Asia-Pacific Conference on Library & Information Education & Practice, 2009

DOES THE NATIONAL DIET LIBRARY HAVE PORNOGRAPHIC BOOKS?
AKEMI KIKAWADA
Graduate School of Library, Information and Media Studies, University of Tsukuba
1-2, Kasuga, Tsukuba, Ibaraki
305-8550, Japanakemi@slis.tsukuba.ac.jp
KEITA TSUJI
Graduate School of Library, Information and Media Studies, University of Tsukuba
1-2, Kasuga, Tsukuba, Ibaraki
305-8550, Japankeita@slis.tsukuba.ac.jp

Introduction. This study clarifies the state of deposition of publications targeted at mature readers in the National Diet Library (NDL) and some other related issues.
Method. First, we selected 50 publications by category from Amazon.co.jp, largest online bookstore in Japan,
and then, we investigated as to whether the entry of these publications would result in hits on NDL-OPAC,
which is the NDL’s online catalogue. Next, we conducted a detailed survey on the publications from publishingcompanies that target mature readers and investigated the number of publications deposited by these companies every year. Finally, we conducted interview surveys targeting the NDL, agent companies, and publishingcompanies.
Results. We found that 80% of the publications for mature readers in the “adult” category at Amazon.co.jp
were not deposited in the NDL.
Conclusion. We discovered the evidence of a pattern wherein some of the publishing companies that publish
publications for mature readers deposit only publications that are not targeted at mature readers, and refrainfrom depositing publications targeted at mature readers. The NDL should focus on improving the depositionof publications through agents and on developing an exhaustive knowledge of Japanese publications.

Introduction
Japan uses the legal deposit system, and the National Diet Library (NDL) is authorized to comprehensively
accumulate and store Japanese publications (NDL, 2007). However, in reality, there is only a very small
body of research investigation into the issue of whether this deposition is being conducted thoroughly and exhaustively. Although researches targeting publications and musical materials from within Aomori Prefecture
do exist, (Nemoto, 1986; Katou, 1983) research into other publications is almost nonexistent, and there is noresearch covering publications in every category. Therefore, in this study, we used the publishing information
available online at Amazon.co.jp (http://amazon.co.jp/) and checked the deposition status for publications in
all categories. It was evident that deposition of publications for mature readers is particularly low, or almost nonexistent, in comparison to publications in other categories. Next, we conducted interview surveys
targeting related institutions and clarified the causes of the deficiencies in the deposition of publications.
In recent years, publications for mature readers have been frequently used as material in research andsurveys in fields such as psychology, sociology, folklore studies, philosophy, history, and law (Thompson,
2007; Uchida, 1996; Yagiri, 1996; Yokoyama et al., 2005). For example, in the field of law, the comic booktitled “Misshitsu” is at the center of the obscenity debate (Nagaoka, 2004) in the Shobunkan trial. However,as of September 2008, Misshitsu did not score a hit in an NDL-OPAC search. This is because Misshitsu
is not deposited in the NDL, which implies that when current or future researchers attempt to research the
Shobunkan trial, they will not be able to refer to the original material on which the entire trial is based.
Moreover, Japanese publications for mature readers are recognized as cultural objects outside Japan(Thompson, 2007; Uchida, 1996). In the past, Japan has lost a great deal of pornographic woodblock prints

