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In 1975, a woman who had made critical remarks about the Manga Taikai was excluded from that convention, and [End Page 234] subsequently a firestorm of anger among fans produced a movement against the Manga Taikai led by the famous circle Meikyū (Labyrinth), which resulted in the conception of a new alternative convention. On December 21, 1975, the first Comic Market—"a fan event from fans for fans"—was held in Tokyo.6

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Comike's underlying vision was of an open and unrestricted dōjinshi fair, offering a marketplace without limitations on content or access.

With the advent of these fan-consumers (as opposed to fan-creators), dōjinshi became demand-driven publications. Greater competition gradually fostered rising standards of quality, which in turn attracted more circles and buyers. Higher sales shrank production costs and boosted profits, which could then be reinvested in the dōjinshi themselves. Small printing companies, many of which had begun in the minikomi (microcommunication) boom of the early 1970s, were able to use the profits derived from greater demand for their services to modernize their equipment, lowering production costs further and enabling them to construct their production schedules around each Comike.8 Additionally, lower printing costs freed smaller groups from the dependence on bigger groups, which often had strict rules on content and style to avoid conflict among their many members. Having lost their raison d'être, these big clubs and circles gradually faded away, leaving dōjinshi creators to produce stories they liked, in the manner they liked.9

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aniparo parodied popular anime series, and in doing so, attracted a new type of fan to Comike, beyond its core group of 2000 or so attendees. These were female fans, mostly middle and high school students strongly influenced by the 1970s florescence of shōjo manga. They began to create and consume dōjinshi in which the (bishōnen or "pretty boy") male protagonists of popular anime and manga were transposed into a very particular sort of erotic story typified by the phrase: "without tension" (yama nashi), "without punchline" (ochi nashi), and "without meaning" (imi nashi)—and hence the contemporary genre title, yaoi.10

The eleventh Comic Market in spring 1979 saw the popularity of the cute and pure bishōjo or "pretty girl" (strongly influenced by 1970s shōjo manga) skyrocket among men's dōjinshi circles, attracting many new male participants.

The Comic Market was dominated by women from the beginning (90 percent of its first participants were female), but in 1981, thanks to lolicon, male participants numbered the same as female participants for the first time in Comike's history.13

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Internal conflicts on the Comike planning committee underlay some of these developments: they marked the ascendancy of the faction led by Yonezawa Yoshihiro, who favored Comike's unlimited expansion.15 Though he was criticized for purportedly selling dōjinshi out to commercialism, Yonezawa couched his plans for Comike in terms of a collective organization of the convention by all participants, including staff, circles, and visitors.16 Whatever the underlying reality, these public principles remain little changed today.17

Faced with this loss of identity, talent, and space, every other large fan convention except Comike dissolved. Yaoi Boom But in the middle of the decade, one manga and its anime not only saved dōjinshi fandom from near extinction but was responsible for its biggest boom yet. Takahashi Yōichi's Captain Tsubasa (1981–88, Kyaputen tsubasa),

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New dōjinshi conventions appeared, and manga shops began selling dōjinshi on commission. Comparatively lush, custom-made, oversized dōjinshi with more than one hundred pages became common, and popular circles could now live on their fanworks' profits

professional creators like Toriyama Akira of Dragonball fame participating,

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Despite the self-censorship brought on by the mass media's criticism, Comike nevertheless continued to thrive. Young men tired of new, tighter restrictions on professional manga turned to Comike, and attendance once again swelled to 230,000 in the summer of 1990.23 Hardcore lolicon was now passé, and erotic dōjinshi for men had greatly changed. New genres were introduced with such aspects as fetishism and a new style of softcore eroticism enjoyed by men and women alike; in particular, yuri (lily), or lesbian stories, emerged.24Dōjinshi also became smaller and shorter due to professional publishers recruiting talented dōjinshi creators en masse: the bulk of dōjinshi were the works of the less talented creators left behind.25

Other factors contributing to the increased interest in dōjinshi and in fanworks were the development of fixed otaku landmarks and the spread of computers. Almost everyone could now afford to make digital dōjinshi as well as audiovisual or even interactive dōjinshi (i.e. dōjin music and dōjin games).

The personal technology revolution meant [End Page 239] simplification of fanworks' production processes as well as completely new possibilities for communication and new digital genres. With the growth of dōjinshi in other media, the term "dōjin products" (dōjin seihin) has gradually come into use to describe fanworks of all genres.

Further, the conversion of Tokyo's Akihabara "Electric Town" into a district full of shops selling otaku-related goods, as well as the nationwide expansion of otaku-goods retailers and the establishment of Internet communities and message boards in the late 1990s, enabled otaku to live out their interests and to communicate nonstop with like-minded people everywhere. Their interests and culture were easily shared, and consequently information on Comic Market and dōjin culture spread around the world.

The rise of the Internet also meant that Comike lost its monopoly as the center of otaku and dōjinshi culture. Nevertheless, Comike remained the most important event for Japanese fans, especially after companies with otaku-related products started to exploit it.28 Firms had been interested in Comic Market for decades as a never-ending pool of promising new talent and as a place to exploit them commercially, and they were willing to pay much money for direct access to these masses of otaku.29 Starting with NEC in the summer of 1995, companies were granted exhibition space to market or to sell their newest products. This was the birth of the dealer booth at Comike, and, as with dōjinshi circles, the number of applicant companies was much higher than that of available spaces: a self-sustaining event with such high attendance was too important for any related company to ignore.30 Companies accepted the existence of unlicensed parody dōjinshi using copyrighted material (albeit in a transformative and thus arguably fair-use manner) since they could now sell exclusive goods at Comike (Figure 3) or use it as a marketing place, attracting to the convention people who were not interested in dōjinshi.

