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Comment by bni | Hacker News Reader

If someone scans a recent DVD release of SW, is it still public domain?

Or must you have access to an original film reel from the early 1900 and scan that? Do anyone have besides in some Disney archive?

Has issues like that ever been clarified?

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If you consider https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Threshold_of_originality the answer seems to be "it depends"

For example, in the US there have been cases where high quality reproductions of old public domain paintings did not meet the threshold of originality to qualify for copyright. Remastered audio recordings with adjustments such as equalisation and sound editing were ruled to be eligible for copyright in 2016, then the ruling was overturned in 2018.

On the other hand, under German law digitised versions of public domain paintings are entitled to new 'Leistungsschutzrecht' copyrights, reflecting the effort and expertise necessary to create the reproductions.

There was actually a dispute between Wikipedia/Wikimedia Commons and the British National Gallery over this - the UK working similar to Germany

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Portrait_Gallery_and_...

Actually the UK works like the USA, there was a recent court case on this that made it very clear. Photographs of public domain works, of any quality, are public domain as well unless they contain some original expression of their own (say, if you're taking a selfie in front of a famous picture, you probably have copyright over it - but not if a museum takes a high-res, excellent lighting photo to reproduce the painting itself).

There are some more details on the UK system and its historical changes at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweat_of_the_brow#New_(Europea...

UK law is very clear in the sense that in 2023, an appeals court judgement explicitly stated that in the UK, no new copyright is created in making a photographic reproduction of a two-dimensional public domain artwork.

UK law is not very clear, in the sense that it took an appeals court judge to reach that determination, and it only happened in 2023 :)

And presumably if people like Disney were so inclined they could make sure every new DVD release had slight adjustments to colour grading, a remastered audio track, and things like that, muddying the water by introducing more elements of human creativity.

Actually, according to Wikipedia, starting in 2021, even Germany requires human creativity for a work to be protected by copyright. They explicitly say in the law that simple reproduction of public domain works is not protected.

In the UK, it was recently ruled that copyright could only apply to things not designed solely to replicate the original artefact. The context was museums licensing photographs of artefacts while keeping the originals locked away.

From what I understand it's not been tested significantly in the US yet, though I could be wrong.

Although it’s somewhat different IANAL but Feist probably at least peripherally applies in that “sweat of the brow” doesn’t give you copyright. So with respect to the photographs, just because you spent days setting everything up to get the perfect reproduction, you probably still can’t get copyright on it.

https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Reuse_of_PD-Art...

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridgeman_Art_Library_v._Cor....

There's a similar case in the US - Bridgeman vs Corel - that influenced the UK one. I don't think it forms a universal rule in the US, unlike the more recent UK ruling, but it is influential.

I'm guessing that Brock Baker didn't digitise a 1928 reel of film himself.

If the digitisation was done recently and a lot of work went into cleaning up the images (restoring old movies is time consuming and costly - including artists touching up/recreating/fixing frames) couldn't Disney (or who ever has done it) claim that the new restored digitised version is now copyright?

It seems to depend on the exact jurisdiction, but in the US and UK, it seems that this type of work is not protected, as it doesn't constitute human expression, it is only a matter of skill and technique.

Now of course anyone can claim anything in court, and you have to decide whether you think you can beat Disney's lawyers if you decide to do so...

It's like trying to copyright pictures of artwork from a museum - I don't think changing the media matters - taking a picture isn't significant authorship of a painting. Similarly whether on DVD or film reel, there isn't a significant authorship change in posting the same clip from a DVD.

Recent Hacker News discussion on this:

Court of Appeal ruling will prevent UK museums from charging reproduction fees

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38817128

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