Golan v. Ashcroft submission site

Golan v. Ashcroft is a lawsuit challenging Congress's removal of thousands of works from the public domain. In 1994, Congress enacted a copyright provision under § 514 of the Uruguay Round Agreements Act that removes many foreign works from the public domain and grants them "restored" copyrights. The law, which is codified at 17 U.S.C. §§ 104A and 109(a), takes away the public's long held rights to freely use these works -- which are now controlled by "restored" copyright holders.

To win the lawsuit we need your help: we need examples of how people have been harmed by this removal of works from the public domain. You can help us if you have ever wanted to use:

• a foreign sound recording made before February 15, 1972; or
• a foreign work published in or after 1923 that was in the public domain in the U.S. (due to lack of copyright notice, renewal, or national eligilibility of the author), including:
  • works of Shostakovich, Prokofiev, Stravinsky, Khachaturian, and other foreign composers (search for restored works)
  • numerous classic British, French, German, and other foreign films (including several Hitchcock films, Faust, Metropolis, and The Red Balloon, Kurosawa's Ikiru, The Third Man, and Intermezzo)
  • or any other foreign book, photograph, song, or work subject to a "restored" copyright
  • although registration is optional, you can search the U.S. Copyright Office for restored works

Please tell us what the work is, what you wanted to do with it, and how we can contact you. We will follow up with you if we need more information about the nature of your harm. With your help, we can reclaim the public domain.

    Lawrence Lessig and the Golan v. Ashcroft team

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