Walt Disney's Earliest Mickey Mouse Designs Are Now In The Public Domain- But There Are Still Rules To How You Can Use Them

At the beginning of 2024, Walt Disney's earliest designs of the beloved and iconic Mickey Mouse, most notably those from the character's first short, Steamboat Willie, have entered the public domain. This has caused a great deal of excitement among fans, although some have been left confused over what exactly this means, and what exactly they can do with the character.

So, let's take a look at the specifics of what this all means for Mickey, and the remaining rules around the character's public domain use.

No, Disney has not 'lost' Mickey Mouse

Some longtime fans have been upset by the thought of Disney 'losing' Mickey, but they needn't worry, because that is not exactly what has happened here. Mickey will remain Disney's main mascot, an icon of Disney animation. They still own the trademark on the character, will still use whistling Mickey as a logo, and of course, no-one can ever take away the fact that Mickey Mouse is the creation, and some would say alter ego, of the late, great, and deeply loved Walt Disney.

All the early Mickey design entering the Public Domain changes is that other content creators can now use it in derivative works (a work based on or derived from an already existing work) without Disney suing them for Copyright infringement.

However, it is still not open slather for Bootleg Mickey Mouse content, because..

You can't go ahead and use just any Mickey Mouse

Many of the initial News reports on the subject were somewhat unclear on this point, so we will explain it here. Not every version of Mickey Mouse has entered the Public Domain. The current, and most immediately recognisable version of the character, as seen above, is still very much under Disney Copyright and thus off-limits. Artists should particularly steer clear of giving their Mickeys gloves, yellow shoes, human skin tone, or visible whites of the eyes, as these were features added sometime after in Mickey's debut. Most also recommend avoiding the red pants, as while they may have featured in at least one poster from the now Public Domain era, they were not a regular part of Mickey's design until the advent of colour film, and are more closely identified with the still under Copyright protected version of the character.

Creators who wish to make use of Public Domain Mickey Mouse are limited to the designs used in the first three shorts to feature the character: Steamboat Willie, Plane Cazy, and The Gallopin' Gaucho.

The designs of Minnie Mouse and Pete as they appeared in Steamboat Willie are also now Public Domain, and therefore free to use for content creators. So, stick to those designs and you're good to go, right?

Almost. Just one more thing you might need to consider..

Mind the Trademark

While the Mickey Mouse design of his early cartoon shorts is now Public Domain, Disney, as mentioned earlier, still has a Trademark over the Mickey character as a whole. A Trademark is a legal acknowledgement of a peace of intellectual property is used to identify the work of a particular company or service and distinguish it from others.

So, while content creators can, in theory, use the early Mickey and Minnie designs in any kind of derivative work they like, the work must be just that: Derivative. They cannot do anything to suggest or mislead consumers into believing that they or their Mickey-related works are affiliated with Disney, because while they may be free on copyright grounds, Disney could still sue for Trademark infringement.

This is part of why the makers of horror film Winnie The Pooh: Blood and Honey, produced when A.A Milne's novels became public domain, could not depict Pooh as wearing a red shirt. While Milne's novels and E.H Shepherd's original illustrations of the character were free for use, Disney's design, the first version of Pooh depicted as wearing a red shirt, is under Disney Trademark.

This won't stop content creators from pushing the boundaries with Mickey Mouse.. a horror video game is reportedly in the works already. There are just certain parameters they must stay within to avoid legal trouble.

It will be interesting to see what happens when the original designs for characters such as Goofy and Donald Duck reach the Public Domain in coming years.