rightscom

Funding and governance of library and information services for visually impaired people: international case studies

Part2:Country studies

Japan

Copyright

The relevant exceptions for visually impaired people are covered by Article 33bis and Article 37 of the Copyright Law of 2003 [http://www.cric/or.jp/cric_e/clj/clj.html].

It is permitted for anyone to make copies of all materials in Braille. Copies by recording are only allowed in special libraries for visually impaired people and schools for the blind, in order to protect copyright. There are no exemptions or exceptions for print-impaired people. The most serious problem is that public libraries are not at all allowed to produce materials except for Braille books. As a matter of course, public transmission is not permitted.

(Reproduction for preparing a textbook in large print)

Article 33bis

(1) It shall be permissible to reproduce works already reproduced in a school textbook, by enlarging print letters, illustrations, etc. used in that textbook, for the purpose of study use by weak-sighted children or pupils.

(2) A person who intends to prepare a textbook reproducing such works (only such textbook as reproducing all of or a considerable part of such works) by enlarging such print letters, illustrations, etc. (hereinafter in this paragraph referred to as “textbook in large print”) shall inform in advance the publisher of the former textbook thereof and, in the case of distributing copies of such textbook in large print for profit-making purposes, pay to the copyright owners concerned compensation, the amount of which is fixed each year by the Commissioner of the Agency for Cultural Affairs in proportion to the amount of compensation mentioned in paragraph (2) of the preceding Article.

(3) The Commissioner of the Agency for Cultural Affairs shall announce in the Official Gazette the amount of compensation fixed in accordance with the provision of the preceding paragraph.

(Reproduction in Braille, etc.)

Article 37

(1) It shall be permissible to reproduce in Braille a work already made public.

(2) It shall be permissible to record on a memory, or to make the public transmission (excluding the broadcasting or wire diffusion, and including the making transmittable in the case of the interactive transmission) of, a work already made public, by means of a Braille processing system using a computer.

(3) For Braille libraries and other establishments for the promotion of the welfare of the visually handicapped, designated by Cabinet Order, it shall be permissible to make sound recordings of a work already made public, exclusively for the purpose of lending such recordings for the use by the visually handicapped.