1978

Under the law in effect before 1978, copyright was secured either on the
date a work was published with a copyright notice or on the date of
registration if the work was registered in unpublished form. In either
case, the copyright endured for a first term of 28 years from the date
it was secured. During the last (28th) year of the first term, the
copyright was eligible for renewal. The Copyright Act of 1976 extended
the renewal term from 28 to 47 years for copyrights that were subsisting
on January 1, 1978, or for pre-1978 copyrights restored under the
Uruguay Round Agreements Act (URAA), making these works eligible for a
total term of protection of 75 years. Public Law 105-298
[http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d105:SN00505:
|TOM:/bss/d105query.html| ], enacted on October 27, 1998, further
extended the renewal term of copyrights still subsisting on that date by
an additional 20 years, providing for a renewal term of 67 years and a
total term of protection of 95 years.

Public Law 102-307 [http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-
bin/bdquery/z?d102:SN00756:|TOM:/bss/d102query.html|] enacted on June
26, 1992, amended the 1976 Copyright Act to provide for automatic
renewal of the term of copyrights secured between January 1, 1964, and
December 31, 1977. Although the renewal term is automatically provided,
the Copyright Office does not issue a renewal certificate for these
works unless a renewal application and fee are received and registered
in the Copyright Office.

Public Law 102-307 [http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-
bin/bdquery/z?d102:SN00756:|TOM:/bss/d102query.html|] makes renewal
registration optional. Thus, filing for renewal registration is no