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Asia-Pacific Conference on Library & Information Education & Practice, 2009of the Edo era known as “shunga” to other nations due to the inability of the Japanese people to view them as
art objects. These lost shunga works have now been elevated to a high status as art objects in other countries(Sekiya, 2004). The NDL is not living up to the procuring policy that states “focus on the procuring of
precious materials that should not be scattered or lost” (Editorial Committee of Introductory Textbook of
the NDL, 1998), and considering this past example of cultural loss, the NDL should procure and preserve
publications for mature readers in order to make cultural objects available to future generations.
This report is structured as follows. First, the relevant terminology is defined in Section 2. Next, Sections
3 and 4 explain the survey method, survey results, and observations therein. Lastly, Section 5 summarizes thereport.
Definitions of terms
In this chapter, we will outline the current status of legal deposits and pornographic publications in Japan.
The legal deposit system
The legal deposit system is defined as a legal requirement wherein a person or group is required to submit
copies of their publications to a repository, usually a library. The UNESCO states “Legal deposit may be
defined as the requirement, enforceable by law, to deposit with one or more specified agencies copies ofpublications of all kinds reproduced in any medium by any process for public distribution, lease, or sale”(Lunn, 1981; Larivi ere, 2000), or as a system for the publisher to obligate the deposition of publications,etc. to the national library by law (Japan Society of Library and Information Science, 2002). Typically, thenational library is one of the repositories of these copies.
The national library is defined by the Recommendation concerning the International Standardizationof Library Statistics 1970. The UNESCO describes national libraries as “libraries which, irrespective of
their title, are responsible for acquiring and conserving copies of all significant publications published in the
country and functioning as a ‘deposit’ library, either by law or under other arrangements” (UNESCO, 2007).
The legal deposit system has become the main goal of the national library along with ensuring the bibliographic control of all books. In Japan, the authority for the inspection of publications was transferred from
the Ministry of Education to the Ministry of Interior by the publication ordinance in 1875. The legal deposit
system was achieved by the mechanism of delivering the publications submitted to the Ministry of Interior
because of the inspection of Tokyo Syojakukan.
In prewar Japan, there were a few laws and regulations related to legal deposit, including the Publishing
Law and the Newspaper Law. The main purpose of these laws was to clamp down on publishing for the
purpose of controlling public order and morals. Under these laws, publishers were obligated to deposit two
copies of their publications with the Interior Ministry, one of which was sent to the Imperial Library (one ofthe predecessors of the NDL).
The legal deposit system for the collection and preservation of a domestic cultural asset was set up inaccordance with the National Diet Library Law (Law No. 5, February 9, 1948) in 1948 after the inspection
system had been abolished (Editorial Committee of Introductory Textbook of the NDL, 1998; Japan Societyof Library and Information Science, 2002).
Outline of the legal deposit system in JapanThe legal deposit system in present day Japan is provided with two clauses each from Articles 24 and 25of the National Diet Library Law (Law No.5, February 9, 1948) (NDL, 2007). The purpose of the legal
deposit system in Japan is to collect publications, arrange them, preserve them permanently, and ensure thebibliographic control of all books. The publishers must send a complete copy of the best editions of their
publications to the NDL within 30 days of publication to enable their collection and use as cultural goods.
The law is applicable to publications including books, pamphlets, serial publications, musical scores, maps,
and phonographic records.

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Japanese state authorities should send at least 30 copies of their publications to the NDL. Independentadministrative institutions and prefectural and city governments should send five copies of their publications.
Among all Japanese cities, government-decreed cities should send five copies of their publications, other
cities and boroughs should send three copies, towns and villages should send two copies, and private sectors
bodies should send one copy each. If a publisher fails to send a publication, he/she shall be punished witha fine equivalent up to five times the retail price of the publication. However, this rule has not been applied
since 1948 when the National Diet Library Law was established.
Article 24-2 applies to publications issued by or for local government agencies such as metropolitan andprefectural governments. A prescribed number of copies of the publications of any local government agency
and government-related corporations must be sent immediately to the NDL for its official use and for its use
in international exchange. For example, prefectural and municipal agencies must deposit up to five copies,
and town and villages, up to two copies.
The NDL should pay for the publications that have been sent from publishers via the legal deposit system.
The NDL pays a fine equivalent up to five out of ten the retail price of the publication for books in principle.
However, the NDL asks publishers to donate their publications if possible (NDL, 2007).
Operation of the legal deposit system in JapanThe government and other public offices send their publications through the administrative department branch
and the judicial branch of the NDL. The branches in charge gather ministry publications as required anddeposit them at the NDL. Independent administrative institutions and local municipal entities send their publications by mail.
Wholesale booksellers began sending publications for sale in a lump sum to the NDL since 1951. If eachpublisher entrusts selling his/her publications to Nippon Shuppan Hanbai, Inc. or Tohan, they also entrust thetask of sending publications to the NDL. The publication that the major wholesale booksellers turn over will
be sent to the NDL without omission by introducing this mechanism (NDL, 2006, 2007).
ZoningZoning is a system or institution that restricts young adults’ access to pornographic materials in shops. Pornographic books with zoning marks put by publishers should be placed in isolation from other materials in bookstores. They cannot be sold to children and young adults. In particular, bookstores are required to mark theboundary between general publications and pornographic books on their sales floor.
Pornographic publications
Pornographic publications are defined as books, video, and DVD whose sales are limited by self-imposed
restraining methods such as the zoning method mentioned in this paper. They are synonymous with dirty
book, erotic literature, and so on. Most of these contain graphic and realistic scenes of sex. Incidentally,
throughout this paper, “general books” are referred to as publications without zoning.
Search procedure
In this study, we conducted the following three surveys: (1) an overall survey investigating the extent towhich publications listed on Amazon.co.jp are deposited in the NDL, (2) a survey on the detailed depositing
state for each publisher of publications for mature readers, and (3) an interview survey with the NDL, agent
companies, and publishing companies.
Investigation 1: Research concerning the general situation of delivering books
The goal of the first survey is to clarify the overall state of deposition of publications in Japan. This survey
will indicate the current situation pertaining to the particular deficiency in the deposition of publications for

