At the beginning of the new year, everything is renewed.
January 1 is New Year's Day and International Public Domain Day, a day that creators love.
At this time of year, American books, videos, and audio-visual works that have been copyrighted for more than 95 years are given "free body" and can be used legally for free.
Image from: law.duke.edu
This year it's the turn of the 1928 work, and there's something special about Mickey Mouse being one of them.
When Disney's reputation as "the strongest legal department on the surface" is known, this day is extremely memorable.
Mickey Mouse is free, but not completely
I only hope we never forget one thing – it all started with a mouse.
In 1954, Walt Disney, the founder of Disney, said this on a television show. It goes without saying how important Mickey Mouse is to Disney.
On May 15, 1928, Mickey Mouse appeared in the public eye for the first time in the test screening of the silent animation "Airplane Fan", but received little response.
1928 "Plane Fans".
On November 18 of the same year, the sound black-and-white animated short film "Steamboat Willie" was released, and the instant hit Mickey Mouse made his official debut, and this day was also set as his birthday, and now Mickey Mouse is 95 years old.
1928 Steamboat Willy.
The original Mickey Mouse could not speak, had no whites of the eyes, had a stubborn personality, and played other animals as musical instruments, which was somewhat different from the classic image of wearing red shorts, yellow shoes, and four-fingered white gloves.
As of January 1, Disney no longer enjoys its exclusive rights, which is good news for creators - they don't have to go through the process to get Disney's legal nod and pay royalties, they can directly recreate their works, and their works can be used to make money.
For example, you can ask Mickey Mouse from Steamboat Willie to speak, or draw it in color.
1928 Steamboat Willy.
Actually, this day could have come much earlier.
The original Mickey Mouse had only 56 years of copyright protection, and it was supposed to be in the public domain in 1984, but Disney and other companies lobbied Congress twice to push for changes to the U.S. copyright law, and other works in the same year were also extended.
The first time was in 1976, when the copyright law was amended and "renewed" for 19 years.
The second time was in 1998, when the Copyright Term Extension Act, nicknamed the "Mickey Mouse Protection Act", was passed, and the "limit" of the original Mickey Mouse was added by another 20 years, for a total of 95 years, until the last minute of 2023.
Seeing that 2024 is coming, Disney seems to be following the rule of "no more than three things", but it is not sitting still, and there are still ways to protect Mickey Mouse.
On the one hand, there is and only the 1928 Mickey Mouse copyright expires, not including other Mickey Mouse after the original generation.
Image from: law.duke.edu
In order to fit the mainstream aesthetics and animation technology of each era, Mickey Mouse's image and personality are constantly changing, and each "fine-tuned" Mickey Mouse has an independent copyright.
Mickey Mouse wore gloves in 1929, had a pet dog Pluto in 1930, appeared in color animation in 1932, and was given a mischievous personality to Donald Duck.
Image credit: Disney
Now, creators are working with the original Mickey Mouse and need to avoid unexpired elements such as clothing, and if Disney doesn't lobby Congress, it's only a matter of time before other Mickey Mouse goes into the public domain, and they will finally be in their 95th year.
Not just Mickey Mouse of all kinds, but animations and characters such as Donald Duck (2029), Goofy (2027), Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (2032), Pinocchio (2035), Dumbo (2036), Bambi (2037) and others will slowly become available to the public.
On the other hand, unlike copyright, which has an expiration date, a trademark can survive indefinitely.
In 2007, Disney made the image of Mickey Mouse from "Steamboat Willie" into a logo, which was protected by trademark law and appeared in the opening credits of movies such as "Frozen" and "Full House of Magic."
Image from: law.duke.edu
However, copyright law and trademark law have different roles. The former protects creative works from being copied and adapted by others. The latter protects the brand and prevents consumer confusion, but does not suppress the creation itself.
Therefore, although Mickey Mouse has trademark protection, as long as the creator does not make money in the name of Disney, does not mislead the audience that the work comes from Disney officials, and does not open stores such as "Disney Mickey Mouse Burger", then there should not be much of a problem.
