6 ms·

It's entertainment. Why should anything other than being good for shareholders matter? It's not an essential goods company like say food or medicine

lostcolony 9y ago
It's culture. Why should a single entity have such overlarge control over the creative works that lead and inspire all of us?
- snuxoll 9y ago
  This is the biggest problem I have. Disney already has plenty of money to lobby Congress, taking over another studio won’t change that - but we’ll be consolidating more and more IP’s that we love under a behemoth that can go wrong in so many ways.
- friedButter 9y ago
  Then there should be provisions in the copyright law to allow the govt to suspend copyright when entertainment becomes part of the culture, similar to how some patent protections are suspended in India when a medicine is determined to be essential
  - TheCoelacanth 9y ago
    There already is one right in the Constitution: "limited time". Originally copyright in the US only lasted 14-28 years. Copyright is supposed to expire quickly enough that important parts of culture will not be tied up by copyright.
- WillReplyfFood 9y ago
  Well, it seems to lend itself towards monopolization for no economic reason, as can be seen at the renteers dominating scientific publications.
- rayiner 9y ago
  To the extent culture is based on commercial dreck, it doesn’t deserve to be protected.
- B1FF_PSUVM 9y ago
  > works that lead and inspire all of us? Here we go, gentlemen. The cattle take as their own the pablum the owners feed them. (Cheers.)
Larrikin 9y ago
Disney having more money and power to lobby against sane copyright laws is a negative for every citizen and really the world
- fragsworth 9y ago
  I don't think it's bad that Disney protects things like Mickey Mouse and all of their old IPs. It's not just shareholders, there's a lot of people whose jobs depend on Disney being able to make money from these historic IPs. And I think it's fine that they keep it, it doesn't really hurt anyone. The problem is the easiest way to protect this is by having Congress extend the copyright law duration on all copyrighted works. There are possibly other mechanisms that would work better at letting un-used IP go to public domain (and Disney would likely be fine with this), but it's complicated and I think that would require a political movement to get started and nobody cares enough to do it.
  - snuxoll 9y ago
    Letting only unused IP go to public domain is completely contrary to the stated goals of the constitution. To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries. Much of our creative works and culture are driven by building on top of what came before. The asinine length of copyright we have today means we have to wait entire generations before works are available to adapt and build upon, which is extremely hypocritical wrt Disney since most of their classic movies were based on public domain books.
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
    - frogpelt 9y ago
      Maybe we need a compromise. Should we let companies keep some percentage of their IP out of the public domain?
      - 9y ago
xamuel 9y ago
When entertainment agents are too powerful, it leads to more and more draconian intellectual property law.
Y_Y 9y ago
People didn't like this comment, but I think it's fair enough, at least from a capitalist perspective. The company is doing what it's supposed to do and the system is working as it should. (This is one of the reasons why I oppose capitalism)
- bighi 9y ago
  Kind of. Depends on what part of capitalism you're referring to. Because monopolies greatly reduce or limit competition, and competition is the big force that makes capitalism work properly. Capitalism without competition is no different from Communism or a lot of other systems in which one party rules supreme.
  - OtterCoder 9y ago
    I've always held that the extremes of corporate power look a lot more like feudalism than anything else. The main difference being that corporations divide up the different experiences of life, where fiefdoms divided the land. In the end we have absolute rulers in their own private domains who only have to pay a small tribute and lip service to the nation they are nominally aligned with.
  - pbhjpbhj 9y ago
    In theory Communism is rule by the proletariat, monopolistic Capitalism is rule by a very few super-rich shareholders/owners. They seem like markedly different situations to me. Can you explain further?
    - jacobr1 9y ago
      Most publicly avowed communist countries actually adopted State Socialism. And in practice, these systems of state-owned industry ended up under consolidated control of oligarchic regimes. Some communistic critics of these Marxist–Leninists regimes even called them State Capitalist. It is not uncommon to refer to "Communism" and mean some form of despotic, top-down state control of industry. Given that revised definition of "Communism," a greatly consolidated, monopolistic Capitalism, with increased favoritism by the state for leading firms, does start to seem similar in some interesting ways.

