Talk:List of films in the public domain in the United States

Sita Sings the Blues is NOT in the Public Domain
Under the terms of the Copyright Act 1976, it is NOT LEGALLY POSSIBLE to release a work into the public domain. All copyrightable works created on or after 1 January 1978 are protected by copyright from the moment of creation - whether or not the creator wants them to be protected by Copyright.

Copyright is an intangible intellectual property that can be bought, sold or given away to/by an individual, business entity or sovereign entity. The public domain is none of those. No work enters the public domain until its copyright expires according to the law of the individual country.

E.g. Gone With the Wind is still protected by copyright in the United States where U.S. copyright law applies. But it is in the public domain in Canada, where Canadian copyright law applies.

Nota Bene: There is no such thing as international copyright law. There are international agreements about copyright law, but they are NOT laws. All signatory nations to these agreements protect each other's copyrighted works according their own laws.

Creative Commons Corporation is a Massachusetts corporation with its principal place of business in Mountain view, California. It is NOT the U.S. Congress and has NO power to change the Copyright Act.

The fact a work has a Creative Commons licence - or any other similar licence - does NOT put the work into the public domain. It just means the creator of the work has given permission, through the Creative Commons Corporation, to let anybody use the copyrighted work according to the terms of the licence. If you break the terms of the licence, your use of the work can be terminated.

Conversely, when a work enters the public domain NO LICENCE IS NEEDED to use it. E.g. The plays and films West Side Story, Kiss Me, Kate and The Boys from Syracuse were all based on plays by William Shakespeare - respectively, Romeo and Juliet, The Taming of the Shrew, and The Comedy of Errors." The creators of those 20th century works did not need permission from Shakespeare's estate; they did they need to pay a royalty for using his work as the basis of their own works; AND they did NOT even have to acknowledge their modern works were based on works by Shakespeare. Because the original works were all in the public domain, it was perfectly legal to adapt them into modern form without bothering to acknowledge or credit Shakespeare as their source -- just as it was perfectly legal for Shakespeare to write Hamlet without bothering to credit Holinshed as his'' source.

That is NOT the case with a Creative Commons licence. You don't have to pay to use a CC licensed work but you have NO right in law to use it as the basis of a new work of your own, for which you claim sole credit. If you do that, the FBI can come after you for criminal copyright infringement - and if that happens, NO Creative Commons license will save you.

So, again, a license from Creative Commons or anybody else can let other people use your work with paying you or obtaining your permission; but it does NOT put your work into the public domain. The law does NOT permit that.

2601:645:C300:3950:1DD9:C44E:3548:A19E (talk) 07:52, 24 March 2021 (UTC)


 * That's not correct. One can overtly place a work in the public domain; it's called abandonment of copyright, and is well-recognized in US copyright law, and has been for a long time. The general requirement is the intent of the copyright owner to abandon, and some manifestation of that intent by an overt act showing the intent to abandon. A sampling of cases and other references that discuss this:
 * Capitol Records v. Naxos of America. 372 F. 3d 471 (2nd Cir. 2004) ("The parties agree that the District Court invoked the correct legal standard in stating that abandonment of copyright requires '(1) an intent by the copyright holder to surrender rights in the work; and (2) an overt act evidencing that intent.'");
 * Hampton v. Paramount Pictures Corporation, 279 F. 2d 100 (9th Cir. 1960)(applying abandonment doctrine under the 1909 Copyright Act: "Rights gained under the Copyright Law, 17 U.S.C.A. § 1 et seq., may be abandoned. Abandonment of such rights, however, must be manifested by some overt act indicative of a purpose to surrender the rights and allow the public to copy.")
 * Micro Star v. Formgen Inc., 154 F. 3d 1107 (9th Cir. 1998)(Citing Hampton and applying the same doctrine and test under the 1976 Act).
 * Fagundes, Dave and Perzanowski, Aaron K., "Abandoning Copyright" (2020). Faculty Publications. 2060.


 * There's no serious question that a would-be copyright owner can abandon their copyright and voluntarily place their work in the public domain. If you want the article to reflect otherwise, you need to have some credible reliable sources to back your view. TJRC (talk) 04:28, 6 April 2021 (UTC)
 * That's right. In addition, copyright law allows creators to license their works. Nothing at all prevents them from choosing a Creative Commons license over any other to license their works to the public. Huggums537 (talk) 11:49, 2 September 2022 (UTC)
 * Let's not resurrect a dead thread. For accuracy's sake: a CC license is not a submission of the work to the public domain. Only the CC0 license is a public-domain-equivalent license. lethargilistic (talk) 06:39, 17 September 2022 (UTC)
 * Agreed. Thank you for clarifying that. Copyright law allows creators to license their works, and nothing at all prevents them from choosing any of the CC licenses to copyright their works, including the CC0 or any other Public-domain-equivalent license. My point was that The CC license is just as valid for licensing as any other copyright license including the CC PD license. So if that was not clear, hopefully you now cleared it up. Thanks. Huggums537 (talk) 16:10, 17 September 2022 (UTC)

about the film the terror
didn't Austin McConnell bought the rights to the Spanish dub of The Terror? ...and I&#39;m AlwaysOutnumberedNeverOutgunned (talk) 11:52, 4 December 2021 (UTC)

Public Domain Day 2023.
Greetings,

I see that over the years, writers here have had extensive discussions on the topic of films in the US Public Domain (PD). I read through several pages of discussions, but my endurance was sapped so, that I could not go on. Forgive me if you already know about this resource.

'The Center for the Study of the Public Domain' has information about some items that yearly come into PD. There are some films listed on their 'Public domain Day 2023' page, including "The Jazz Singer", "Metropolis (original version)", and "Wings" - all quite notable. Perhaps you will find other valuable list candidates from other 'Public Domain Day' years.


 * Duke University Law School, The Center for the Study of the Public Domain - https://web.law.duke.edu/cspd/
 * About - https://web.law.duke.edu/cspd/about/
 * 'Public Domain Day 2023' [also, scroll down for a discussion of the current law and the negative effects it has had] - https://web.law.duke.edu/cspd/publicdomainday/2023/
 * 'Copyright Registrations and Renewal Records' - https://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/cce/

"Current US law extends copyright for 70 years after the date of the author’s death, and corporate “works-for-hire” are copyrighted for 95 years after publication. Prior to the 1976 Copyright Act (which became effective in 1978), the maximum copyright term was 56 years—an initial term of 28 years, renewable for another 28 years. Under those laws, works published in 1964 would enter the public domain on January 1, 2021. Under current copyright law, we’ll have to wait until 2060." - - - https://web.law.duke.edu/cspd/publicdomainday/2021/pre-1976/#fn1text

PS: Thank you to whomever it was that provided the link to the comic book, "Bound by Law", at 'The Center for the Study of the Public Domain'. It is a fun presentation of copyright; I could really feel the protagonist's frustration.

Thank you for your time, Wordreader (talk) 19:33, 19 October 2023 (UTC)


 * Hi, this list only covers films made since 1928, excluding works of the US government. There is no point cataloging films made before then because it would involve adding virtually every American film to the list. If you know of any films in the PD since then that are not in the list we'd be happy to add them. Betty Logan (talk) 21:14, 19 October 2023 (UTC)