Word.ws English Dictionary

Public Domain Day

Public Domain Day proper noun: an annual observance on January 1 of when copyrights expire and works enter into the public domain. Copyrights usually expire every year on January 1 based on the individual copyright laws of each country.

Proper noun

Public Domain Day

  1. An annual observance on January 1 of when copyrights expire and works enter into the public domain. Copyrights usually expire every year on January 1 based on the individual copyright laws of each country.

Origin of Public Domain Day

First mentioned by Lawrence Lessig in 2004, but it is unclear when observance began.

Questions about Public Domain Day

What does Public Domain Day mean?
Public Domain Day means an annual observance on January 1 of when copyrights expire and works enter into the public domain. Copyrights usually expire every year on January 1 based on the individual copyright laws of each country.
What part of speech is Public Domain Day?
Public Domain Day is a proper noun.

Words near Public Domain Day in the dictionary

  1. public defenders
  2. public diplomacy
  3. public display of affection
  4. public displays of affection
  5. public domain
  6. Public Domain Day
  7. public domainness
  8. public enemies
  9. public enemy
  10. Public Enemy No. 1
  11. public enemy number one

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: Public Domain Day (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “Public Domain Day.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/public_domain_day. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.