What Could Have Been In the Public Domain Today, But Isn't

SgtChaireBourne writes "Many works published in 1955 would have entered the public domain this year. Duke University's Center for the Study of the Public Domain has an overview of the movies, books, songs and historical works that are kept out of the public domain by changes to copyright law since 1978. Instead of seeing these enter the public domain in 2012, we will have to wait until 2051 before being able to use these works without restriction."

Comments

one chapter falls flat

[mapkinase]

Chained Melodies, and Molecules . . .

What if you were interested in scientific developments in 1955 (the year that Tim Berners-Lee, Steve Jobs, and Bill Gates were born)? Many copyrighted scientific journal articles about, for example, the synthesis of DNA- and RNA-like molecules, the effect of placebos, the experimental confirmation of the existence of the antiproton, fibre optics, or the synthesis of mendelevium remain behind paywalls (see here, here, here, here, and here.) (Not all scientific publishers work under this kind of copyright scheme. “Open Access” scientific publications, like those of the Public Library of Science, are under Creative Commons attribution licenses, meaning that they can be copied freely from the day they are published.)

1/ Most important articles published now are free for read.
2/ Old articles are already in the textbooks if they are worthy, and should be forgotten, if not. Nobody except freaks is interested in what exactly was the wording of Crick and Watson's paper, and everybody knows what it is about.

Re:Brought to you by:

[Anonymous Coward]

That's "crony capitalism", brought to new heights by der furher Obama.