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Comment by bediger4000 | Hacker News Reader

You can tell this is another overly optimistic, Gee Whiz! future:

2058 - The Beatles' music catalogue enters the public domain

It'll never happen. Mickey Mouse will enter the public domain centuries before The Beatles do.

See http://futuretimeline.net/21stcentury/2019.htm#copyright . I have no doubt that when 2019 rolls around, if Disney et al. (I mention Disney specifically instead of the RIAA or anyone else because Disney seems to be the one really at the forefront of the copyright extension issue every time it comes up) are still around in any significant form (hopefully they'll have been thoroughly disrupted years before then, but you can't really predict the future, etc. etc.), they'll be pushing for another extension to copyright terms. However, there's no guarantee that said push would make it through Congress, especially given recent victories over legislation such as SOPA/PIPA and efforts to disrupt the industry. The website presents its predictions in light of current laws and trends, since anything else would end up being too complicated from all the possible "what-if" alternate timelines.

I would imagine, at some point, the compromise will happen that the old works are in the public domain, but newer trademark laws protect the characters from being used in other people's new works. That is their biggest fear anyway.

So you don't have copyright but yet you still have copyright rights on the characters? That would be a weird legal limbo, let's not go there.

The even simpler compromise is that older copyrights that do not have a current registration maintained fall into the public domain. Registrations must be refiled every few years to stay current.

This compromise would fit current interpretations of copyright, allow Steamboat Willie to continue to be effectively permanently copyrighted, without constantly rewriting copyright law. It would also allow the vast bulk of existing old copyrights to become public domain.

It is a compromise where each side gets most of what it cares about, and we don't need to have progressively worse laws passed.

Personally, I believe that any system allowing for indefinite copyright protection (even a system like the current one, that involves constantly changing the system to extend protection) is harmful in the long run, but your compromise is definitely far superior to the status quo, and would probably make for a pretty good bridge from now to future, far more sane copyright law.

2019 is a mere 7 years away. With the resources Disney has (IP, cash, mindshare, etc) they will still be going strong in 2019, even if only through momentum.

Even if they never made another dime, they'd last through 2019 without a problem. I think people underestimate just how much money these companies have.

Exactly. Consider how long SCO has stuck around as an obnoxious legal entity. Now give it billions of dollars.

Hahaha. It's funny that you think that prediction sounds so implausible compared to all these other crazy notions like genetically engineered designer babies.

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