« 808 State | Main | Attraction to Adult Women: a Hot Trend for Upper-Middle Class Men »
April 16, 2007
Oricon vs. Ugaya Update: "I just made up the numbers at will."
(1) April 3 saw the second hearing in the civil case between music business ranking chart provider Oricon and freelance journalist Ugaya Hiro. At the time of the first hearing, Ugaya announced that he was counter-suing Oricon for infringing on his freedom of speech and abusing the legal system, so now these courtroom hearings actually regard two cases rather than just one. The following quotes come from the Oh My News article that covered the event.
At the hearing, Ugaya's lawyers stated:
「オリコンの訴えは『報道・言論の自由』の侵害であり、狙いは損害の補償や回復ではなく、烏賀陽個人を疲弊させ、発言を封じることで、訴訟そのものが訴訟権の乱用にあたり不法である」"Oricon's lawsuit infringes on the freedom of the press and the freedom of speech, and their aim is not to recover or compensate for damages, but to impoverish Ugaya as an individual and prevent him from speaking. This litigation itself is illegal in its abuse of the right to sue."
Oricon's team countered with.:
「名誉棄損訴訟である以上、抑止的効果を及ぼすことはある意味やむをえない。また、烏賀陽氏は個人ではなく、個人事業主である。力は看過できぬほど大きいものである」"As this is a defamation suit, we cannot avoid a certain amount of exerting an effect of restraining him. Furthermore, Ugaya is not an individual, but an individual entrepreneur (individual at helm of commercial enterprise). He has a power that is too great to be ignored."
From looking at the case, Oricon's real complaint seems to be less with the Cyzo article and more with Ugaya's 2003 AERA piece on industry doubts about the ranking company's accuracy. The three-year statute-of-limitations for libel/defamation claims, however, has expired on the AERA piece making the Cyzo piece the only article available for legal action.
The next hearing will be June 12.
(2) The new Japanese site oriconcase.jugem.jp provides the latest updates on the Oricon vs. Ugaya case for those who want constant news. With little mass media coverage, the internet is still the crucial source for information on this landmark lawsuit.
(3) The federation of Japanese mass media labor unions MIC (Mass Media, Information & Culture) presented Oricon with a written demand that the ranking company withdraw its lawsuit against Ugaya and also presented a proposal seeking to find a quick solution to the conflict.
(4) Since nobody in the Japanese music industry has had any kind of comment or criticism on this court case, My News Japan did an interview with freelance political journalist and Oricon co-founder Watanabe Shoujiro. Watanabe acted as Editor-in-Chief for the magazine that would eventually become Oricon - 総合芸能市場調査 (Sougou Geinou Shijou Chousa/General Survey of the Entertainment Market).
Here is my translation:
Both the media and the music world have been silent about the Oricon case. What do you think about that?
Nobody is going to support [Ugaya]. Those guys in the music industry are all connected with the rankings.
Why doesn't the mass media write anything?
Because Oricon manipulates the rankings.
Has it always been that kind of company?
It's an industry paper! Industry papers get money from the industry. You don't get general advertisements. So it's natural that this happens.
When you were editing Geinou Shijou Chousa, did you go out personally to check exactly how many copies of records were selling at the stores?
No, no. For those rankings, I just made up the numbers at will.
The "A rank" meant it sold about 150 copies in a week. "B" was 130. C was 100. I just assigned the ABC ranking as I liked!
At that time, it's not like stores were really checking their inventories.
Well...
It was like...
"Did you have the data?"
"Sorry, Mr. Watanabe. We've been busy and haven't done it yet."
"Well, shoot. Today's the deadline, so please do it."
"Just please make up appropriate numbers, Mr. Watanabe."
"We made this record the #1 seller at that store" - "Oh, that! That's selling well at our place too. Please make it #1."
It was exactly like that!
(5) Oricon has issued an English statement on their side of the case. Their explanation for not suing the publisher of Cyzo strikes me as having a strange logic:
In this lawsuit, the comment based on apparent misinterpretation of facts is the cause of the claim for damages by libel and the point of issue. We were concerned about spreading the point of issue across the entire article and making it obscure by suing the publisher of magazine, INFOBAHN Inc.
