Re: Copyright in Public Domain Photos

On Thu, 24 Jun 1999, Helen Dunne <hdunne[_at_]mov.vic.gov.au> wrote:
>
> On Tue, 22 Jun 1999, Linda Cullen <lcullen[_at_]sipress.si.edu> wrote:
> >
> > I just read with a great deal of interest an article about a recent
> > U.S. District Court case (2nd Circuit Court of NY) wherein it was
> > decided that owners of photos or transparencies of artwork in the
> > public domain can no longer claim copyright to the photos and
> > transparencies. The article entitled "Photos Lose Copyright Rights"
> > by Joshua Kaufman, Esq. appeared in Art Business News, January 1999.
> > Since the article is six months old, I wondered if anything has
> > changed about this ruling since then? Will it go to the Supreme
> > Court?
>
> I'm confused on this one... if the photographs were in the public
> domain which I have interpreted to be copyright has expired, then
> how could they lose copyright? If they were in copyright and the
> owners of the photographs for some reason, somehow lost copyright,
> then surely they would still have certain rights over their property?

The case that the original poster was referring to was Bridgeman v. Corel (Corel v. Bridgeman?). It involved the question whether photograph of public domain works were entitled to copyright protection. The photos themselves were not in the public domain (not through the passage of time, anyway), though the court determined that the photos weren't entitled to copyright protection, because they were faithful reproductions of the PD works.

Patrick W. Begos
Begos & Horgan, LLP
NY and CT
begos[_at_]ibm.net Received on Thu Jun 24 1999 - 13:44:58 GMT