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Excellent article. The Mickey Mouse Protection Act always made me uneasy. What's to say they don't extend protection yet again? Perpetual copyrights are no less
by iqster 15y ago
Excellent article. The Mickey Mouse Protection Act always made me uneasy. What's to say they don't extend protection yet again? Perpetual copyrights are no less than tyranny in a media society.
This article talks about an instance where works that had previously gone into public domain were brought out of it. Granted, this was done to bring US law in line with International Treaties. It still feels wrong though.
- Jun8 15y agoThe interesting question is: should such decisions be made by the Congress or the judiciary (e.g Supreme Court) system? This would be one hell of a case for the Supreme Court. Note that in 2003 the SC held the extension of the copyrights passed by the Congress in 1998 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golan_v._Holder#cite_note-CIT_Granted-12 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golan_v._Holder#cite_note-CIT_G...). The SC Blog has interesting information about the case: http://www.scotusblog.com/2011/03/a-major-test-of-copyright-power/ http://www.scotusblog.com/2011/03/a-major-test-of-copyright-...
- protomyth 15y agoAt this point, I wish (as a compromise) that they changed trademark law and stopped (or rolled back) the extension of copyrights. It would seem that Disney and Co. could live with no else being allowed to make "Mickey Mouse" (substitute character here) media but allowing the older works to pass into the public domain. It is not a great compromise, but it would probably allow older works to actually be available and preserved.
- adestefan 15y agoThe real shame is that most of Disney's early works are based off of stories and characters that are public domain.