skunker - 12:26 am on Nov 14, 2005 (gmt 0)

Okay folks, here's the deal. I have a website that displays thousands of historical images (some in the public domain, some not) from the early 1800s to the mid 1940s. I am guessing that most of these images were government works (e.g. government hired photographers, military photographers, etc).

First, some questions about copyright:

1.) Can I publish Civil War photos on my site that were taken from, say, the University of Maryland's archives? The University says that I can not do so. But, my site falls under the "Fair Use Doctrine" under U.S. copyright law that provides for the licit, non-licensed citation or incorporation of possible copyrighted material. This means that those images, according to US law, can only be used by my website for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, or research and is therefore not an infringement of copyright as this website's sole purpose is to educate and research the Civil War era.

2.) With that said, can I safely display these photos on my website? How can the University tell me what I can't do with these photos if they were taken by government entities during the Civil War?

What if someone had a collection of their photographs that their grandfather took during World War I and then donated them to the University. Can the University copyright these photos even though the grandfather took them for the government?

But, what happens if the grandfather took these photographs for his personal use during WW1 (or WWII). Does that make it "government works" and is therefore still required to be in the Public Domain as per the copyright law?

And, finally, lets say I have a bunch of images on my website that are not in the public domain, but falls under the "fair use" doctrine....and what if I run a bunch of popunders, adsense, etc and make a killing off the traffic? I am therefore making money...but I am not selling the photos...am I still breaking the "fair use" doctrine by making money this way?

I look forward to hearing your feedback. I think I am walking on very shallow water and may need to start rethinking some of my marketing approaches.

Thanks for your time.