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Comment by wmorgan | Hacker News Reader

That's a timely question with the holidays coming up. A lot of people will be wanting to watch movies from the 1940's and 50's. Many of them don't realize those works are still under copyright.

It's not just hypothetical. In our family we subscribe to 3 or 4 streaming services, but last year we still had to pay $5 to watch It's a Wonderful Life (1946), a movie that was literally in the public domain for 20 years. A Charlie Brown Christmas (1965) wasn't available at any price, except with ads that stretched its 25-minute runtime to nearly an hour. We pirated that one. I don't think most people would think there was anything wrong with that.

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You think an ordinary person's expectation is that It's A Wonderful Life is public domain? I think the opposite thing is true, and that most Americans generally assume that any major motion picture or television show is copyrighted no matter when it was produced.

> I think the opposite thing is true, and that most Americans generally assume that any major motion picture or television show is copyrighted no matter when it was produced.

You're probably right for everything produced since the second World War, but I doubt people think that e.g. Triumph of the Will is under copyright. I think people have a vague notion of "historical" vs. "contemporary" that starts right around the end of WWII.

Why not? Lots of ordinary people were watching it in 1980's, when it actually was in the public domain. I don't think they realize it gets the same level of legal protection as new releases.

My point is there's plenty of good content people want that's 30-70 years old & they don't feel bad about pirating it. My dad by his principles would never download a new movie; nevertheless he's looking up the songs from his childhood on YouTube. He feels entitled to listen to them whenever and however he wants. I think that's a pretty common attitude toward the older stuff.

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