I suppose if I were in this line of business I would provide scans without providing any specific rights or permissions regarding how they could be used, only how they can’t be used. So I guess what i’m asking is under what terms do you provide the scans?

Hi sii. Thanks for responding.

Wow. Haven’t even considered that. Since we (IAMPETH) don’t own the copyright for the book or the artwork, it didn’t even occur to me to consider terms of use.

I guess part of the dilemna is, since we don’t own the copyrights, is it even our permission to give?

If he (the typographer) were breaking any laws by creating and selling the font, would we (IAMPETH) be getting ourselves into hot water by providing the scans? kind of like “aiding and abetting” a law-breaker... that kind of thing.

In the United States, all books and other works published before 1923 have expired copyrights and are in the public domain.

Further: http://www.loc.gov/cgi-bin/formprocessor/copyright/cfr.pl?&urlmiddle=1.0...
Section e.

Thank you for responding clauses. I appreciate it.

I don’t know if it matters, but the images/website is hosted in the United States, and the typographer is in Germany. The book was published here in the U.S.

And thanks for the link. Good stuff.

James, I think your totally safe in providing the scans, but it does seem strange that the type designer is asking your permission to make a font from them. Like buying a gun and asking permission of the gun shop owner to go shoot tin cans off a fence.

I think it’s rather nice of them to ask :)

And no it doesn’t matter if the person utilizing the public domain images is in another country.

Thanks sii. He’s really not asking for our permission, he’s just asking for some high resolution scans. We’ve got the original book, and he needs high-res images to start creating his font. We just want to make sure that we (IAMPETH) are not exposing ourselves legally by helping him make his fonts.

I’m like you though... I think we’re safe. I’m ready to go for it, but we’ve got cooler heads than mine that are expressing concern.

I bet it’s Florian.... ;)

As long as the copyright on the book was never renewed you should be perfectly safe.

What copyright permissions did you get when you hosted the book images? I used to work in book digitization, and we had very specific rules as to what we were allowed to do with the images based on a letter obtained from the rightsholder.

If the book is in the public domain (as it likely is), go nuts :-)

- Lex

Lex and pugnax - thank you for your responses.

pugnax - How could I determine if the copyright has been renewed? The publisher, A.N. Palmer Company is no longer in business.

Lex - We did not get any copyright permissions on this particular book. We figured it was public domain since it was printed in 1914.

This document might have the information you’re looking for:
http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ15a.html

Carl: Which Florian?
Certainly not me. I ain’t no type designer … hell, do I want to end up like these guys?
;°)