Actually, I support none of the various copyright extension acts. Explicit rather than Implicit copyright was fine, but the absurd lengths they're going to are nuts. 17 years. Period. (It was established in the 1780's, when it could take two years to get something to publication, or more - and they felt it was appropriate, and it stayed there until the 1900's. )
Disney would _not_ have lost control of Mickey Mouse, or any of their other icons. Those are trademarks, not copyrights, which have never had an expiration date. (they can also not be sold, only given)
All Disney would lose was the right to deny someone to _copy_ an old, existing copy of a movie, for example, or modify it - unless said modification distorted their trademark (you couldn't whack up Cinderella into a porn movie, for example, even if you used footage from a copyright expired reel. All you could do is convert it, then sell copies. That's where all those dollar store DVD's are coming from - copies of old movies and shows that did not have explicit copyrights, and were older than 1951, as I recall. Some later than that, but for similar reasons)
no subject
Disney would _not_ have lost control of Mickey Mouse, or any of their other icons. Those are trademarks, not copyrights, which have never had an expiration date. (they can also not be sold, only given)
All Disney would lose was the right to deny someone to _copy_ an old, existing copy of a movie, for example, or modify it - unless said modification distorted their trademark (you couldn't whack up Cinderella into a porn movie, for example, even if you used footage from a copyright expired reel. All you could do is convert it, then sell copies. That's where all those dollar store DVD's are coming from - copies of old movies and shows that did not have explicit copyrights, and were older than 1951, as I recall. Some later than that, but for similar reasons)