I am looking for a list of Closed down or old sites that no longer exist but I can go back to them in the way back machine (archive.org). The reason is I am creating a social website which has users photos stored in their profile and initially to get the website going I want to find a old site that I can take photos from so I wont bump into copyright permissions. Any ideas much appreciated
IMO, the fact that a site no longer exists does NOT place any photos on that site into the public domain. Yje image copy write may very well still be valid. An inexpensive set of stock photos may be your safest option.
Copyright lasts for 70 years after the death all original authors of the work. Just because a site no longer exists, that doesn't mean that copyright on any of the work has been negated.
copyright has no expiry, it used to be 25 years - then it was bumped up to something like 70 eventually as bluegrass mentioned, but now it's over 100 years and they're lobbying for it to be pushed up even further. They already have it so that once a copyright expires, it doesn't go into the public domain automatically - it has like a 30 year gap of grace until it can be considered copyrightless. Buying the domain doesn't give you ownership over the name of the site (it could still be trademarked), and it certainly doesn't give you authority over the content - that has to be bought. From a personal standpoint, if I had a site that I abandoned or closed down, and I found out that someone had copied the site from a cache with the same domain and was trying to use it with my content or design I'd be really really ticked off.
The 95/120 year rule only applies when it is a work for hire, unknown author, or the date of the author's death is not known. The rule is 95 years from the original publication date or 120 years from the creation date, which ever is shorter. If the author (original copyright holder) is known, then it is still the term of that person's life plus 70 years. The is no set grace period for works to enter the public domain. Works automatically enter the public domain on the first day of the year following the expiration of the copyright. So the grace period ranges from one day to one year. All works whose copyright expired sometime this year will enter the public domain on Jan. 1st of 08.