If people uploads heaps of vintage (80s, 70s,90s) commercials into YouTube publicly, does that mean they own copyright or is it public domain automatically?

Question

What makes it okay for them to upload it without the original owners of them to not complain about them being uploaded?

In: Other

Answer 1

Neither, copyright belongs to the owner independently of whether other people follow it or not.

However, if there isn’t any commercial value in enforcing the copyright or the owner of the copyright is a company that doesn’t exist anymore then there may not be any value in trying to enforce their rights. That doesn’t mean the copyright vanishes, but it does mean that practically speaking it’s not a worry for people violating that copyright.