CATDOLL: "Comic Market" publicly expressed concerns that non-personal prosecution would hinder the freedom of doujinshi

We have previously reported that the United States and other countries have proposed that Japan should implement the "non-prosecution" principle. Earlier this month, Comic Market, the world's largest doujinshi bazaar, issued a statement in a prominent position on its official website. In the statement, it was stated that the "Comic Market" preparatory committee is very concerned about the intellectual property rights in the TPP agreement, especially the negotiations on the introduction of non-prosecution criminalization of copyright infringement, and expressed great concern about the current situation. Then it listed the various methods that "Comic Market" had previously used to reflect this issue to Japan. Finally, the preparatory committee hopes that Japan will continue to allow the current free expression activities in the future and maintain the freedom of doujinshi activities that are interested in Japanese cultural expression.

The so-called non-personal prosecution crime means that as long as there is an infringement, no matter what the attitude of the copyright holder is, it will be prosecuted. The reason why no one cared about fan works before was because Japan adopted the principle of personal prosecution, that is, only the copyright holder can sue the infringer, and the copyright holder generally does not sue fan works for infringement.