A bit after Public Domain day ( https://web.law.duke.edu/cspd/publicdomainday ) this year, but I think this is equally important. Without copyright extensions over the past 30 years, classics like The Cat in the Hat, West Side Story and Atlas Shrugged (how ironic) would now all be in the public domain.

Interesting!! What's fair? Limiting the copy right?? No longer contestable, ... Tricky one, can't have the past holding back the future...

While I'm certainly not one of those people in favour of abolishing copyright all together, I certainly think the current policy is far too long. How long should you be able to benefit from your work? 20 years? 50 years? Your lifetime + 50 years? Lifetime +100 years? It certainly gets much harder to justify three generations after your death (but damn convenient if you're the Disney Estate). The current laws also lead to stupid shenanigans such as rights-holders making claims on works such as "Happy Birthday" and "Kookaburra Sits in the Old Gum Tree".