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mature readers.
Acquisition of complete bibliographic list
In order to clarify the overall state of deposition of publications in Japan, first, it was necessary to obtain an
exhaustive list of publications. However, it is difficult to obtain such a list. A preliminary survey revealed that
there were quite a few deficiencies even in the “Nihon-Shoseki-Somokuroku” and that it cannot be used as an
exhaustive list (more on this later). Therefore, we decided to use the publication list at Amazon.co.jp for thisstudy. This decision was based on our judgment that the publication list at Amazon.co.jp, which is the largest
online bookstore in Japan, is the most thorough publication list currently available in Japan (the preliminary
survey led us to feel that the publication list at Amazon.co.jp was at least more thorough than the NihonShoseki-Somokuroku). Next, we conducted a survey investigating the extent to which the publications listedon Amazon.co.jp were deposited in the NDL. It must be noted that the publication list at Amazon.co.jp is notcompletely exhaustive. However, most of the publications listed on the website are publications that shouldhave been deposited in the NDL. Thus, if we find publications from within that list that are not deposited in
the NDL, it will be sufficient for the purpose of this study, which is to merely bring attention to the fact that
there are problems in the thoroughness of deposition of publications in the NDL. We would like to defer theissue of determining the position of publications listed by Amazon.co.jp among the entire range of Japanesepublications.
Research on the holding situation according to category
Amazon.co.jp divides Japanese books into 27 categories. In its “100 top sellers” list for each category, weinvestigated whether each title scored a hit when searched for in NDL-OPAC. We used 25 categories for thesurvey; the “calendar” and “poster” categories were not included.
We used the November 26, 2006 version of the 100 top sellers, and our NDL-OPAC search survey was
conducted half a year later in June 2007. The reason why we included a time lag was because we assumed
that it will take some time for publications to score hits on NDL-OPAC after they have been picked up by
Amazon.co.jp. Moreover, one of the reasons why we did not select publications through random sampling,but instead selected the top sellers, was that their extraction was easy; further, the main reason was that we
felt that the best sellers have high priority as publications that should be deposited in the NDL. A publicationthat is selling well indicates its profound connection with modern society, which in turn should relegate its
status as a highly valued cultural object.
Furthermore, to compare the state of the deposition at the NDL with the national libraries of countries
other than Japan, we investigated if the top 25 publications from the top sellers list at the French version of
Amazon, Amazon.fr (http://www.amazon.fr) scored hits in the OPAC of Bibliotheque‘ Nationale de France(The National Library of France), called Catalogue Bn-Opale Plus (http://catalogur.bnf.fr/). In the case ofFrance, we used the February 21, 2007 top seller list and conducted the search survey for the Catalogue
Bn-Opale Plus in June 2007. The categories we used for the survey were 29 “livres” (books) categories,
excluding “Calendriers et Agendas” (calendars).
Investigation 2: Research on the pattern of delivery of books by publishers
In the second survey, we investigated the patterns in the state of deposition for each of the five publishers who
published publications for mature readers. The five publishers we targeted for the survey were Core Magazine
Co., Ltd., France Shoin Inc., Akaneshinsha, Kill Time Communication, and Shobunkan Corporation. The
four publishers apart from Shobunkan are the most frequently listed publishers in the 100 top sellers listof the adult category at Amazon.co.jp. We included Shobunkan because in 2002, they were accused ofincluding obscene content in their publications. The patterns we uncovered in the deposition of publications
by publishing companies that publish material for mature readers are combinations of A and B as given
below:

