According to Yomiuri Online, a new manga featuring "Hard Gay" Razor Ramon will appear in the newly launched Comic Yoshimoto:

On June 19, Yoshimoto Kogyo, a major entertainment agency based in Osaka, will inaugurate Comic Yoshimoto, a manga magazine carrying 14 stories, including a human drama based on a scenario written by the agency's popular TV personality Shinsuke Shimada and a comedy featuring real-life comic duo Razor Ramon.

Via: Icarus Blog

On June 8th, the Osaka Prefecture Police Department (OPPD) Juvenile Section conducted a comprehensive investigation of 70 bookshops and convenience stores.

The goal of the inspection was to check the availability of Shoujo manga that were labeled as "harmful book" due to their excessive sexual contents. According to the report, the OPPD displayed special interest in shojo manga that contain excessive sexual contents that can't be seen on their covers.

Source: Jiji Tsushin

Tech On! reports that Sony Computer Science Laboratories, Inc. (Sony CSL) has announced a new system that can automatically create manga from blog entries and other texts based on symbols and registered keywords:

The system estimates the writer's emotions and makes up several pages of multiple-frame manga based on facial expressions written with symbols, the frequency of "!" and "?" appearances and pre-registered keywords.

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On June 10th, 4-koma mangaka Taizo Yokoyama (90) passed away in his home in Kanagawa Prefecture. The cuase of death was pneumonia. Taizo Yokoyama is known for his 4-koma (four-panel) political manga Shakai Gi-hyou (Social Satire).

Source: Yomiuri Online

Anime news and review website Active Anime announced today that it is now compatible with wireless devices:

Active Anime is now PDA / Mobile Phone friendly. Now you can now read our news, reviews and articles with your wireless device while you’re on the go! Image below is what you will see from your wireless device. Image is from a Windows Mobile® Smartphone.

The World Cosplay Summit Brazilian Stage took place on June 9th, and the winners are Marcelo and Thaís, who cosplayed as Naraku/InuYasha and Sesshomaru.

Brazilian publisher JBC, who promoted the event, used the occasion to introduce its new manga: Death Note. JBC's Julio Moreno announced that they plan to unveil two more titles soon, one shoujo and the other shonen.

A full report of the event can be found on Papo de Budega.

Source:
- Papo de Budega
- Shoujo Cafe

The Japanese blog "Justification of Information, Print Media or Story Addiction" (Information Addiction) has posted an article looking at the total number of pages of manga that appears in magazines monthly. According to a study from Media Research Center published in May, currently the total number of pages manga magazines in Japan carry sums up to approximately 102,411. A translation of the article can be found here.

So now you've read the "Idiot's Guide to Online Copyright Issues" from Part I and an in-depth analysis of the laws from Part II, what's left? We took the ideas explored in Part I, and created a questionnaire, which we then sent to various website/blog authors and people from around the online scene.

The questionnaire looks as follows:

Person A writes an article in Japanese, Person B translates Person A's article
into English and posts it on his own website...

1. Without asking for permission first or giving credit
2. Gives credit but did not ask for permission
3. Got permission and gave credit

One of the first people we contacted, surprisingly, is not involved with the anime/manga community at all. However, this doesn't mean you should skip what he has to say. Allow me to introduce Jonathan Bailey from Plagiarism Today, a site "targeted at Webmasters and copyright holders regarding the issue of plagiarism online."

*We would also like to thank Jonathan Bailey for helping out with this project, providing us with valuable information related to copyright and plagiarism issues.

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In Part I, we introduce you to the basic concept of copyright infringement and plagiarism, and how they apply to translating contents on the internet. For Part II, we contacted Ronnor from the Japanese law blog called Ahowota Law Student News. Ronnar has expressed his own view on the matter, below is a translation of Ronnor's article (translated with Ronnor's approval, of course!):

Unauthorized Translation and Copyright Law

1. Background information on the problem

Like the Japanese - no, even more than the Japanese - overseas otaku want to know the latest information about Japan's anime and manga. As a comparatively recent example, the problem of Rozen Maiden's hiatus was given headline treatment on an overseas site (*1). However, unless the work is in the The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya (*2) class, with plans for world-wide development, the original publishers hardly ever give English press releases. Information is transmitted only in Japanese, a minority language in the global scheme.

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Copyright infringement and plagiarism existed long before the internet became a household name. However, with the internet quickly finding its way into people's homes, and a little help from the ever-developing technology, more and more people are able to easily make their own website/blog.

The problem is that with so many people producing content, unauthorized use of someone else's content is now just a copy/paste away. This article won't look at the general issues involved with online plagiarism and copyright infringement (which have already been discussed many times elsewhere), but it will focus on a specific case of copyright infringement.

This article is the result of a collaboration between ComiPress, a Japanese law blog called Ahowota Law Student News, and many others who provided useful insights and comments. Due its length, the article has been divided into three parts. In Part I, we introduce the basic concept of copyright infringement and plagiarism, and how they apply to translating contents on the internet. In Part II, we provide a translation of Ahowota Law Student News's opinion on the subject. In Part III, we take the concepts explored in Part I and present them to other site/blog's authors, journalists, and people from the industry to get an outside view on the issue.

