Comic book about copyrights

Three American authors with copyright law knowledge made a comic book, which explains how copyright laws work. The three authors, Keith Aoki, James Boyle and Jennifer Jenkins, work at Duke University School of Law in the US and appreciate the systematic of the copyright, but they think copyright laws are outdated. The three authors believe their should be more 'fair use' of works.

Aoki, Boyle en Jenkins, made the comic, named ‘Bound by Law?’, to give artists and students insight in the systematic of copyright laws and what copyright means to them. By telling their story through a comic book, the authors hope to address as many people as possible and they wish to simplify the content. However, the comic is critically about the current copyright system, so the comic appears to be more of a complaint against copyright than an educational tool.

The comic is a project of the ‘Center for the Study of the Public Domain’, which is connected to Duke University. The mission of the center is to promote research on the contributions of works in the public domain. The public domain contains all the works that are not or no longer protected by intellectual property rights and are free for everyone to use. ‘Bound by Law?’ deals with the influence of intellectual property rights on art and culture.

Read the comic book here.

Reference: Duke University School of Law

By: Karen Groen