[leon_]

> Nopublicdomainistan

Anyone said Germany? The concept of the "Urheberrecht" which many people falsly translate to copyright (it's more of a creator-right) is that you can not relinquish it in Germany. It's kinda like your mother can not "un-mother" herself from you ;)

That's why there's no real Public Domain in its purest form possible in Germany.

> clearly the author is never going to come after them. so what is the actual real world problem they face in this situation

The real problem is: A lack of legal certainty. You can not use PD in any bigger project if it is _possible_ that the original author might come after you.