Some copyright is 25 years, most is 70 years after the death of the Author. Will depend on what is reproduced (i.e. Text of publication or full copy of the work), as the actual work may not be copyright, but how it is written is. As 'Copyright arises automatically when a work that qualifies for protection is created. The work must be original in that it needs to originate with the author who will have used some judgment or skill to create the work - simply copying a work does not make it original.' See http://www.cla.co.uk/copyright_information/copyright_information/ or http://www.ipo.gov.uk/types/copy.htm For Information relating to UK Copyright, Will probably apply to most other countries as well as Copyright seems to be standard across most countries but there may be some differences in different countries. From reading this I would suspect that a copy of a will is not Copyright, but could be wrong. Tim Treeby DFHS 13926 On 12/01/2014 17:13, Terry Leaman wrote: > The law in the UK is copyright expires 75 years after the death of the > author. Of course, it could be willed to someone else on the authors > death in which case the 75 years would apply again. > > Terry > On 12/01/2014 17:01, Chris Whitehead wrote: >> 1) According to FreeBMD Miss Olive Moger died aged 80 in 1961 in Tiverton >> district, so if the 50 year rule is applied (is this still the law?) then >> copyright in her books expired 2011. >> >> 2) As I understand it copyright is concerned with published material and >> with images. >> If you transcribe an unpublished document then copyright is not relevant >> except that your transcription would be your copyright if it were published. >> If you were to publish images of the original document, then there would >> be issues with the owner of the material. >> Additionally when you take a copy of a document at a record office you >> have to sign a declaration, which in many cases restricts the use of the >> image to private study. >> >> I would be glad, however, if someone could give an authoritative opinion >> on this. >> >> Chris. >> >>

Hi: PKEASE, let's not have a general debate on copyright here on Devon-L. Here is the statement on copyright from the GENUKI/Devon FAQ - http://genuki.cs.ncl.ac.uk/DEV/DevonFAQ.html#COPYRIGHT > 20. What rules regarding copyright, etc., apply to DEVON mailing list postings? > > The rules are essentially the same for posting to a mailing list, or providing information on the web. Indeed, substantial transcriptions should be made available for inclusion in GENUKI/Devon, as well as - or indeed instead of - being posted, so as to ensure their continued easy accessibility. (Recall that GENUKI is an archived and searchable virtual library, the continued availability and existence of which does not depend on any single individual.) > > Please do not post extensive transcriptions from documents or publications unless you can demonstrate that you have good reason to believe that you are not offending against either the wishes or the legal rights of the owner, or against copyright. > > Note that if an individual, or an archive, owns a document, then they have every right to constrain someone who they allow to look at or borrow that document, e.g. not to copy this document. (It is on this basis that some Devon parishes are refusing to allow their parish registers to be published online.) The owners may well have buttressed their rights by requiring you to sign a form acknowledging the constraint beforehand - but merely telling you is sufficient, since the notion of a contract does not depend on any actual paperwork or signatures. But if you are the legal owner of a document, or you have not entered into any contract that binds you in some way, and the content of the document is not copyright, then there is no legal impediment to your providing transcriptions - but see below. > > Copyright typically exists in any published document until 70 years after the death of the author, whereas Crown Copyright typically exists for 50 years after publication or, in the case unpublished documents, for 125 years after the date of creation. To copy or publish substantial parts of a work in copyright you have in general to obtain permission. > > For up-to-date, detailed advice about copyright and crown copyright matters see the discussion, and the various documents listed, in the GENUKI Maintainers' page on Copright: > > http://www.genuki.org.uk/org/maintenance/Copyright.html > Luckily, since 1999, Crown Copyright has been waived in the contents of most unpublished public records held in The National Archives and other official archives, such as county record offices, so such documents (which include census records) can be transcribed and the transcriptions made available electronically, e.g. via the DEVON mailing list or in GENUKI/Devon, without any need to seek prior permission. However, the archive holding the original document should be identified, and its catalogue number included. (Note that this waiver applies only to transcriptions, not to actual photographic or scanned digital images of documents, such as images obtained via TNA's Discovery facility.) > > In those cases where there is a requirement that explicit permission be obtained, the transcription should be accompanied by evidence that such permission has been sought and received. (This is typically the case with church documents, when a statement naming the authority, e.g. the relevant vicar, who has given permission will suffice.) > > Note that some societies, as a contractual restriction on the purchaser of their publications, disallow the public offering of free (or paid-for) lookups from these publications. The reason for such a restriction is obvious - if lots of people provided such a service, relatively few copies would be sold, probably not enough to cover the cost of publication. (A particular case in point is the FFHS's National Burial Index.) It is therefore important that the DEVON mailing list not be used to "advertise" a willingness to do lookups of material contrary to the original supplier's wishes. However, there is no impediment to providing look-ups of, for example, parish register microfiches or census records. > > The bottom line is that we must do everything we can to build a climate of trust and cooperation with the relevant archive and church authorities, as well as cement our existing cooperation with organisations such as the Devon Record Office and the Devon Family History Society. Thus the letter of the law is less important than the spirit of the law - only by being careful not to offend the people who possess information, in the various libraries, archives, churches, societies, etc., can we retain their continued cooperation. So when there is any doubt you should request permission beforehand, rather than rely on a narrow and perhaps arguable interpretation of the letter of the law to justify your posting. (This applies particularly to Devon parish register transcriptions, given the sensitivities involved.) > > In summary, all of this is easily understandable by putting oneself in the position of the person or organisation that owns the original information, or that has laboured hard to produce some publication, and considering how some activity would look from this point of view. Please note especially the penultimate paragraph above! As regards the Moger Abstracts, Richard Grylls <richard.grylls@btinternet.com> obtained copyright clearance on behalf of the Devon Wills Project - his advice, as to how to contact the Moger family representatives, should be sought by anyone wishing to publish information from the various sets of Moger documents. Cheers Brian Randell -- School of Computing Science, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1 7RU, UK EMAIL = Brian.Randell@ncl.ac.uk PHONE = +44 191 222 7923 FAX = +44 191 222 8232 URL = http://www.cs.ncl.ac.uk/people/brian.randell