Fair Use Against Disney

Disney, nowadays, has been one of the most powerful brands in our society. According to Forbes survey, Disney’s brands value has been raised steadily since Walt Disney established the company; it is now the 12th highest in the whole company of the world. This result is not surprising because, people can easily find something about Disney, characterized products or animated film, in daily life. There are many debates regarding an effect of Disney, including about “Dieneyfication”, I will bring two main stream of critical perspective against expansion of Disney’s effect in this essay. Additionally, the term of “Disneyfication” will be used for indicating expansion of Disney’s influence in the following statement.

With endless copyright laws and fine lines of right and wrong Eric Faden created a video using short clips from disney animation studios to test the limits of fair use. Walt disney studios is known for suing schools, churches , and public libraries for broadcasting their movies and animations without permission(which is never given). Once again disney has proved their reputation by by filing a lawsuit against eric faden whom abided by the copyright rules. I can only imagine Disney’s lawyers heads spinning off as they watched the “movie”.

Professor Faden is a film/media teacher at Bucknell University in Lewisburg Pennsylvania. He received his PhD. while in Florida. Now in addition to teaching he makes some films and writes papers on film and media. When doing these things he would have to have a good understanding of copyright laws so as not to break them when creating works. Faden demonstrates this knowledge when making the “A Fair(y) Use Tale”, by not committing copyright infringement on Disney Studios.

Faden used his work on this video for a nonprofit educational purpose of his students, so in this case he did not violate factor four. To the creators of the disney work, if he did anything it was provide commercial to their work and in that way many people may have gained interest in watching the disney movies Faden used to create his

“It all started with a mouse.” Since the 1970’s, Mickey Mouse has become one of the most famous icons in the world. The Walt Disney Company started in 1923, and has since expanded into over a hundred different movies, merchandise, and theme parks around the world and a variety of countries and continents (Walt Disney Studio History). Walt Disney opened his first park, Disney Land in California, in 1955, but later built Walt Disney World in 1971 which is located in central Florida. This was a bold move, but it was Walt’s plan to make a bigger park with more space and more attractions and opportunities for the guests. Since then, Disney World has become one of the most admired tourist spots in the world, and has the most widespread theme park

Disney believed in magic. Disney is a common household name. In fact, some toddlers can recite the name of their favorite characters from their favorite Disney movie. It is not uncommon to see adults watching a Disney movie, and I would venture out and say most Americans have been to Disney Land or Disney World once in their life. Needless to say, Disney is part of the American culture. However, translating the success that Disney has had in the United States to another country can present a lot of challenges. As we will see, in this case, Disney did not do their homework when it came to planning this project in Europe. Some of the challenges that the company had were their makings such as hubris management and a lack in understanding their customer’s cultural differences

The films of Walt Disney have served as icons of childhood over the last century. The Disney Corporation’s success is evidenced in its financial fortitude. In 1995, Walt Disney Company had the biggest market share, relative to the number of releases, at 19% (Smith & Thompson, 1996). In 1997, Disney had sales of nearly $24 billion.

Walt Disney was well known for being a patriarch in the animation industry. His employees, numbering 800+, were the most experienced and well paid in the whole field. Just less than a decade earlier, Walt and his studio had struck gold with the success of the first ever full-length animated feature film, Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs. The film had become, at the time, the most successful sound movie ever. Walt had decided to take a large sum of the profit from Snow White and use it to finance a new animation studio located in Burbank, California – the same studio that Disney operates out of today. Profits were also used to fund new ventures into the largely undiscovered world of animation and stereophonic sound. However, behind the curtains

The first thing that should be done before anything else in this case, is the proper definition of fair use. Merriam Webster’s defines fair use as the following: a legal doctrine that portions of copyrighted materials may be used without permission of the copyright owner provided the use is fair and reasonable, does not substantially impair the value of the materials, and does not curtail the profits reasonably expected by the owner. The U.S. Copyright office states that these are the activities that can be claimed as fair use: criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. So to further analyze fair use, I shall share some observations. Fair use can be claimed if it does not substantially impair the worth of the movies used in the video, or lose any money for disney. The strategy can also be used if it is used in the context of criticizing, reporting, or providing commentary on something. Teaching, research, and scholarship are also forms protected by copyright.

Faden’s video “Fair(y) Use Tale” is not exceeding copyright as Disney has seem to argue. Faden’s video is meant to educate young kids on the rules of copyright laws. I strongly agree with his method of teaching the rules because as kids you get bored really easy with this video they can see something they are familiar with so they are not as bored. The fair use laws says that you can use a proportion of someone’s work , in this case Dinsey for educate,news reporting , criticism, and research. This is exactly what Faden did he used a series of clips from disney movies to explain the copyright rights which is education or teachings. The video also did not decrease disney's profits which is one of the regulations of copyright.

Although the clips that Faden used were small snippets, he used plenty of them. He used clips from multiple different movies like Monsters, Inc., The Little Mermaid, Toy Story and many more. Faden should realize that what he did was wrong and, that he did take the work of someone else to create a video. If Faden were to continue to make these videos, they could become super popular. This could cause people to give credit to the wrong creator. Giving credit to Walt Disney and asking for permission would have been the best idea. There are consequences for copyrighting work. Sometimes there are large amounts of money you will have to pay as a fine. Since Faden didn't give credit to Walt Disney Studios many people who might not have seen these Disney movies may think Faden is the creator of the

The video he made was only meant to inform people about copyright. It was nonprofit which means he isn't gaining money from the video at all. He isn't taking disneys money either.

Cinderella, Beauty and the Beast, The Little Mermaid, cute children’s movies right? Most of us see these commercial fictional movies as harmless kid’s films with incredible diversity; however, we seem to ignore, or, yet, be oblivious of the underlying subliminal messages that such movies ingrain into our children’s impressionable minds. Founded in 1993 by Walt Disney, the Disney conglomerate and the movies they produce are still a huge influence on people in this day and age, especially young, impressionable kids; their target audience. Various Disney movies are produced every year, yet the traditional ones gain most of the attention, which are the likes of said movies, also including Aladdin (1992), Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937),

Mr. Faden’s video is without a doubt fair use. This is for many reasons. The purpose of the video, the amount used in the video, the different works that were used, how it affected the market are all things that did not hurt Disney in any way, light, or form. Therefore, I will be using these topics in my defense of Mr. Faden.

I would like to say that my client, Eric S. Faden is not guilty of copyright infringement. It is well known that Disney often sues companies and even just everyday people in the name of copyright infringement. My client, Professor Faden, has not breached this rule because he is following all the rules of fair use.