January 2010
Yeats and Freud Copyright Expires
The works of WB Yeats and Sigmund Freud are being made available to view for free online on websites including Wikisource as their copyright protection has now expired.
Copyright protection in the EU lasts for the life of the author plus 70 years from the end of the year of the author’s death. As both Yeats and Freud died in 1939 the copyright in their works expired at midnight on New Years Eve 2009.
Other cultural works that have now been made available for free due to the expiration of their copyright include Arthur Rackham’s illustrations which appeared in early versions of children’s books such as Peter Pan and Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and the works of archaeologist Howard Carter who had discovered the tomb of Tutankhamen.
A representative of Wikimedia UK the not-for-profit foundation which runs the Wikipedia and Wikisource sites has said that from their experience making such works available for free sparks a new wave of creativity as it promotes the modern day interpretation of classic works.
BRIFFA Comment
The length of EU copyright protection is substantial however a very important feature of EU copyright law is that it successfully strikes a balance between the encouragement of creativity and effective protection of original works.
Even though for example the works of Yeats and Freud have been protected by copyright for over 100 years their works have no doubt inspired the works of others during this period. The key to this is the fact that copyright law protects the expression of an idea as an original work from substantial copying rather than the idea itself.
In addition, once out of copyright, the Internet now provides a digital platform from which such works can be broadcast to a global audience some members of which may otherwise never have had access to them.
For more information on copyright protection and enforcement please do not hesitate to get into contact with one of our Intellectual Property Lawyers via info@briffa.com.