The Pig and the Box is a children's book

Children's literature

Children's literature is for readers and listeners up to about age twelve; it is often defined in four different ways: books written by children, books written for children, books chosen by children, or books chosen for children. It is often illustrated. The term is used in senses which sometimes...

 written and drawn by a Canadian writer, producer and programmer known as "MCM".

Written in July 2006, The Pig and the Box is a book about the negative sides of DRM

Digital rights management

Digital rights management is a class of access control technologies that are used by hardware manufacturers, publishers, copyright holders and individuals with the intent to limit the use of digital content and devices after sale. DRM is any technology that inhibits uses of digital content that...

, written as a reaction to Access Copyright

Access Copyright

Access © or Access Copyright is the operating name of a Canadian business corporation whose official registration name is The Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency...

's Captain Copyright

Captain Copyright

Captain Copyright was a propaganda cartoon character created by Canada's Access Copyright agency to educate children about the agency's stance on copyright and copyright infringement. As of August 18, 2006, the Captain Copyright initiative had been canceled...

 campaign directed at kids.

The Pig and the Box is licensed under a Creative Commons

Creative Commons

Creative Commons is a non-profit organization headquartered in Mountain View, California, United States devoted to expanding the range of creative works available for others to build upon legally and to share. The organization has released several copyright-licenses known as Creative Commons...

 Attribution-ShareAlike license. It was made popular by posts on Boing Boing

Boing Boing

Boing Boing is a publishing entity, first established as a magazine, later becoming a group blog.-History:...

 and Digg

Digg

Digg is a social news website. Prior to Digg v4, its cornerstone function consisted of letting people vote stories up or down, called digging and burying, respectively. Digg's popularity prompted the creation of copycat social networking sites with story submission and voting systems...

and it took only a few days before volunteers had translated the story into German, Chinese, Danish and Italian. To date it has also been translated into French, Finnish, Hungarian, Norwegian, Portuguese, and Spanish.

Version 2

In January 2009 The Pig in a Box entered a second printing. The second printing featured a new cover and language approved, or changed to be less edgy, for children. For example, “He nearly peed his pants” was changed to “He nearly danced like an orang-utan.”

External links

• Download The Pig and the Box (link to second printing)
• Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike license
• Read The Pig and the Box (original version)