Copyright changes have made it possible to determine – with only relative discomfort – whether an old recording is in the public domain. The “overall rule” as of 2022 is that a composition or story has a 95 year limit and that a “performance” (ie recording) is in the public domain at 100 years. So, at the end of 2022, recordings from 1922 are public domain for – you know, scratch tracks (some have a generous amount of scratch already) or full-out background soundtracks, if you’re on a budget. Some lightly filtered bits will be posted here periodically from the Animating Apothecary archives, mostly as a test, to supplement the amazing collections already existing at archive.org. Checking with the Library of Congress Copyright Office can determine whether older recordings of a less popular nature have had their copyright renewed under the older rules – in many cases, these have slid into the public domain already, just thanks to ignorance and apathy (“It’s Old! Don’t Know! Don’t Care!”).