An Interesting and Useful Look at of Some of the Books, Films, and Music Entering the U.S. Public Domain on January 1, 2019

UPDATE December 29, 2018: Public Domain Review Publishes “Class of 2019” Article

[The Public Domain Review] top pick of artists and writers whose works will, on 1st January 2019, enter the public domain in many countries around the world.
Of the eleven featured, six will be entering the public domain in countries with a “life plus 70 years” copyright term (e.g. most European Union members, Brazil, Israel, Nigeria, Russia, Turkey, etc.) and five in countries with a “life plus 50 years” copyright term (e.g. Canada, New Zealand, and many countries in Asia and Africa) — those that died in the year 1948 and 1968 respectively. As always it’s a motley crew assembled for our graduation photo, including a major figure of the European avant-garde, two of the most important figures in the history of film, the urinal-loving father of conceptual art, and three key figures in social justice movements.

• The Class of 2019 Includes:
• Mervyn Peake
• Martin Luther King Jr
• Marcel Duchamp
• Kurt
• John Steinbeck
• Helen Keller
• Maria Olga de Moraes Sarmento da Silveira
• Ruth Benedict
• Sergei Eisenstein
• Antonin Artaud
• D. W. Griffith

Read the Complete Article
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End Update
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From the Center for the Study of the Public Domain (Duke University Law School)

For the first time in over 20 years, on January 1, 2019, published works will enter the US public domain. Works from 1923 will be free for all to use and build upon, without permission or fee. They include dramatic films such as The Ten Commandments, and comedies featuring Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, and Harold Lloyd. There are literary works by Robert Frost, Aldous Huxley, and Edith Wharton, the “Charleston” song, and more. And remember, this has not happened for over 20 years. Why? Works from 1923 were set to go into the public domain in 1999, after a 75-year copyright term. But in 1998 Congress hit a two-decade pause button and extended their copyright term for 20 years, giving works published between 1923 and 1977 an expanded term of 95 years.
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Here are some of the works that will be entering the public domain in 2019. A fuller (but still partial) listing of over a thousand works that we have researched can be found here.

Films

• Safety Last!, directed by Fred C. Newmeyer and Sam Taylor, featuring Harold Lloyd
• The Ten Commandments, directed by Cecil B. DeMille
• The Pilgrim, directed by Charlie Chaplin
• Our Hospitality, directed by Buster Keaton and John G. Blystone
• The Covered Wagon, directed by James Cruze
• Scaramouche, directed by Rex Ingram

Books

• Edgar Rice Burroughs, Tarzan and the Golden Lion
• Agatha Christie, The Murder on the Links
• Winston S. Churchill, The World Crisis
• e.e. cummings, Tulips and Chimneys
• Robert Frost, New Hampshire
• Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet
• Aldous Huxley, Antic Hay
• D.H. Lawrence, Kangaroo
• Bertrand and Dora Russell, The Prospects of Industrial Civilization
• Carl Sandberg, Rootabaga Pigeons
• Edith Wharton, A Son at the Front
• P.G. Wodehouse, works including The Inimitable Jeeves and Leave it to Psmith

Music

• Yes! We Have No Bananas, w.&m. Frank Silver & Irving Cohn
• Charleston, w.&m. Cecil Mack & James P. Johnson
• London Calling! (musical), by Noel Coward
• Who’s Sorry Now, w. Bert Kalmar & Harry Ruby, m. Ted Snyder
• Songs by “Jelly Roll” Morton including Grandpa’s Spells, The Pearls, and Wolverine Blues (w. Benjamin F. Spikes & John C. Spikes; m. Ferd “Jelly Roll” Morton)
• Works by Bela Bartok including the Violin Sonata No. 1 and the Violin Sonata No. 2

Direct to Spreadsheet Listing Over 1000 Items Entering Public Domain on Jan. 1, 2019 (.xls)
Read the Complete Article (approx. 2000 words)

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