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Project:The copyright status of Wittgenstein’s works: Difference between revisions
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{{p center|By {{person link|Michele Lavazza}}<ref group="N">The author would like to thank Dr Jasmin Trächtler, Mr David Chandler, and Mr Javier Arango for reviewing this text. Additionally, he would like to extend sincere gratitude to Dr Nicolas Bell, the Librarian of Trinity College, who provided insightful comments on a draft of this essay.</ref>}} | {{p center|By {{person link|Michele Lavazza}}<ref group="N">The author would like to thank Dr Jasmin Trächtler, Mr David Chandler, and Mr Javier Arango for reviewing this text. Additionally, he would like to extend sincere gratitude to Dr Nicolas Bell, the Librarian of Trinity College, who provided insightful comments on a draft of this essay; and to Prof Alois Pichler of the Wittgenstein Archives at the University of Bergen, the conversations with whom helped give this essay its final shape.</ref>}} | ||
{{p center|31 July 2022}} | {{p center|31 July 2022}} | ||
== Introduction == | |||
The copyright status of Ludwig Wittgenstein’s works is a more complicated matter than that of most other authors. This is largely because the greater part of his writings was published posthumously, with the intervention of different editors, by different publishers, in different countries. The purpose of this essay is to dispel some common misconceptions about copyright in general, to describe the rules that apply to Wittgenstein’s literary legacy and to clarify the current copyright status of his writings. This, in turn, is to illustrate how the Ludwig Wittgenstein Project strives to pursue its goals in a thoroughly lawful manner. This text is a research paper; it is scholarly in nature and does not constitute legal advice. | |||
== The purpose of copyright and the public domain == | |||
== | |||
Before starting to talk about Wittgenstein and his writings, it is important to briefly discuss the purpose of copyright and its general logic. This will help us gain a better understanding of the ethics behind the laws and make sense of what copyright is and what it is not. | Before starting to talk about Wittgenstein and his writings, it is important to briefly discuss the purpose of copyright and its general logic. This will help us gain a better understanding of the ethics behind the laws and make sense of what copyright is and what it is not. | ||
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It is important to understand how layers of copyright function in this kind of scenario, particularly because of how important the issue of transcriptions and translations is for the future of Wittgenstein studies. | It is important to understand how layers of copyright function in this kind of scenario, particularly because of how important the issue of transcriptions and translations is for the future of Wittgenstein studies. | ||
An additional difficulty stems from the question of whether, and to what extent, an editor’s work may count as original or creative enough to generate a further layer of copyright. | |||
=== Transcriptions and originality === | |||
The general rule here is quite simple. Obviously, both the creative work which is the starting point of a creative effort (as its material or its subject) and the creative work which is the output of such effort are copyrighted. | The general rule here is quite simple. Obviously, both the creative work which is the starting point of a creative effort (as its material or its subject) and the creative work which is the output of such effort are copyrighted. | ||
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=== The authorship issue === | |||
It should be added that, from the point of view of Wittgenstein scholarship, the issue of copyright layers is particularly thorny when it comes to assessing the impact of the editors’ work on the very authorship of a published book. In those cases where the editors’ intervention was very significant in selecting and sorting Wittgenstein’s remarks while preparing them for publication, the editors may have to be considered co-authors, thereby extending the copyright term on a work beyond the 70-year period after Wittgenstein’s death. Given the uncertainty of this matter, the Ludwig Wittgenstein Project opted for a cautious approach, which is presented in [[Project:Why are some of Wittgenstein’s texts missing from this website?|a separate essay]]. | It should be added that, from the point of view of Wittgenstein scholarship, the issue of copyright layers is particularly thorny when it comes to assessing the impact of the editors’ work on the very authorship of a published book. In those cases where the editors’ intervention was very significant in selecting and sorting Wittgenstein’s remarks while preparing them for publication, the editors may have to be considered co-authors, thereby extending the copyright term on a work beyond the 70-year period after Wittgenstein’s death. Given the uncertainty of this matter, the Ludwig Wittgenstein Project opted for a cautious approach, which is presented in [[Project:Why are some of Wittgenstein’s texts missing from this website?|a separate essay]]. | ||
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Its country of origin is the US.<ref name="simultaneous"/> | Its country of origin is the US.<ref name="simultaneous"/> | ||
However, in February 2017 the text of Wittgenstein’s Ts-207 was released by the copyright holders – The Master and Fellows of Trinity College, Cambridge and the University of Bergen, Bergen – under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution – NonCommercial 4.0 International licence. Therefore, the text should be regarded as being in the public domain in countries where the copyright term is 70 years PMA and licenced under CC BY-NC 4.0 International in the US. See above, [[#Notes on Logic|§ ''Notes on Logic'']], for more details. | However, in February 2017 the text of Wittgenstein’s Ts-207 was released by the copyright holders – The Master and Fellows of Trinity College, Cambridge and the University of Bergen, Bergen – under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution – NonCommercial 4.0 International licence. The text of the ''Lecture on Ethics'' that was published in the ''Philosophical Review'' in 1965 only differs from the text of Ts-207 for very few spelling variants and punctuation marks; the two must thus be considered to be the same text and to share the same copyright status. Therefore, the text should be regarded as being in the public domain in countries where the copyright term is 70 years PMA and licenced under CC BY-NC 4.0 International in the US. See above, [[#Notes on Logic|§ ''Notes on Logic'']], for more details. | ||
=== Bemerkungen über Frazers “The Golden Bough” === | === Bemerkungen über Frazers “The Golden Bough” === | ||