Steamboat Willie [video]
youtube.com
youtube.com
wp says:
> In the 1950s, Disney removed a scene where Mickey tugs on the tails of the baby pigs, picks up the mother and kicks them off her teats, and plays her like an accordion, since television distributors deemed it inappropriate.[34] Since then, the full version of the film was included on the 1998 compilation VHS The Spirit of Mickey and the Walt Disney Treasures DVD set "Mickey Mouse in Black and White", as well as on Disney+.
this version has the tugging on tails, but not the picking up and accordioning of the mother, so it's a falsified version
the version xdennis linked https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jap-UBbmPsw in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38830369 does have that full segment and is also clearer
The fact there's no censorship just makes them so raw.
Clicks link to view video
Confronted by blocked video with the message "Ad blockers are not allowed on YouTube," even though he turned off his ad blocker a week ago
Changes URL to onion.tube to view it there
Confronted by a message saying that YouTube is currently attempting to block Invidious instances, so this video can't be viewed
Clicks Switch Invidious Instance
Finally watches the video
...I guess the moral of this story is, soon we won't even need copyright law to stop us from watching all the things
When subscription prices get too high and the service lackluster, I can understand. Every production company tried to build their own subpar streaming service, and value delivery just doesn't scale like that.
When every one of a million different news websites has its own individual subscription, I can also understand. Nobody has time for that, and the service offered is never worth the value.
But YouTube premium is dirt cheap. And you're paying for legions of engineers to make the service rock solid. And it has everything. I think it's the last service I'd ever cancel, and I don't even watch YouTube that often.
right now i'm visiting my in-laws for the new year, and they have netflix; i think they pay 8 dollars a month for it
it's ridiculous that we're even considering depending on those legions of engineers given that most of us have at least ten-megabit internet service at home, but decentralized alternatives like lbry/odysee and even bittorrent are getting lobbied out of existence, in large part because they are resistant to censorship
I would tape rented VHSes back in the day too.
At least Blockbuster charged me for the original. YouTube just makes me "watch" an ad before I get my copy [1]
[1] A computer watches the ad for me
Youtube was built based on work of a creator community -- much more so than Alphabet engineers -- who viewed this as a sort of open platform. Once there was network lock-in, the paywall hits, the mandatory obnoxious ads hit, and the user-hostile JavaScript hits.
Alphabet holds the legal contract, and the army of lawyers, but there was a social contract with a community which it simply broke.
It tried (with mixed success) to do the same with the free GSuite service (once they have all your email, bill you for seeing it). Remember how Alphabet originally won by using unintrusive adwords instead of flashing banner ads? All these things might be legal, but they ain't right.
I pay for subscription services, but yes, I'll go to great lengths to never, ever pay a penny for Youtube.
I’ve heard Google employees/engineers make jokes (not entirely sure how much is a joke and how much is real) about how YouTube might be the first website back online after WW3 assuming it didn’t destroy the internet (seeing as the internet originally was designed to survive such a thing it’s not entirely far fetched to imagine global chaos and heavily degraded services but still operating in some capacity)
the year youtube ceases to be profitable is the year it deletes 100% of its videos and you discover that your extrapolation of its reliability into the future was based on an incorrect understanding of the world
if you've been paying attention, though, you know that a substantial percentage of its videos have already been consigned to the memory hole, so its reliability as a repository of human culture is already observably poor
90% of the time they block me because I have an ad blocker that is _disabled for their website._ The other 10% they show me the video. This feels like a bug.
I'm not going to pay them because they have a bug, or if it's not a bug, pay them because they think they can tell me what addons I can run when viewing other websites. That would be like Stockholm syndrome.
YouTube is a highly optional part of my life, so if they are going to fuck around and be shitty, fuck em I'm out. Happy to instead do my small part in breaking the monopoly and just reduce my YouTube consumption, plus encourage other people to reduce it as well.
Or download Freetube desktop app.
