Book People Archive

A summary timeline of recent US copyright extensions

There have been some longish email messages lately asking when
US copyright terms were changed, so I thought it useful to boil down
a summary of what extensions were made and when.  I've
elided some details; if you want to know more, see the annotated
US Copyright Law at copyright.gov or fairuse.stanford.edu, or
look at the documents cited in some of the recent posts.  For more
details about what's *now* in the public domain or copyrighted,
see http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/okbooks.html .


   -- 1909-1962: US copyright terms run for 28 years if not renewed,
                 56 years if renewed.  According to a 1961 Copyright
                 Office study, fewer than 15% of registered copyrights
                 get renewed when the time comes to do so.

   -- 1962:      All renewed copyrights extended to Dec. 31, 1965
                 or later.  This was the first of a series of short
                 extensions intended to "freeze" renewed copyrights
                 until an overhauled copyright regime patterned after the
                 Berne Convention could be passed.  (The Berne
                 Convention requires copyright of life+50 years,
                 rounds terms up to the end of the year, and
                 mandates that copyright not be dependent on
                 "formalities" like copyright notice, registration,
                 and renewal.)  From this point onward, all renewed
                 copyright terms would be rounded up to the end of
                 the year.

   -- 1962-1976: 8 more one-time extensions were passed, to continue
                 the freeze on renewed copyright expiration, in the
                 continued absence of an overhauled copyright law.
                 Each extension is for 1 or 2 additional years,
                 enough to ensure that no renewed copyrights expire
                 during this time period.

   -- 1976:      Planned overhaul finally passed.  Renewed copyrights
                 extended to 75 years, rounded up.  New copyrights
                 from 1978 onward would not be subject to renewal.
                 Instead, their terms would be 75 years rounded up for
                 works for hire and similar works, life+50 years
                 rounded up for works of personal authorship, a la Berne.
                 (Again, I'm simplifying a bit here.)

   -- 1989:      Requirement of copyright notice eliminated.

   -- 1992:      Renewal made automatic for copyrights subject to
                 renewal.  (This effectively prevented any copyright
                 after 1963 from expiring due to nonrenewal.)

   -- 1993:      Across the ocean, the European Union
                 mandates life+70 year copyrights, 20 years longer than
                 required by Berne.   Lobbyists, citing this development,
                 press the US Congress to also extend its copyrights
                 by 20 years.  They'd get their way after a few years
                 of effort.

   -- 1996:      After the Uruguay round of GATT, Congress retroactively
                 exempts many foreign works from notice, registration,
                 and renewal requirements.  This brought many previously
                 public domain foreign works back into copyright, and
                 as far as I know, it's the only recent US law to have
                 taken things out of the public domain.  It's why you
                 now have to check the publishing history of works by
                 non-US authors published after 1922 to determine
                 if they're in the public domain.

   -- 1998:      Congress adds 20 years to the terms of nearly all
                 copyrights still in force.  Pre-1978 copyrights, works
                 for hire, etc., now run a maximum of 95 years rounded
                 up; other copyrights now life+70 rounded up.  This
                 effectively "freezes" subsisting copyrights from 1923
                 or later.

                 On behalf of her late husband and MPAA chief Jack
                 Valenti, US Rep. Mary Bono asks Congress to further
                 extend copyright terms to last "forever minus one day".
                 Congress has yet to take her up on this.

   -- 2003:      One amall bright spot: Works never published prior
                 to 2003 by long-dead authors start to expire under
                 the "life+70 rounded up" rule.
                 (Prior to the 1976 revision, unpublished works were
                  effectively covered by an unlimited-length "common law"
                 copyright.)  Works published before 2003, or that
                 have copyrights from 1978 or later, won't expire
                 under life+70 until at least 2049.

   -- 2019:      Copyrights from 1923 are scheduled to finally expire,
                 at least if Mary Bono and those with similar sentiments
                 don't get their way before then.

John