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DSRH

Copyright duration

Generally, copyright lasts for the creator's lifetime plus seventy years. It must also be remembered that many formats may have several copyright holders simultaneously, for example, an author and a publisher can have different rights in the same published edition at the same time. Moreover even if a book is out of print it may still be in copyright. Sound recordings, broadcasts and the typographical arrangements of published works are protected by copyright for a period of fifty years. Where material is published in volumes/parts or broadcast in episodes, the period of copyright protection starts from the day on which the individual part was made available. While the content of the work may be out of copyright if the author has been dead more than seventy years, the publisher will continue to have copyright in the typographical arrangement (actual print layout of the book) in any published edition of that book for fifty years. Sound recordings and broadcasts are protected by copyright for fifty years. If someone makes a work available to the public for the very first time after the original copyright has expired they may acquire rights equivalent to the author's for a period of twenty-five years.  This will only happen if it has never been available before.