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Why You’ve Never Read “I Have A Dream”

varnull.adityamukerjee.net

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Re: Why You’ve Never Read “I Have A Dream”

#31

Post by nanidin »

Macsenour wrote: post #19

I remember hearing the story of how the text was written and at the last minute, as copies were being made, the lawyer for King added the Circle C and copyright info. Apparently the King family has benefitted financially by that last minute addition. Frankly, I can't imagine a better way to reward Dr. King, and his family, for such an amazing event and turning point in our history. It's not like the money is going to…

Unless copyright law has changed since then, the circle c doesn't matter. The way copyright works in the US, the rights to any creative work are automatically reserved for the author.

Re: Why You’ve Never Read “I Have A Dream”

#32

Post by gknoy »

fnbaptiste wrote: post #11

I read the entirety in college. It was in a textbook I used to own. That in his Letter from a Birmingham Jail, which is also very much worth reading (found here: http://www.africa.upenn.edu/Articles_Gen/Letter_Birmingham.h... )

I remember reading that about a year ago though Letters of Note (which is often excellent), and being absolutely blown away by how eloquent King was. It was an amazing letter.

Re: Why You’ve Never Read “I Have A Dream”

#33

Post by azernik »

From someone (not me) who's dealt with publishing excerpts in a book, at least one major publisher's lawyers have decided that the text of the speech was indeed a "public performance" - given in a public place, and broadcast on public radio - and therefore not under copyright. The King family are apparently notoriously insistent on high royalties for any use of the estate's copyrighted works, but they seem to only have a firm lock on the video recordings.

(Of course, this may be something that has yet to be tested in court, so Don't Try This At Home unless you have the money for a large lawsuit.)

Re: Why You’ve Never Read “I Have A Dream”

#35

Post by Macsenour »

nanidin wrote: post #31
Macsenour wrote: post #19

I remember hearing the story of how the text was written and at the last minute, as copies were being made, the lawyer for King added the Circle C and copyright info. Apparently the King family has benefitted financially by that last minute addition. Frankly, I can't imagine a better way to reward Dr. King, and his family, for such an amazing event and turning point in our history. It's not like the money is going to…

Unless copyright law has changed since then, the circle c doesn't matter. The way copyright works in the US, the rights to any creative work are automatically reserved for the author.

I'm not an expert in copyright law by any means. I only recall the story I heard when the man who put the copyright information on the paper released a book a couple of years ago. I'm forgetting his name at the moment.

Re: Why You’ve Never Read “I Have A Dream”

#36

Post by scrabble »

Pxtl wrote: post #9
sczkid wrote: post #6

Here's a good summary of the copyright issue: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2013/08/...

Interestingly it mentions that King himself was involved in suing people for selling videos of his speech, showing that the final lines of the blog article are wrong - he actually did enjoy the protections that copyright law offered him.

Did he also sue people who weren't profiting from his speech?

I think those are very different things.

Re: Why You’ve Never Read “I Have A Dream”

#39

Post by hudibras »

clicks wrote: post #4
yread wrote: post #2

You can read it here http://www.archives.gov/press/exhibits/dream-speech.pdf

And watch it here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=smEqnnklfYs Incidentally, please do take the 17 minutes to watch this speech (and perhaps follow along with yread's transcript link). It really is one of the greatest speeches ever given.

And keep in mind that MLK was 34 years old when he gave that speech. I'm trying hard not to think about what I was doing at that age...

Re: Why You’ve Never Read “I Have A Dream”

#40

Post by snicklepuff »

I've seen and read the entire speech dozens of times: In school, I distinctly remember being given the entire speech transcription and talking about it as a class on more than one occasion. In elementary school, we would have an actor come on our "morning announcements" and re-enact the speech each year. One teacher showed it to us on YouTube in it's entirety.

Is my experience really that unusual?

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