There is no voluntary mutual transaction; the author doesn't consent to have his work forced into the public domain In the absence of copyright the author woul

There is no voluntary mutual transaction; the author doesn't consent to have his work forced into the public domain In the absence of copyright the author would have no protection what so ever and would be at mercy of society at large. With copyright they gain protection from the public domain which we, the public, give them in exchange for the cultural creations this protection entices. If they in exchange of this protection returns nothing to society (i.e. infinite retro-active copyright extensions), then we as a society should have no reason to provide this protection for them. Basically Disney was able to build an empire on works found in the public domain, but they refuse to give the same opportunity for others to do the same. That is also very one-sided and society as a whole gains very little cultural capital and is forced to pay (again and again) for what they have generously provided protection for. Make no mistake of it: If copyright law is one-sided, it is to the creators' and media-conglomerates benefit and not society.