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[Propagation note: Originally posted Tuesday, 25 June, 5:03 am, and it's not yet shown up on my server after nearly 100 hours. I wonder what on earth is going on. Times vary from this extreme, to 24-30 hours (usually), to one post early this morning in only 30 minutes. This makes no sense. Packet routing like this is being done as if the Net used passenger trains, not electrons, for mail. ... Sorry if this showed up twice for you. --SR] Betsy Speicher wrote: >>Project Gutenberg has some wonderful things but they are all in >>the public domain. _Atlas_Shrugged_ and _The_Fountainhead_ are still >>under copyright. Coming in April, 2032: The complete CD-Chip version of Rand's works! Now ready for insertion into your 50-terabyte-capacity wristwatch-viewer library! At a store near you! (That's when all of her copyrights finally expire, with one exception. And it may be the soonest we'd see this, anyway ... but that's another polemic.) Ed Matthews writes: >I've seen online copies of Anthem all over the place. Is that because >the copyright expired, or did someone violate the copyright laws? "Anthem," alone among Rand's works, is now in the public domain, and openly acknowledged as such. Scan the copyright page of the new 60th Anniversary Edition, and you'll see no notice. (A fascinating edition, by the way, with a facsimile of her original British edition and her own handwritten alterations. I'm not so sure that every bit she cut out was that badly done, myself.) The reason for this is that Rand transferred the copyright, in 1947, to a company that Leonard Read had set up called "Pamphleteers," dedicated to a publishing program of individualist and libertarian works. Although this contract brought the book to America, provoked Rand's re-edited edition, and brought the book many new printings from Caxton Printers in hardcover (later, in NAL paperback), the Pamphleteers group didn't succeed with other titles. Isabel Paterson was once approached about lending her titles to this effort, including "The God of the Machine," but was dubious about its prospects. Pamphleteers, Inc. subsequently went defunct, as Read turned his attention to the newly formed Foundation for Economic Education. (Some of the gyrations about the founding of these organizations, and Rand's initial interest, is depicted among several letters to Read in "Letters of Ayn Rand.") It seems that 1973 (the 26-year anniversary) passed without Rand renewing the copyright in her own name, as was then her legal right. This has happened many times with books that have copyright held in an organization's name. Something similar happened with Frank Capra's film "It's a Wonderful Life," not renewed after falling into limbo in 1972, when RKO Pictures' remnants were in legal turmoil after the death of Howard Hughes. It was in the public domain for 22 years, which is why you saw it so many times on TV. (A new copyright doctrine from the Federal courts allowed Republic Pictures to claim copyright on the film in 1994 -- by buying the rights to the song in the film, "Buffalo Gals, Won't You Come Out Tonight," and to the original short story behind the screenplay. And *that's* why it is shown on TV only once a year now.) Now all copyrights are held until 50 years after the original author's death, for works created since the Copyright Act of 1976. The original author also retains all rights unless they're *explicitly* given up by contract, or by doing the writing as someone else's employee. "The Fountainhead," from what I've been able to construe, enters the public domain in 2026, by falling under a special revision to the copyright law that applies to most works still in print and written before 1950. "Atlas Shrugged" will enter the public domain in 2009. § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § § Steve Reed ... jsreed@interaccess.com Piece of Sky Consulting, Chicago Windows assistance and fine type crafting