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Comment by dehrmann | Hacker News Reader

It also hints at what his reaction would be. It seems unfair for the family to criticize them doing to Walt what he did to Lincoln.

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With Walt, there's also the context that he was the founder and CEO of the company who chose to make himself a very public spokesperson for the company for many decades, including regular TV appearances on Disney's weekly national TV show - all in an era where few CEOs were public figures outside financial markets. And many of his appearances went far beyond the role of CEO to include playing host, product demonstrator and marketing spokesperson.

He clearly had no problem with representing the company and actively promoting Disney theme parks, movies and products with his image. Even while he was alive Disney Corp sold high-end memorabilia like large framed pictures of Walt working at his drawing board and including his distinctive signature. So he not only promoted products but turned himself into a revenue generating product. In some sense, he made himself a mascot for his company as much as Mickey Mouse and this was clearly by design. To me that's different than a CEO who mostly limited his public exposure to the usual earnings calls and shareholder's meetings.

I agree, and to be clear, this makes it more acceptable that Disney would make a Walt animatronic, right?

To me it does because his actions while alive clearly establish a consistent pattern of behavior which indicates he would not have any issue with the company he founded and dedicated most of his life to using his likeness to honor him (while also making money). As far as we know, he didn't sign an explicit license for use of his likeness. Although he may have, like for those memorabilia framed/signed photo sales), but either way he certainly established an implicit license by creating and supporting products for Disney using his likeness while alive. Under common law, often voluntarily acting on something repeatedly and consistently tends to establish intent in the absence of a written contract.

If it existed, would such an explicit license extend to derivative usages like this? Probably not legally but I think ethically it does sharply reduce the likelihood Disney is acting against what Walt would have wanted.

Dead for 10 years vs dead for 100 is a meaningful difference to me.

Namely how many people alive actually knew the person.

I agree that the number of years matter, but Walt Disney died in 1966.

I was bringing up the existence of a meaningful transition point not where it specifically lies.

There’s more creepy versions of the same kind of thing using recently dead performers for example.

So I guess the standard is: dead for 100 years is acceptable. Dead for 60 years is "too soon".

Was 100 years acceptable at the time? 160 years seems fine since I doubt anyone would complain about a Lincoln animatronic today

to be more... or less? exact, its likely "everyone who knew the person while they were alive is also deceased"

I think what would be unfair is putting words in the mouth of the animatronic, making Walt say something that he wouldn’t have agreed with. Same with any historical figure.

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