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We should create a strong policy concerning the german 25year term of scientific editions, due to the risky nature of this category.
I propose including every submission for copyright review. Also should be consensus of what is regarded as a scientific edition and what not, because I can't tell...

Well, at the moment all Barenreiter scores are treated as urtext, and nothing else. I'd agree that non-Barenreiter "urtext" editions should be submitted for copyright review. The reason that I exclude Barenreiter (which would make up a huge portion of the urtext on IMSLP) is because they are a known urtext publishing firm.

And actually, we can do a copyright review right here (on the publisher) Correct me if I'm wrong about the Barenreiter situation Carolus.

Baerenreiter was very sloppy and haphazard about US copyright renewals for all things published before 1964 (after which date the renewal became automatic). They apparently left the renewal decision up to the individual editors and their heirs. Thus a fair number of titles from both the Neue Bach Ausgabe and Neue Mozart Ausgabe were not renewed in the USA and were immediately reprinted by Kalmus, Luck's et al. Works published with a correct notice from 1964-1977 were automatically renewed and are protected for a full 95-year term in the USA (as are those published between 1923 and 1963 where all the requirements were met). Those published in 1978 and afterwards are protected for 70 years after the death of the last surviving editor. This all applies only to the USA, of course. Canada, where IMSLP is hosted, treats things quite differenty in this regard.

Since Canada evidently employs the "rule of the shorter term", any Baerenreiter (or other German) urtext editions appear to be entitled to a single 25-year term, just as they are in Germany. As I understand it, If the editions in question were essentially re-engravings of previously published works, they received a 25-year term for the engravings only. If it was a case where the concept of editio princeps applied, they received a 25-year term for first publication of the work. The editio princips rubric applies only if the new edition is radically different in sound from anything previously published, or - obviously - the work had never been previously published at all. The NMA version of Mozart's opera La Finta Giardiniera, for example, is radically different from that of the old Breitkopf score (issued ca.1880) due to the discovery of lost mamuscripts and was thus entitled to protection as a work published for the first time. While both the engraving and the editio princeps term run 25 years, Baerenreiter was entitled to collect performance royalties on recordings through GEMA due to the added status of the editio princeps claim. By contrast, although an engraving term would preclude competitors from reprinting an urtext edition less than 25 years old, it would not preclude them from re-engraving the work themselves and using their own editor's name on it.

I think both the editio princeps and the engraving terms run concurrently, so that the Mahler Piano Quartet - first published in 1973 by Sikorski in Hamburg - entered the German public domain on Jan. 1, 1999 for both the work itself and the engraving. You might wish to confirm this with a copyright attorney well-versed in the Canadian law just to make sure, but it would appear that the basic concept is that an urtext edition of any work where the composer has been dead for more than 70 years - one where the editor employed a rational, consistent, musicological method for editorial decisions - is entitled only to a limited term of 25 years, regardless of whether there was newly discovered source material introduced or not.

This issue may well become more legally complicated when the edition in question includes an elaborate realization into modern notation of a sketchy continuo line, for example, in the score and parts (something which is really contrary to urtext practice). Such an edition may well be entitled to a longer term of the editor's life plus 70 years - even under German law - due to the very extensive and individual nature of the editor's contribution in such a realization. Thus, the farther back one goes, the more extensive and necessary an editor's contribution becomes. For a good idea of what I'm talking about, take a look at the original Lully scores we have. Think of what would be involved to bring these works to life in comparison to the much more extensive and precise indications left by a composer like Beethoven or - even more so - Mahler.