In the summer of 2004, 5 percent of all circles participating in Comike were headed by a professional mangaka or illustrator, while another 10 percent had some professional experience.

Despite its relative newness, Higurashi became one of Japan's biggest media phenomena, and at the seventy-sixth Comic Market in summer 2009, Tōhō Project became the first dōjin title ever to receive the honor of being considered its own genre.

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It seems that dōjinshi circles are not switching entirely to the Internet but rather are using it as an informational and marketing platform for themselves and their creations, spreading the knowledge of and fascination with Comic Market to new spheres.

With high attendance, positive media attention, and industry support, Comike's position seems invulnerable. Even the deaths of important figures such as Iwata Tsuguo in 2004 and Yonezawa Yoshihiro—who was the face of Comike for decades—in 2006 did not harm its position. But unresolved problems, such as the use of copyrighted material in parody dōjinshi and the child pornography questions inherent in lolicon and shotakon, remain.

Comike was neither the first nor the biggest dōjinshi fair when it was established; its main purpose was to provide the freest market possible, and that freedom has come at a price. The dream of a Comic Market open to every one and everything was never realized, as there were too many physical, financial, and legal restrictions. Even today, the Comic Market suffers from a lack of space, a lack of money, and a lack of legal security. Only two-thirds of applicant circles can participate due to constraints, since, as a small independent operator Comike's financial resources are limited and most of the work is done by volunteers.

s the center of attention, with its size and its links to the industry, it is undeniable that Comike possesses the power and the means to influence social, market, and even political developments. In [End Page 244]

recent years it has not been reluctant to use this power. Whether through conferences on copyright issues or on the establishment of a "National dōjinshi fair liaison group" (Zenkoku dōjinshi sokubaikai renrakukai) in 2000, it has taken on the responsibility of representing and of regulating Japanese dōjinshi culture.

Digital magazine store Zinio, like all content suppliers for iPhone and iPad, agreed to Apple's "Regional Content Review" for all items sold through their app. This means that all "in-app purchasable" content must be approved by Apple to be acceptable to the broad U.S. population (the United States is one "region") or it will block it. The more obvious targets for censorship in the Zinio store included Playboy and Penthouse magazines, but Vogue France was also rejected because it features artistic and occasional use of nudity. Vogue France is also not stocked at Wal-Mart stores for the same reason.

Stories have surfaced about comic books being blocked as well. In February, Stephen Lindsay, the creator of Jesus Hates Zombies, discovered that a link to buy his book through the ComiXology app had stopped working. A ComiXology rep explained in a tweet that Apple "deemed it inappropriate according to their SDK guidelines" and they were forced to remove it.

"Here's the thing," said Lindsay. "Jesus Hates Zombies doesn't involve any sex whatsoever. None. It has violence and swearing, but that's because it's a mature readers horror comedy. But the violence isn't even intense. And being a black and white comic, there's zero red blood, which means any gore is dramatically cut down."

When asked if it would be fair to say that any comics with content that would fit in an R-rated movie (violence, brief nudity without explicit sex) would fit into Apple's guidelines, Murphey agreed.

"People seem to think that Apple is slamming our hands down every day saying 'No — we shall oppress this material— you are not permitted to do anything that we do not deem to be family friendly'… and that's not what's happening at all," Murphey continued. "Apple has not censored what we publish in a way that we feel has been terribly oppressive. When things first started in 2008, before they had the parental controls in effect, they were much more strict about what could and couldn't be allowed in the store. Now things are much better."

"My problem with Apple banning [Jesus Hates Zombies] is simply this," says Lindsay. "They allow the Marvel book Kick-Ass. How in God's name is my book worse than Kick-Ass when it comes to content? The simple answer, it's not. But because Kick-Ass is a Marvel book, it gets a pass."

The experience of smaller publishers producing books with LGBT characters and situations also seems hard to reconcile with Murphey's assessment of Apple's guidelines. Tom Bouden's adaptation of The Importance of Being Earnest was rejected as an iPad app for the App Store, again due to "materials that may be considered obscene, pornographic, or defamatory." A handful of sexually suggestive images depicting men, some extremely mild, were specifically flagged as problematic in the 80-page graphic novel.

perhaps to avoid calling attention to its restrictions, Apple did not allow black censor bars to appear in content.

Yaoi Press packaged their graphic novel Zesty for submission to the App Store with the assistance of digital provider Fika Publishing

The book was rejected without explanation.

"I'm not as hopeful about the iPad as I was this morning," said Abraham in an article about Manga on the iPad for About.com. "The iTunes store just rejected Zesty, our tamest graphic novel, without citing a reason. We thought this could be a bright spot for us, akin to our sales on Amazon Kindle, but we're very discouraged right now."

We have snuck onto Apple platforms through the Kindle app." A search on Amazon's Kindle Store for Yaoi Press titles yields a wide range of prose and graphic novels, all of which can be purchased and synced to an iPad or iPhone. Kindle purchases do not happen "in-app", and are not required to be reviewed and approved by Apple. Amazon appears to have no content restrictions with regard to sexual content; even explicit sexual material appears to be fair game for Kindle books.

"Amazon doesn't seem to have a problem with the story," Bonte said. "They accepted it for digital distribution. The problem with Amazon is that they take 70% and Apple only 30%, plus the platform is absolutely not usable for comics.

"If Dylan was 20 today," Tate wrote, "how would he feel about your company? Would he think the iPad had the faintest thing to do with 'revolution'? Revolutions are about freedom." "Yep, freedom from programs that steal your private data," Jobs responded. "Freedom from programs that trash your battery. Freedom from porn. Yep, freedom. The times they are a changin', and some traditional PC folks feel like their world is slipping away. It is."