Laws concerning the ownership of things like movies, music, books and more have been changed, re-written, ignored and unearthed many many times over the past 90 years. With that said, it’s no surprise that many people don’t understand why January 1st, 2019 was so important to the “public domain.”
CLICK HERE TO ACCESS THE CENTER FOR THE STUDY OF THE PUBLIC DOMAIN’S WEBSITE
Jennifer Jenkins is the Director of the Center for the Study of the Public Domain at Duke University School of Law. She was able to explain what is happening and why people should be very excited!
Let’s start with this – what is the Public Domain? Simply put, the object is available to the public for free and without copyright. For example, if “Dan’s Farm” is a book that was written decades ago, but the copyright on it has lapsed (by anyone who might own a piece of it – publisher, author, illustrator, etc) it will enter the Public Domain and now YOU may read it for free, print copies and sell them, adapt it into a movie, use the words as lyrics to a song, make the picture your company’s logo – pretty much anything you want. You may also hear the term fair use in relation to being able to consume all of these great works for free.
HOW TO DOWNLOAD THOUSANDS OF BOOKS FOR FREE
Jenkins adds that due diligence is important. It’s much easier to prove that something is NOT in the public domain versus proving it is in the public domain.
ADDITIONAL CONTENT:
KFGO Podcast –
Tang: The Drink, the History…the Cleaner?
KFGO Podcast –
Fargo Pinball Talks “Toy Hall of Fame” Inductees
KFGO Podcast –
Drunk Bees, Yep, It’s a Thing!
KFGO Podcast –
Axe Throwing is Going to be Your Next Night Out on the Town
(Amy Iler & JJ Gordon are talk-show hosts at 790 AM KFGO in Fargo-Moorhead. “It Takes 2 with Amy & JJ” can be heard weekdays 11am-2pm. Check out the show page on
FACEBOOK.
Follow Amy on Twitter
@AmyKFGO
. Follow JJ on Twitter
@JJGodon701
.)
