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Tokyo Demands YouTube Play Fair
eldavojohn writes "Recently, the city government of Tokyo has requested that political speeches to be pulled from YouTube, claiming that it gave certain hopefuls an advantage over others for Sunday's election. You may recall YouTube being in trouble with more than a few countries in the past. 'Japanese election law limits the broadcasting of speeches, which are aired only on public broadcaster NHK. Soon after the race kicked off last month, the speech by one fringe candidate, street musician Koichi Toyama, 36, has become a popular attraction on YouTube due to his eccentric, confrontational approach.' Is it fair that some government officials are being viewed more on YouTube than others or is it simply leveling the playing field for anyone with a message since it costs very little to put a video on YouTube?"
What's that, a new form of thought DRM?
Each country has their own laws. This may come as a shock to some, but the US can't/shouldn't enforce our laws on other countries.
But the US isn't, in this case. Instead, it's the Japanese legal authorities that want to impose Japanese law on foreign soil. The turnaround equivalent could for instance the restrictions for paid political speech in the US, which does not stop any foreign blogger or other media talking about the US election, endorsing one candidate over another (without disclosing what agenda they really do and who is paying and so on). Or laws in some countries like Sweden that forbid identifying a crime suspect by name and image before they've actually convicted, but which of course doesn't stop newspapers publishing that info on websites in neighboring countries
I live in Japan and there's a good deal of rules and other things that do make sense here, but the election-related framework is frankly one that no longer does, if it really ever did (candidates are for instance not allowed to actually change the content on their websites once campaigning is started). One way to solve this could be to distinguish push and pull media. Keep restrictions in place for push media like radio, television, magazine ads and so on, media for which it was intended. But allow free use of pull media like websites or Youtube - there the user is actively searching out the info, not getting it stuffed down their throat. The playing field is also more even due to the low cost of setting up and maintaining such a prescence.
Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
I live in Tokyo, and know Koichi Toyama, the candidate in question, so I'll bite...
First and foremost, sure, it's illegal by Japanese law. But where does YouTube reside again? There has been little thought regarding the internet and "new media" when in comes to elections and politics in Japan. So little, that it's becoming absurd.
The original election laws were put in place to put an economical cap on elections, and thus leveling the field. Each candidate for the Tokyo metropolitan mayor election needs to pay 3 million yen up front. If they get a certain percentage of votes, the money is returned. (The exact numbers escape me at the moment, but I think it was something along the lines of 10 to 15%.) If they don't, they are "extremist fringes" which shouldn't have ran in the first place. Whether you agree with this concept or not is up to you, but it does have it's advantages. Idiots can still run for office, but they'll waste the money. To be honest, Koichi Toyama fits into the "idiot" profile, but he knew well that the money spent would gather attention, for a fraction of the price of a TV commercial aired in Tokyo. I say he got a bargain. (In his speach, he explicitly states that "If I get elected, the majority will shit their pants. If I get elected, _I_ will shit my pants.")
At least for the Tokyo elections, election posters can only be posted on official boards designated by the election committee. And those posters are paid for through tax dollars (well, yen...). So all candidates get the same exposure, and same number of posters. There is a limit to the number of campaign cars with loud speakers that can roam the streets. There are numerous limits, and I think some of these limits could be imported back to the U.S. for a genuinely level field when it comes to elections. (I'm an ex-pat, by the way.)
That said, the "limit" is so extreme, that candidates are not allowed to pass out flyers of any kind. They are not allowed to post to public areas (including the internet) addressing their political agenda. They cannot mail/e-mail anyone. The best they can do is call their constituents, but even then, they're not allowed to discuss what their political agenda is.
So, how do you determine which candidate to vote for? Well... appearance. Name. Hopefully you heard their speach infront of some train station. Or watched TV. (Contrary to the summary, NHK is not the only broadcaster that broadcasts these speaches. As long as each candidate gets a chance, with the same length and un-edited video, anyone broadcaster can broadcast it.)
Up until now, you really couldn't tell what the candidate was REALLY thinking. Just recently, a candidate from Miyazaki had an idea though. During the election race, homepages cannot be updated. So, he put up his political agenda BEFORE the race started, and left it up. And now, FINALLY, from this election, candidates are allowed to hand out flyers. Again, these flyers are paid for through tax money. Level field.
However, this still doesn't address the fact that YouTube and other CGM-ish media is the exact kind of media that will level the playing grounds in a way that doesn't require economic powers, which the "limits" were placed in for in the first place.
I say let YouTube rule, do no evil, and let this serve as a kick in the ass to the Japanese government as a reminder that this is the 21st century, and getting the "message" out in one way or another is a good thing.
That said, I recently commented on mixi (a Japanese SNS) that all they need to do to get the videos down is to have NHK issue a DMCA take down notice. NHK owns the copyrights. They can issue a DMCA take down notice. (However much you despise that.) And, as far as I can tell, YouTube will comply.
I have a hunch that NHK already knows this, and has forfeited copyrights, or else is playing dumb on purpose. Likewise, the election committee probably knows damn well too. Let's see if this will change the laws any time soon. I for one hope it does.
I think it would be easy to apply a U.S. perspective to this and cry foul. But if Japan has publicly funded elections and strict, but fair rules about how candidates communicate then maybe they are justified in their action. It seems to me that a slightly stricter approach to election practices might take away the "guy with the most money wins" mentality that has come to dominate the U.S. process.
Limits of free speech are sometimes justified (you can't cry fire in a theater) and this MAY be one of those occasions. Or not.
I think it would be easy to apply a U.S. perspective to this and cry foul. But if Japan has publicly funded elections and strict, but fair rules about how candidates communicate then maybe they are justified in their action.
I agree. The initial reaction among Americans to this news would likely be to cite "free speech" as justification for letting YouTube keep the clips up.
But that's a very Amero-centric way of looking at the world, and is rooted in the same kind of thinking that now has us in trouble in Iraq and is responsible for the dim view taken of us by the rest of the world.
If Japan's laws say speeches can't be broadcast except through government-controlled TV, then I'm sorry, but that's the law. And if Google wants to do business in Japan (as they do), then they need to respect local laws. A US company should not be trying to impose US law or US cultural norms on Japan.
It's perfectly within YouTube's power to geo-restrict these videos to parts of the world where they're allowed. Yes, you can get around those restrictions if you really want to, but there's no reason they shouldn't take reasonable measures to comply with Japanese laws with regard to Japanese videos.