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News Articles: public domain

An enlarged cartoon of Tintin pictured on display at Paris' Pompidou Cultural Center in 2006. The Belgian cub reporter is among the characters and works entering the public domain in 2025.

Popeye, Tintin and more will enter the public domain in the new year

The copyrights of thousands of 20th-century films, books, compositions and sound recordings expire on Jan. 1, making them free for anyone to share and adapt. Here are some of the highlights.

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By:
  • Rachel Treisman
The original 1928 script for Disney's <em>Steamboat Willie</em>, the first cartoon to star Mickey Mouse.

'Steamboat Willie' is now in the public domain. What does that mean for Mickey Mouse?

A 1928 movie featuring the first appearance of Mickey Mouse enters public domain on Jan. 1. But creative and commercial access to the character is complicated by both copyright and trademark law.

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By:
  • Neda Ulaby
<em>Winnie-the-Pooh: The Deforested Edition</em> is a word-for-word republishing of the A.A. Milne classic, with one arresting change: all of the trees have been cut down.

Oh Bother! Winnie, poo and deforestation

Now that Winnie-the-Pooh is in the public domain, it's a free-for-all. In Winnie-the-Pooh: The Deforested Edition, the trees have are all gone. The book is by toilet paper company Who Gives A Crap.

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By:
  • Elizabeth Blair
When F. Scott Fitzgerald published <em>The Great Gatsby</em> in 1925, it didn't sell many copies. Now it's sold nearly 30 million.

Opinion: 'The Great Gatsby' Enters Public Domain But It Already Entered Our Hearts

NPR's Scott Simon reflects on the legacy of F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby. The literary classic's copyright expired on the first day of 2021.

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By:
  • Scott Simon
F. Scott Fitzgerald, Virginia Woolf, Ernest Hemingway, Franz Kafka and many more authors and artists have 1925 works entering the public domain on January 1. Above, a first edition of <em>The Great Gatsby</em> at the London International Antiquarian Book Fair in London in 2013.

Party Like It's 1925 On Public Domain Day (Gatsby And Dalloway Are In)

Every year on January 1, the copyright on thousands of books, songs, films and other creative works expires. Law professor Jennifer Jenkins says 2021 is "a bumper crop."

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By:
  • Neda Ulaby