How to Use public domain in a Sentence

public domain

noun
  • All of which, by the way, was very much in the public domain.
    — Andy Meek, BGR, 7 Mar. 2022
  • Patty rewrites the lyrics of songs that are in the public domain.
    — Adam Gopnik, The New Yorker, 23 Dec. 2019
  • Now the cat’s out of the bag and the recording is out in public domain.
    — David Taylor, Houston Chronicle, 22 Oct. 2019
  • Get a public domain song as a backup.
    — Brian Hiatt, Rolling Stone, 20 Mar. 2026
  • Where that starts to change is in the new additions to the public domain.
    — Steven Lubar, Smithsonian, 1 Oct. 2019
  • Mount Graham was one of the first parcels to be placed in the public domain.
    — AZCentral.com, 20 Aug. 2021
  • There are a lot of things that have not yet been in the public domain yet that are relevant.
    — Gabe Lacques, USA TODAY, 3 July 2021
  • Very little is known about the man himself, and what is known has been in the public domain for a long time.
    — David Ellis, The Atlantic, 8 June 2019
  • Books old enough to be in the public domain may be available for free download online.
    — Timothy B. Lee, Ars Technica, 7 Apr. 2020
  • Both names are in the public domain, while Biscoff could be trademarked.
    — Daniel Michaels, WSJ, 12 July 2021
  • Making the web public domain opened it up to anyone who had a computer.
    — David Grossman, Popular Mechanics, 17 May 2023
  • All of this scientific work has been in the public domain since mid-March.
    — Los Angeles Times, 9 May 2020
  • Almost all of the music is classical and in the public domain.
    — Kalhan Rosenblatt, NBC News, 22 Sep. 2022
  • The financial details of the deal remain out of the public domain.
    — Izzy Colon, SPIN, 24 Jan. 2022
  • Over the years, of course, British spies tried to put intelligence in the public domain.
    — Washington Post, 21 Apr. 2022
  • The photos stay in the public domain even when a person is not prosecuted or is found not guilty.
    — Francesca Giuliani-Hoffman, CNN, 2 July 2020
  • The original mistake was in the public domain and everyone could now get on with life.
    — The Economist, 2 Nov. 2019
  • If the pandemic is to be countered on the scale required, the vaccines need to be made public domain.
    — Robert Zubrin, National Review, 25 Nov. 2020
  • And public domain isn't just good news for those who want to create art, but also for those who simply want to consume it.
    — Rachel Treisman, NPR, 26 Dec. 2025
  • Since the image of the American flag is in the public domain, anyone can use it.
    — Michael D. Breidenbach, The Atlantic, 4 July 2018
  • These are some of the more famous names that will join the likes of Shakespeare and Beethoven in the public domain.
    — Jeff John Roberts, Fortune, 31 Dec. 2020
  • The chilling 911 call of his wife, Ashley, is in the public domain.
    — Sam Farmer, Los Angeles Times, 16 July 2021
  • The suit was eventually settled, and the tape remained in the public domain.
    — Lauren Puckett-Pope, ELLE, 6 Jan. 2022
  • According to the Reno Memo, the design will be a public domain -— just like ours.
    — Lainey Seyler, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 26 Apr. 2018
  • Roark says that while there was a lot of information about Melanie in the public domain, there wasn’t much about William.
    — Anne Easton, Forbes, 17 June 2022
  • The choice for public domain put a foot down for users, as opposed to corporations, and the web has wrestled with the choice ever since.
    — David Grossman, Popular Mechanics, 17 May 2023
  • In the time before the chats burst into the public domain, the handsome and charming governor appeared to have a teflon coat.
    — John Bacon, USA TODAY, 23 July 2019
  • Rackus said the group has put the plans for their software and hardware in the public domain so that anyone can download them and try to improve upon them.
    — Helen Branswell, STAT, 25 Apr. 2018
  • Flix is one of the largest libraries of public domain animation and live action and over the next year will be doubling the size of its library.
    — Kansas City Star, 10 June 2024
  • Welch said that in all, about 15 million acres were carved out of the public domain to be designated Apache lands.
    — AZCentral.com, 20 Aug. 2021

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'public domain.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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