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United States Your Rights Online

In The Non-US Public Domain 45

Posted by michael from the don't-touch-that-mouse dept.
truthsearch writes "Lawrence Lessig's weblog points to 'a page by John Mark Ockerbloom at the University of Pennsylvania listing books that are in the public domain elsewhere but not, because of the Copyright Term Extension Act, in the United States. Check out the books you are not allowed to download.' Includes books like 'Animal Farm' and '1984'."
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In The Non-US Public Domain More

In The Non-US Public Domain

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  • Okay, question time... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by (trb001) ( 224998 ) on Wednesday October 23, 2002 @12:55PM (#4513789) Homepage
    I'm not trying to get around the copyright, but I have an honest question. If I were to download these books and then bring them into the US, would that be an illegal act? Specifically, how would I declare them when coming into the country? I doubt any immigration people have a clue about online books, let alone which ones are copyrighted.

    I suppose it's the same case as coming into the US from Amsterdam and carrying weed with you, but it would seem that immigration is probably more apt to ask you about drugs than illegal books.

    --trb
    • It would be more similar to going to a foreign country, downloading and installing a program that was not under copyright protection in that country (perhaps they don't recognize US copyright and require the copyright registered specifically in their country) and then coming to the US with that program still installed.

      IANAL, but I believe that the US copyright holder can then sue you, assuming it's identical to the version that is distributed in the states.

      I'm all for protecting the rights of the author, but I believe copyright law has gone way too far. In most cases the author has been dead for years and the copyright holder is a corporation or trust that has benefitted for a long time. Most cases where losing the copyright would severely damage the entity that owns it they -also- have a trademark on the relevant portions.

    • I think it would be more like software piracy. They don't care if you pirate a game now and then, and they don't care if you have a zillion mp3s. They only go after the people with high volume. If I run an ftp with hundreds of warez programs on it and I have another one with all my mp3s and I'm using mad bandwith. Then they come after.
      So as long as you don't bring back 10 billion copies of animal farm they aren't going to think twice about you bringing it into the US. Which means if you set up an ftp with ebooks of these and the server was located in say France, there isn't much that can happen. Sure the american book company can sue you, but would they win?
    • IANAL, but I'd guess it's like formerly restricted encryption software. Back when we had the 128-bit version of Netscape and the 40-bit "export" version, I seem to recall there being a question about whether or not you could travel abroad with a laptop that had the strong version installed.
      It's probably legal to download it abroad and bring it into the US, but not to distribute it to anyone. Of course there's no way this can be enforced, and the US government is much more concerned about drugs and weapons (is strong encryption software still classified as a "munition?") than literature (unless it's pornography [thesmokinggun.com])
    • I think the fact that the phrase 'illegal books' can actually be used in realistic conversation is extremely worrying.

      What will happen if copyright keeps getting extended? Will we have 'literary contraband', legal everywhere except the US (and countries whose laws the US 'influences')? Will importing a copy of 1984 that you didn't pay for become a crime for which you can be fined or imprisoned?

      I'm not an alarmist, but the way things are going, I may as well be.

      --Dan

      • What will happen if copyright keeps getting extended?

        From what I gathered in the transcript of the Supreme Court argument of Eldred v. Ashcroft, the Supremes seem not to have a high opinion of the Bono Act. Even if the Supremes narrowly affirm the 1998 extension, a third extension in under half a century (1976, 1998, 2020) may constitute clearer evidence of Congress's pattern of behavior, that instead of deciding the balance that would best "promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts", Congress is trying to go around the "limited times" language of the Constitution. In that case, the court would almost surely overturn a further extension. Think about it: a 19-year extension in 1976 (which had been phased in from 1962), a 20-year extension in 1998, and a hypothetical third extension in the early 2020's?

        Three strikes and you're out. I vote.

    • If I were to download these books and then bring them into the US, would that be an illegal act?
      Well, I'm shooting at the hip here, but doesn't copywrite law actually apply to the act of copying? In other words, you made the copy in a jurisdiction where that act is legal. And Animal Farm and 1984 are not illegal to possess in the United States (insert joke about "just wait, they will be") so therefore I don't see how it would be illegal to bring those copies into the country.

