of copyright. Better Publications, later renamed Standard Comics, folded in 1959, which leaves open the possibility that it failed to renew its copyrights as it would have been required to do in the time period not long before the expiration in 1967-1970 of the first of two possible rounds of copyright protection under prior law, but it appears that the copyrights may have been sold to a third-party when the company folded, and that third-party may have preserved the copyright in a timely fashion. If the copyrights were renewed, they benefited from an extension of copyright periods for copyrights still in force when the current law (pre-amendment) was in force, and from a later extension of copyrights under that law. It also depends to some extent on who holds the copyright. If the copyright was held by the natural person author, whose identity isn't clear, the date of that author's death matters (even thought the date of death had not been relevant when the copyright was originally issued under prior law. Alan Moore with America's Best Comics revived the character in 1999. There was also an earlier revival by AC Comics, which is also not out of copyright. So, any public domain aspects of the character would at a minimum not include anything derived from either revival. It isn't clear if either revival was done with the permission of the copyright holder, or if either company reviving the character had determined that the copyright had expired. Trademark Considerations Better Publications and its successors may also have had trademarks related to American Crusader, but those probably expired from lack of use prior to two recent revivals of this character. But, even if the copyright on the original version of the comic in 1941 has expired and provides a public domain core upon which you can expand independent of AC Comics or Alan Moore's revival with ABC, either AC Comics or ABC may have a trademark in connection with American Crusader that materially limits what you could do with this character. There is one live American Crusade trademark on file with the U.S. Patent and Trademark office: The summary of the registration is as follows and it does not appear to apply to the comic book character: Mark Image Word Mark AMERICAN CRUSADER Goods and Services IC 008. US 023 028 044. G &amp; S: Filleting knives; Fishing knives; Folding knives; Hunting knives; Pocket knives; Sport knives. FIRST USE: 20160215. FIRST USE IN COMMERCE: 20160215 Standard Characters Claimed Mark Drawing Code (4) STANDARD CHARACTER MARK Serial Number 86896152 Filing Date February 3, 2016 Current Basis 1A Original Filing Basis 1B Published for Opposition December 27, 2016 Registration Number 5159010 Registration Date March 14, 2017 Owner (REGISTRANT) Patriot Outfitters, LLC LIMITED LIABILITY COMPANY KANSAS 206 Maple Hill Road St. Marys KANSAS 66536 Attorney of Record Joseph T. Leone Type of Mark TRADEMARK Register PRINCIPAL Live/Dead Indicator LIVE The dead trademarks which can be reviewed via an easy internet link also do not refer to the comic book character. So, you probably only have to worry about copyright considerations and not trademark considerations, although there could still be a state trademarks (arising from state law filings), or common law trademark rights in it (arising from use in commerce in a particular geographic area), asserted. If so, what aspects of the character can be safely used? If it is in the public domain (not just under copyright, but also under trademark law which does not have a fixed expiration date), then you can use all public domain aspects of the character. For example, it isn't a coincidence that there are lots of Sherlock Holmes and King Arthur and Merlin and Aladdin and Brothers Grim fairy tales, and Jane Austin book based stories in TV and movies, because those characters are in the public domain, so no one other than the staff used to create their versions of those characters needs to be paid a royalty or needs to provide permission to do so. In the case of Sherlock Holmes, part of the Sherlock Holmes works are in the public domain, and other parts of the original Sherlock Holmes works are not, so anything specific to the copyrighted portion of the original works are still protected by copyright.
As Polygnome points out in the comments, the first step is to determine who owns the original copyright on your mother's work now. This will be her heirs. If you are the sole heir then no problem. If the copyright was explicitly left to you in her will, also no problem. If there are multiple heirs and no explicit assignment of the copyright, then problem. The copyright will probably be considered part of the chattels of the estate (i.e. everything except real estate). If those are allocated fractionally (e.g. half each to two siblings) then the copyright probably followed that principle, unless you have already come to some agreement about it. If you are on good terms with the siblings then the best bet is to just make a deal for their part of the copyright. You could just ask them to sign it over to you, or you could cut them in for a percentage of future royalties. That makes the situation 100% clear, and any publisher is going to require 100% clarity before they consider offering a contract. Once you have the whole copyright you can go ahead and register. I've looked through the registration process and it doesn't actually ask about derivative works. What it wants to know is whether you own the copyright, and who were the authors (including works for hire). So just fill it in on that basis.
