On Tue, 21 Dec 2004 16:37:04 +0000, Zoney zoney.ie@gmail.com wrote:
As far as I know, certainly in some jurisdictions very little modification of public domain or out of copyright work may be required to create a new copyrighted work.
While we don't want to be too fussy, as it's unlikely an uncertain case will be challenged, we should keep an eye on photos of such objects (to pick a contrived copyrighted example, an inspired photo of a row of old paintings - i.e. an original work to some extent despite the paintings not being the work of the photographer)
Also, as a practical matter, I suspect that even in those jurisdictions, since the work is in the public domain and only the copies have a claimed copyright, the owners would have to prove WHICH copy you in turn copied. After all, there's no original copyright to defend, so proving a resemblance to the original is not enough to prove infringement. I suspect being unable to determine which copyright was in fact infringed would make a case rather difficult to prove.
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