The mouse via Steamboat Willie is scheduled to enter public domain? Guess we can look forward to quite eventful three weeks before the end of the year, while Disney is frantically trying to prevent that outcome.
The mouse via Steamboat Willie is scheduled to enter public domain? Guess we can look forward to quite eventful three weeks before the end of the year, while Disney is frantically trying to prevent that outcome.
What if we didn't wait for things to enter the public domain but instead they were born right into it?
I have started a book publishing company that publishes new, public domain books only:
How do authors make a living by giving away all their work for free?
How much do you want for that comment?
Someone who spends years perfecting a recipe has no similar protections, yet they've certainly done work. Their options for making money off of it comes from maybe associated works, or a restaurant, or hiding the recipe. Maybe authors will have to read works out loud? Create different types of value in a world where we will have AI generating stories en masse?
Books of recipes are copyrightable though. You can use a recipe, but you can't just copy the book and sell it as your own. What you can't copyright is a simple set of instructions, which is what a recipe is.
Not sure where you get the idea that comments can't be copyrighted. As far as I know, if they are original works of authorship in a tangible medium, and you don't agree to waive that right in the terms of service, you own the copyright. In other words, the usual tests of whether something can be copyrighted.
In any case, comparing comments, recipes, and books as though they were the same thing doesn't make sense to me. I'd like to hear the ways in which they are equivalent, and why authors of novels should be stripped of their current right to claim the sole right to make copies of their own work.
Not sure where you get the idea that comments can't be copyrighted.
Hm? I'm just pointing out that all kinds of content creation occurs and they have different types of value. I absolutely think a comment has value and could be copyrighted. But, for certain types of creation that are "work" do not have equivalent protections. So, are we just trying to protect work?
They're not making a living from that comment, and they are worried that authors will not be able to make a living from their writings.
Taking a big step back, I guess that question is: Do we value people who write enough that we want some full time writers? We can then structure our society accordingly.
There plenty of idle people who can afford to give away their book length writings for free, probably millions in fact.
And some fraction of them do, some fraction add an optional donation prompt, etc...
The recipe itself isn’t protected by copyright but the rest of a cookbook is. E.g. their writings about the recipe and the photography. Usage of one’s likeness is also subject to protection. E.g. you can’t market a cookbook on Amazon as Ina Garten’s Barefoot Contessa even if the contents of the book are exactly her recipes. I don’t think it’s a good analogy.
I mean that's exactly my point -- one needs to find other ways to "making a living" from the work done within the framework of laws which may or may not appreciate or have the means to protect ones work.
A book in the public domain can be sold, so probably by selling books. Or other jobs. This seems really interesting to me as someone who does not write books full time.
They established early copyright because publishers would just print copies of books and never pay the authors at all. The middlemen aren't going to do it voluntarily, and if they do, they'll be undercut by those that don't.
Authors can sell their own books even if someone else publishes it. Especially if it's published into the public domain.
And someone else can take the content and print it and sell it themselves
Wouldn't that be neat :-)
not if they sell or exclusively license the copyright to someone else.
Which is not the case for books in the public domain.
The last chapter requires an enterprise license.
Hi!
I found a typo, I suspect you meant, enterprise subscription.
Authors don't make a living from their work now. I've known many authors and they all do it as a side gig.. to promote their career while making a few extra bucks. None of them were even close to doing it for a living.
If you want to encourage writing you'll need a different system than copyright.
Weird. Every author I'm aware of writes their books for an actual living.
So, one writes a book to make a living?
You made that comment to make ends meet?
It is only "for free" if it has any value.
This is the gift economy, where reciprocity is just a special (restricted) case of it.
It's either done as a hobby and/or the reputational etc. benefits support their "brand" in their pursuits that they do get paid for.
Have you spoken with lawyers about this idea? At least in the United States, that’s not how copyright or public domain works. One does not need to apply for copyright to receive one, and there is no mechanism for renouncing copyright. There is a belief held by some that copyright, like many other rights, can be renounced however that theory has never been tested in court and there are several dissenting opinions from notable IP lawyers.
https://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/faq-general.html#register
The MIT No Attribution (MIT-0) license is an OSI-approved license. As I've been told by at least a couple IP lawyers, the situation may be stickier in continental Europe. Most works the US federal government creates are also considered in the public domain so it doesn't seem that controversial a concept in the US.
code under MIT-0 is still copyrighted to its original author - it just authorizes derivative work to be done without explicitly mentioning it (which is different from public domain)
We're getting into pretty meaningless distinctions though. Anyone can take the work, give no credit, and use it however they wish. Which sounds a lot like public domain.
CC0 from Creative Commons does explicitly state "place them as completely as possible in the public domain." It does also acknowledge that it is not always possible to fully do so because of unrelinquishable moral rights and other reasons. https://creativecommons.org/public-domain/cc0/
To the original point, it may well make sense to license under MIT-0 or CC0 if they want to place a book in the public domain. The OSI's concerns about CC0 don't really apply to writing as I understand it.
The carve out for US Government work is explicitly stated in the statute. Not only does that not create a precedent for others to create copyright-free works, but if anything it makes the case that exceptions to copyright-by-default have to be explicitly defined in law.
