TP’s “pact” asks creators to relinquish moral rights?; Japan to adopt “fair use” laws

Found via Journalista, creator Lea Hernandez voices strong concerns over Tokyopop’s new “pact” for artists submitting to their Manga Pilots program, in particular its framing of moral rights, a set of guarantees of control given to creators including attribution and alteration that traditionally cannot be waived, yet Tokyopop is apparently convincing creators to do just that.

I don’t have much to say on the particulars of Tokyopop’s new “pact”, simply because I’m not in a position to care for all the details as much as a creator like Ms. Hernandez does and should.  But I will make the general observation that convoluted contract shenanigans seem to be symptomatic of a comics publishing industry that no longer sees the comics publishing part as its number one priority.  Be it publishers who don’t focus on putting out books, or artists who worry their heads off over secondary rights before they draw their first page, this is all a horrible way to go about making comics.

Edit:  This thing is spreading briskly over the internet, and the scorn is almost universal.  Reactions at Comics212, from Hope Larson and Bryan Lee O’Malley (both found via Precocious Curmudgeon, who advises bluntly to “put the pen down”), A Geek by Any Other Name, and the Sweatdrop Studios forum.

Edit 2: At least one reviewer, Johanna Draper Carlson of Comics Worth Reading, finds Tokyopop’s conduct so distasteful that she may never give them her time of day again.

This Livejournal post offers a humorous and depressing anecdote regarding Tokyopop and the Savannah College of Art and Design (I assume).

I’m going to wager that TP’s damage control will either roll out a newly worded contract or pull it completely from the web and give all future contracts “company trade secret” status in 5… 4… 3…

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Also at Journalista, week-long excerpts from an old issue of Garo, the non-comformist manga magazine.  Today’s comic features a character that looks a lot like Loady McGee…

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Fun… Jason Thompson lists his 5 favorite manga on which he served as editor, spanning from before the authentic manga boom to current day, providing an interesting juxtaposition of the different approaches to manga localization then and now.  (Found at MangaBlog)

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Very important change to copyright law is about to take place in Japan… The Asahi Shimbun reports that Japan is set to adopt US-style copyright exemptions for fair use, a legal concept which allows portions of copyrighted material to be used without permission, provided it is used for the purpose of review and criticism, academic research, or parody.  While the decision is to promote new business ventures such as Google, the article also states specifically that parodies, i.e. doujinshi, would now be protected by law.

While self-published parodies thrive in Japan, all of it is technically illegal; most Japanese anime/manga/video game producers simply choose not to press charges against fan activity that ultimately raise the profile of their properties; doujinshi creators have no real protection other than the good will of those companies.  That will all change next year, when the revision is set to take place.

Edit: Gia rightly points out that pornographic doujinshi may not be off the hook.