Book People Archive

Re: Stanford Launches Database of Copyright Renewal Records

John Mark Ockerbloom wrote:
> Michael Hart wrote:
> 
>> From what I understand about the Stanford project, they are using the
>> files they downloaded from Project Gutenberg.
> 
> That's one of their sources, yes. ...
> 
> I'm not sure if they downloaded directly from PG, or whether they got
> their filed via Michael Lesk.

I'm fairly sure they got the files from PG. Michael Lesk's database is
based on a "pre-release" version of the files that Distributed
Proofreaders made available to the Internet Archive in December 2003.
There were a few changes to the files between then and the PG-posting
in March 2004, and the Stanford database reflects (at least some of)
those changes.

> They apparently have other sources as well, since they also have book
> renewal records from 1978-1992, which last I checked Gutenberg didn't have.
> I haven't yet been able to determine where they got these from.  
> (Ultimately
> they're from the Copyright Office's database, but they don't seem to have
> obtained them directly from there.)

Back in 2002 or so, someone (who might want not want to be named, I'm
not sure) pulled all the renewal records from the Copyright Office's
database, via one of their online interfaces, and put them into text
files. It looks to me like that's what Stanford is using.

-Michael Dyck