Johannes Gebauer wrote:
[snip]
I realize that, the way you explained things you couldn't make a
photocopy even if the original music is out of copyright.
Absolutely. Are you sure this would be different in the US? If you
brought out a new edition of a work by Bach, could anyone photocopy your
edition and sell that?
Thanks for the quick response -- that was what I had imagined things to
be. As for this final question, in the U.S., page appearance isn't
covered by copyright law, so if I bring out a new printing of a public
domain work and have added no editorial content (added my own phrasing,
altered some chords, corrected some misprints) I can't make a valid
claim for copyright simply because my new edition is more legible or
laid out with better page turns. Anybody could photocopy that and I
would be unable to stop them.
However, if I had made editorial changes (simply adding my name as
Edited By: would not qualify, as far as I have been able to ascertain) I
would have a valid copyright claim and could initiate a lawsuit for damages.
But the simple appearance on the page would not qualify in the U.S. as
copyrightable.
However, as is usually the case, it is often the party with the deepest
pockets which wins such copyright cases, not necessarily the person with
the valid claim.
For instance, Hal Leonard has brought out a couple of fake books of
obviously public domain material, either material old enough to be
public domain but with known composers, or folk songs with no known
composer and also old enough to be public domain, and on each song in
each book they have a copyright claim such as "copyright © 2000 by Hal
Leonard Corporation" -- I realize there could be a valid copyright
claim on the entire collection of songs within that book, such that
nobody could simply photocopy the entire book and sell it as their own,
but there is no valid copyright claim in any of the individual songs.
But should they bring a lawsuit against someone such as me, they would
win simply because I couldn't afford to pay a lawyer to defend me
through all the hearings and delays and filings and appeals.
The old age-of-chivalry concept that might makes right. I would have
hoped we had grown beyond that, but it still rears its ugly head in most
aspects of modern life, and the intellectual property area is no different.
--
David H. Bailey
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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