=> https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp
=> https://flathub.org/en-GB/apps/io.github.celluloid_player.Ce...
I wondered if that puts the Corridor version in jeopardy in any way, given that the version they have posted was produced many years later. In my few minutes of research, it seems like the answer could be quite complicated and it would depend on whether or not the censorship process exceeds the threshold of originality.
For example, I imagine if Disney had engaged in a significant colorization process of the original footage in the 50s that the resultant colorized footage would still be under copyright today.
I do think that the process of removing footage could be considered a sufficiently creative endeavour. For example, if Kubrick released a re-cut version of Odyssey 5 years after the original, I would not expect the re-cut to enter public domain until 5 years after the original (even if the only difference was removal of certain scenes). If anyone could argue that censoring a film constitutes as an editorial creative process and thereby should be granted copyright protections, it's Disney.
For example, this[1] work is entirely derivative, created only using cuts from another piece of media and yet the resulting work is a complete departure and loses practically all meaning from the original. If Disney had done something like this years later using Steamboat Willie, I don't think there'd be any question that it should be considered a copyrightable piece of work and exceeds the threshold of originality.
According to the Copyright Alliance[2]:
> There is no requirement that the work be novel (as in patent law), unique, imaginative or inventive. A work need only demonstrate a very small amount of creativity in order to meet the originality requirement.
If J.K. Rowling replaces the word "wand" with "wang"[3] in the Harry Potter series and publishes a new revision, has she created a new work? According to your link, yes, she has. If you upload Harry Potter "wang" edition to the internet after the original edition enters the public domain, have you violated the copyright on the "wang" edition? Well, I think it could be argued that you have!
[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=694_jtbvJuY
[2]: https://copyrightalliance.org/education/copyright-law-explai... basics/requirements-for-copyright-protection/
[3]: https://web.archive.org/web/20080618113626/http://www.bash.o...
I posted the PDF but should have quoted, “it is not possible to extend the length of protection for a copyrighted work by creating a derivative.” But, I get your point: is it possible to practically extend a copyrighted work by defending a carefully-chosen derivative?
I was surprised how broad this can go: the Copyright Act of 1976, 17 U.S.C. Section 101: A "derivative work" is a work based upon one or more preexisting works, such as a translation, musical arrangement, dramatization, fictionalization, motion picture version, sound recording, art reproduction, abridgment, condensation, or any other form in which a work may be recast, transformed, or adapted. A work consisting of editorial revisions, annotations, elaborations, or other modifications which, as a whole, represent an original work of authorship, is a "derivative work."
So, it appears I’m not clarifying anything. But, maybe we look at the things which are not derivative works. Let’s say a movie shows a copyrighted picture on the wall. There seems to be a six-second convention beyond which a production assistant would typically obtain permission.
The Titanic story comes to mind: James Cameron paid for a particular painting shown in Titanic. It was re-released in 3D and he was asked to pay again. So, within the industry, his derivative work enjoys protection, but insider copyright agreements do not survive the derivation.
Sometimes the removal of certain scenes from a movie could completely change the way you think about that movie, or completely change the overall tone.
a more serious risk is not having any way to save it or distribute it reliably; works that are too similar to copyright-restricted works tend to disappear into the memory hole on youtube and similar platforms, with no due process and no appeal. for now you can still get hard disks that don't automatically scan their contents against a youtube-style blacklist, and which can retain their contents for more than a few months when turned off because they aren't SSDs, but neither of those is likely to remain practical forever
And, of course, King of the Hill skewered the idea by having Bobby get addicted to cigarettes when Hank used this punishment.
I suspect animal on animal violence is common in old cartoons because more people spent time with animals. The idea that we should stop animals from hurting each other is a very recent notion.
I don't think cartoons of the time were intended to present realistic depictions of animal behavior, so much as use them as tropes and archetypes. Rather I suspect physical and slapstick comedy was popular at the time, and that broad style of comedy was easier to portray in a visual medium.
