Klarinet Archive - Posting 000990.txt from 1999/02

From: "Mark Charette" <charette@-----.org>
Subj: Re: [kl] A silent Act of Congress - The Mickey Mouse copyright extension
Date: Fri, 26 Feb 1999 20:11:13 -0500

From: David Blumberg <reedman@-----.com>

>US. Congress recently managed to pass a "silent act" that makes music
>copyrighted
>after 1924 not public domain for 95 years instead of the current 75.
Why?
>Because Disney's Mickey Mouse was coming up to the end of its
copyright. So
>Disney lobbied to Congress to extend it's copyright. Problem was that
all
>copyrights had to be extended to allow that. So without as much as a
peep,
>Congress made a "silent act" of extending the Copyright laws to 95
years.
>How unfortunate. Works (like Ravel, Gershwin) that would have had a
chance
>at being re-released, or re-arranged will now have to wait another 20
years.
>It is called in the publishing industry the "Mickey Mouse Act".

I remember reading about this in the newspapers last year, so it wasn't
all that silent. I just looked it up:
-------------------------------
This actually happened October 27, 1998. For full information, see
http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/circs/sl15.pdf . The interesting points:

For works created after January 1, 1978, 70 years after the death of the
author. For anonymous or pseudonymous works or works made for hire, 95
years from publicaiton or 120 years from creation, whichever expires
first.

For works prior to January 1, 1978 and still under original or renewal,
95 years.

Those works which reverted to public domain before this legislation
remain in public domain.
-------
----
Mark Charette@-----.org/clarinet
"Cards by Aimee", http://www.sneezy.org/Aimee
"The phenomenon is too variable for proper study" often
translates from "I don't know how to get musicians to do
anything twice the same" - A. H. Benade

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