Public Domain - Open Educational Resources - OER - Library at SUNY College at Old Westbury

What is Public Domain?

The Public Domain encompasses:

Works published in the U.S. prior to 1928;
Works whose copyright has expired or were not renewed;
Works for which the copyright owner has intentionally and explicitly "dedicated" it to the public domain;
Works created by U.S. Government employees during the course of their employment;
Works which do not qualify for copyright protections (such as ideas, common knowledge, data points etc.).

Public domain is different than "publicly accessible" or "free online." Read more about the Public Domain here.

Copyright Term and the Public Domain in the United States
Cornell University provides a detailed chart for determining public domain status of works in the United States.

Public Domain Slider
The Public Domain Slider is an interactive tool to help determine the copyright status of a work that is first published in the U.S. Works published before 1923 is in the public domain, but the copyright status for copyrighted works after 1923 can be difficult to determine. There are many works in the public domain that have been published after 1923 because registration was not renewed and/or the copyright symbol – © – does not appear on the work. If a work is in the public domain, you are free to use that work in any way you choose with appropriate attribution.

Creative Commons Public Domain tools (CC0 and CC-PD)
Learn about the difference between CC0 and the Creative Commons Public Domain mark.

CC0: "No rights reserved"

CC PD: "No known copyright"

Public Domain Content

Government Publications

Most content found on .gov websites by the US Federal Government is free of any copyright restrictions and in the public domain. However, look closely at .gov content--sometimes the materials have been contracted out or developed in partnership with a company or organization, and in these cases, a traditional all rights reserved copyright may be present.

A great place to start a search is USA.gov
Try to search a specific agency's website. A-Z List of Federal Agencies. Many times these materials are not retrieved with simple Google searches.

Here are some examples of US Federal Databases:

The Homeland Security Digital Library is a collection of documents related to homeland security policy, strategy, and organizational management. Topics include maritime, unmanned aerial systems, terrorism, epidemics and many more.

SciTech Connect is a collection of science, technology, and engineering research information from the U.S. Department of Energy.

Copyright by State

State Copyright Guide
Click on a state to see a review of the copyright status of government documents within that state, or use the states menu. Red indicates that documents are presumptively copyrightable, green indicates that documents are presumptively public domain, and colors in between indicate a tendency to one or the other where the governing law is not clear.