Meeting at the waterhole
A copyright lawyer’s adventures in Arnhem Land
I stumbled into the Aboriginal world completely by chance. I was completing the three month reading course to become a barrister in 1988, during which time I was not permitted by the bar rules to take any work. I was at the time blessed with a three-year-old child and another baby due shortly. I had no idea how I was going to get my first brief. Desperation turned to invention.
An ABC radio current affairs program ran an item on Aboriginal demands for a law to protect the copyright in their artistic works. They were complaining about unauthorised reproduction on T-shirts of important artworks. I readily interpreted a solution under conventional copyright principles. To a lawyer trained in copyright, it was obvious enough. I rang the ABC, and spoke with the program’s producer. “Sorry to bother you,” I said. “But I just heard your program, and while I don’t usually ring with my comments and thoughts . . . No new law is required. Copyright will do.”
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