Carl Sagan’s team wanted to include…

Carl Sagan’s team wanted to include the Beatles song “Here Comes the Sun” on the Voyager Golden Records (discs containing greetings in 60 languages, music and sounds from Earth aboard both Voyager spacecraft launched in 1977), but the record company EMI, which held the copyrights, declined.

In 1974 the 1946 movie…

In 1974 the 1946 movie “It’s A Wonderful Life” fell into public domain because the studio failed to renew it’s copyright. As a result, it was aired a lot, which explains why it became so popular even though it flopped in theaters. The studio got rights to the movie again in 1993.

Even though Benjamin Franklin…

Even though Benjamin Franklin is credited with many popular inventions, he never patented or copyrighted any of them. He believed that they should be given freely and that claiming ownership would only cause trouble and “sour one’s Temper and disturb one’s Quiet.”

In 2016, ‘Getty Images’ sold some…

In 2016, ‘Getty Images’ sold some of the 100,000+ photos that had been donated, royalty-free, to the Library of Congress by the original photographer and Getty Images then demanded payment from the photographer, for using the photos she owned. She sued them (unsuccessfully) for over $1 billion. 10

UK prop designer Andrew Ainsworth…

UK prop designer Andrew Ainsworth, made the original Stormtrooper helmets, was sued by Lucasfilm for $20m for making and selling replicas, argued he did not hold the intellectual property rights, a point upheld by a US court. After spending £700,000 defending himself, Ainsworth won. 00