[INDOLOGY] Highlights from the Sanskrit corpora

[Dominik Wujastyk]

Yes.

> in this case, actually authors, who obviously transferred their copyright
to the still existing BORI.

We don't know if Edgerton, Sukthankar and others actually signed over their
copyright to BORI.  That would require a search of the BORI archives.  But
also, if BORI paid the editors for their work, it could be classed as "work
for hire" in which case BORI would have had the copyright automatically on
that legal basis.

What you say about 25 years is right, as far as I recall from that article
I cited, as far as the text goes.  It might be that the apparatus falls
under the 60-year rule.

Bear in mind that although India and most nations are signatories to the
1952 Geneva Universal Copyright Convention
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Copyright_Convention>, there are
many national laws and exceptions.  So one has to understand (C) in
particular national legal contexts.



On Tue, 1 Oct 2019 at 01:46, Dominik Haas via INDOLOGY <
indology at list.indology.info> wrote:

> Dear Jonathan and Dominik,
>
> I just had the very same thoughts. I'm not an expert of law either, but
> technically speaking, the BORI Mahābhārata is not simply an edition, but a
> new text created by its editors between 1919 and 1966. The editors are,
> in this case, actually authors, who obviously transferred their copyright
> to the still existing BORI. So unless an ancient and complete manuscript
> appears which contains the very same text as the BORI Mahābhārata (very
> unlikely, I would say), the BORI holds the copyright of its text. According
> to German law (mentioned by Dominik), however, it does not – 25 years have
> long gone past since the publication of the original edition. The co-owned
> copyright of Prof. Tokunaga (1994), too, would expire this year – in
> Germany.
>
> Of course, authors also have the copyright to transcriptions of their text
> – just imagine someone would transcribe a talk you give and then publish it
> as their own text. I would argue that creating an electronic transcription
> of a (copyrighted) Devanāgarī text isn't much different.
>
> Best regards,
>
> Dominik A. Haas
>
>
> __________________
> *Dominik Haas, BA MA*
> PhD student, University of Vienna
> dominik.haas at univie.ac.at
> ORCID: 0000-0002-8505-6112 <https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8505-6112>
> univie.academia.edu/DominikHaas
>


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