      Now certainly you could stretch this logic to something absurd such as, "Well if the webserver is in another country and I'm in the US and I download the book, it's not illegal since the actual copy is generated in the other country." But I don't think that's a valid argument, the copying would have to occur entirely in a jurisdiction where that is legal.

      • therefore I don't see how it would be illegal to bring those copies into the country.

        Assume it isn't, just for fun. Sure, you could legally have a friend print you out a dozen different books and ship them to do you in print--but that'd be more expensive than just tracking down their ISBNs and ordering them from your bookseller (or even Amazon.)

        Now, let's pretend that it is illegal. Let's say that you get a scheme where you print books offshore en masse, and then bring them into the US to sell them--oops, you're a big target now, and the people who hold the copyright will take you to court.

        And in court, you can either capitulate and admit that you just wanted to undercut their market--or make the claim that they weren't selling the books for no good reason, and get the judge to command you to give the copyright holder a fair royalty and for them to license out the right to sell the book.

        Somehow I doubt that extranational copyright differneces are going to be that much of a problem--and I doubt that copyright is going to have a very "chilling" effect on real creativity.
    • Alarming term isn't it?
    • Actually, customs doesn't have a clue about any kind of books. I do commercial book imports into the States and they just ask you what the value is. If it's less than three thousand dollars --according to you-- then no problem. There is no set number of volumes and definitely no regard to content or origin or copyright. I learned this by bringing five thousand dollars worth of books in that definitely had no copyright history in the US and they told me the rule and let me slide. So they definitely would not take the time of day to hassle you unless you really made a point about insisting on being fined. They won't arrest you unless you get violent, but they'll probably give you a fine if you insist. The customs officers don't like to be made into test cases for stuff like copyright and they're good at ducking such things by offering to give you a small fine and then letting you walk if you'd prefer not. It's a good theoretical point you make though. US copyright law is absurd. Twenty years is enough for me and I'm an independent publisher and author.

  • Warning: Don't Do This! (Score:3, Funny)

    by GuyMannDude ( 574364 ) on Wednesday October 23, 2002 @12:56PM (#4513794) Journal

    Do NOT download or read these books online if you or your system are in the United States or in another country where copyright protections can extend more than 50 years past an author's death.

    Why doesn't he institute some way of preventing anyone with a .com, .edu, or .us domain from downloading them? If this is "warning: don't do this" website is intended to make some kind of statement against US copyright law, then he should just come out and say it. This reminds me of the Ren & Stimpy episode (Space Madness) where Ren places Stimpy in charge of guarding the History Eraser Button: "What ever you do, don't touch it!"

    GMD

    • Why doesn't he institute some way of preventing anyone with a .com, .edu, or .us domain from downloading them?

      Why should he do that? It's not his job to police other people. Let Asscroft worry about it.

    • Presumably because .com domains are not and have never been the exclusive domain of those within the US. It's far from being a reliable method of ensuring that the people downloading are not located in the states - this is the net after all - geography is invisible.

      So a warning does the job as well as anything else will. It's not a "statement AGAINST copyright" it's a statement ABOUT copyright. Ie, a fact, not an editorial.

    • Re:Warning: Don't Do This! (Score:4, Informative)

      by Cecil ( 37810 ) on Wednesday October 23, 2002 @01:43PM (#4514242) Homepage
      Because it wouldn't work. As much as you americans would like to think so, 'com' does not mean 'USA-owned'. Nor does 'edu'.

      My old ISP was named 'niagara.com', because it served the Niagara region of Ontario. Not Niagara Falls, NY. Back in the day, the registrar for 'ca' was pretty anal (still somewhat, but less so) and it was very difficult and expensive to acquire even a '.on.ca' address for Ontario, Canada, much less an actual top-level '.ca' address. So '.com' was slightly shorter, and much cheaper, and much easier, so that was the domain name they used.

      There are many other countries around the world in the same position, not just Canada. I've seen the number of UK companies, for example, that use .com addresses just because people recognize them. And this is from the UK, with the .co.uk domain name that probably is the only thing that is even remotely close to com/net/org as far as mindshare goes. Imagine how countries with obscure country codes feel.