I know that some of this may be covered by either the Creative Commons license or the OGL it was published under, but it's not clear to me how far those freedoms extend. It was all published as materials under copyright to the original authors, TSR, WotC, &amp;c. and if things had been left like that hszmv's answer would've been completely correct: stay vague and allow users to enter those names and descriptions, talk to WotC's lawyers and sales department about license fees, or just keep it to yourself and your friends. You're right, though: WotC went whole-hog, dumped their partial OGL idea, and relicensed some things as Creative Commons. There are different Creative Commons licenses, though, some restricting commercial use that would still keep your app to yourself and friends without a specific licensing agreement. Go find out exactly what WotC put under CC. If it's only the Player's Handbook, then you can only use names and descriptions that are from the Player's Handbook and you're still facing a cease-&amp;-desist if you start adding in Monster Manual info.If it's everything, it's everything they have but still won't include any older modules that they don't have the right to change the copyright status of. It'll still be under copyright, usually until 70 years after the death of the original creator. For Gary Gygax, that'll be 2078. Expect that length to extend during your lifetime though. US copyright usually extends every time Mickey &amp; friends come close to entering the public domain. [Edit: The comments below suggest it might only have been the Systems Reference Document (I assume for 5e). It's 403 pages of not nothing but it's not much given the universe we're talking about. The spell and monster lists are generic. Bigby is nowhere to be found and the only mention of a beholder is a reminder not to use the name beholder without their written approval.] Go find out exactly which CC WotC used. The article above says &quot;all use&quot; but you need to find out the exact number of the Creative Commons license for each thing you're using and make sure all of your uses fall within its terms. Some are basically free use but still insist you mention the copyright holder prominently or in every use. Go ahead and do that if you have to. [Edit: The comments below say it is probably CC 4.0. The SRD download page says you can use CC 4.0 or their own OGL. In both cases, yes, you must acknowledge WotC by name in a way prominent enough to satisfy the license you choose.] And of course, Don't trust legal advice from internet randos or ChatGPT. If this is a serious thing you're going to be spending a good chunk of your life working on or expect to make significant money from, go talk to an actual lawyer. Bonus points for one specialized in IP with a knowledge of roleplaying and the way it's been (partially) opening up lately.If you start off just by talking to WotC's lawyers, just do that somewhere where you get their explanations and permissions in writing. Then keep that somewhere safe in electronic and hard copy. Then still take that with you when you go talk to your own lawyer.
A statement by a fictional character is part of the fiction, and so is normally protected by copyright. A short exclamation such as &quot;You are not prepared!&quot; might be ruled to be too short and not sufficiently original to be protected if it were used separately, but that would apply just as much to a short statement that was not a quote from a character. But something like one of Gandalf's speeches on &quot;mercy and pity&quot; to Frodo in Chapter 2 (&quot;The Shadow of the past&quot;) in book 1 of The Lord of the Rings would clearly be protected. The longer and the more distinctive such a text is, the more clearly it would be protected. Whether it is put in the mouth of a character or is part of the narration makes no significant difference. Note, in a copyright sense a statement does not &quot;belong to a particular universe&quot;, rather it belongs to a copyright owner, often the author, or in the case of a video game quite likely thy publisher. As this comment by Kevin mentions, and as I should have mentioned, reproducing a short quotation from a work of fiction, particularly if properly attributed, is quite likely to be fair use. See Is this copyright infringement? Is it fair use? What if I don&#39;t make any money off it? for more specific details. See also the threads tagged fair use If a quote is used for a different purpose than the original, in what is called a &quot;transformative&quot; manner in copyright cases, then it is more likely to be held to be fair use. The smaller of a percentage of the source item the quote is, the more likely it is that it will be considered to be a fair use. The less the use of a quote serves as a replacement for the source, or harms the market for the source, the more likely it is to be considered a fair use. See the links above for more detail.
Content posted to the web is usually openly accessible to all (unless protected by a password, paywall, or similar restriction). But that does not mean it is freely copyable by all. Such content is protected by copyright in just the same way as if it had been published in a book of essays by various contributors. Unless the copyright holders (who are likely to be the original authors, but might not be) give permission, or an exception to copyright applies, copying such content would be clear and obvious copyright infringement, and any copyright holder could sue for damages. Permission could be given by publishing the content under a permissive license, such as a CC-BY-SA license, or any of many other available permissive licenses. Or a would-be reuser could find the copyright holders and ask for permission. If the holder cannot be found or identified, or does not respond, then no permission has been granted. In the US the main exception to copyright is fair use. See this answer and other threads with the fair-use tag here for more on fair use. Since the question seems to contemplate using the whole of the posted content, since it might well damage any potential market for that content, and since the use does not seem to be &quot;transformative&quot;, nor used for criticism or comment, a finding of fair use for this situation seems unlikely. But Fair use findings are very much fact-driven, and the exact facts do matter. Thus I cannot be at all sure whether a court would find this toi be fair use or not. In other countries there are a variety of exceptions to copyright, and I have not come close to reviewing them all. But none of the ones I know of seem to apply to the situation described in the question. Many are narrower than the US concept of fair use. I fear that without permission, copying this content would be infringement. However, it would not be infringement to create a site that includes a link to the existing content, and a summary or description of that content, along with new content, including comments on the old, with brief quotes to indicate what is being commented on.
No, it's still copyright infringement. When you modify a copyrighted work in any way, you generate a derivative work which you are not allowed to distribute without the permission of the original copyright holder.