Texts acceptable for LV:
* Scans of works which show the publication year as being 1924 (1925, after we head into 2021) or earlier
* Texts available on Gutenberg.org, whose copyright status in the "bibrec" tab shows as PD in the USA (see note below)
* Texts from other sites that state clearly which edition the text came from, and that do not restrict the use of their text with a CC or other license (gutenberg.au, bartleby.com, and plenty of others may qualify)
Sources that share transcribed works (e.g. works rendered into html) without a clear statement of what edition they came from aren't allowed, just like they're not allowed for >95-year-old works. Wikisource is not acceptable unless it has a scan that clearly shows a publication date of 96 years ago or more, because they restrict use of the texts with a CC license.
*Note also that HathiTrust restricts views on many of their works for out-of-USA viewers. So if you can, please use Gutenberg or Internet Archive first, and Hathi as a later option.
We know everyone wants to jump into each new year's newly PD works, and the excitement builds! But we still need to follow our regular text policies when we burst into the new year.
In other news...
(As of December 2018) We have learned that Distributed Proofreaders (which feeds into Project Gutenberg) aren't working on any 1923 texts yet. Like here, they won't be starting any 1923 projects until January 1, 2019. We assume they will carry forward this policy into each new year.
Concern has been expressed about posting book suggestions for about-to-become-PD texts. It is fine to make a list of books entering the PD soon, but let's not link to texts themselves until January 1. It's better not to take any risks on this.
[Edited December 22, 2019 to make it more general for each year rather than only for 2019.]
