A whole raft of 1920s pop culture is now in the public domain
Something fascinating happened when the clock struck midnight on New Year's Day.
For the first time in more than 20 years, tens of thousands of copyrighted works from the early 20th century entered the public domain. This means everything from early incarnations of Felix the Cat to Robert Frost's famous poem Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening have shed their legal protections.
The quirky development will also result in English teachers no longer have to worry about photocopying too many copies of Agatha Christie's novel The Murder on the Links or – to use another example – Winston Churchill's account of the First World War.
Merchandise manufacturers could even sell tea towels with Virginia Woolf quotes from Jacob's Room, if they felt inclined or perhaps a mug with a still from 1923 Box Office hits The Hunchback of Notre Dame.
Jennifer Jenkins, a Duke University law professor, summed up the legal development best when she told Smithsonian Magazine: "The public domain has been frozen in time for 20 years and we're reaching the 20-year thaw."
Why has it taken so long for 1923 works to shed their copyright restrictions?
Works published in 1923 should have entered the public domain the late 1990s because, at that time, works were granted copyright protection for 75 years. (These days, it's 70 years after the author's death.) However, American lawmakers passed a bill in 1998 that retroactively extended old copyright protections for an additional 20 years.
While the bill was meant to protect Disney's grip on Mickey Mouse – whose image should have entered the public domain in 2004 – it has had some bizarre side effects. For example, James Joyce's Ulysses has been in the public domain for two decades. This was because it was published in 1922, not 1923, therefore shedding its copyright restrictions before the 1998 bill became law.
But now that 2019 is upon us, the public domain is starting to catch up. And at this stage, it looks like film studios and publishing giants aren't going to team-up for another copyright extension.
As a result, Mickey Mouse's original image could enter the public domain as soon as 2024. Superman could be next, with the Kryptonian's copyright due to expire in 2033.
Even those normally on the side of copyright restrictions in order to protect artists' incomes have admitted it's time for works from the 1920s to enter the public domain.
Mary Rasemberger, the executive director of America's Authors Guild, has suggested there comes a time when a piece of work "belongs to history as much as to its authors [and author's descendants]".