      Secondly, I now run my own reverse DNS servers. It's trivial to change my reverse lookup DNS address to anything I want. It's a hideously insecure way of trying to deal with the problem. You'll get huge numbers of both false negatives, and false positives, and both will make the system useless. It's a bad idea. Repeat after me: Geoprofiling people by domain names is ludicrous.

      Now, perhaps Geoprofiling based on IP addresses is a little bit less hit-and-miss, but it's still not entirely accurate, and I would be pretty miffed if it caught me mistakenly and didn't let me download things that I wanted to download.
    • For something else you better never do, or "the man come, and take you a way," Click this link. [uncoveror.com] Just say no to copyright infringement!
  • Mein Kamph...

  • My selfish perspective (Score:4, Insightful)

    by L. VeGas ( 580015 ) on Wednesday October 23, 2002 @01:03PM (#4513860) Homepage Journal
    I was excited about this for a second until I actually looked at the list. Can you imagine trying to read Dreiser on your monitor? Or, oh my god, James Joyce?

    I know this has little do with the point of the article, but I bet I could buy any of these books for 50 cents or so and save money on aspirin and eyeglasses by not circumventing the US copyrights on these works.

  • Wow. Makes ya wonder... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by realgone ( 147744 ) on Wednesday October 23, 2002 @01:07PM (#4513902)
    So I'm reading through that list of books which I'm certainly not downloading the background as I type this -- *cough* -- and I noticed Mein Kampf [gutenberg.net.au] is on the list of copyright-extended titles. The first question that pops into my head is: "Who's getting the royalty checks on that nowadays?"
    • I noticed Mein Kampf [gutenberg.net.au] is on the list of copyright-extended titles. The first question that pops into my head is: "Who's getting the royalty checks on that nowadays?"

      That should be Bavaria, the German "land" that holds the copyright of "Mein Kampf".

      • Well, I don't know about that, but if it's Copyrighted then these guys [stormfront.org] are in trouble yet again. OTOH, if the publishers they list, HURST AND BLACKETT, own the US English translation rights and have agreed to let that organization post it, then they are in the clear wrt copyright law. Of course, IANAL.

    • If you have read anything about Germany, you will know they are so anti-anti-semetic that they made it illegal to use anti semetic rhetoric. Mein Kampf is certainly nazi propaganda so

      a.) why is is copyrighted
      b.) is not receiving royalties illegal?

      Makes no sense to me!

      --Joey

      • If you have read anything about Germany, you will know they are so anti-anti-semetic that they made it illegal to use anti semetic rhetoric. Mein Kampf is certainly nazi propaganda so

        a.) why is is copyrighted
        b.) is not receiving royalties illegal?

        Makes no sense to me!

        Bavaria holds the copyright and uses that copyright to actively stop people from printing and distributing the book. It was printed a few years ago in Sweden, but Bavaria protested, and the book was withdrawn.

        This is of course crazy. "Mein Kampf" is an important historical document, and it should be available in printed form. We must learn from history, not try to bury it.

  • In Addition... (Score:3, Funny)

    by The Cydonian ( 603441 ) on Wednesday October 23, 2002 @01:08PM (#4513907) Homepage Journal

    Kids, next time when you want to find the meaning for the (presumably) Spanish word "hupia", don't google [google.com], don't click on the third link [angelfire.com] and no, don't download the page even through Google's cache [216.239.53.100]. You'll be violating a couple of copyright laws, not the least of which is the Copyright extension thing.

    I mean, we still haven't seen any "Michael Crichton is dead at 58" trolls, have we?

  • Interesting (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 23, 2002 @01:19PM (#4513987)
    In today's "information economy", knowledge is power. And now we have news of a real situation where everybody is allowed to freely access several important pieces of work .. except if you happen to live in the United States, that is. And the irony is that this is because of a particularly silly law from these same United States!

    In light of recent events, I wonder if Congress might not be willing to reconsider this law. Broadly interpreted, the intent of this law can almost be considered as treasonous. In a world where knowledge is power, it seems to me that it is borderline sedition to have a government forcibly restrict its citizens from access to knowledge that the rest of the world has for free. I don't see how Congress can (non-hypocritically) express support for U.S. troops in foreign lands while at the same time expressing support for legislation that prevents the American people from arming themselves with information that we may well need to fight the war on terrorism.