lostcolony 9y ago

It's culture. Why should a single entity have such overlarge control over the creative works that lead and inspire all of us?

snuxoll 9y ago
This is the biggest problem I have. Disney already has plenty of money to lobby Congress, taking over another studio won’t change that - but we’ll be consolidating more and more IP’s that we love under a behemoth that can go wrong in so many ways.
friedButter 9y ago
Then there should be provisions in the copyright law to allow the govt to suspend copyright when entertainment becomes part of the culture, similar to how some patent protections are suspended in India when a medicine is determined to be essential
- TheCoelacanth 9y ago
  There already is one right in the Constitution: "limited time". Originally copyright in the US only lasted 14-28 years. Copyright is supposed to expire quickly enough that important parts of culture will not be tied up by copyright.
WillReplyfFood 9y ago
Well, it seems to lend itself towards monopolization for no economic reason, as can be seen at the renteers dominating scientific publications.
rayiner 9y ago
To the extent culture is based on commercial dreck, it doesn’t deserve to be protected.
B1FF_PSUVM 9y ago
> works that lead and inspire all of us? Here we go, gentlemen. The cattle take as their own the pablum the owners feed them. (Cheers.)

Larrikin 9y ago

Disney having more money and power to lobby against sane copyright laws is a negative for every citizen and really the world

fragsworth 9y ago
I don't think it's bad that Disney protects things like Mickey Mouse and all of their old IPs. It's not just shareholders, there's a lot of people whose jobs depend on Disney being able to make money from these historic IPs. And I think it's fine that they keep it, it doesn't really hurt anyone. The problem is the easiest way to protect this is by having Congress extend the copyright law duration on all copyrighted works. There are possibly other mechanisms that would work better at letting un-used IP go to public domain (and Disney would likely be fine with this), but it's complicated and I think that would require a political movement to get started and nobody cares enough to do it.
- snuxoll 9y ago
  Letting only unused IP go to public domain is completely contrary to the stated goals of the constitution. To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries. Much of our creative works and culture are driven by building on top of what came before. The asinine length of copyright we have today means we have to wait entire generations before works are available to adapt and build upon, which is extremely hypocritical wrt Disney since most of their classic movies were based on public domain books.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - frogpelt 9y ago
    Maybe we need a compromise. Should we let companies keep some percentage of their IP out of the public domain?
    - 9y ago

xamuel 9y ago

When entertainment agents are too powerful, it leads to more and more draconian intellectual property law.

Y_Y 9y ago

People didn't like this comment, but I think it's fair enough, at least from a capitalist perspective. The company is doing what it's supposed to do and the system is working as it should. (This is one of the reasons why I oppose capitalism)

bighi 9y ago
Kind of. Depends on what part of capitalism you're referring to. Because monopolies greatly reduce or limit competition, and competition is the big force that makes capitalism work properly. Capitalism without competition is no different from Communism or a lot of other systems in which one party rules supreme.
- OtterCoder 9y ago
  I've always held that the extremes of corporate power look a lot more like feudalism than anything else. The main difference being that corporations divide up the different experiences of life, where fiefdoms divided the land. In the end we have absolute rulers in their own private domains who only have to pay a small tribute and lip service to the nation they are nominally aligned with.
- pbhjpbhj 9y ago
  In theory Communism is rule by the proletariat, monopolistic Capitalism is rule by a very few super-rich shareholders/owners. They seem like markedly different situations to me. Can you explain further?
  - jacobr1 9y ago
    Most publicly avowed communist countries actually adopted State Socialism. And in practice, these systems of state-owned industry ended up under consolidated control of oligarchic regimes. Some communistic critics of these Marxist–Leninists regimes even called them State Capitalist. It is not uncommon to refer to "Communism" and mean some form of despotic, top-down state control of industry. Given that revised definition of "Communism," a greatly consolidated, monopolistic Capitalism, with increased favoritism by the state for leading firms, does start to seem similar in some interesting ways.