Reply #12: If it's out of print, you're pretty much out of luck.

[Tansy_Gold]

You think it should revert to public domain because you think potential buyers have more of a right to make free copies than the original creator of the work?

Here's a scenario for you -- Arthur Author writes a book "Fortunes in Funk" and contracts with Gloomy Press to publish it. Gloomy fulfills the contract, prints 5,000 copies, but the book gets little publicity and only 500 copies are sold. The rest are remaindered. Two years later, Arthur Author writes another book, "Greed in Gulag." Unhappy with his results at Gloomy Press, he finds another publisher, Howitzer Books. His editor at Howitzer has lots of faith in Gulag, orders a 100,000 first printing and a massive media blitz. Not only does Gulag become a best-seller, but now people are rediscovering Funk as well. Arthur's contract with Gloomy gives them the right to print more copies -- and make money off them -- so Howitzer is kinda pissed, but they get to contract with Arthur for his next five books, in hopes that they will also be bestsellers.

Some authors have two or three or a dozen books like "Fortunes in Funk" before (if) they break out and become best sellers. So you're saying they should just lose the rights to those works because they didn't sell the first time?