  • I'll be grabbing some of the works published in 1923 to 1926, which would currently be in PD were it not for the Bono Act, and posting them on my web site in civil disobedience of the Bono Act. Come and get me beotch.

    And so I can make sure that the federal police [fbi.gov] is reading this, I'm throwing in a few Echelon keywords (which, incidentally, are good for getting around lameness filters):

    air strikes Cuba Libya Iran Iraq Korea Sudan Syria axis of evil Saddam Hussein Osama bin Laden jihad Taliban harboring terrorist Al Qaeda bomb World Trade Center FBI CIA NSA DOJ Unabomber FC Bomberman MI5 MI6 Bond espionage counter intelligence AG Ashcroft national security UN IRS rob banks 2600 hacking pay phone cracking DES crypto anarchy

    • posting them on my web site in civil disobedience of the Bono Act

      Come and break the law with me. http://www.pineight.com/bono/ [pineight.com]

    • There is an interesting article here on the current copyright status of the collected works of H. P. Lovecraft:

      Regarding Copyrights... [gizmology.net]

      Of course, I would have to figure out which stories fell into the Sonny Bono Act black hole in order to figure out which ones could be published to a Website in violation(?) of copyright law.

      Lovecraft, of course, died nearly penniless, never seeing any of the money that those who later claimed copyright on his works gained.

      (I'm still a little miffed that the Cthuhlu Mythos aren't in my copy of Deities and Demigods.)

      • Of course, I would have to figure out which stories fell into the Sonny Bono Act black hole

        • Anything first published before 1923 has fallen into the public domain in the United States. The earlier Lovecraft works are in this category. Project Gutenberg republishes works in this category.
        • Anything first published from 1923 to 1963, whose copyright was not renewed, has fallen into PD in the US. According to the link you gave, the later Lovecraft works are most likely in this category. Project Gutenberg republishes works in this category.
        • Anything first published from 1923 to 1926, whose copyright has been renewed, has fallen into PD in the US PROVIDED that the Bono Act is unconstitutional. My Civil Disobedience [pineight.com] page republishes works in this category.

  • land of the free - ironic (Score:4, Funny)

    by solferino ( 100959 ) <hazchem@gmailCOUGAR.com minus cat> on Wednesday October 23, 2002 @07:44PM (#4518022) Homepage

    this reminds me of the choice you are presented with when downloading the debian cd iso's from sites outside america (like my own country, australia)

    for the first cd you are given the choice of two versions - disk1, and disk1-non-us (labels not exact here)

    one's initial reaction is to think - hey, i want what all those lousy american bastards are getting, i'll go with the standard disk1

    however a little more reading shows you that the non-us cd actually contains lots of goodies that those lousy american bastards are unable to legally obtain - mostly security and encryption stuff

    same with this page - those ppl fortunate enough to be living in america - 'land of the free' - are unable to obtain these books due to their government making a pact with the corporate devil sometime in the late 70s early 80s

    those of us living having to make do with living outside the borders of the 'leader of the free world' are however able to access them

    this, my dear american friends, is called irony
    • those of us living having to make do with living outside the borders of the 'leader of the free world' are however able to access them

      You do realize that there are books which are in copyright in Australia and not in the US. Life of author plus fifty years does sometimes extend beyond the straight 80 which US copyright law currently amounts to. It's worse in Europe, as life plus seventy years usually is longer than a straight 80 years.

      • yes, you make a good point - my comment was a bit of a smart-arse comment and i agree that counting copyright from the date of first publishing makes much more sense than counting it from the death of the author - it's simply unfortunate that the length of time has been extended by so long in the usa

        indeed, with the practice of counting from the date of the death of the author one can imagine writing a fan letter such as :

        dear author,
        i enjoyed your book so much that i am hoping you die soon

        btw, i looked at a few author decease dates after reading this story and noticed that a.a. milne died in 1956 so winnie-the-pooh will be availble copyright free in australia in 2006 - i wonder how disney (who negotiated some sort of exclusive license with the milne estate) feel about that - i myself feel very happy as i find the disney portrayal of winnie the pooh abysmal and would like to see it balanced by other people having the right to present alternative interpretations of winnie the pooh to the public

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