The , often referred to as JASRAC, is a Japanese
copyright collection society
Copyrights can either be licensed or assigned by the owner of the copyright. A copyright collective (also known as a copyright society, copyright collecting agency, licensing agency or copyright collecting society or collective management organiz ...
. It was founded in 1939 as a
nonprofit organization
A nonprofit organization (NPO) or non-profit organisation, also known as a non-business entity, not-for-profit organization, or nonprofit institution, is a legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public or social benefit, in co ...
, and is the largest musical
copyright
A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, education ...
administration society in Japan.
Overview
JASRAC's main business activity is to act as trustee of
copyright
A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, education ...
rights such as recording and
performing rights
Performing rights are the right to perform music in public. It is part of copyright law and demands payment to the music's composer/lyricist and publisher (with the royalties generally split 50/50 between the two). Performances are considered "p ...
for songwriters, lyricists, and
music publisher
A music publisher is a type of publisher that specializes in distributing music. Music publishers originally published sheet music. When copyright became legally protected, music publishers started to play a role in the management of the intellect ...
s. It manages licensing to music users, collects license fees, and distributes the same to the rights holders. It also supervises
copyright infringement
Copyright infringement (at times referred to as piracy) is the use of works protected by copyright without permission for a usage where such permission is required, thereby infringing certain exclusive rights granted to the copyright holder, s ...
s and prosecutes infringers. Because JASRAC is a foundation, it is subject to the subject to the rules non-profit management.
![Jasrac head office shibuya](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/be/Jasrac_head_office_shibuya.JPG)
The headquarters is located in
Shibuya
Shibuya ( 渋谷 区 ''Shibuya-ku'') is a special ward in Tokyo, Japan. As a major commercial and finance center, it houses two of the busiest railway stations in the world, Shinjuku Station (southern half) and Shibuya Station.
As of April 1 ...
, Tokyo, in a building owned by the
Masao Koga
was a Japanese composer, mandolinist, and guitarist of the Shōwa era who was dubbed "Japan's Irving Berlin" by Universal Press Syndicate. His melancholy style, based upon Nakayama Shimpei's '' yonanuki'' scale, was popularly known in Japan as ...
Music Cultural Memorial Foundation. It has 22 branches in major cities of Japan. JASRAC was established in 1939 with the predecessor Great Japan Music Association, and is the oldest copyright management company in Japan.
History
Plage Whirlwind
In 1899, Japan joined the
Berne Convention
The Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works, usually known as the Berne Convention, was an international assembly held in 1886 in the Swiss city of Bern by ten European countries with the goal to agree on a set of leg ...
where the
Copyright
A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, education ...
law was enforced. However, there was no concept on how to pay royalties for recorded songs for each live performance. In 1931, ), a German teacher at the imperial First High School under the old system, established a copyright management organization called "Plage Institution" in Tokyo, and worked to acquired the agency rights for Japan from a European copyright management organization. The Plage Institution began requesting music usage fees to all businesses using music, such as broadcasting stations and orchestras.
As the license fees requests of Plage were at the time extralegal and their enforcement included pressurizing, the use of compositions outside Japan became difficult. Even
NHK
, also known as NHK, is a Japanese public broadcaster. NHK, which has always been known by this romanized initialism in Japanese, is a statutory corporation funded by viewers' payments of a television license fee.
NHK operates two terrestr ...
was deadlocked in negotiations with the Plage Institution for over one year, and was not able to broadcast foreign music pieces. Plage also began to urge Japanese artists to let the Plage Institute act as the agent for their copyright management. Though he pursued both monetary goals and proper management of copyrights, he wasn't able to bridge the gap to the music users, and the acquisition of agency rights from Japanese authors caused further uproar. These incidents were called the "Plage Whirlwind" and triggered concentration management of copyright in Japan.
Establishment of the Copyright Brokerage Business Act
In order to develop the situation, in 1939, the copyright brokerage act () was enacted providing that only holders of permission from the
Ministry of Home Affairs (Japan)
was a ministry in the Japanese government that existed from July 1, 1960, to January 5, 2001, and is now part of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications. The head of the ministry was a member of the Cabinet of Japan.
References
...
can undertake copyright brokerage business, and the predecessor of JASRAC (Japanese Society for Rights of Authors, Composers and Publishers), the Great Japanese Music Copyright Association, was established and started operation in 1940. Plage was excluded from copyright management work, received a fine for violating this law, and left Japan in 1941. The Agency for Cultural Affairs granted permission of brokerage business to four organizations, including the Great Japan Music Association, and other organizations. They didn't allow other entry, and the mediation of music copyright became the monopoly business of the Great Japan Music Association.
Video-sharing site
In 2006, JASRAC took legal action by requesting that nearly 30,000 videos featuring songs or clips that violated the copyrights of
Sony Music Entertainment Japan
, often abbreviated as SMEJ or simply SME, and also known as Sony Music Japan for short (stylized as ''SonyMusic''), is a Japanese music arm for Sony. Founded in 1968 as CBS/Sony, SMEJ is directly owned by Sony Group Corporation and is opera ...