OSI approving something is meaningless from a legal standpoint, it’s just some people on the internet. Even were that not the case, creating a license is not the same as renouncing copyright. Which, again, it isn’t clear that it is possible to do under US copyright law.
Edit: to be clear, MIT-0 doesn’t even attempt to renounce copyright. It merely provides slightly broader rights to holders of a license to the copyrighted work.
OP’s company is based in the UK, so I was curious if the UK had stronger mechanisms for renouncing copyright. According to this source[1], they do not: “Under United Kingdom law, the availability of [copyright] abandonment is far from clear, and statements purporting to abandon copyright may be interpreted as mere revocable licenses.”
(I don’t mean to suggest that OP’s company is doing anything wrong. I assume they’re up to speed on the legal environment and are doing the right things to ensure their works are perpetually available. I just thought this was interesting).
[1] https://scholarlycommons.law.case.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?ar...
This is fantastic. I want to know: how do you plan to sustain this? Donations?
In the last 6 months, I have published two books on my "free time" while working a full-time job. It wasn't unsustainable, just a bit more busy. I might even do it again in the next 6 months!
Essentially: it's rare that people want to publish books and dedicate them to the public domain. People who write a lot are writers who make a living from writing and they write on Substack, for newspapers, large publishing houses, et al. They are not interested in dedicating words to the public domain. Thusly, Laniakea Books is not an unsustainable operation :)
Understood, thank you <3
Thank you! This is fantastic. Letters From Prison [1] is incredible. Will take a look at the other books soon.
Honest question: how do you feel about paying for editor's work and marketing a new author if then anyone can sell the resulting book?
So the works of J.R.R. Tolkien, who died in 1973, will enter the public domain in New Zealand (and other countries) next year? Or do they not, as he presumably published his works in the UK? Or they enter the public domain in New Zealand et al. but not in other countries?
What would be the New Zealand connection of Tolkien (other than the peter jackson movies)?
There's none. But the validity of a copyright of a work is dependent on the place in which you're applying the law, not on the place where the author is from (except when applying the rule of the shorter term).
Tons of works are in the public domain in one country, but not another.
The oldest still in effect copyright I know of is from 1611: the King James translation of the bible is still copyright of the crown in the UK. No other country recognizes that copyright.
So I can get a King James Bible easy peasy pretty much anywhere in the world except in James' home country.
High larious.
Of course it is also easy to find in UK.
But is it legal to post the full text online without paying anything to the Crown?
Pay, yes; permission, no; it is a mandatory licence, unlike many state royalty subjects.
The oldest still in effect copyright I know of is from 1611.
I can beat that by over 4000 years.
As far as Icelandic copyright law is concerned the copyright on the Diary of Merer[1], written 4500 years ago, will be held by the French Egyptologist Pierre Tallet until 2039.
This is because the copyright protection commerces when the work is made available for sale, loaning out etc. to the public.
If you discover a previously unpublished work that's not protected by copyright you get to enjoy 25 years of copyright protection, i.e. the copyright is assigned to the person who discovered and published the work.
I only have a source in Icelandic, it's article 44 of the copyright act [2].
The 25-year rule is part of an EU copyright directive (which Iceland, as an EEA country, has adopted as well). Also, this isn't technically a copyright, but an equivalent right. (And the right is not 4000 years old.) The EU directive says (in English):
Any person who, after the expiry of copyright protection, for the first time lawfully publishes or lawfully communicates to the public a previously unpublished work, shall benefit from a protection equivalent to the economic rights of the author. The term of protection of such rights shall be 25 years from the time when the work was first lawfully published or lawfully communicated to the public.
The KJV is protected in the UK by Royal Prerogative rather than by copyright law. The KJV rights are actually older than copyright in the UK.
A number of countries have copyright restrictions on things of national significance, etc., however, and then there's the concept of domaine public payant.
Presumably the films, which were famously all shot there.
Somewhat tenuous, but Tolkien was taught Old English at Oxford by a New Zealander, Kenneth Sisam[1].
It's just an English speaking country with a largish population and a more traditional copyright law.
In Life+50 countries, they'll enter the public domain. In the UK and other Life+70 countries, they won't.
So can they host the Gutenberg project in NZ then? There is no feasible way for people to prevent people from downloading the hobbit. They couldn't stop music or movie downloads except by adopting a subscription model that effectively reduced the prices. These files are tiny and the ethical case against it is so much harder to make.
Edit: also, these are the sorts of books that don't get lumped into subscriptions and are often missing from digital libraries.
They can, but they'd have to make those downloads only available to NZ users. This is also why American sites need to block EU users or comply with the GDPR. You can't just pick a server location with the laxest laws.
IIRC, Gutenberg already does this, limiting access from Germany which has a stricter copyright than the US.
No, there is no requirement under US law to preemptively block non-US users, or under NZ law to block non-NZ users. German courts held that there was jurisdiction over PG because they had content in German, and PG decided to comply. But you can, in fact, pick a server location with lax laws. But you may be susceptible to get sued elsewhere (in some cases), and the local country can force ISPs to block your site, too, if you don't respond.
Does Gutenberg block access or does Germany? If gutenberg NZ had no presence outside NZ would it even matter?
And even if it was blocked, vpn works fine.
Just checked and the AU site lets me access things I shouldn't where I am, so they clearly aren't that concerned.
