Free Casefiles

[joltinjoe]

GUYS CAN ANYBODY FILL ME IN AS HOW TO GET HOLD OF HARDY BOYS CASEFILES OFR FREE ON THE NET

THNAKS
JOE

[tomswift2002]

Joe, you don't have to shout.

As for getting the Casefiles free, that is not going to happen till at least 2087 at the earliest.  The Casefiles are still under copyright, and considering that the last book was only released to stores 9 years, 10 months ago, and some odd number of days, no one is going to want to risk getting prosecuted by S&S for copyright infringment.  Even though the series is dead and out of print, under copyright laws, Simon & Schuster can still defend the series and prosecute people.  Now then, if the series had been printed in prior to 1950, we might be looking at a couple of books not having been renewed properly, so they would be in the public domain, but with the Casefiles having only turned 20 years old in April 2007,  the only way to get the books is to look for them in paperback at a used bookstore (or as some people might say, check EBAY or Chapters.ca or Amazon.com's used sections).  I just checked both Simonsays.com and Simonsayscanada.com and neither site is listing any Casefiles as being available.

[White Eagle]

2087?! BUT WE'LL ALL BE DEAD!
OUR KIDS'LL PROBABLY BE DEAD!!!!!!

[tomswift2002]

According to the Sonny Bono Law, the books will can be protected by copyright for 100 years after first publication.  Seeing the Dead On Target was published and copyrighted in 1987, then 2087 would be the earliest that any Casefile would be in the public domain, unless Simon & Schuster were to close and no one bothered to buy any of their copyrights, then the books would fall into the public domain much earlier.

[Centrion]

Except for contests, I've seen no real other way to get free Casefiles.

[White Eagle]

Except for contests, I've seen no real other way to get free Casefiles.

Unless you have a friend who's willing to just give you all of his. (Fat chance!)

[Bigfootman]

One word: E-books, the first few casefile do have E-books, but I'm not sure that they are legal

[tomswift2002]

Funny I haven't heard any news about the first few Casefiles being released in E-Book format, and I just checked S&S's website.  The only E-Book releases by S&S are Haunted, Past and Present Danger, The Castle Conundrum, Crime In The Cards, Kickoff To Danger, Ghost Of A Chance, Trick-Or-Trouble, Ghost Stories, Foul Play (UB), & House Arrest.  And that is a total of ten books (3 from the UB's, 7 from the Digests that are completely random numbers in each series).

[SDLagent]

Yeah I just checked SimonSays. Looks like they took quite a few eBooks off the site, like you said, there's only ten currently, even though there was around 40 before, including Casefiles.

[Bigfootman]

It's not on S&S it's on another site.

[tomswift2002]

Which site is that?  Since somehow I think they are probably illegal E-Books.

[pixieron]

well,there is a website...i downloaded the first 5 (no 1-5)casefiles books there....the format of the book is .pdf so adobe reader is needed.im not sure whether it's still there but check it out

esnips.com

[NZone]

I know http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page has free e-books of all kinds

[tomswift2002]

Project Gutenberg does have free e-books, but their rule is to only have books written before 1923, unless you can prove that the Copyright on a newer book has lapsed and the book is now in the public domain, such as Tom Swift And The Visitor From Planet X and Tom Swift and the Electronic Hydrolung, which were both released and copyrighted in 1961, according to extensive research in the US Copyright office was never renewed, so they both lapsed into the public domain in 2006, 45 years after they were first published.

Because the Hardy Boys Casefiles #1 Dead On Target and #2 Evil, Inc. were released in April 1987, the earliest, should the copyright lapse into the public domain, we could see a free ebook version of those 2 books would be April 2032, 45 years after the release date.

The original texts of the Hardy Boys #1, 2 & 3 from 1927 (Tower Treasure, House On The Cliff, The Secret of The Old Mill) were set to enter into the public domain in 2002, 75 years after their first publication in 1927 (because their copyrights had been automatically renewed in 1955 after the US government made an amendment to the US Copyright Act allowing for books produced by mass market producers to be protected for 75 years instead of the previous 45 year max, although that 45 years was left in place as a renewal date so that publishing houses couldn't go to the courts 6 or 7 decades after the first release of the book and claim that they still deserved to receive royalties) but because of the Sonny Bono Law entering into effect, those three Hardy Boys books will enter into Public Domain some time between 2022 and 2047.

Here's the Wikipedia article on the Sonny Bono Law:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Term_Extension_Act

[Bigfootman]

Which site is that?  Since somehow I think they are probably illegal E-Books.

Yep, they are ilgall, I saw some latter nnancy drew files there.