Hello,

I know more about this subject than I am willing to say --as I find it
intensely boring to write about, and there are indeed many articles
available on the internet.

In Pali specifically, there is an instructive precedent: GRETIL

The GRETIL texts (in Pali, Sanskrit, etc.) simply state a disclaimer (close
to meaningless) that copyright applies to the etext just as to the original
book (and that the author/editor retains their rights accordingly), and then
proceed to provide a great many (free) electronic versions of texts. Now
there are two elements to draw attention to here (1) GRETIL is flagrantly in
violation of copyright in many instances (e.g., Christian Lindtner's edition
of Nagarjuna), but (2) they only reproduce the original language text (Pali,
Sanskrit, etc.), not the modern translation, interpretation or essay (in
English or another modern language). Now again, a dichotomy: (1) the
publisher does not own the rights to the ancient, source-text, but (2) the
publisher *does* own the rights to the edition. In other words, the PTS
(for example) does not have any legal ownership or exclusivity over the
words of the Buddha, nor even do they own the Romanization of the particular
manuscripts they used in the Danish Royal Library. What they own is the
edition, i.e., the intellectual property in question is Fausboll's work in
reading different copies and correcting errors in the manuscript --and the
fruit of that labour does indeed have a copyright that will lapse subject to
the laws of the country you inhabit. This is part of why it has been so
easy for GRETIL or Metta.lk to churn out "copyright free" editions of
source-texts: because (1) the source itself is rarely or hardly covered by
copyright, and (2) you can always beat the copyright of the editor by
working from the same "unedited" source he/she did. You can, literally,
read the manuscript in the Danish Royal library, type it up, and do what you
please with it --Just like Fausboll did.

The fact is that GRETIL doesn't do this; they *are* transgressing the
copyright of the editors (and, NB, Chr. Lindtner's edition of Nagarjuna is
still selling like hotcakes) but nobody presses charges because (1) they
aren't including the english translation [which drives the majority of
sales], and (2) they would have to legally prove in court that GRETIL was
including their corrections to the Sanskrit text --because they only own the
rights to the corrections, not to the text _per se_. There are precedents
in this area: e.g., if a dictionary is 100 years old, the content can be
made public domain (and this has been done, with various internet
dictionaries), but a more recent edition of the same text that contains
corrected errors is no longer public domain --in effect, the copyright has
been revived by editorship. Legally speaking, editorship is a form of
authorship.

And now, for something entirely less dull, GRETIL:
www.sub.uni-goettingen.de/ebene_1/fiindolo/gretil.htm

E.M.

--
A saying of the Buddha from http://metta.lk/
Get your Dhamma Books from http://books.metta.lk/
Those who feel shame when they ought not to, and do not feel shame when they
ought to, such men due to their wrong views go to woeful states.
Random Dhammapada Verse 316