So can they host the Gutenberg project in NZ then?
There is already an Australian branch of Project Gutenberg, which hosts some works which (for complex/obscure legal reasons) are still under copyright in the US but now public domain in Australia (e.g. the works of George Orwell). I don’t think there is a New Zealand equivalent, but I’m sure if someone was sufficiently motivated it could happen
If something is in the public domain, is it still accessible for copying or can companies still profit off of selling public domain material? For example, if I “pirate” a public domain text published by some company, am I in the wrong?
Very good question! Not an IP lawyer, but I believe the gist of it you may copy the original work, but not any sufficiently transformative derivative work, as that would gain its own copyright. So you could copy the text of a public domain book and re-publish it yourself, yes. You could also sell your copies for $10/ea, just like the publisher you're copying from is doing, or give them away for free, or whatever you like.
The tricky bit is what its "sufficiently transformative" to gets its own copyright. Probably simply text printed in a book is not, so I think you'd be OK scanning and distributing such a book. But if the publisher added new footnotes or illustrations or cover art or a forward, etc, that would still be covered under its own copyright and you would have to remove them. And I could see an argument that a certain printing style (maybe a choice in font or page layout?) could be transformative, but I think that starts to be quite a stretch.
illustrations or cover art or a forward, etc,
OT, but isn't it called "foreword"? You're the second person in this thread calling it "forward" which means something completely different to me, while "foreword" is basically a literal translation of the word for it in my native language.
Hey, you're right[1]! News to me, hah.
IANAL but I'm told that Feist is probably the relevant US Supreme Court decision. Just because you went to a lot of trouble ("sweat of the brow") to format a book probably doesn't give you a safe copyright--although extensive annotations, illustrations, etc. probably would.
You can sell public domain materials all you want. And whenever anyone else copies stuff in the public domain, even if they copy it from your copy, they're not infringing copyright.
But be careful as when someone publishes something public domain they often have things that are not public domain in their version. They can "fix" errors, add artwork, introductions and so on.
Yes, of course, the added content would not be in the public domain. Although it should be note that certain changes such as fixing grammatical errors/proofreading would not be considered copyrightable.
IANAL but my understanding is that public domain material can be published in a copyright protected form, yes. For instance, Beethoven's 5th symphony is in the public domain, but if a publisher starts selling the sheet music for it, then that content itself is still protected. So any contributions they've made such as annotations or formatting, cover art, etc are protected but the underlying content is not.
Yeah, I understand that Dover books might have a copyright on, say, Moby Dick but it's on the forward that they tackled on to Melville's prose, not the story.
I had a similar question before reading Moby Dick. I noticed it was being sold online, although inexpensive, which made me wonder. It turned out the English text is in the public domain, and anyone can profit from it. So, why did the publisher charge for it? I wanted to read it in my native language, Polish, and the translation was not in the public domain. Additionally, I wanted to easily upload it to my Kindle, so I also paid for convenience. I know this not fully answers your question, but wanted to share my experience.
why did the publisher charge for it?
Why not. Easy money.
I'm not your lawyer, but if the text is public domain, you can do whatever you want with it. You should be able to walk into a book store, take a photo of every page of Sherlock Holmes, post it on Facebook, and be good legally. You can legally download scans of Jane Austen novels published by Penguin last year.
A publisher would only have a copyrightable claim in their original creative works. So the cover art, the foreword, etc. This would also include e-books, as the specific code for that would be copyrightable illegal to download. Only the words themselves would be free, so you would need someone to create a gratis file therefrom for you.
Disney Animation has been using a clip from Steamboat Willy (and the song) as their opening bumper for years.
It was originally done when John Lassiter took over Disney Animation as an homage to his idol Walt. But some IP lawyers have said that it may also make it impossible to use Steamboat Willy in the public domain because they could claim you're violating their copyright on their bumper.
Will be interesting to see if that gets tested.
This reminds me of the copy protection on the original Gameboy.
So Nintendo makes the Gameboy, and they only want authorized games to be used in the system. But how can they stop someone from looking at the hardware and making a compatible game without paying a license fee?
Well, they build a check into the hardware for a specific set of assembly code on the cartridge. If your cart doesn't have that exact assembly it won't boot up.
The code?
It displays the Nintendo logo on the screen and plays their jingle.
That way, if you did make an unauthorized cartridge, you'd have to infringe on their trademark in order to make the game playable.
damn thats big brain
It also didn’t work, both technically and legally
This has however been rendered pointless once the courts ruled in Accolade's favor in Sega v. Accolade, where Sega's trademark enforcement system was questioned as being monopolistic, and bypassing it by third parties on the grounds that it is for the purposes of lawful interoperability was ruled as fair use.
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/CopyProtection/Ninten...
Nintendo wasn't actually the first company to implement cartridge logo checks. Sega did it first with their "Trademark Security System" or TMSS, which worked in pretty much the same way, but then lost in a US court case against Accolade as the judges deemed that anything strictly required for games to work could not be protected by copyright or trademark law.
Despite the precedent however, the same idea kept popping up in many subsequent consoles and even some non-gaming products:
- The original PlayStation reads the logo that gets displayed on the startup screen from the first 16 sectors of the disc. Notably, US consoles will not validate the logo against a known good copy - possibly hinting at the fact Sony was aware of the TMSS case - but Japanese and late European models will.