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About publications for mature readers:(A1) Deposits are made for almost all publications for mature readers.
(A2) Deposits are only made for some publications for mature readers, and some publications are notdeposited:
1) A diachronic (time gradient) imbalance is evident wherein deposits were once made in thepast, but are not made at present
2) A synchronic imbalance is evident wherein though two publications were published at thesame time, one was deposited and the other was not.
3) The two abovementioned imbalances are mixed.
(A3) Publications for mature readers are not deposited at all.
With regard to publications other than publications for mature readers:(B1) This company also publishes general publications, and most of them are deposited.
(B2) This company also publishes general publications; deposits are made only for some of thesepublications, while some of them not deposited.
(B3) This company also publishes general publications, but these are not deposited at all.
(B4) This company does not publish general publications.
Investigation 3: Interview surveys with related organizations
In the third survey, through an interview survey, we clarified the cause for publications not being deposited.
The survey targets were Library Group 1 in the Library Sales Division of the Tohan Co., Ltd. and theAcquisition Planning Department in the Acquisition Division of the NDL. We also interviewed the concerned
publishers.
Results and Consideration
This section will detail the results of the three surveys conducted by us and provide commentary on the
results.
Investigation 1
Table 1 shows the percentage of the books that are listed in 50 top seller books in each Amazon category andare not found in NDL-OPAC (henceforth such percentage is referred to as “ratio of non-deposition”). We cansee in Table 1 that the ratio of non-deposition with regard to pornographic books runs up to 80% while thatof others remains at about 10%. Table 1 also presents data on the percentage of books that are listed in the 50
top selling books in each Amazon category and are not found in Books.or.jp (http://books.or.jp). Books.or.jp
is an online version of Nihon-Shoseki-Somokuroku (Japanese “Books in Print”). We can see in Table 1 thatBooks.or.jp is not comprehensive in that it does not contain many of the books listed by Amazon.
Are pornographic books deposited at Bibliotheque nationale de France?
We conducted a similar investigation on French publications. We checked the percentage of books that arelisted in the 25 top selling books in Amazon.fr (French Amazon) and are not found in Catalogue Bn-Opale
Plus (OPAC of Bibliotheque nationale de France). We can see that the ratio of non-deposition concerning
the category Erotisme is 12% (3 books out of 25). The ratio does not differ significantly from that of othercategories (in fact, 12% is relatively lower than the others). Since the books of Erotisme in Amazon.fr and176

