PRESS RELEASE
We invite filmmakers, artists, and creatives of all skill levels and backgrounds to celebrate Public Domain Day, by creating and uploading a 2-3 minute short film to the Internet Archive.
This contest offers a chance to explore and reimagine the creative treasures entering the public domain, especially works from 1930 that will enter the public domain on January 1—classic literature, early sound films, cartoons, music, and art. Participants are encouraged to use materials from the Internet Archive’s collections to craft unique films that breathe new life into these cultural gems.
Top entries will be awarded prizes up to $1,500, with winners announced during our virtual and in-person Public Domain Day Celebrations on January 21, 2026. All submissions will be featured in a special Public Domain Day Collection on archive.org and highlighted in a January 2026 blog post.
Join us in this creative celebration of cultural heritage and timeless art!
Guidelines
- Make a 2–3 minute movie using at least one work published in 1930 that will become Public Domain on January 1, 2026. This could be a poem, book, film, musical composition, painting, photograph or any other work that will become Public Domain next year. The more different PD materials you use, the better!
- Note: If you have a resource from 1930 that is not available on archive.org, you may upload it and then use it in your submission. (Here is how to do that).
- Your submission must have a soundtrack. It can be your own voiceover or performance of a public domain musical composition, or you may use public domain or CC0 sound recordings from sources like Openverse and the Free Music Archive.
- Note: Sound recordings have special status under Copyright Law, so it’s important to note that while musical compositions from 1930 will be entering the public domain, the sound recordings of those works are not. Sound recordings published in 1925 will enter the public domain.
- Mix and Mash content however you like, but note that ALL of your sources must be from the public domain. They do not all have to be from 1930. Remember, U.S. government works are public domain no matter when they are published. So feel free to use those NASA images! You may include your own original work if you put a CC0 license on it.
- We are celebrating the public domain as a triumph of human creativity, and we want your submission to reflect that spirit. The contest honors the imagination, craft, and originality that people bring to remixing culture, so your final film should be a human-made work of art. If you use AI tools in your submission, please explain how they are used.
- Add a personal touch, make it yours!
- Keep the videos light hearted and fun! (It is a celebration after all!)
Submission Deadline
All submissions must be in by 11:59pm PST, January 7, 2026.
How to Submit
- Create an Internet Archive account.
- Upload your film to archive.org.
- Add a subject tag field of “remix contest 2026” in the upload form.
- Link all your sourced materials from 1930 or prior in the upload description.
- Copy the URL/link to your submission, you will need it for the submission form.
- Complete the online Submission Form.
To help get you started here are some materials that will become part of the public domain on January 1, 2026.
- Books: The first four original editions of the Nancy Drew books, including The Secret of the Old Clock. As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner. Dick and Jane made their first appearance in the Elson Basic Readers. The Little Engine That Could by Watty Piper choo-chooed onto the scene.
- Comics: The iconic Blondie by Chic Young first debuted in 1930. Mickey Mouse made his first appearance in comics in 1930 featuring multiple serialized storylines! Even more Popeye stories including those featuring the Sea Hag!
- Films: The King of Jazz, a two-strip Technicolor musical revue featuring Bing Crosby, elaborate sets, and Vaudevillian routines. Morocco, a melodrama featuring Marlene Dietriech pushing the boundaries of pre-Hays Code Hollywood. All Quiet on the Western Front, the Best Picture winning adaptation of the novel. Dizzy Dishes, the first appearance of Betty Boop in film. The Picnic, a Disney short featuring the debut of Rover, the dog that would become Pluto a year later.
- Musical Compositions: It Happened in Monterey, a song of longing for romance past. But Not for Me, a lament about love songs. Livin’ in the Sunlight, Lovin’ in the Moonlight, a carefree celebration. Dream A Little Dream of Me, a wishful request of longing. Beyond the Blue Horizon, a song that invokes our own blinking servers that made 1 trillion webpages possible. Georgia on My Mind, a song that became the official state song of Georgia in 1979. You can record your own versions of any of these compositions and reuse them in your film.
- Sound Recordings (1925): A Cup Of Coffee, A Sandwich & You, a fox trot rendition by the Carleton Terrace Orchestra. St. Louis Blues by Bessie Smith ft. Louis Armstrong on the cornet. I’ll See You in My Dreams by the Isham Jones Orchestra, the top selling record of 1925. Manhattan by Ben Selvin Orchestra as The Knickerbockers, a jazzy evocation of the city.
Prizes
- 1st prize: $1500
- 2nd prize: $1000
- 3rd prize: $500
Judges will be looking for videos that are fun, interesting and use public domain materials, especially those from 1930. Submissions should highlight the value of having cultural materials that can be reused, remixed, and re-contextualized for a new day. Winners will be announced and previewed at our virtual event, then shown on the “big screen” and celebrated in person at the in-person Public Domain Day party in San Francisco. Winners’ pieces will be purchased with the prize money, and viewable on the Internet Archive under a Creative Commons license.
Past Winning Submission Examples
- The Situationship
- A thoughtful edit that condenses a whole film down to short film length while also updating its context for the present day with a Sapphic love story.
- When I Leave the World Behind
- Queline Meadows’s inspired mix of movies, images, music and text woven into a subtle and emotionally affecting video expressing a strong sense of nostalgia and the irretrievable passage of time.
- Just Like A Hollywood Star
- A rich montage of sound and picture, focusing on images that model beauty, fitness, posture, proper behavior, and the laws of physics to produce an unpredictable result.
- 1928 Playable Demo
- An inventive creation positioning old film as a video game invoking feelings of interactivity.
- This Is The Science Of Optics
- A collage of sight and sound with experimental elements bending the visuals and leaving the audience with pontifications about existence.
- Danse des Aliénés
- This trippy piece creates a visual experience unlike others with animation, bold colors, and unique framing to draw the viewer in and invoke experimental filmmaking of later decades with older materials.
For further reference, check out past entrants from 2025.