Disney's repeated extension of copyright has caused the outside world to complain for a long time, and some people have already tried to break the law in advance.
MSCHF, the New York-based creative team that has repeatedly offended Nike, parody Musk and Zuckerberg, has been brewing a three-year performance art campaign to sell concept tokens in 2021 that buyers can redeem for their Mickey Mouse figurines in 2024.
MSCHF didn't dare to call Mickey Mouse by his first name, and used the word "Famous Mouse" to cover it up, but it was full of irony, and everyone knew who the mouse's name was.
Three years have arrived, congratulations to the first Mickey Mouse on his freedom!
The strongest legal department on the surface has gone from falling to the bottom to being punished even if it is far away
Disney has been slow to let go of Mickey Mouse because the IP business is really profitable.
As of December 2023, Mickey Mouse and his friends are second only to Pokémon in the world's 50 most profitable IPs in 2023, with a total IP revenue of $52.2 billion, including retail, box office, discs, and videotapes.
1940 Fantasia. Image credit: Wikipedia
The reason why Disney has the reputation of "the strongest legal department on the surface" is not only because of its impact on copyright law, but also because of the prestige accumulated by decades of IP rights protection deeds.
Disney's approach to protecting its life-giving characters is anything but gentle and cute.
So says the New York Times. It is very reasonable to be on the bar with the suspected infringing movies or theme parks, after all, these are Disney's main business and cannot be touched, but it is not only in these areas to protect rights, once it touches the scale, although it will be punished far away.
In 1989, Disney sued Oscar for the unauthorized use of Snow White's image to perform the opening song and dance, which not only allegedly scandalized Snow White, but also misled the audience into Disney's involvement.
Oscar initially refused to apologize, but relented after Disney filed a lawsuit.
Image credit: Medium
In the same year, Disney also asked three kindergartens in Florida to remove the murals of characters such as Mickey Minnie, Donald Duck, and Goofy, which hurt the young hearts of some children.
Universal Pictures, which is competing with Disney for the theme park business, rushed to the kindergarten and drew its cartoon characters in the same place.
The hard-line style of Disney's legal department has spawned a lot of jokes, and the most damaging one is that if you survive on a desert island, the fastest way to rescue is to draw a Mickey Mouse on the beach and let Disney fly a plane to pick you up for a lawsuit.
In fact, in recent years, according to federal court documents, the number of Disney copyright lawsuits has decreased. At the same time, it has stepped up its crackdown on online piracy, but it generally does not go to court, but instead sends takedown notices directly.
Image credit: variety
Both of these trends are related to the boom in internet creator culture.
In 2011, Disney actively lobbied Congress to pass the Prohibition of Internet Piracy Act (SOPA), but ultimately did not succeed.
The bill cracks down on piracy so hard that ordinary people can be held accountable for publishing copyrighted works, and websites may even be shut down for infringing links, which is devastating for platforms like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and more.
The tech giants stood across from Disney and came out on top.
Times have changed, and while entertainment giants have deep roots, the last 10 years have been a game-changer for internet technology companies, and a large number of YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok creators have brought a new dimension to the internet economy. Piracy is wrong, but copyright protection should not be excessive.
Back at the beginning of Disney's founding, Mickey Mouse was born, and it was inseparable from copyright, at that time it was Disney itself who was pitted, and Mickey Mouse was their savior after falling to the bottom.
In 1927, Disney created the cartoon character "Oswald the Lucky Rabbit" for Universal Pictures, and released 26 short films one after another, which were well received by the market.
But when Walt Disney proposed to increase the budget, the Universal Pictures manager in turn demanded a two-percent reduction, claiming that Oswalt's rights belonged to Universal, and that he had already bought off most of Disney's animators, and that Walt Disney was not in a position to ask for it.
