In disney's case, yes.
I don’t understand the issues involved with copyrights apparently expiring after a certain number of years.
Does this mean that Disney’s right to Mickey Mouse and his name and likeness expires after a certain period of time? I guess I thought an owner of such characters and images and company names were indefinite?
Well, as I said, I don’t understand what’s going on with this.
Copyrights have to be periodically renewed. If not renewed the material becomes public domain.
In disney's case, yes.
It would make the characters, stories, books, movies, etcc public domain in the same sense as huck fin, tom sawyer, quasimodo, tale of two cities, shakespeare, etc
Original storylines and ideas would become public domain and useable by anyone to create new stories and material for sale. Stories and movies that are still within the timeframe would still be protected.
It doesn’t impact trademarks which are often confused with copyrights.
Similar to patents intent was to provide for a period of profit for the creator/inventor of the published work: music, scripts, books, character creations, art, etc - however, that period was NEVER supposed to be indefinite and Congress has abused the public trust for a long time in this regard. Our culture is OURS and a return to an appropriately limited timeframe is the right thing to do.
Impacts much more then just Disney by the way. Superman, music, plays, all sorts of movies, etc
IMHO, this is a good thing. Copyrights were always meant to expire into the public domain. Under current law, they are entirely too long. Heck, 30 or 40 years should be plenty.
No because Mickey Mouse itself is trademarked.
This is about copyright on the cartoons themselves.🤔