NAIROBI, Kenya, Aug 6 – The Kenya Copyright Board has raised concerns on the use of memes by individuals and corporates for financial gains without getting approval from original owners.
The Board’s Executive Director Edward Sigei on Friday said that a copyright holder has the exclusive rights to copy, reproduce, make adaptations, publish and broadcast their work for a fixed period established under the Copyright Act.
Sigei issued the statement after a series of memes generated from videos made by two Kenyan comic artists named Arap Marindich and Tula, that have been trending on various social media platforms.
“A meme generated without the authority of the Copyright owner is an infringement on their copyright particularly the exclusive rights to reproduce, copy, adapt and publish since the original photo or video undergoes alteration and incorporation of a text,” stated Sigei.
The Board however clarified that while meme usage on social media is tolerated, its creation and use for commercial purposes can attract a significant civil liability and must be cleared from the authors.
It also noted that in some cases content used for generating memes may be in public domain or released under creative common license.
“Consequently, corporate bodies must consider conducting due diligence on the status of photographs or videos before being tempted to join the fun,” said Sigei.
Sigei said whereas a video or static image can trend and cause comic relief at any one given time, under the Copyright Act, the copyright holder reserves the exclusive rights to copy, reproduce, make adaptation, publish and broadcast their work.
He said such memes can be exploited for the benefit of the author through advertising and as Non-Fungible-Tokens (NFTs).
