system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: Why would allowing companies to extend their intellectual property rights as long as they were using the property be a bad thing?

I've been pondering this for a while and I get the argument for the public domain but with the protections that fan created art and fiction get under fair use laws why would it be bad for Disney or any other corporation to try and retain the rights to their core IP so long as they were using it?
gpt
The original concept of Intellectual Property was to grant TEMPORARY protections on an idea, with the understanding that it would eventually enter the public domain so that society could benefit from it outside of a profit-generation center.

Disney obviously wants to protect how people can use Mickey, and wants to continue making money off of things it created.  Eventually it should enter the public domain, but people are having trouble defining when that should be.  Is it more important for the public to use things creatively? Or is it more important to protect initial investments in expensive IP for as long as it's deemed useful by the investors?