We are super excited to bring you a brand new feature on the site celebrating the works that will enter the public domain each year. Some of you may remember our “Class of ..." posts, complete with photoshopped graduation snap of the lucky authors and artists whose copyright would be expiring. While we loved the format, it was very much tailored to those countries with a copyright term based on when a person died (expiration occuring 50 or 70 years later). Since 2019, when works finally began again to enter the public domain in the United States, there’s been a different kind of copyright expiration to factor in — one not based on death dates, but instead when a work was published. So the person-focused graduation photo became a little redundant. We needed a new way and now we have one — the advent-style countdown calendar! This new format gives us the opportunity to feature lots more content, and build a climax towards Public Domain Day (January 1st). The plan is to do one of these every December, one-by-one revealing our top pick of new entrants to the public domain. Check out the inaugural one, for 2022, here.

Many thanks to Oxford Continuing Education who got our brain cogs whirring after featuring our project in their own advent-style calendar last year showcasing free, educational online resources. (See their one for this year here).

Follow our tweets as the windows get revealed with the hashtag #PDin2022.