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Kadokawa Shoten has opened the official site for its BL (boy's love) light novel label Ruby Bunko at: www.kadokawa.co.jp/ruby/

The official website of Comic Yoshimoto has finally been launched by Yoshimoto Kogyo at: www.comicyoshimoto.jp/
*Note www.comicyoshimoto.jp has been around for a while, but the website had no content until now.

Tokuma Shoten has opened an official website for Animage at: www.tokuma.co.jp/animage/

This year's New York Asian Film Festival features the East Coast premiere of DEATH NOTE and DEATH NOTE: THE LAST NAME with director Shusuke Kaneko in attendance. Both movies will be presented in association with JAPAN CUTS – Festival of New Japanese Film and they will take place at Japan Society (333 East 47th Street, between 1st and 2nd Avenues). Advanced tickets go on sale Thursday, June 7. Please go to www.subwaycinema.com for more details.

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Dengeki Online and Ultimatum Talk report that ToraDora! and Ookami to Koushinryou, two light novel series published under MediaWork's Dengeki Bunko label, will be adapted into manga.

ToraDora! will be drawn by Zekkyou and will begin serialization in the September issue of Dengeki Comic Gao! (July 27), while Ookami to Koushinryou will be drawn by Koume Keito and will serialize in Dengeki Maoh starting with the November issue (September 27).

Source: LightNovel.org

Episode 42 of Right Stuf's Anime Today podcast features an interview with Shojo Beat Editor-in-Chief Marc Weidenbaum and Senior Editor Megan Bates:

In this new interview, Weidenbaum and Bates discuss the publication's history, the role reader feedback plays in editorial decisions, how female readers are driving the U.S. manga market, and what the future holds for Shojo Beat as the magazine celebrates its second anniversary and kicks off its third year.

A full press release can be found on Active Anime.

From Comic Book Resources comes Top Cow's schedule at this year's Wizard World Philadelphia, taking place in the Pennsylvania Convention Center from June 15th-17th. Top Cow has announced many exclusive contents for the convention, including Witchblade Takeru #5 featuring a new cover by Eric Basaldua.

From Reuters comes an article titled "Foreign manga artists face tough challenge in Japan", which looks at the obstacles foreign students face while attending schools for manga in Japan.

Via: Journalista

According to Type-Moon's Fate/Zero website, the release date for Fate/Zero volumes 3 and 4 have been pushed back to July/late 2007.

According to the message, volume 4 of Fate/Zero was originally planned for the Summer Comiket. However, it became difficult to satisfactorily finish the volume before the deadline, so the release date has been pushed back to later this year.

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A recent poll from Oricon asked men and women in their 20s to 40s the following question: "Which manga master character would you like to learn work from?"

Below are the results:

18.4% - Anzai-sensei (Slam Dunk)
12.3% - Master Roshi (Dragon Ball)
8.4% - Kakashi Hatake (Naruto)
6.9% - Karin-sama (Dragon Ball)
6.0% - Genkai (Yu Yu Hakusho)

Read More »

According to Shueisha, with the release of volume 4, the tankoubon sales of Kentaro Yabuki's To-LOVE-Ru (currently serialized in Weekly Jump) has official crossed over the 1,000,000 mark.

animeOnline points out that Japan Probe has listed the top 50 manga series determined by Japan's Agency for Cultural Affairs. A video countdown of the top 50 manga series can be found here.

The Top 50 Manga Series

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Japanese otaku/doujin shop Toranoana has released the results of its 1st Golden Tiger Award. The Golden Tiger Award is a manga and novel award voted by 127 editors and 90 Toranoana employees. A total of 481 works released between January 2006 - December 2006 were able to enter.

The winner of the grand "Golden Tiger" award went to Kiyohiko Azuma's Yotsuba&!, which received the highest points from votes and sales combined.

Read More »

The new comic release list for June 6th 2007 from ComicList, compiled by MangaCast.

According to Xtra.ca, a shipment of erotic/gay comic books headed for Priape, Montreal was confiscated by the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) due to obscene content. Icarus Blog and Newsarama point out that the shipment contained French editions of manga by Gengoroh Tagame.

On the USA Today Booklist Top 150 (PDF) for the week ending June 3rd, volume 14 of Del Rey's Negima! ranks at #94. Viz's Bleach volume 19 ranks at #104, while volume 14 of Naruto drops to #118.

A small update on Kodansha's International Manga Competition. Kodansha IMC's Ceena reminds us that although the deadline for the competition was on May 31 2007, Kodansha will accept your work as long as it's postmarked by the deadline:

Please send your manga to Kodansha as soon as possible, enclosing the original postmark. We'll accept your work as a submission if it encloses the postmark by the due date.

Thank you for your interest in our competition. We're looking forward to reading your work!