Actualités

Japan's Foreign Ministry to Hold Manga, Anime IP Panels

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan is sponsoring a symposium on intellectual property in anime, manga, and other areas of content on March 26 in Tokyo. The free Japanese symposium will cover how to strengthen Japan's global competitiveness and intellectual property enforcement in three panels. The panelists on the first panel on Japan's global competitiveness will include Avex Group Holdings senior executive director Takashi Araki, Pokémon Company president Tsunekazu Ishihara, Kadokawa Shoten president and CEO Tsuguhiko Kadokawa, manga creator Machiko Satonaka (Lady Ann), and Daisuke Yoshida of the Secretariat of Intellectual Property Strategy Headquarters, Cabinet Secretariat. Chairperson Yutaka Kubota of Japan's Association of Copyright for Computer Software (ACCS) will appear at the second panel about intellectual property enforcement. The third and final panel will wrap up the symposium's discussions. Professors from Tokyo University and Yasuo Tanabe, Vice Head of the Foreign Ministry's Economic Department, will moderate the panels.

Satonaka is a vice-chairperson in the Digital Manga Association Japan, an organization of manga creators whose leadership also includes Monkey Punch (Lupin III) and Tetsuya Chiba (Ashita no Joe). Satonaka met with former Prime Minister Koizumi on related issues in 2004 and held a symposium titled "Why Did Japanese Manga Overtake the World?" during last month's Japan Media Arts Festival. Kubota's ACCS contributed to the much-publicized investigations of file-shared anime episodes, uploaded manga magazines, and pirated anime DVDs.

Source: animeanime.jp