Re: A bottomless pit of plagiarism

In article <102n1lb$1226a$1@dont-email.me>,
Gary McGath  <garym@mcgath.com> wrote:

On 6/14/25 3:05 PM, Tim Merrigan wrote:

Winny the Pooh, they bought the rights to, I don't know about Pinocchio
or James and the Giant Peach, though since Dahl was still alive when
they made JatGP, I assume there was some sort of negotiation.

>
Disney's Pinocchio came out more than half a century after Collodi's
story. Copyrights didn't run as long in those days, and the copyright on
the original story had probably expired.

[Hal Heydt]
Alternatively, if the story wasn't originally copyrighted in the
US, the US may not have recognized the validity of the copyright.
See, for instance, the reason for the premier of the G&S oparetta
_The Pirates of Penzance_.  Or the amount of 20th century
literature pirated by the Soviet Union and its subject countries,
right up until the USSR caught wise ti the idea that they could
control the distribution of Russian works if they agreed to
reciprocal recognition of copyright.

This can lead to other comlications...  Some of Poul Anderson's
works were printed in Poland without permission, but active fen
there managed to arranged that royalties were paid.  Problem was
that there was no way to get those funds out of the country.
Then the IRS wanted Anderson to pay income taxes on that money.
His ultimate solution was to take a working vacation (that is, go
there, be a toursit, but also do research on a book--a legitimate
expense) and spend *all* of the Polish royalties.  The result of
the trip was _The King of Ys_.