Public Domain

From TeeVeePedia, the Internet TV Encyclopedia.

The Public Domain usually refers to that area where the general public lives; that is, off the television sets of the world and therefore unimportant. In America, this refers to the entire country except for Hollywood and certain areas of New York City, Las Vegas, Washington, D.C. and Miami.

The term "Public Domain" can also refer to certain stories, storylines and fictional characters originally developed in or before the 19th century. As these were originally written before passage of the DMCA, anybody can use these in their own stories. However, since most Public Domain storylines are really, really bad, they are seldom employed by mainstream media. In the rare case that an interesting story or intriguing plot is ever found in the Public Domain, it is immediately removed from the Public Domain and sold to the highest bidder, usually Disney.