For information marketers, there is a whole new world that opens up called the Public Domain which can be explored and used to create new works and products and generate further income streams. For some, this provides a very satisfying, interesting and lucrative way of  life.

It is a world that is full of a fascinating variety of material including images, paintings, all kinds of literature from the high classics, novels and plays, through romance to sci fi, fairy stories, folk tales, real life adventure to dull text books to comic books and even old magazines. It includes music, patents, philosophy.

When the copyright expires on a written work for example, that work passes into the public domain. This means effectively the work passes from being the private property (of the author or creator) so to speak, to become public property. Once this has taken place, the material concerned can then be used to create further new derivative works in multiple various different ways according to the interests and skills of the new user,  it can be reused,  and republished or otherwise reproduced

Let’s look at some examples. A book can be adapted and updated to make it contemporary by simply adding  some new images or changing the text. An old classic tale can be revamped with new material added. A new book can be written around a well known character from already existing book such as Sherlock Holmes.

In the case of images and paintings, they can be photographed or otherwise used and re-interpreted to produce new images. An old wood cut could be used for a print on demand poster. Familiar traditional or other popular  images could be used for a range of greetings cards such as trains, dogs, cats, horses, or printed on T-shirts, towels, mugs and plates, and cloth bags for resale such as well known American Indian images or celtic designs.

An out of print book could be brought back to life and turned in to an ebook to sell on Kindle or as a hard bock or print on demand book on the amazing Amazon or other platforms

There is endless scope and fascination in this field.