- Similarly, PS2 games must contain a bitmap of the startup screen logo in the first 16 sectors of the disc, and PS3 games are required to have a PNG of the original PS3 logo in their filesystem.
- Xbox 360 hard drives must have a PNG of the Microsoft logo in their "security sector", which among other things contains a digitally signed copy of the drive's serial number to ensure third party drives cannot be used.
- macOS will refuse to boot in a VM or on non-Apple hardware unless the BIOS can provide a supposedly copyrighted (but otherwise well known) 64-character string.
- The handshaking process for establishing a connection to an Oracle database server involves sending a string that clearly states it is property of Oracle and protected by copyright law.
could claim you're violating their copyright on their bumper
That's not how it works, the use of Steamboat Willy in the bumper and public domain use just share the same source material, and Disney can't claim copyright on that source material since they no longer own it. Someone would have to copy the actual bumper to make it copyright infringement.
They presumably meant trademark, not copyright. I.e., if you use Steamboat Willie in anything that Disney could plausibly make with Steamboat Willie, they could argue that the character isn't being used as a character, but to imply endorsement by Disney, violating the trademark.
I'd take that bet. I know 3 different law firms with deep pockets that know that when Disney loses the case they will have to pay all of the lawyer fees.
After all, that portion of Mickey Mouse will also be entering public domain, so Disney won't own Mickey exclusively anymore either. Same as the non-red shirt version of Winnie the Pooh.
You can use Steamboat Willy if your legal budget is larger than Disney's
The copyright will expire no matter what. Using the rubber hose Mickey establishes it as an active trademark. That will make it challenging to sell derivative works but the films themselves will be public domain.
I always thought it would be establishing "Willie" as precisely a trademark to invoke that side of IP law.
Disney has also released a bunch of cartoon shorts in Mickey’s original style within the last 10 years. While I like the series, I felt that its main purpose was to preserve the original copyright
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mickey_Mouse_(TV_series)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wonderful_World_of_Mickey_...
Will software become “public domain” over time?
That's what abandonware was all about. If you don't support or sell the software any more, it becomes public domain.
But it was a idealistic view not accounting for the future. Today you can run virtualized anything anywhere. The software companies can claim 80s software still being usable because they can deploy it that way.
We considered that console game ROMs will become public domain because once the console lifecycle is over, no original proprietor earns a dime. It's all 2nd hand sales from there on. But, today you run these via their virtual console products and they still make money off them, so public domain is off limits.
That's what abandonware was all about. If you don't support or sell the software any more, it becomes public domain.
In what jurisdiction? Definitely not the US or any of its major economic partners, at least.
In no jurisdiction, it was the motto behind abandonware movement.
All of laws, this one, IP laws, everything concerning software is far too simplistic.
Tho if you want to dance in the grey zone, universally I think it's worthless for a company to sue you when they can claim no damages. This is why old software piracy sites exist by a shovel. If site owner and hosting doesn't care about cease and desist letters and just routes them to spam, the lawyers sending them know they cannot actually mount a case. Else they have to explain how $0 of projected damages is worth court's time.
Yes. In the US this happens 95 years after the initial creation of the software. Many other countries match this time period. Other countries may recognize a shorter copyright, but I believe no country will recognize a longer one.
What exactly happens in 2100 when AutoCAD 2005 goes "public domain" but the company does not need to provide the source code, there is no licensing server available, dongle support, whatnot. Also the company still retains the AutoCAD trademark so you cannot legally distribute modified copies of 2005 if they still contain AutoCAD/Autodesk branding in them.
That's for 2005. For today's software that depend on connectivity, nobody gets anything if the clients are pushed to public domain. You still lack the entire infrastructure. The server code is not a product, its a service implemented by the proprietor, that's beyond this law.
Yes, the foundation of all software licensing is copyright law and as such all such licensing becomes null and void once it is in the public domain.
However, given that the copyright horizon is only up to 1928 in the US, you've got a ways to go before that is even theoretically a concern.
There was a window of time in which works had to be registered to have a copyright, which is where some of the later surprisingly-public-domain works come from, when the registration wasn't done or wasn't renewed properly. It's possible that some software in that era could be unregistered. However, I'm having a bit of trouble finding a good term for that era and so I can't quite look it up to see if it overlaps a period of time in which software might exist. Any help appreciated from respondants.
Of course, for that to even matter, someone has to have a copy of the software to actually put into the public, and software utility without hardware to run it is pretty limited.
Yes, but odds are you won't live long enough to see anything useful. Mel's blackjack program https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Story_of_Mel from the 1950s might escape before you die (depending on how old you are), but it strongly depends on the specific architecture of a computer and so isn't useful.
There is probably a lot of software from then that isn't copyright. Back then you had to register copyright or you didn't have it - often that wouldn't have been done. Then you had to re-register the copyright, which given the software wasn't in use anymore wouldn't have been done. Both of these factors do not apply to modern software (at least not in most countries)
Actually pretty exciting for books.
Agatha Christie, W.E.B. DuBois, Evelyn Waugh, Nabokov, D.H. Lawrence, H.G. Wells, Virginia Woolf, and A.A. Milne all have books entering in 2024.
