2016 January 11

Wiki activity

(Rotwang talk page, Public Domain Super Heroes) {My Rotwang‐related feelings.}

I don’t make any rules at PDSH, but my sentiment is that a character should have no place here if it is not in the public domain in its country of origin. This is the World Wide Web and not America On‐line, so whether a character is in the public domain solely in the US has no relevance to current creators anywhere else in the world who want to reuse that character in new works. (Even if they want to publish these new works on US‐based sites like Blogger, Facebook, Wikia, Wikimedia etc., they should still probably avoid characters that are not in the public domain in their country of origin.) Metropolis is simply not in the public domain in Germany and will not be for some time, so I feel Rotwang should get the boot. (I also therefore feel that H. G. Wells characters like the Invisible Man and Dr. Moreau should get the boot until 2017, and that Pippi Longstocking should be removed as well.) Again, I am no administrator here.

(My user page, Public Domain Super Heroes) {Musings about other authors whose characters might warrant inclusion.}

(My user page, Public Domain Super Heroes) {Evidently, there’s already an article for Dr. Nikola.}

(My user page, Public Domain Super Heroes) {Note on Macunaíma.}

Other sources

• The works of Arthur Morrison entered the public domain in the United Kingdom in 2016, so characters of his like Martin Hewitt and Horace Dorrington deserve articles.

• Guy Boothby characters like Dr. Nikola, Simon Carne and Pharos

• What about the fiction of Hugh Stowell Scott (Henry Seton Merriman), Robert Murray Gilchrist, Anthony Hope, Arthur Griffiths and E. W. Hornung?

• Works by Brazilian author Mário de Andrade entered the public domain in Brazil and much of the rest of the world in 2016, which means that shapeshifting hero Macunaíma from the eponymous novel is in the public domain. If the novel was published in the US at all, it was released in 1928 or later, so it seems likely not to be in the public domain in the US.