The EU has retroactively extended the copyright term for sound recordings. I don't know if any sound recordings from the 50's and 40's have been uploaded to the EU servers, but they will have to go down as they are now illegal. I think this is quite a blow for the public domain. Let's see what happens
Apparently this proposal was under discussion since some years, with a 95 year term initially, and possibly to be applied retroactively only to recordings that are not in the public domain already. Let's wait and see the officially approved text. Then there might be some time before it becomes effective in The Netherlands, where the EU server is currently located.
The section dealing with retroactive provisions is rather garbled:
(3) The following paragraphs shall be added to Article 10:
‘5. Article 3(1) to (2e) in the version thereof in force on 31 October 2011 shall apply to fixations of performances and phonograms in regard to which the performer and the phonogram producer are still protected, by virtue of those provisions in the version thereof in force on 30 October 2011, as at 1 November 2013 and to fixations of performances and phonograms which come into being after that date.
I guess this means that the 70 years term does not apply to performances whose copyright terms have expired already at the above mentioned dates.
