National Diet Library Newsletter
No. 135, February 2004
 |
 |
Copyright research
of Japanese books
printed in the Meiji era:
Behind the scenes of digitization
(part two of two)
By Digitization Section, Digital
Library Division,
Projects Department, Kansai-kan
of the National Diet Library
This is an abridged
translation of the article of the same title
in the NDL Monthly Bulletin
No. 511 (Oct. 2003).
| Contents
(Last issue no.134)
(This issue)
|
4. Results of the copyright
research
As a result of three-year research excluding
the open research mentioned later, 34,997 (33%) out of 106,098 works printed
in the Meiji era were confirmed as copyright-free.
The results, assorted by NDC (Nippon Decimal
Classification), are shown in Chart 2.
Chart 2: Results assorted by NDC
Categories of the NDC (Nippon Decimal
Classification) are as follows:
000 General works
100 Philosophy
200 General History
300 Social sciences
400 Natural science
500 Technology, Engineering
600 Industry and commerce
700 The arts. Fine arts
800 Language
900 Literature
2,528 items (2.4%) are confirmed as copyrighted. 62,877 items (59.9%) are still unknown because the year of the author's death is uncertain. Research has been on hold for 5,696 items (5.4%) for two main reasons:
1. More than ten authors are involved in one work
2. Errors of bibliographic data or data in authority file for author hampered further research
Many of the books that fell under reason 1 were volumes of haiku and tanka poems. As the NDC 900s includes such volumes of poems, the number of research-suspended works in the 900s is extremely large. In case plural authors (fewer than 10) are involved, if there is at least one whose copyright is uncertain or one author has a factor for suspension, the copyright of the work is defined as "unknown" or "research suspended" respectively.
Remaining problem
Research has been suspended for works in which
too many authors are involved. The rate is about 4% of the total research
subjects. How we handle them in the future remains a problem.
Outline
Open research for author information (hereinafter called "open research" ) was carried out from March 17 to June 16, 2003. The research subjects were 54,000 authors of 67,000 titles whose copyrights were still unknown in the copyright research.
An open research site was set up in the NDL website. It had a page to search for author and a form for users to send information on the contact address of the copyright owner or the year of the author's death.
Background
According to Article 67 of the Copyright Law
(Exploitation of works in the case where the copyright owner thereof is
unknown), in case we cannot find the copyright owner or his/her contact
address despite considerable effort, we can reproduce his/her work under
a compulsory license from the Commissioner for Cultural Affairs after depositing
compensation fixed by the Commissioner.
Open research is counted in "considerable effort." Actually when the Planning Office of the International Library of Children's Literature digitized and released two titles of magazines for children on the web in FY2000, it did open research for copyright on the web before applying for a compulsory license from the Commissioner. In the end, it released 1,853 out of 2,203 authors' works.
Results
The open research page logged 60,890 accesses
and received 738 remarks: 679 via the form and 59 via other tools.
The results are shown in Chart 3. As well as useful information on
author, we received comments on errors in our bibliographic data and we
corrected them one by one.
| Number of research subjects | 54,097 (67,373 titles of works) |
|---|---|
| Access count | 60,890
(Daily average: 708 Number of searches performed: 29,180) |
| Number of remarks via the form | 679 (From author: 46, From others: 633) |
| Number of remarks via other tools | 59 (for 461 authors)
(Details) By phone: 21, By letter: 6, By email: 32 |
| Total remarks | 738 |
| Number of authors whose year of death identified | 532
(Expiration of copyright: 480 Confirmation of copyright: 52 ) |
| Number of contact addresses identified | 60 |
| Number of works made available on the web by the research | 976 |
Currently, works released on the "Digital Library from the Meiji Era" have been confirmed as copyright-free in the three-year copyright research from FY 2000. In future, we will clear issues of copyrighted works and works of which the year of the author's death is unknown, before we digitize and upload them. There are mainly two ways to clear copyright issues: one is obtaining a license from the copyright owner and the other is receiving a compulsory license from the Commissioner for Cultural Affairs.
Obtaining license from copyright owner
We will look for contact addresses of the copyright
successors of 824 authors who are confirmed as copyrighted by the copyright
research or the open research. If we find their addresses, we will
ask permission to release the work on the "Digital Library from the Meiji
Era." Though some of the addresses were found in the open research,
most
of them are still unknown. In next research, we will refer to other
information tools such as groups to which the author belonged, related
academic societies, publishers who issued the author's works and local
governments of the prefecture or city in which the author resided when
his/her work was published.
We will apply for a compulsory license from the Commissioner for Cultural Affairs for authors whose copyright successors' addresses are still unknown in the next research.
Application for a compulsory license from the Commissioner for Cultural AffairsFor authors whose copyrights are still unknown after open research, we are conducting the above-stated research for successor's contact address in FY 2003 and 2004, after which we will apply for a compulsory license from the Commissioner for Cultural Affairs based on Article 67 of the Copyright Law. In FY 2003, we will apply for the release of 18,149 works in the NDC 000s-200s and will apply for other works in the NDC 300s-900s in FY 2004. We are consulting with the Agency for Cultural Affairs about the specific number of works for which we can apply at one time.
To prepare for application, we have to arrange documents on prima facie evidence as supporting data and estimate compensation in addition to searching for the copyright successor's contact address. Compensation corresponds to the ordinary rate of royalty and after we receive a compulsory license from the Commissioner, we need to deposit the compensation with the Ministry of Justice. We will try to provide the works properly as people's cultural heritage after careful consultation with the Agency for Cultural Affairs.
Through these researches and procedures, we will digitize and provide most of the Meiji collection on the web by the first half of FY2005.
|
|
|