[emeritus]

For nearly a century the US was out of step with most of the rest of the world in that it did not sign up to the 1909 Berne Convention on copyright (which provides that no registration is necessary to get copyright). The US did eventually sign up with effect from 1st March 1989, but for works published before that date it was necessary to file a copy with the US Library of Congress to get copyright protection. Presumably many journals published outside the US wouldn't have bothered with the expense of the US registration formalities, with the consequence that they are not protected by copyright in the US,(although they are protected in other countries). The US also used to have onerous marking requirements in that a work had to be marked with a statement that it was protected by copyright (marking with a C in a circle satisfied this); the date of first publication; and the owner of the copyright. Unless this was done, copyright was difficult to enforce in the US, even if it had been registered. Thus many of the older journals and other publications that are available on US web sites, could well be free of copyright in the US, even if they are still in copyright in other countries.

The attitude of the former GEC and Marconi was that they were happy for anyone to make use of their copyrighted works as long as an acknowledgement of the source was given ( I was in the room next to their publicity officer for a couple of years and he told me that this was company policy).

One thing I have observed is what seems to be a belief that, just because you own a copy of something, you also own the copyright in it. There are many examples of images on web sites for which copyright ownership is asserted, that are clearly out of copyright. I have even come across this with organisations such as the National Railway Museum, where a book contains reproductions of a 200-year-old newspaper cutting, an a poster dating from the mid-1800's, and photographs taken in the mid-Victorian era, that are stated to be copyright of the NRM or Crown copyright in the list of acknowledgements of the picture sources, but for which any copyright that may have existed has long expired, or which are clearly not Crown Copyright. Copyright is complex, and the goalposts keep changing, especially due to EC directives forcing changes to the UK copyright acts, but one thing which I think is still in force is the requirement for transfer of copyright to be executed in writing in order for it to be valid, and I doubt that few could produce the necessary trail of documents from the original owner if they wished to take enforcement action in the courts.