Hi everyone,
First, I want to introduce myself, as I’ve been a lurker until now on this list. My name is Alek Tarkowski, I head a Polish digital / open think tank called Centrum Cyfrowe, and I’m also active with Communia.
The campaign that you are discussing has been created by us, and I’m happy and open to discuss it. Please feel free to share any doubts, criticisms or suggestions.
Regarding the copyright duration, please note, that this is not just an issue of Otto Frank’s co-authorship. There’s also the issue of extended copyright protection for works published post-mortem. Because of this, versions A and B of the diary, despite having not been edited by Otto Frank, are according to Dutch law in copyright until 2036.
We’ve written about this on our blog:
We were not aware that the diary has been already made available, thank you for providing the link. I still feel that the advantage of our work is the effort we put into making this case public.
All the best,
Alek Tarkowski
Hi Jan,
Re. your statement: "It turns out that the original Dutch version is in the public domain in Poland -- but not in the Netherlands"
This may be premature. It all depends on whether you accept the claim that Otto Frank has copyright over Anne Frank’s diary.
As I stated on the communia-blog: that claim has not yet been upheld by any court and is considered invalid by several experts on the writings of Anne Frank.
I am not sure whether this campaign - however sympathetic its cause - helps ensure that Anne Frank's diary remains firmly in the public domain, as it appears to take these claims for granted,
Also: the text of the diary has been available from this (French?) website since January 1.
--
dyrektor, Centrum Cyfrowe
Twitter: @atarkowski
WWW: centrumcyfrowe.pl / creativecommons.pl
polecam:
uwolnij.podrecznik.org / otwartawiedza.pl / otwartengo.pl / otwartezabytki.pl