Jimmy Wales wrote:
I would like to gather from the community some examples of works you would like to see made free, works that we are not doing a good job of generating free replacements for, works that could in theory be purchased and freed.
Dream big. Imagine there existed a budget of $100 million to purchase copyrights to be made available under a free license. What would you like to see purchased and released under a free license? ...
I was recently asked this question by someone who is potentially in a position to make this happen, and he wanted to know what we need, what we dream of, that we can't accomplish on our own, or that we would expect to take a long time to accomplish on our own.
Although this is not associated with text in any manner, I strongly recommend that the rights and metal parts for all the pre-1942 sound recordings now held by Sony BMG (which includes just about everything recorded in the U.S. before 1942, including the Columbia/ARC and RCA Victor catalogs) be purchased and "freed". I don't know the exact number of recordings, but this collection definitely comprises over a million "sides."
Although I'm not certain Sony BMG would entertain an offer, there is some reason to believe they might, especially if linked in with some potential tax write-offs and the positive publicity that this would give Sony BMG.
For background information on the unusual copyright status of early U.S. sound recordings (which is surprising!), and whether or not Sony BMG might even be interested, refer to the article I wrote about the topic of freeing the older sound recordings:
http://www.projectgramophone.org/TeleRead-Article-01Nov2003.html
(Especially refer to the section entitled: "A Note To The Major Media Companies: Why Not Donate Your Older Sound Recording Catalogues?")
Note that this is serious. I have close ties to Brewster Kahle at the Internet Archive (we've explored how to get many of the older recordings digitized and placed online and have even talked about acquiring a large collection of 78 rpm records), plus I have close connections with the Association for Recorded Sound Collections:
I'll be happy to discuss this further with the person in the position to potentially make the purchase.
Jon Noring