The idea that the only reason the US extended the copyright term was because of Disney and Mickey Mouse is one of those clever, edutainment, Ted Talks kind of factoids. It is fun to write about and bring up in threads like this, but in reality, IP(including copyright) had become the predominate strategy of US economic policy in regards to globalization. That isn't to say Disney was not one of many companies fighting hard to extend copyright. Especially due to Micheal Eisner's Disney strategy[1] which, at the time, utilized much of Disney's historical catalog. Most media companies(and US policy makers) are likely more focused on extending IP protections globally at this point. Which is probably one of the reasons we are not seeing a fight about this now.

It is actually interesting now that I think about things like this. I wonder if this is a product of the "Google Knowledge" era. Where quick and clever explanations spread do to their ability to rank higher in a search engine query or social media share.

[1] http://www.pophistorydig.com/topics/disneys-movie-vault1984-...

Excerpts from the cited article:

"In this case, however, some external forces helped expedite the decision, as in Italy, the film was soon to move into the public domain, which meant it would be fair game for pirates and widespread copying. Snow White was released on VHS in 1994, and would break all records for Disney’s animated classics, selling nearly 50 million copies worldwide. It was the last of the early Disney animated films released for home video. Disney was also able to extend the copyright for Snow White."

"The enormous market Disney discovered in selling older films, underscored the “huge potential upside” in stepping up production of new ones. – Michael Eisner"

There's definitely a market for books, cartoons and merchandise directly adapted from Milne's original book, especially if they're cheaper than Disney's material.

Winnie the Pooh... I didn't know until now that it's even associated with Disney in any way. I grew up reading & watching it as a kid, and even this year I saw Christopher Robin in the cinema (I must have mentally tuned out Disney logo at the beginning). Point being, it's a franchise now, and it still sells like hot cakes, to adults. All the adult friends I know have a sentiment to Winnie the Pooh, and are - or are going to - show it to their kids.

Not surprised Disney would want to protect that.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16096448

> Will Congress do the same thing again this year? To find out, we talked to groups on both sides of the nation's copyright debate—to digital rights advocates at the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Public Knowledge and to industry groups like the Motion Picture Association of America and the Recording Industry Association of America. To our surprise, there seemed to be universal agreement that another copyright extension was unlikely to be on the agenda this year. "We are not aware of any such efforts, and it's not something we are pursuing," an RIAA spokesman told us when we asked about legislation to retroactively extend copyright terms. "While copyright term has been a longstanding topic of conversation in policy circles, we are not aware of any legislative proposals to address the issue," the MPAA told us.

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2016/01/well-probably-never-fr...

> we expect that Disney will try to use another body of law to suppress creativity and commerce involving Mickey Mouse, whether or not "Steamboat Willie" and "Plane Crazy" are in the public domain: trademark law. If you sell something Mickeyish—including its public domain cartoons—Disney might ask a court to stop you because people who buy the cartoons from you may think they're buying from Disney.