Getting Started
Creative Commons
While our U of I Library Copyright Guide and the Cornell Libguide are excellent, thorough resources, my goal here is to provide an abridged version of issues you will most likely to encounter sourcing copyright free media to compliment your research.
First off, items can be made available by any one of the six creative commons licenses . This License Chooser module created by the Creative Commons is helpful in understanding why people choose the different variations you’ll encounter during research.
Public Domain
Things become quite complicated regarding media that is not in public domain, so let’s begin with media that
- Any item published before 1930 regardless of copyright status (1925 for sound recordings)
- Any item published without a copyright notice between 1930-1977
- Any item published without a copyright notice and subsequent registration within 5 years of expiration from 1978-1989
- Any item published with notice but copyright was not renewed, 1930-1963
- Any item prepared by an officer or employee of the United States Government as part of that person’s official duties
- For the most part, any item published outside the United States before 1978
Relating to the first point, any item with a copyright notice , whose copyright has been renewed still becomes public domain 95 years after their publication date.
When this workshop was originally created in Winter of 2024, this had just happened with Mickey Mouse in 1928’s Steamboat Willie and can now be recreated by anyone, anywhere, without permission of the Disney corporation. But keep in mind, this applies only to this specific work released over 95 years ago and not the character Mickey Mouse more generally.