Licence & reuse
For rights KOMET is entitled to license, we permit the noncommercial uses described below. Commercial exploitation requires separate permission unless already permitted by law. Public-domain material and third-party rights are treated separately.
1. Who grants which permission?
KOMET Druck- und Verlagshaus GmbH operates this archive of Der Komet, published since 1883. As publisher, we hold our own rights or rights granted to us. Individual articles, photographs, advertisements and illustrations may nevertheless have other authors or rights holders.
This permission extends only to copyright permissions and, where applicable, database rights that KOMET is actually entitled to grant. It transfers neither ownership nor exclusive rights. The publisher does not claim unlimited, perpetual authorship of every archive contribution since 1883.
2. Free private and scholarly use
Within that scope of rights, we grant nonexclusive, royalty-free permission for:
- Reading, research, quotation and keeping individual sources in private collections, family-history research and local-history research;
- Downloading, printing, copying, cropping, transcribing and correcting OCR for personal noncommercial purposes;
- Using individual sources and illustrations in noncommercial scholarly works, theses, presentations and research publications, including deposit in freely accessible scholarly repositories;
- Research through the public web search, API and MCP, and collecting sources in private archive projects.
A researcher’s salary or affiliation with a university does not, by itself, make the particular use commercial. Its actual purpose is decisive. Commercial reuse by a publisher, image agency or other business is outside this free permission unless a statutory permission applies.
3. Credit sources and identify changes
When sharing or publishing under this permission, identify the author where known, Der Komet, issue or date, page, “KOMET Archive”, the permanent page URL and these terms. Identify crops and substantive changes, including transcriptions and OCR corrections. Do not imply endorsement by KOMET or the historical author.
Example: Author, “Article title”, Der Komet, issue/date, page; KOMET Archive, permanent page URL; used under KOMET-Archive-NC-1.0; add “cropped” or “transcription” where appropriate.
4. Request permission for commercial use
Commercial reproductions, selling scans, advertising, paid image services, paid source collections and other commercial exploitation of protected material require prior permission from the relevant rights holder unless permitted by law. Attribution alone does not replace that permission.
Contact info@komet-pirmasens.de with page URLs, scope, medium, print run or audience and intended purpose. We can authorise only rights we control.
5. Public domain and statutory permissions
A public-domain work does not require copyright permission from the publisher. The noncommercial condition in these terms does not apply to it, including commercial use of public-domain components. Publication year alone does not establish public-domain status: the protection periods applicable to each contribution and its authors are decisive.
Digitisation alone does not automatically create a new copyright in the historical original. In particular, statutory rules on reproductions of public-domain visual works apply. Any separate rights that still exist must be assessed individually.
Quotation rights, lawful private copies, statutory permissions for research and teaching and other legal exceptions remain unaffected. If a statutory permission covers a use, you do not need this additional permission. Its legal requirements, including any mandatory attribution, continue to apply.
6. Third-party and personal rights
Photographs, agency contributions, advertisements, illustrations, trademarks and other third-party material may carry separate rights. Absence of a rights notice does not establish that no third-party rights exist. These terms do not license rights KOMET cannot grant. Where necessary, clear the intended publication with the respective rights holders.
Data protection, personality, name, trademark and other rights remain independent of copyright. A use permitted by copyright is not automatically lawful in every other respect.
7. Database, automated access and AI
Any rights in the selection, arrangement and substantial parts of the archive database are distinct from rights in individual sources. Public access does not provide blanket permission to copy or republish the entire collection or build a commercial replica. Uses covered by law or this permission remain permitted.
API and MCP provide research access to public sources. They grant no additional permission for commercial content reuse or AI-model training. Statutory permissions, including text and data mining, remain unaffected. Respect the published request limits; access and reuse rights are separate matters.
8. PDF access and private projects
One-time PDF approval is a technical account permission to download files. It is not a commercial licence and does not extend rights in the source. The same rights information applies to PNG, JPG, clipboard copies, prints and crops.
Users’ own private project notes are outside this archive licence and are not made available to other visitors through it. This permission does not separately license the archive software, publisher logos or trademarks.
9. Reliable scholarly use
Verify OCR quotations against the scan and retain the issue, page and source URL. Uses permitted and compliant with this version will not lose permission retrospectively merely because this page is later changed. If a particular source carries different information, its actual rights and conditions must be observed. Mandatory statutory rights always remain unaffected.
10. Custom terms, no blanket Creative Commons licence
These are custom noncommercial reuse terms for this archive. The collection as a whole is not placed under CC BY-NC 4.0 or another Creative Commons licence. A licence expressly attached to a particular item remains applicable. Please contact us above with rights questions or proposals for reuse.