Public Domain Search
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[edit] About this search
This custom search engine attempts to restrict the search to sites that contain mostly or completely public domain content. The majority of these sites are from the US federal government.
This will never be perfect - there are so many subdomains of .gov, and so many new sites being created - some of which are federal, some of which are not. But we'll make it as good as we can.
[edit] Why is this needed?
There are other ways to search for content which has been tagged as Creative Commons licensed (or which uses a public domain "mark" from Creative Commons). Click "Advanced search" in your Google search and choose the relevant permissions. Or go to Creative Commons' search page - there are Google, Flickr and other search options.
This is great, but the Public Domain Search is complementary to this - it mostly searches sites that don't use a Creative Commons mark, and won't turn up in Creative Commons searches.
Public domain is also a bit different from other open content - CC-by and CC-by-sa. Note that if you want material compatible with Appropedia and you're using the Creative Commons search, you need to select "use for commercial purposes." (Although Appropedia is not-for-profit, our license allows commercial use.) And note that these searches, like the PDS, aren't perfect - they sometimes give results that use the wrong license.
[edit] Status (under development)
This search is functioning but is not properly refined. It returns useful results, but a significant number of non-public domain hits come up.
[edit] Seeking Law/IP Intern
Appropedia is looking for a law/IP intern, someone interested in this area, to help refine this Public Domain Search, based primarily on federal US government sources. If you are interested, please leave a message here. (User:Chriswaterguy is overseeing this project.)
[edit] Source
Note that all data use to create these searches is "open source" - see below for links and details.
- Public Domain Search/Included and excluded sites - what is searched, and what isn't.
- Public Domain Search/How the search is built (This is a work in progress - learn how you can help!)
- Public Domain Search/Searching Gutenberg.org
[edit] Give feedback
- If you know of any other true public domain sites, or find sites with the Public Domain Search which shouldn't be there, or other good public domain search engines, please let us know.
[edit] Disclaimer
NOTICE: Results are *mostly* public domain - but please double-check the content licensing before copying the content. Some pages (especially US state and local government that haven't been excluded yet) are not public domain, and others are not clearly marked - see US federal government websites and public domain for more information.
[edit] Porting public domain content
The main reason for creating and maintaining this custom search engine is to find and port good quality public domain content to Appropedia. If you are helping with this:
- Search for your topic using the Appropedia Public Domain Search. Find content (e.g. projects, general topic information, how-tos) that would be
- Make sure that the content really is public domain (look for a copyright notice, or "Web policies" or "Permissions"...)
- Port the content. The easiest way is to use WikEd. (See also Appropedia:Porting HTML to wiki - page needs updating.)
- Use the {{pd source}} template notice on the page.
[edit] See also
- US federal government websites and public domain
- Other public domain searches and indices
- Open content - includes public domain, and licenses with minimal restrictions.
- Open content #Searching for open content - lists searches for Creative Commons licensed material (open content, but not public domain).
