A bill just quietly passed in Japan. It extends copyright from 50 years to 70 years. Also, under-reported, is the fact that "circumvention of copy protecton or deterrence mechanisms" is now illegal and the defendant is responsible for proving innocence. I wish this legal spill-over from the US into Japan would stop. Especially for these REALLY STUPID laws. At least I have another project to work on in Japan. ;-P
Thanks for the heads-up Gohsuke.
Listed below are links to blogs that reference this entry: Copyright extension and DMCA-like bill passed in Japan.
TrackBack URL for this entry: https://joi.ito.com/mt/mt-tb.cgi/817
a follow-up on my Dead text …-post: the full text of Geerhardt Kornatowski’s dissertation is available (Dutch, pdf), under the... Read More
a follow-up on my Dead text …-post: the full text of Geerhardt Kornatowski’s dissertation is available (Dutch, pdf), under the... Read More
a follow-up on my Dead text …-post: the full text of Geerhardt Kornatowski’s dissertation is available (Dutch, pdf), under the... Read More
a follow-up on my Dead text …-post: the full text of Geerhardt Kornatowski’s dissertation is available (Dutch, pdf), under the... Read More
![Joi Ito [logo]](/_site/img/joi-ito-logo-300.png){kind=logo}
This is very sad news.
I wonder when the Japanese government will understand that copyright is not about creating as much incentives for authors as possible, but instead, about promoting the development of culture. The harmonization argument (yes, harmonization with the DMCA) and the idea that authors' rights are in danger because of "rampant piracy" on the internet (check out the first paragraph of this Japan Times article for an example of this rhetoric), seem to push the copyright legislation in the direction of more and stronger protection.
Joi, is there something we can do?
NB: Lawrence Lessig wrote about a draft of this bill in January.
I've heard in Jan that there's problems in the modified bill from Lawrence Lessig. but even I missed the news on the day about the bill passed, until I was notified the story by Keiko Toyama who is the editor of Japanese version of Lessig's Code and the Future of Ideas. thanks for the heads up Toyama-san.