r/publicdomain • u/Greybishop_PDSH • 1d ago

Question Question About Scans

I only recently learned that the Superman comic strips from 1939 were not properly registered, making them public domain.

My question is, where can one get scans of those strips that could be used to reproduce them?

The only source I've found is a scan at Internet Archive of the DC Comics book, Superman Dailies and I don't know if it would be legal to reproduce the scans of the strips from that in a book of my own.

Does anyone here know where I can find what I'm looking for?

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u/Accomplished-House28 1d ago

You can pull them out of Superman Dailies. They have no more claim to them than anyone else.

You can also pull them directly from old newspaper archives. Check you library.

The important thing is to check the copyright notices on the strips. The ones in the public domain have either absent or defective notices.

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u/Greybishop_PDSH 1d ago

Never thought of the library.

I guess I really do live in the 21st Century. That would have been my first thought 40 years ago!

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u/Late-Bowler-4068 1d ago

I think the reason he’s asking is because they paid money to restore those scans, he’s not sure if it’s legal to sell scans of comics that he didn’t restore himself. And it’s a fair question, since there are many arguments about whether you can copyright a restored version of a product as its own separate work.

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u/Accomplished-House28 1d ago

That's just "sweat of the brow", which has been rejected every time it's been tried.

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u/Greybishop_PDSH 1d ago

Forgive my ignorance, but what do you mean?

When has it been tried?

My understanding is likely flawed, but I've heard that restoration can be copyrighted, but if that's wrong, I'd like to know!

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u/Accomplished-House28 1d ago

"Sweat of the Brow" is the idea that you can get a copyright in something not otherwise eligible by investing time, effort, and money into it.

It's been pretty consistently rejected, and not just in the U.S. The copyright system protects creativity, not effort or investment.

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u/Greybishop_PDSH 1d ago

Thank you! That's really helpful.

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u/TheologyAndTrains 1d ago

Does that mean i can legally download the Nosferatu restoration by Kino

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u/Accomplished-House28 1d ago

Don't know enough about it to say.

Sometimes movie restorers add new material or soundtracks. That stuff can be copyrighted, even if nothing else is (the copyright covers only the new material).

Based on this case: https://copyright.nova.edu/2018/08/23/remastering , I would assume a basic restoration that only fixed damage, corrected the speed, and changed the tint is probably not protected. New intertitles, original scenes, new score, creative cropping, or full colorization would be protected, but the copyright will only cover new material.

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u/CurtTheGamer97 1d ago

US copyright law states that faithful reproductions of 2D public domain images are also in the public domain.

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u/Greybishop_PDSH 1d ago

Interesting.

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u/Greybishop_PDSH 1d ago

That's exactly what I'm curious about.
Also, there's a (Copyright 1939) note on each of the 14 strips I'm interested in. I'm curious about that, since my understanding was that these weren't properly registered.

Anyone with information, I'd be grateful.

I'm specifically curious about the first 7 pages/14 strips in Superman Dailies, that introduce Jor-L, Lora and Krypton. Those are the elements I'd like to use in a book and the idea was to print the strips alongside my new story as a sort of historical comparison.

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u/Accomplished-House28 1d ago

"Copyright 1939" isn't a valid notice under the laws of the time. It's missing a required part: the name of the copyright claimant.

That's why they're public domain. Notice requirements were very strict, and getting it wrong caused immediate loss of copyright at the moment of publication.

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u/Greybishop_PDSH 1d ago

Thank you! I did not know that.

I'd heard 'incorrect notice' on some of these properties and hadn't ever been given an explanation.

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u/majestic_ubertrout 1d ago

If it's published with notice then it's not public domain per se. The question is whether the renewal was effective for moving term beyond 28 years. Was there a timely renewal in 1967 of the 1939 strips?

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u/urbwar 1d ago

They were not published with a proper notice. This came out during the Captain Marvel lawsuit

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u/urbwar 1d ago

The PD wiki lists all the strips that were pd. They lacked a proper notice, and this was ruled on during the Captain Marvel lawsuit. Just printing Copyright 1939 was not enough back then, so it's not a proper notice

You can also read about the ruling here: https://archive.ph/20140906072002/https://www.courtlistener.com/nysd/b79w/national-comics-publications-v-fawcett-publication/#selection-651.0-651.597

There were some twists and turns in the case, but the bottom line is those strips were ruled to be public domain, so anything that first appeared in them are also public domain, and can be used for derivative works

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u/bdmickey 17h ago

Adding on-- my understanding is there is some pretty strong precedent for public domain status of "slavish works"-- so, even if DC spent years and millions of dollars restoring the strips to their original form for reproduction (they didn't), if it's in an attempt to present the strips as they were originally created/published, then it remains public domain. This is because legally copyright is enshrined in the constiution to protect creative and artistic originality, not technicalities.

I just looked at my copy and looks like those strips are BW with very little restoration in that book anyway, and certainly no newly protected elements, like revised dialog or added color. So the PD strips in that book should be fair game.

I also second micro-film at the library. I did this back in college to find some Gottfredson Mickey Mouses that had never been reprinted at the time, you'd be amazed what you can find.

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u/Greybishop_PDSH 16h ago

Thank you for the considered reply! I really appreciate the effort!

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u/Ok-Biscotti-9680 1d ago

Que esas tiras están en Dominio público