[Foundation-l] [Wikimediauk-l] [Fwd: Royal Society Digital Journal Archive]

[Andrew Gray]

On 26/09/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> To what extent is this true under US law?
>
> The claim to ownership of a scan from 1665 is odious. Perhaps it's just me.

Do remember, of course, that only a trivial proportion of these works
are from 1665! Nothing published in the last seventy years is likely
to be safely out of copyright (as new scientific material is rarely
posthumous, and scientific journals don't tend to go in for reprints
of old stuff), and you have to go back to about 1860-70 before you're
safe assuming PD without checking the author's details.

(Before that, or for any where you can be sure as to when the author
died - transcribe away, Macduff...)

-- 
- Andrew Gray
  andrew.gray at dunelm.org.uk