And a Brecht play (The Threepenny Opera - one of his best, at that), and a Eugene O'Neill (Strange Interlude)!
Not trying to contest, just asking...
Brecht died in 1956, so +70 years (as per German law) would be end of 2026, right?
That would depend on the country right? USA doesn't have a life+, so it's a hard date of 1928.
To be precise, the US does have life+70 for works published after 1978. The rest of the world went that route and the US begrudgingly followed, but the works published before the switchover date are grandfathered into the old system. The US copyright regime is a real rats' nest of complexity, see https://guides.library.cornell.edu/copyright/publicdomain
The US copyright regime is a real rats' nest of complexity
The likely alternative would be (even more) retroactive copyright extensions which would be much worse.
Until they bribe the supremes to revise the ruling.
"The Passion of Joan of Arc directed by Carl Theodor Dreyer"
As old, silent films go, this is quite good.
In the past, this might mean a cheap DVD release. Not sure the signficance of public domain for movies these days.
Piling on with more social proof for anyone browsing this thread for recommendations: I’ve seen 50ish non-comedy silent films, all reputedly-very-good ones, and this might be my favorite. Top 5, no question, likely top 3, and I’d have to think about it and maybe do some re-watches, but possibly #1.
One of my favourite releases of 2023 was a well restored edition of Laurel & Hardy's first year (1927) of films[1].
The copyright holder had neglected them somewhat with them only being released in ancient DVD-era masters.
This new release gives the films a full digital restoration based on the best archival materials from around the world.
I genuinely think without public domain day, this never would have happened and I very much hope we see a similar edition of their 1928 films next year.
[1] https://www.rogerebert.com/streaming/laurel-and-hardy-year-o...
This film already has a 2K release by Criterion (vhttps://www.criterion.com/films/228-the-passion-of-joan-of-a...), probably other publishers. It gets show in theaters in some cities at least once a year.
I think for films, the restoration/HD prints will still belong to someone, and that's what people are interested in nowadays anyway.
Not quite in the same vein, but the patent for T-splines expires in 2024. Big news for 3D modeling systems.
Can you add some context on what T-splines are and why it's a big news? I kinda know splines in a trajectory planning sense but never heard of T-splines. Thanks!
The important part is that compared to B-splines, it lets you reduce the data size of a closed form surface by reducing the amount of data needed to describe it.
https://web.archive.org/web/20120710171813/http://cagd.cs.by...
The first 3 pictures explain it better than I can describe it, the rest is math going into how it's implemented.
Corridor Crew plans something with Mickey Mouse on January 1st.
Let’s conspire to make sure that said video gets upvoted to the top. (It’s not vote manipulation, because I have no relation to corridor crew.)
A gentleman’s agreement, if you will.
Did the works of Django Reinhardt enter the public domain?
I suppose this compositions and arrangements do, to the extent they were actually written down. The improvised parts may not be, since e.g. Grappeli died in 1997. Recordings take more time to enter PD. But IANACRL.
I always found it weird that patents are a flat 20y but somehow copyright is life + X years. For me it should be a similar 20-30y period. How does life even work for a corporation?
it doesn't. companies can't author works, just own them.
that's the reason de etre of the silly "made by ai" discussions.
Looks like Tarzan is entering the public domain, that's interesting.
The Burroughs estate was Disney before Disney was Disney
“Lady Chatterley’s Zombie Lover” coming right up. Probably direct to Netflix
The list is short for Canada: nothing. As part of the renegotiated NAFTA agreement, all copyright terms have been extended by twenty years.
No music?
Prokofiev, nice! I recently realised that his music was still under copyright, same for Shostakovich... Death + 70 years is a really long time
I do think it’s bad that almost everyone will die before any work that influenced them enters the public domain
I’d love some site you can add things to, and people can simply upvote if they think it’s a noteworthy item. And then I can subscribe to a calendar for the top 100.
The reality of course is there is no public domain to speak of in the USA, except for abandoned works, unless you have vast financial resources. Suppose the early Disney stuff somehow actually enters the public domain. Anyone that tries to use it is going to get absolutely buried in trademark lawsuits and the usual tidal wave of spurious motions.
This feels like one of those things where a UI designer tries to make the most comically inefficient way to convey mundane information.
Related 3 days ago:
Public Domain Day 2024 Is Coming: Here's What to Know
Steamboat Willie seems perfectly adaptable for AI animation. Can’t wait to see new cartoons.
Disney spent the last decade or so growing their business (through large acquisitions) to where Mickey is now just small fraction of their worth. So they likely don't really care anymore.
Plus it's only the old, old design of Mickey, not the current version they have been using for awhile that looks more normal to most people these days.
I was shocked to learn my 7yo daughter associates Disney with Mickey and Minnie.
She's watched like one Mickey cartoon on Disney+, and she's seen way more Disney stuff than that. Never been to Disneyland.
But somehow to her, Disney === Mickey/Minnie. Branding is wild stuff.
Where I grew up Donald Duck magazines were super popular (this was during Don Rosa so they were quite good as well). I got a magazine delivered weekly. I remember being a kid and always skipping the Micky Mouse stories as they were always really boring.
