Three years ago, a presumed lost animation film, +Empty Socks from +1927, was discovered in the Norwegian National Library. At the +time it was discovered, it was generally assumed to be copyrighted by +The Walt Disney Company, and I blogged about +my +reasoning to conclude that it would would enter the Norwegian +equivalent of the public domain in 2053, based on my understanding of +Norwegian Copyright Law. But a few days ago, I came across +a +blog post claiming the movie was already in the public domain, at +least in USA. The reasoning is as follows: The film was released in +November or Desember 1927 (sources disagree), and presumably +registered its copyright that year. At that time, right holders of +movies registered by the copyright office received government +protection for there work for 28 years. After 28 years, the copyright +had to be renewed if the wanted the government to protect it further. +The blog post I found claim such renewal did not happen for this +movie, and thus it entered the public domain in 1956. Yet someone +claim the copyright was renewed and the movie is still copyright +protected. Can anyone help me to figure out which claim is correct? +I have not been able to find Empty Socks in Catalog of copyright +entries. Ser.3 pt.12-13 v.9-12 1955-1958 Motion Pictures +available +from the University of Pennsylvania, neither in +page +45 for the first half of 1955, nor in +page +119 for the second half of 1955. It is of course possible that +the renewal entry was left out of the printed catalog by mistake. Is +there some way to rule out this possibility? Please help, and update +the wikipedia page with your findings. + +
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