In many ways the current laws on copyright afford a  very long protection period, compared to say patents on real ideas that ironically actually take longer to develop to a point where something can be sold that so the creator might recover their money back. In general  a patent on an engineering idea or design expires after 20 years from first filing , but a publication copyright lasts 70 years from release, or 70- years after the named author's death (last named author if more than one), and trademarks last as long as you keep up the registration payments.

The irony is that a lot of this copyright protected stuff is earning the owners of the copyright nothing at all, and in many cases it is not even clear if there is a legal entity who is the copyright owner, and the advice has to be, if in doubt do not copy.

In practice this means that there are many books, films etc first published   up to the mid 1920s still in copyright, but no enforceable patents from before Feb 2004.
As a hardware guy (with his name on a few patents from the 1990s) I find this disparity rather unfair but hey-ho.

However, fortunately.  for the purposes of debate on fora like this, or for study and training, reasonable excerpts may be perfectly legally made from things that are still in copyright so long as the source is acknowledged.

(a perfectly legal example of a small excerpt to help the debate, from https://web.law.duke.edu/cspd/publicdomainday/2024/ )

There is of course no reason that an organization may not accept or even perform the release of things they are responsible for into the public domain earlier that they are forced to by law,  but it is quite unusual to do so.
(Look at who can(not) draw a picture that looks like Mickey mouse or having to pay Warner/Chappell if you are seen singing "Happy Birthday to you" in  public as example of misuse of that power if you like.)  Both those examples have only very recently become legal in the UK, and even now only for a very early black and white mickey mouse..

Mike.

In many ways the current laws on copyright afford a  very long protection period, compared to say patents on real ideas that ironically actually take longer to develop to a point where something can be sold that so the creator might recover their money back. In general  a patent on an engineering idea or design expires after 20 years from first filing , but a publication copyright lasts 70 years from release, or 70- years after the named author's death (last named author if more than one), and trademarks last as long as you keep up the registration payments.

The irony is that a lot of this copyright protected stuff is earning the owners of the copyright nothing at all, and in many cases it is not even clear if there is a legal entity who is the copyright owner, and the advice has to be, if in doubt do not copy.

In practice this means that there are many books, films etc first published   up to the mid 1920s still in copyright, but no enforceable patents from before Feb 2004.
As a hardware guy (with his name on a few patents from the 1990s) I find this disparity rather unfair but hey-ho.

However, fortunately.  for the purposes of debate on fora like this, or for study and training, reasonable excerpts may be perfectly legally made from things that are still in copyright so long as the source is acknowledged.

(a perfectly legal example of a small excerpt to help the debate, from https://web.law.duke.edu/cspd/publicdomainday/2024/ )

There is of course no reason that an organization may not accept or even perform the release of things they are responsible for into the public domain earlier that they are forced to by law,  but it is quite unusual to do so.
(Look at who can(not) draw a picture that looks like Mickey mouse or having to pay Warner/Chappell if you are seen singing "Happy Birthday to you" in  public as example of misuse of that power if you like.)  Both those examples have only very recently become legal in the UK, and even now only for a very early black and white mickey mouse..

Mike.