First I would read all the Donald Duck and Scrooge McDuck stories, then I would read the weird stories (like Goofy [but only if it didn’t involve Micky], Chip ‘n’ Dale or even the Big Bad Wolf), and only if I had nothing else to do, I would first re-read the Donald and Scrooge stories and then finally read Micky.
Growing up I never understood what the big deal was around Micky, objectively the worst of the Disney characters.
Scandinavian, right? It blew my mind to hear about the enduring popularity of Donald Duck at the top of the Disney food chain.
Yes
Mickey’s silhouette is still used in various Disney logos, so it’s not too wild a connection to make.
(It's the ears.)
Grew up in the 90s and Mickey was not a significant character in their movies that decade and the old Mickey cartoons were rarely shown. Mario became more famous than Mickey by then, but the mouse logo is ubiquitous, and most people had at least seen Fantasia or clips of the old cartoons.
My grandparents had several tapes of Disney cartoons; they don't have to be broadcast for people to be familiar with them.
It's the ads.
https://www.google.com/search?q=disney&tbm=isch
Mickey Mouse clubhouse? Lots of Disney branding still has him. Just asked my 6yr old who the most famous Disney Character is.
While Mickey may represent a small portion of revenue, it (he?) accounts for a large portion of the Disney brand. It's one of the most recognizable cartoons of all time
When I was a kid Mickey had transcended movie character, he was like the Santa of the Disney world. the M.C. The spirit of Walt in some ways. I think I'd seen maybe one special or fantasia with him actually starring, and even that was after I knew him. My nephews have seen less of him and yet he's still something of a magic benevolent being to them.
He represents so much more than a character, I think in a time when they're expanding portfolios they NEED to keep Mickey to stay Disney if they want to - and imo they should want to.
There's a video by Corridor Crew that goes over exactly what you mentioned.
https://youtu.be/u2dIvUAd5QE
Yeah, What I wrote came from that really. I should have mentioned it.
I mean it's a compelling breakdown IMO.
Disney also spent the last decade making enemies of at least 50% of the power base in Washington to the chances of them getting any favorable treatment in government is slim to none
I feel like by this point, Mickey is already useless as copyright, but rather as trademark. Will this be how Disney use Mickey in the future?
They trademarked everything they could about him, so it is still a valuable part of the portfolio.
And that's exactly why long copyrights stifle innovation and encourage rent seeking and stagnation. As soon as they saw the deadline approaching, they started creating new content (which arguably hasn't been that good, but that's another problem)
I don't think that's possible.
It's been obvious for a few years that Disney wasn't going to pursue extending copyright anymore. It would have been politically difficult at any point in the last few years as the Senate does so little.
To expand on this point a bit, Ars Technica has some articles on the copyright extension saga. In 2019, when works started going into the public domain again in the US, they published https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2019/01/a-whole-years-wo... in 2018, they published https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2018/01/hollywood-says-i... which had interviews saying that there were no plans for another copyright extension term push.
Of course, both times, comments were pretty incredulous that Disney would prevent Steamboat Willie from going public domain. And now we're 3 weeks from that happening, and 1 week from the US House planning to go on recess, and there's no sign of any bill that would extend copyright further. People who pay attention will note that Disney has seemed to prepare for Steamboat Willie going public domain: part of the short now appears as part of their film logo in movies, presumably to enable them to claim it as trademark and sue anyone who tries to upload it into oblivion. Nevertheless, I fully expect quite a few people to do stuff like upload Steamboat Willie to Youtube in January, and it will be interesting to see what the response of that is.
Where it also gets tricky is the creation of additional Steamboat Willie content - if you want to create and publish new Steamboat Willie stuff, you'll have to be crystal clear that it's not coming from Disney. If it looks like it's coming from Disney, that's when they can step in.
Hmmm, is the term "Mickey Mouse" trademarked?
As in, would a new name be needed for any new "Mickey Mouse" animation created using the old Steamboat Willie (mouse) character?
Mickey Mouse is trademarked as a word and as a picture and all kinds of derivatives like the silhouette of his head or the design of the eared hats. You can't use him as a symbol of your business or to suggest that your product comes from Disney, but none of that will stop you from making a new creative work featuring Mickey as he appeared in Steamboat Willie any more than McDonald's can stop you from writing a book where characters eat a Happy Meal.
Makes sense, thanks. :)
You have to make pains to not look like you're representing yourself as Disney, _and_ you can't step on anything Disney did in later Mickey cartoons
Sure you can. You just can't infringe subsequent copyrighted works.
But if there's an episode where that character goes to space or whatever your derivative work can do that too.
Legally speaking, they have a right to distribute copies. But Youtube isn't required to accept it though, and their copyright claim system is already somewhat notorious for the degree to which non-copyright owners to try to strike down videos for claimed copyright infringement.
Steamboat Willie is probably the single most famous work to fall into the public domain since Youtube started. It is (formerly) owned by one of the most famously aggressive company in protecting IP. Youtube itself is also owned by an entity that is on the other side of IP law than Disney, but definitely far less aggressive in pushing those claims.
The timelessness of those old cartoons has waned considerably. GenX was already getting reruns of Disney and Looney Tunes cartoons that were aimed at Boomers. As the boomers are aging out, a lot of the slices of both domestic life and leisure time in these cartoons are something alien. Women in the kitchen? Hunting rabbits? And with a shotgun? Really?