Posted by marxy at April 16, 2007 12:34 PM
Trackback Pings
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.pliink.com/mt/mt-tb.cgi/250
Comments
That last paragraph is some awful legalese Engrish. Who are they アピールing to anyways?
Posted by: sphinx at April 16, 2007 7:26 PM
On the nature of the importance of rankings, especially in music, consider
It's a pretty good op-ed, and I'd love to get my hands on the study's paper.
Posted by: john at April 16, 2007 9:43 PM
thanks for the update!
Posted by: Chris_B at April 16, 2007 10:11 PM
Posted by: sphinx at April 16, 2007 11:28 PM
That feels like an ad for Mister Donuts.
"Who are they アピールing to anyways?"
What I think they are trying to say in their explanation of why they did not sue the publisher is that they did not want to challenge all of the parts of the story. In other words, they only wanted to target Ugaya's statements and not the main point, which is way more damning, that Oricon gives special treatment to Johnny's Jimusho. Now, Cyzo didn't make a great case to start with on that point, but if you are going to go ahead and take the risk of suing a publication or journalist, you'd think it's a bit too much like "quiet acknowledgement" to leave that part of the article "unsued." I doubt they would leave that notion unchallenged, but if the point is just to "get Ugaya," leave the Cyzo problem for another day.
"On the nature of the importance of rankings"
In Japan, the national market has taken over a lot of functions of local community, and one of those in the consumer culture field is establishing proprietary customs. Oricon charts tell a lot of young consumers without self-confidence in making their own choices and worried about upsetting the social order exactly which songs are automatically "safe" because they are popular. No one can claim that a #1 song is not "proper" for consumption. It clearly has national approval by a large enough percent of the population to not be a risky choice.
Now this "majority determines legitimacy" could have a nice democratic function, but Number Ones are absolutely not determined in democratic ways. What would be more damning though than the monopoly companies' access to media and promotional budgets etc. is if they were actually buying position on the charts, and therefore, buying a faux sense of bottom-up democratic support to make sure their top-down control had all bases covered.
Posted by: marxy at April 16, 2007 11:46 PM
Nothing to add on Marxy's post.Although I sort of disagree with "upsetting the social order"thing.
It's just choosing pop music on your I-pod,right?
Talking about "majority determines legitimacy",what do you all think about the stream of cherry-blossom related songs keep on coming out?
And the existence of the 9-year old idol in thong bikinis I've just found from 痛いニュースthread?
http://news.ameba.jp/2007/04/4263.php
Posted by: Aceface at April 17, 2007 12:15 PM
I was not arguing, I enjoyed this piece, I just felt that article was a nice supplement. Sort of preempting some sort of argument which has not popped up yet, heh.
Do you have anything on entertainment management firms, such as ones for comedians in Japan and TV exposure?
Posted by: john at April 17, 2007 12:38 PM
"And the existence of the 9-year old idol in thong bikinis I've just found from "
This will be somewhat covered in a new essay.
"Talking about "majority determines legitimacy",what do you all think about the stream of cherry-blossom related songs keep on coming out?"
These are themes and not "artists." The Japanese market is much more artist-oriented than song-oriented. It doesn't matter if B'z puts out a record of Tuvan throat singing, it will sell x00,000 copies because it's B'z.
"It's just choosing pop music on your I-pod,right?"
For kids it's about "fandom" and that's a social activity.
"Do you have anything on entertainment management firms, such as ones for comedians in Japan and TV exposure?"
I have yet to really post my Master's thesis research on here, but it was all about jimusho control of media channels with data backup. Search around my archives for bits and pieces. I would look up "jimusho" and see what happens.
Posted by: marxy at April 17, 2007 12:58 PM
Post a comment
Thanks for signing in, . Now you can comment. (sign out)
(If you haven't left a comment here before, you may need to be approved by the site owner before your comment will appear. Until then, it won't appear on the entry. Thanks for waiting.)