How is Wile an “animal abusing asshole”, and “to the extreme”? It’s a primarily carnivorous animal trying to hunt another to eat. It’s not like he’s catching and torturing the Road Runner.
it's nice that you internalized my thesis so thoroughly, but it's unfortunate that you seem to believe i was arguing against it
(unless you think the key difference is that steamboat willie wasn't episodic)
I did. I apologise for the misunderstanding but it was the “perhaps you are among the exceptions” that did it. And I bet that’s what made someone downvote you too (your comment was already grey by the time I saw it). If that part had been left out, the lingering ambiguity would have given more room for the correct interpretation.
"Under this Act, works made in 1923 or afterwards that were still protected by copyright in 1998 would not enter the public domain until January 1, 2019, or later. Mickey Mouse specifically, having first appeared in 1928 in Steamboat Willie, entered the public domain in 2024[5] or afterward (depending on the date of the product). Unlike copyright extension legislation in the European Union, the Sonny Bono Act did not revive copyrights that had already expired, and therefore is not retroactive in that sense" Source: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Term_Extension_Act
"Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act – also known as the Copyright Term Extension Act"
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Term_Extension_Act
It is 95 (up to 120) years after creation or the death of the author plus 70 years. This is absolutely absurd and serves no public interest. It only serves to benefit huge media companies that have purchased our entire shared heritage's back-catalog and survive largely by leasing it back to us over and over and over.
That is a start at least. International copyright of course is a complete mess and it is not obvious exactly what expiring copyrights in one country means elsewhere. J.R.R Tolkien's copyrights are listed as expired now in New Zeeland and a few other countries, but will remain in copyright in most countries for another 20+ years. Guess in NZ and the few other countries with life+50 copyright they can enjoy making their own new LoTR games or whatever, but they have to carefully limit distribution to not violate copyrights elsewhere? I think there were some issues like that a few years ago when Ian Fleming's copyrights expired in Canada and someone made a Bond movie or something that was illegal to import to the US?
Mickey, Disney, and the public domain: A 95-year love triangle
Public Domain Day 2024 Is Coming: Here's What to Know
Etc
Hadn't seen this before. Welcome to the public domain.
I doubt you have any problem with people profiting off of Shakespeare, Mozart or fairy tales, so what is different about Mickey Mouse?
How many of Disney's cartoons do you think were based on public domain works?
Great artists build upon the work of those who came before them. This is how it’s been for millennia. Why should Disney be the end of the line?
All this adds up to the fact that established characters are already effectively part of the public domain. A perpetual monopoly on children's culture is both unnatural and unjust.
Disney still benefits from trademark law on their characters along with a generous monopoly on new creations. I would argue that extending this further would reduce the incentive to innovate.
I don't know what the parent poster had in mind, but in my view losing most control by now is absolutely right and proper.
We progress because we're able to build on what previous generations built.
The cartoon had very limited distribution on film, I saw it at a university showing. Disney would distribute Donald Duck and etc but back then all the Mickey material was kept on the shelf for some reason. But then the "Mickey Mouse" law made this notorious.
E.g. pinnochio was released in 1940 based on a book from 1883. At the time the original book was published i believe copyright only lasted at most 42 years. It seems unfair that disney got to benefit from short copyright terms in the beggining and long copyright terms at the end. Nobody likes to see soneone eat their cake and have it to.
That's why it's important to stop the censorship of old media that doesn't fit modern standards.
The more interesting angle is minstrel vibes that I get watching it.
But then that overt racist version? It came out in 1916, and Columbia continued promoting the song until 1925 -- three years before Steamboat Willy came out. Those "minstrel vibes" aren't just vibes. Minstrel shows were big money at that time in history, and the use of Turkey in the Straw is part and parcel. What lyrics were the audience at the time most familiar with? That seems much more relevant than the original lyrics.
For the record I disagree with the sentiment but those are the rules.