Itchy and Scratchy are Tom and Jerry ad absurdum. The Flintstones were somewhere between Tom and Jerry and The Honeymooners. Most of this stuff does not deserve a replay.
Neither of those things are alien. A world exists outside of whatever metropolis you think is the center of the universe. Millions and millions of people hunt and millions and millions of women are primary caretakers or stay at home moms.
I would say the world shown in those cartoons is alien to viewers of today.
There were millions of hunters and millions of stay at home mothers in the 40's during Tom & Jerry's original run, but there's many fewer millions now.
Consider: Women jumped from a third working in 1950 to just over two-thirds (of those who have children under 6, even) working as of the year 2000. We've had another two decades and change plus recessions since then, how much smaller could the demographic be?
I have no idea where you live but you are completely disconnected from the average reality. I'm going to guess NYC or SF because you don't seem to realize that things actually haven't changed that much. You're describing the woke utopia that the left from those places seem to pine for.
I'm as liberal as they come but am from flyover country. Everyone hunts. Women do a lot of the cooking. There are lots of stay at home moms. And everyone is ok with it, shotguns and all.
This is a really bizarre response to hard statistics, just openly denying they exist?
The "average reality" is indeed that mothers work. Stay at home mothers are in the absolute minority and have been for a couple decades.
You seem to have uncritically swallowed some narrative using terms like "woke" "liberal" "metropolis" and you've assumed that it'l apply to me.
I'm from neither NYC nor SF and I'm not liberal, now what?
I recently attended a 90 minute marathon of those old cartoons. At least those 90 minutes absolutely hold up. Quite a few of them had themes that sailed right over your (and my) head when we watched them as kids. e.g. What's Opera, Doc? and Rabbit of Seville
In general, I appreciated the Warner Brothers (vs. Hanna Barbera etc.) cartoons much more after I got a bit older than when I was a young kid.
Not to mention that Disney has run afoul of both parties a handful of times over the last decade, so it's a challenge to find support on either side.
More importantly, those who care about the public domain were not paying attention the last time. They are now, so Disney realizes that it will be a harder sell. As soon as they get someone to propose a laws letters will be written. There is one thing more powerful than money in politics and that is votes. Letters to congress are a proxy for votes and so nobody will risk another extension.
It's my understanding that they still retain a lot of control over Mickey Mouse indefinitely because he is trademarked as the face of their company.
That's almost the most infuriating thing about their copyright grabs; it hardly even gets them anything of interest. They're not making any money on the actual Steamboat Willie movie. We're still a ways away from anything of even modest commercial interest from Disney entering the public domain, and even when Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs does finally come into public domain, I can't imagine it meaningfully affects their bottom line. The ability to roll into a store and just buy it isn't going to meaningfully affect Disney. Meanwhile, they still have all the trademark control, which itself means you can't really do anything to Steamboat Willie that would "offend" Disney. (I'm going to just leave that vague for now.)
Meanwhile, to keep this at-best modestly interesting historical film locked up for those last few marginal drops of IP, they've kept the entire rest of the culture locked up. Hell of a cost society pays just for that. I'd almost rather we just grant Disney copyright in perpetuity if it would shut them up and leave the rest of the culture alone.
Well, it's not just the film, it's also everything in it, including (that design of) the characters themselves. When that enters the public domain, anyone can use (that design of) those characters for any purpose, including in their own works that have nothing to do with the Steamboat film. I can go make a platforming video game ala Cuphead using those characters and sell it. While I think that's a good thing for society, you can probably understand why Disney doesn't.
I would be unsurprised Disney has skeletal outlines of lawsuits in place already asserting that uses of Mickey Mouse from Steamboat Willie in an unrelated video game or something violates their trademark, and are just waiting to fill in the blank for the first person audacious enough to do it.
I kind of expect them to win that. But maybe they won't. Still, I wouldn't touch Mickey with anything less than the metaphorical ten foot pole and a really, really solidly constructed LLC or other corporate structure isolating it from any other asset I care about.
Note I am limiting this to just things they have clear trademark to. Grab the steamboat itself and do as you like. The soundtrack will be up for grabs. But I wouldn't expect to be able to defend myself in a trademark suit with the claim that the Mickey Mouse I used is not copyrighted; I expect the counterargument will basically "Yeah, but who cares? This is a trademark lawsuit".
Okay, yeah that's fair. Thinking strictly about copyright, I think what I said is true, but you're right there's other IP law at play here.
Those characters are trademarked, and Disney has a good case that they are still using those trademarks. Trademark is different from copyright - it doesn't expire, but also has more use it or lose it parts, along with defend it or lose it. Disney is doing both with most of the characters so if you try to use Micky mouse in anything you are likely to lose a lawsuit.
Consult a lawyer for exact details. there are things you can do with the characters after this expires, but the rules are very complex and I don't really understand them.
Given that Disney is infamous for its practice of rereleasing its older films periodically and otherwise making them completely unavailable (the "Disney Vault"), it seems that they have a business model which is fully predicated on copyright exclusivity.
The word "meaningfully" was there for a reason.
Yes, obviously, there's someone buying it when they release it. But even in Marvel's current anemic state I doubt sales of Snow White reaches even .1% of the revenue from The Marvels, a single movie. Their revenue on direct sales of stuff about to go public domain is a rounding error, and nowhere near enough to justify locking up the entire rest of the nation's culture just for that.
