> There's zero benefit to society

Wouldn't it result in additional tax revenue while preventing Disney's movies from proliferating throughout society unimpeded?

In all honesty, I really think you should think this idea through. Compared to the status quo, where we get zero tax revenue from intellectual property, this system would guarantee an expiration based on commercial viability. It couldn't sustain forever because the scale would always accelerate at a rate faster than any economy could sustain it. But it would have this additional benefit in that the more some intellectual property becomes commercially sustainable, the more revenue society can collect.

How does that even begin to approach horrible when it's magnitudes more equitable than the status quo?

Disney are able to pay that amount because their IP is still generating massive income.

I'm not a fan of Disney at all, just pointing out what i belive might be the flaw in the argument.

With an increasing cost for age, they would eventually be paying an absurd amount for content of decreasing value. Either they end up funding the government massively, or they decide to drop commercially irrelevant copyright.

How does getting tons of money from Disney into a government's tax coffers not benefit society? That's money that the government wouldn't need to directly collect from citizens other ways.

If Disney had to pay the federal government a few billion each to keep absolute control over their oldest works, every year, no tax games, that would be pretty great for society. But it's also probably true that the tax games would indeed ensue. Something something low trust, we can't have nice things.