Copyright Status
Night of the Living Dead entered the public domain because the original theatrical distributor, the Walter Reade Organization, neglected to place a copyright indication on the prints. In 1968, United States copyright law required a proper notice for a work to maintain a copyright. Image Ten displayed such a notice on the title frames of the film beneath the original title, Night of the Flesh Eaters. The distributor removed the statement when it changed the title.
A limited number of theatrical release prints were distributed by Walter Reade and these copies could have been shelved if Romero and Image Ten had elected. This would have given Romero the opportunity to rename the film, do a few brief "creative" edits, and then obtain a new Copyright. But this was never done and the theatrical releases continued to be distributed until eventually reprinted and distributed by home video distributors.
Because of the public domain status, the film is sold on home video by many distributors. As of 2012, the Amazon.com lists copies of Night of the Living Dead retailing 52 on VHS, 181 on DVD, and 9 on Blu-ray. The original film is available to view or download free on Internet sites, such as Google Video, Internet Archive, Hulu, and YouTube. As of September 30, 2012, it is the Internet Archive's second-most-downloaded film, with 1,036,742 downloads.
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