Lucky Rabbit Oswalt. Image credit: Disney
Walt Disney was empty, with only one animator and two assistants left by his side, and then he realized that the copyright could not fall into the hands of others, and he rejected the "overlord clause" and learned from the pain to start from scratch, so Mickey Mouse with a similar style and different species was born, and then became popular all over the world.
Under the painful lesson, Disney's copyright management has been quite strict since then.
The regret was eventually filled, and in 2006, Disney CEO Bob Iger made a deal with Universal to acquire the rights to Oswald and the original 26 episodes. Oswalt, who is featured in these short films, entered the public domain in January 2023, and is on the same path as the original Mickey Mouse.
Creation is never an island
Disney, which now has deep roots, reacts much more calmly than when it lost Oswalt.
Because it is clear that since 1928, the image of Mickey Mouse has been tightly tied to Disney, and even if the copyright expires, it will not change.
Seeing mice with white gloves and round ears, our brains involuntarily associate Disney.
The loss of the original Mickey Mouse this time may not bring much loss to Disney, but it is very meaningful to the creators.
Copyright law, which sets a time limit, is designed to protect creations and to flourish.
Image credit: Giphy
During a period of time when the work is released, the creator should receive material rewards and stimulate the enthusiasm of more creators, but the work cannot be monopolized forever and kept private by the creator.
When a work of art loses copyright protection, it becomes the public property of all mankind.
Disney actually stood on the shoulders of its predecessors to become the greatest dream machine of the 20th century.
Mickey Mouse borrowed from Chaplin, and The Lion King was based on Shakespeare's Hamlet, not to mention that it brought to the screen literary stories such as Grimm's fairy tales, Aesop's Fables, Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tales, and the Thousand and One Nights.
We've been familiar with these stories for a long time, but Disney has built on them to give them pictures and sounds, making a more contemporary adaptation, telling a modern version of their own fairy tale, etched in the minds of generations, replacing words in the pile of old papers.
When Disney spends a lot of time and energy to make Mickey Mouse innocent and cute, win the hearts of men, women and children, and then build a business empire composed of movies, merchandise, and theme parks, these images will naturally not be destroyed by others.
In the 1971 satirical cartoon Pirates of the Sky, Mickey Mouse was portrayed by cynical underground cartoonists as very "non-Disney", with sex, drugs, and politics in private.
Disney was furious and defended its rights, and the dispute lasted for 10 years, from the district court to the Supreme Court, and the defendant could not afford to pay nearly $200,000 in damages and did not want to go to jail, and finally the two sides settled, and the cartoonist promised not to break ground on Mickey Mouse in the future.
Opponents argue that this is the use of copyright to stifle artistic expression. One of the cartoonists' defense was typical of the hippie style of the era:
I drew Mickey Mouse not to sabotage Disney's products, but to deal with the American myth that Disney has implanted in our consciousness.
The cartoonist's behavior is not difficult to understand, and Disney's pursuit is also reasonable.
Image credit: cbr.com
The 95-year-old Mickey Mouse has never been just a Disneyland thing, it doesn't exist in isolation, it can't influence everyone's opinion, some see it as a childhood memory, others see it as consumerism and cultural hegemony, using Mickey Mouse as a vehicle to satirize reality, borrowing other people's wine glasses and pouring their own blocks.
This is still the case when the copyright is in hand, and Disney should be mentally prepared in the future, it is impossible not to be spoofed, and lessons from the past abound.
After the novel The Great Gatsby entered the public domain, Gatsby was written as a vampire by the published novel. Bambi, whose copyright to the original novel has expired, has also been transformed into a killing machine in a horror movie, which is very different from the sweet image of the 1942 Disney movie.
Image credit: Disney
Either way, Mickey Mouse will be a source of inspiration for future generations, like the story that has been sung for thousands of years.
Starting January 1st, more different voices can be openly put on the table, and this globally recognized animated character will be given more arcs that even Disney can't think of.
After all, the first generation of Mickey Mouse is shared by mankind, and it is also a good start to the new year.