The U.S. Supreme Court hears a landmark copyright case today that could affect the ownership of decades of intellectual property from Gershwin tunes to the novels of Hemingway and Fitzgerald. Not to mention Mickey Mouse.

The case is a challenge to the Copyright Term Extension Act of 1998 that added 20 years to the ownership of cultural works, thereby protecting movies, plays, books and music for a total of 70 years after the author’s death or for 95 years from publication for works created by or for corporations. The law immediately was challenged by Eric Eldred, who had been posting works of literature on his Web site – Nathaniel Hawthorne, Henry James and the like – and who had anticipated the works of Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald becoming public property that year. The lobbying by Disney, whose famous rodent was due to become public domain in 2003, was so furious that the law, sponsored by the late Rep. Sonny Bono, was dubbed the “Mickey Mouse Protection Act.”

Rather than wait until 2018 for his free literature, Mr. Eldred challenged the law, promptly losing at trial and on appeal. Those quick defeats, when combined with the Supreme Court’s long record of upholding Congress’ constitutional authority to determine the length of copyright protection, made this court’s decision to hear the case one that has sent shock waves through the entertainment industry.

At stake for the industry are royalties estimated in the hundreds of millions. For public domain advocates, the issue is one of placing reasonable limits on the ownership of intellectual property so as not to stifle the free exchange of ideas.

This case has been portrayed as a battle between the powerful entertainment industry and powerless freethinkers. There is, of course, another side.

The 1998 extension was not, despite claims by Web side, driven solely by entertainment industry clout. The advent of the Web as a fast and inexpensive distribution medium in the 1990s made the creative work of thousands of individual copyright holders and their heirs suddenly much more valuable than they had been before. That new economic potential, combined with the Web industry’s disregard for copyright protections on music (remember Napster?), made piracy an important part of the extension debate. The 20-year extension might have been overreaching, but that does not diminish the need to allow creative minds to enjoy the rewards of their work in the Digital Age.

Precisely how the court will decide this case probably will not be known until early next year, but history – none of the previous 10 copyright extensions were overturned and none of them were this long – suggests the possibility of a compromise. In the meantime, don’t expect to find Mickey Mouse in the bargain bin. The only copyright that ever will expire on him is as the scrawny black-and-white star of the 1928 “Steamboat Willy” film. The rounded, colorful modern Mickey is a corporate trademark and thus is protected as long as he remains on the job.