Copyright material expire date?

[since1791]

This forum has been a huge help over the last several months as I've been learning to perform repairs/maintenance on my 1965 Evinrude 9.5 Sportwin. One of the issues I've experienced is the difficulty of finding pics or illustrated docs that were not found anywhere in the postings that would have been a huge help. Recently I've bought the old repair & owners manuals that were made by Johnson in order to help with this issue. These original items are hard to find. I also own the Seloc manual, but it's often way too broad in its application since it covers so many different HP/model year motors.

I'd really like to be able to help others with the same engine just as this forum has been a huge help to me. So the questions are this: Isn't there some kind of # of years limit on copyright material to where it becomes public domain after so many years? In other words, couldn't I post a couple pages of the actual Evinrude service manual from the 1960's? I thought it was 30 years, but I could be wrong about this altogether.

Also, I believe that there's some kind of law that allows people to post up to 10% of copyrighted material for the purposes of commentating or teaching on the material? Example: I post 2 pages of a repair manual & comment along with the pics about what i experienced while performing this repair or suggestions as a result of lessons learned.

Any advice is appreciated as the goal is to help others just as I've been helped, w/out violating forum rules.

 

[F_R]

Re: Copyright material expire date?

I've looked into that question, and the best I've come up with is ask a lawyer. What I've absorbed is that all original works are copyrighted by somebody. It expires after a certain number of years and can be renewed. What is hard to do is enforcing the copyright. Once it hits the internet, it is splattered all over the world. What are you going to do, sue everybody? Yeah, I know, sue where the money is. Lawyer speak again. BTW, my idea of educational is the library website that has copies of all those service manuals. But I'm no lawyer. Just my 2c, so don't listen to me.

 

[Silvertip]

Re: Copyright material expire date?

Here ya go!

http://smallbusiness.findlaw.com/co...yright-Expiration&HBX_PK=copyright+expiration

 

[since1791]

Re: Copyright material expire date?

thanks very much for the responses & the link was very helpful. Especially liked how the link put it into layman terms for the most part too. Short, simple, & to the point. Appreciate the help- thanks to you both! Guess I'll have to find more 'creative' ways to help others with my same engine if there's something that I can actually contribute.

 

[JB]

Re: Copyright material expire date?

I believe that Ken Cook (outboardbooks.com) renewed the copyrights on all of the vintage OMC outboard manuals. Seems reasonable that they would not object to publication of a page or so as part of a technical discussion, but I would not do it without written permission from them.

 

[NSBCraig]

Re: Copyright material expire date?

Copyrights last for life of author plus 50 years or 75 years if it was a work for hire or done under a fake name. So I they still hold up.

There is no renewal, maybe a new printing, or new copyright that covers added text etc. but the term doesn't get upgraded.

As long as your not selling it you are perfectly legal to include any amount of it.

If you have any questions I'd be glad to help you out more, I took copyright law in college (even though that was a couple years ago).

 

[Silvertip]

Re: Copyright material expire date?

This is a commercial web site -- not private. So this may not be consideered a private exchange since it is in the commercial domain. The likelyhood of anyone being taken to task over sharing copyrighted information is slim, but it does happen and we should at least respect the work of the author and not behave like the offshore "fake" DVD/clothing/software operators. I'm a model airplane enthusiast and as such see lots of offshore scale models that are knock-offs of American designed kits. It has come to the point where the manufacturers of the full size airplanes are now licensing the model manufacturers to enable them to use the likeness, markings, and the name on their models. This has forced the offshore operators to at least use different names and slightly altered markings to peddle the same old models. So be upright folks -- honor the copyright.

 

[JB]

Re: Copyright material expire date?

From our rules:

3. Do not post copyrighted material or request that anyone else violate copyright law.

Does this leave any more questions?

 

[NSBCraig]

Re: Copyright material expire date?

Welp there you go- You didn't want to violate forum rules but it's already ruled out. Makes sense since this is iboats commercial forum and not one ran just by enthusiasts, I'm sure they don't even begin to want to deal with the hassle, and by all means it's their show.

 

[The_Kid]

Re: Copyright material expire date?

Best way to be legal is to is to read the copyright information for the manual. Here's what is listed on the shop manual PDF files that I have for my engines. a good place to get manuals for older engines is your local library. My library subscribes to EBSCO database so I can log into my library and access, the manuals online.




So I can e-mail the information to someone but I am not allowed to to post it to a site.

 

[NSBCraig]

Re: Copyright material expire date?

They can say just about anything it doesn't actually mean anything, Keith.

Yes you can post it on a site (not this one), and yes you can e-mail it to someone too.