We had our attorneys research a copyright on a certain piece of work by a well known publisher and dealer, comes to find out the material in question was not copyrighted and the owner abandoned said work and products associated with it. An exaustive search was performed by a law firm for us, they also searched out any court documents or legal litigation pending the material. Nothing turned up as well.

According to the law, the publisher/author/dealer abandoned the material and product which in the eyes of coporate law made it Public Domain. So what we have is an abandoned material, product line and product name. What are the ethics of taking the material in the magic communitys eyes? No one else jumped on it, and the the publisher refused any cooperation or communication with attorneys or copyright investigators, thus the abandonment.

I'd be interested in hearing the different viewpoints.

Jake

Hmmm... "TAKING the material"... Care to elaborate?

If it is public domain, you can publish it, as can anyone else on the planet. Don't think you'll have it all to yourself. You can't copyright a public domain work, so you'll have no protection from competition. Likewise, something being poblic domain doesn't give you the right to plagerise. Cite your sources.

Actually the work is a tangible prop with a trademark, no written work. Under trademark, copyright and coporate law the product and trademark as been abandoned and can be registered copyrighted and produced using the original product name, so once someone does register the trademark, they can copyright it as they have taken legal possesion of said trademark and no one else can take possesion of it as it is no longer in the public domain, while this stands true for the trademark it does not hold true for the product as anyone could still produce it.

If this is someone living's "trademark"... not a good idea.

If this is a political statement designed to get things to change in magic, I guess it's a good idea.

My humble advice is to consider who is involved and their feelings, and from that understanding, act according to the principles you feel are most useful to magic.

I'm not sure I'm clear, Jake, by what you mean by copyrighted. If something was copyrighted and has passed into the public domain (due to non-renewal under the older copyright laws) it cannot be "taken back out of the public domain." It cannot be reproduced exclusively by anyone. Once it's in the public domain, it's in the public domain. Period.

I'm not sure about trademarks, but I know, for example, that "Aspirin" was orginally a trademark of Bayer. It passed into the public domain and is now used generically. Anybody can market that chemical compound and call it "aspirin," but nobody could re-trademark the name or "take is back out of the public domain."

I truly hope you attorneys are very well versed in copyright and trademark law, because if they're telling you something abandoned to the public domain can somehow be reclaimed and used exclusively by somebody else seems like a stretch.

Public domain means EVERYBODY'S domain.

If the registered trademark "Mickey Mouse" were to pass into the public domain, you couldn't re-trademark it, Jake.

I'm curious what defines "abandoned"? Is it a formal step which says, "I don't want this anymore"? Or is it the result of not doing anything with it? If something is properly copyrighted I think it remains intact for the length of time the law allows whether you do anything with it or not.

If you were able to make some improvements in the item you MIGHT be able to trademark and copyright THAT, but not the original idea. As always, give credit to the person who created the original gimmick.

Firstly, claiming it as your's would be very unethical in this community. Re-releasing it, with proper recognition however, may not be so unethical depending on how old of an effect we're talking about.

If the originator is deceased, or the respected individuals who held the rights, some will still think it's taboo, but the majority I think would find it ethical.

If anyone involved is still alive, contact them for their blessings. If you don't get it, forget about it.

Secondly, copyrights cannot be abandoned. Only expired.

Thirdly, everything that is written, is copyright for a specific period of time. If your "attorneys" say otherwise, hire new ones. You're wasting your money.

Sincerely,
Wayne Stevenson
The SpookClub