copyright of a publisher no longer existing

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• November 29, 2009 @ 6:41pmjocep says:

  Can a book be reprinted if the publisher which originally copyrighted it no longer exists? The book was published in the 60's. It is a religious book and the publisher ceased to exist more than 30 or so years ago. No other publisher inherited the publishing rights to continue publishing the book. However, there is one company who has reprinted the book showing the original copyright and name of the extinct publisher. Is this book in the public domain?
• December 3, 2009 @ 1:58pmJanetCroft says:

  This is what's called an Orphan Work. Unfortunately, Orphan Works legislation in the US stalled out last year and we still don't have a clear ruling on the topic. See our wiki at http://librarycopyright.net/wiki/index.php?title=Orphan_works or look at Wikipedia under Orphan Works. The key is to make a "reasonably diligent" search for the copyright owner, but current US law offers no clear guidelines about what a diligent search is. My suggestion is to look at the Canadian site on Orphan works, linked to in our wiki, and follow their suggestions for places to search for the current copyright owner -- and document everything you do. It's not a guarantee that the copyright owner will never step forward, but if they do, you will have documented your search and can prove you tried.
• December 11, 2009 @ 8:36amjocep says:

  Thank you, this was really helpful!

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