Further evidence that it must not be that big a deal is that the Mouse seems to have finally relented and doesn't seem to be lobbying for more extensions anymore.
It's not about making money from Steamboat Willie, it's about preventing others from enjoying it without a monetary transaction happening. I'm sure if they could, Disney would rather destroy all copies of a work they weren't making money from than release them for free. Look at game companies fighting against people distributing abandonware. It's not about the value of that particular good--it's about the value of the other things they are trying to sell, and not letting customers get something for nothing.
"The works of the roots of the vines, of the trees, must be destroyed to keep up the price, and this is the saddest, bitterest thing of all. Carloads of oranges dumped on the ground. The people came for miles to take the fruit, but this could not be. How would they buy oranges at twenty cents a dozen if they could drive out and pick them up? And men with hoses squirt kerosene on the oranges, and they are angry at the crime, angry at the people who have come to take the fruit. A million people hungry, needing the fruit- and kerosene sprayed over the golden mountains. And the smell of rot fills the country."
There's a distinction between trademark and copyright, and the ability to imply a Disney source and to include Mickey in your work are not controlled in the same way. Using the 1928 Mouse in your work while making it clear your work doesn't originate with Disney wouldn't violate trademark law.
that would first of all take a lot of work to make it absolutely clear, a lot of work to use the mouse, and finally a lot of work to fight the lawsuits until it was established that you didn't violate and could do what you were doing.
In short nobody but a crazy person or someone with a real deep artistic need that absolutely required that version of Mickey to work would ever pursue it.
It took one year from Winnie the Pooh entering the public domain to this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winnie-the-Pooh:_Blood_and_Hon...
And AFAIK they were not sued, despite being ever so slightly off brand for Disney.
Plenty of Disney characters like Snow White or Cinderella have been public domain all the time without it hurting Disney.
I'm working on a "Pedophile Willy" adaptation of Steamboat Willy, complete with raw (stick figure) sex scenes and Willy promoting the "pedophile lifestyle".
Lets see how that goes.
OK, yeah I remember seeing that - not seeing the film but seeing it existed. On the other hand that is understood as a property that originally was not Disney.
I think as well Disney protection of its characters might be a more ingrained than just normal copyright protectionism - Walt was notoriously a bastard to anyone who messed around with not treating Mickey with the respect he deserved.
They probably realized by now there is not much value left in that old version of Mickey. It's the newer self of Mickey (different looks and character) that brings in the money, but even that is becoming less relevant these days, I think? That's why they have bought so much IP which appeals to more people than Mickey Mouse.
Someone pointed out to me that Winnie the Pooh brings in more money than Mickey, and his copyright is just about the same timeframe. Everyone assumes The Mouse is what Disney is shitting bricks over and it's just as likely it's the silly ol' bear instead.
Hmm I’m not sure - that might be true for movies but is it true for merch?
Think of all the Mickey ears that get sold at the parks. Either way there is a boatload of Mickey related revenue still…
Disney doesn't need to rely on IP protection to maintain a hand in merch sales in their own parks.
Sure, but the claim was that Winnie the Pooh currently brings in more money than Mickey.
I don’t have the link anymore but at the time I was sent to a breakdown that was above $5B for all Winnie, and around 4 for Mickey and friends.
Obviously not nothing, and the fact they are close together doesn’t give Disney a ramp down once PD starts affecting them.
This link puts Winnie at about half the merch revenue of Mickey recently.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_highest-grossing_media...
Still a substantial franchise though, and looks like it got a bit of a boost around 2005 & 2011 where some newer movies got released.
Pooh as a concept is already in the public domain. Disney's rendition of Pooh doesn't happen until I think sometime in the 1960's, so it'll be a while.
How many kids recognize Pooh without the red shirt? Without it, he's just a bear.
https://lukemcgarry.com/product/pooh-in-the-public-domain-pr...
Since having my first kid 15 years ago, I haven't meet a single kid that cares about Mickey in the slightest. Their parents sometimes shove it in their face but you can tell they don't care as much about it as something newer.
Lucky fellow not to have to watch Mickey Mouse Clubhouse.
There's actually a an ongoing run of pretty funny cartoons [1] using the old designs and characterization elements, though with a strong streak of more modern absurdist humor.
[1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wonderful_World_of_Micke...
So now we can begin to undo all the damage Disney has done by extending copyright beyond any reasonable timeframe, right?
This undos nothing. We just limit damage to what has already been done for this one film. there are other things still in copyright that wouldn't have been, and that damage is still being done, and will until that copyright expires.
What would happen in practice if someone tried to use the public domain Mickey for something? I assume that regardless of the legal status, you'd still have a fun time with Disney lawyers proving in court that you had the right to use public domain Mickey.
Is Mickey also a trademark (which never expires) and anything using public domain Mickey would be too similar to their trademark?
Yeah Mickey is a trademark. Now I could remake Steamboat Willy with characters that weren't trademarked. Previously I could not depict either without getting sued.
The MSCHF art collective had a project a few years ago based on this public domain timing: https://mschfxfamousmouse.com/
They wont. Corridor Crew did a good little video on this topic.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2dIvUAd5QE