,
Avex Japan
is a Japanese entertainment conglomerate led by founder Max Matsuura and headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. Founded in 1988, the company manages J-pop talents like Ayumi Hamasaki and internet sensation PikoTaro. It has also shifted into other busi ...
,
Pony Canyon
, also known by the shorthand form , is a Japanese mass media publishing company founded on October 1, 1966. The company publishes mainly physical home media on compact discs, including music, films and TV shows and video games. It is affiliate ...
,
JVC Victor
, also known as in Japan, is a subsidiary of JVCKenwood that produces and distributes music, movies and other entertainment products such as anime and television shows in Japan. It is known as JVC Entertainment in countries where Sony Music Ente ...
,
Warner Japan
Warner Music Group Corp. ( d.b.a. Warner Music Group, commonly abbreviated as WMG) is an American multinational entertainment and record label conglomerate headquartered in New York City. It is one of the " big three" recording companies and t ...
,
Toy's Factory
is a Japanese record label founded in the late 1980s as a subsidiary of the entertainment company VAP, based in Japan. On May 30, 1990, it was established as an independent company.
Toy's Factory, as of the first half of 2012, is the four ...
, and
Universal Japan be removed from YouTube.
Trial and criticism
In April 2008, FTC (Fair Trade Commission) officials raided the society's Tokyo headquarters on suspicion of violating Japan's Anti-Monopoly Law. In February 2009, the FTC ruled that the system prevents other companies from entering the copyright-fee collection and management business.
In February 2009, a cease-and-desist order was issued by the Japanese Fair Trade Commission (FTC) for allegedly breaking the Anti-monopoly Law, demanding that the society end its blanket-fee system.
Under that system, radio and TV stations are allowed unlimited use of JASRAC-managed music copyrights for a flat fee of 1.5% of their annual broadcasting revenue.
The order was withdrawn, however, in June 2012.
On 1 November 2013, in response to a petition by rival e-License Inc., the Tokyo High Court declared that JASRAC's fee levying system impeded competition within the industry and made it extremely difficult for other organizations to enter the market.
In February 2017, JASRAC sparked a controversy that they announced they would start collecting copyright fees off of music schools. In response to this, many schools, including
Yamaha Music Foundation
The Yamaha Music Foundation is an organization established in 1966 by the authority of the Japanese Ministry of Education for the purpose of promoting music education and music popularization. It continued a program of music classes begun by Yamaha ...
across Japan filed a petition, arguing that it would lead to increased tuition rates. In October 2022, the Supreme Court of Japan considered music schools shouldn't pay copyright fees because students play music. Facilities are still subject to copyright for music performed by teachers.
JASRAC Awards
Established in 1982, the annual JASRAC Awards honors the lyricists, composers, and music publishers whose works received the largest share of royalties from JASRAC—earned through music distribution, karaoke usage, features in commercials etc.—in a given fiscal year (e.g. April 2020–May 2021). Gold, Silver, and Bronze awards are given to the top three of the top ten domestic songs with the most royalties distributed, the International Award is given to the domestic song that received the most royalties from overseas copyright management organizations, and the Foreign Work Award is given to the non-Japanese song that earned the most royalties domestically.
In 2003, the background music for
Hayao Miyazaki
is a Japanese animator, director, producer, screenwriter, author, and manga artist. A co-founder of Studio Ghibli, he has attained international acclaim as a masterful storyteller and creator of Japanese animated feature films, and is widel ...
's ''
Spirited Away
is a 2001 Japanese animated fantasy film written and directed by Hayao Miyazaki, animated by Studio Ghibli for Tokuma Shoten, Nippon Television Network, Dentsu, Buena Vista Home Entertainment, Tohokushinsha Film, and Mitsubishi and distrib ...
'' became the first instrumental work to win the Gold Award.
In 2012, JASRAC awarded
SMAP
SMAP was a Japanese boy band, composed of Masahiro Nakai, Takuya Kimura, Goro Inagaki, Tsuyoshi Kusanagi, and Shingo Katori. The group was created in 1988 by music producer Johnny Kitagawa, founder of Johnny & Associates, originally as a six-pi ...
's "
Sekai ni Hitotsu Dake no Hana
is a song recorded by Japanese boy band SMAP. The Noriyuki Makihara composed song was released as a single in 2003 and sold more than 2.57 million copies, becoming the third List of best-selling singles in Japan#Best-selling singles in Japan, bes ...
" as the song with the most royalties earned in the ceremony's 30-year history.
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See also
* Recording Industry Association of Japan
The is an industry trade group composed of Japanese corporations involved in the music industry. It was founded in 1942 as the Japan Phonogram Record Cultural Association, and adopted its current name in 1969.
The RIAJ's activities include pr ...
References
External links
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Japanese Society for Rights of Authors, Composers and Publishers
Cultural organizations based in Japan
Music industry associations
Music licensing organizations
1939 establishments in Japan
Organizations established in 1939