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Pornography in Amazon.co.jp are different in nature, we cannot claim that pornographic books are more adequately deposited in France. However, there appears to be a difference between France and Japan concerning
the deposition of pornographic books at their respective national libraries.
Investigation 2
The deposition patterns for each publisher of publications for mature readers are outlined below:
Core Magazine
The major publishing areas of Core Magazine are comic books for mature readers, magazines for mature
readers, and computer game magazines. This company was issued a subpoena for documents in October
2006 for suspicion of violation of the “Act on Punishment of Activities Relating to Child Prostitution andChild Pornography, and the Protection of Children (Act No. 52 of 1999).”
The deposition pattern was as per (A2-1) (B1) indicated in the previous section. Although the deposition
was conducted fairly exhaustively across all categories until April 2006, it was almost completely discontinued from May 2006 onward. Core Magazine deposited its publications only when it was urged to do so by
NDL. We will discuss this point later in the paper.
France Shoin
The major publishing areas of France Shoin are comic books for mature readers and books known as “erotic
novels”(novels that are not targeted by zoning but which contain a high amount of erotic depictions). They
also publish e-books. They are a 100% subsidiary of Mikasa Shobo Co., Ltd., which is a publisher of generalinterest books.
The depositing pattern was as per (A2-2) (B1) indicated in the previous section. Although the deposition
was conducted at almost 100% for publications not targeted by zoning, only 79% of the publications formature readers were deposited. Looking at the breakdown for publications for mature readers, it is evident
that although publications for mature readers other than comic books were almost all deposited, almost no
comics for mature readers were deposited. In fact, 80% of 50 comic books for mature readers were notdeposited. It is interesting that only comics are singled out for non-deposition.
Shobunkan
The publishing areas of Shobunkan comprise comics and magazines for mature readers and comic bookswith erotic depictions for teen readers. As mentioned above, Shobunkan was charged with the distribution of
obscene material in violation of Article 175 of the Japanese Penal Code due to the publication of the comicbook Misshitsu in 2002. Shobunkan’s president, chief editor, and contracted cartoonist were arrested.
The deposition pattern was as per (A3) (B2) indicated in the previous section. Publications for mature
readers were not deposited at all, and general interest publications were rarely deposited. Moreover, although,prior to 2002, the deposition was conducted lightly, it was almost completely discontinued from 2003 onward.
Akaneshinsha
The major publishing areas of Akaneshinsha are comics and magazines for mature readers and novels andcomics featuring male-on-male erotic depictions (a genre known as “boy’s love”).
The depositing pattern was as per (A3) (B2) indicated in the previous section. Although almost all
publications not targeted by zoning were deposited, as many as 110 out of 111 in the category of publications
for mature readers were not deposited. Moreover, the overall deposit rate has been slowly decreasing from2003 onward, with almost no deposition from 2005 onward.
Kill Time Communication
The major publishing areas of Kill Time Communications are, in addition to comics and novels for mature
readers, publications related to computers and the Internet. The deposition pattern was as per (A1) (B1)177

Asia-Pacific Conference on Library & Information Education & Practice, 2009indicated in the previous section. All of their publications were deposited.
Investigation 3
Regarding publishers of publications for mature readers, we targeted a group of 13 companies. This group
comprised the five companies targeted in the second survey and eight other companies. We contacted thesecompanies through e-mail, letters, and telephone, and asked for their participation in an interview survey.
However, most of the companies ignored or turned down our requests. We did receive a comment in an e-mail
reply from Shobunkan, which will be discussed later. In any case, the problematic issues in the depositing
system uncovered through the interview survey targeting Tohan and the NDL are presented below.
Issues related to the legal deposit system
The following two points can be stated as problematic issues in the current deposition system: (1) not all
publications are deposited through agents, and (2) publications not handled by agents are not assessed. Firstwe will explain point (1).
As stated above, it is acceptable for publishers to commission only the sales of their publications to anagent and not their deposition. Because of this, some publishers forget or neglect to complete the depositioncommissioning procedures. In some of these cases, by the time the NDL urges the publisher to deposit a
non-deposited publication, the publication is already out of print and cannot be deposited. In particular, inthe case of publications for mature readers with low print runs, this is a common problem. In our interview
survey, the NDL stated that, “among the publications received through agents, approximately 12% are notdeposited.” Moreover, most of these publications are not deposited due to this reason.
Next, we will explain point (2). As stated above, the materials that the NDL uses to check on depositing deficiencies are only the new publications lists obtained through agents. The publications not handledby agents are not assessable. However, distribution channels not going through agents are comparatively
developed for publications for mature readers. For example, some of the sales formats are sales through online bookstores such as Amazon.co.jp, mail order sales conducted through publisher websites and postcards,
wholesale transactions conducted directly with specialist shops, and vending machine sales. In the case of
publications distributed through these methods, sometimes, the NDL does not even realize whether the publications are being published at all. Depositing deficiencies in France Shoin’s comics for mature readers andAkaneshinsha’s publications for mature readers are most likely due to this reason. In order to aim for moreexhaustive deposition, the NDL must obtain a sales list through means other than agents (for example, from
Amazon.co.jp), obtain publishing records from each publisher, and verify that information. Due to the expansion of the Internet, the number of publications distributed through means other than agents is on the rise.
In this environment, it is necessary to use a variety of types of information sources.
Another problematic issue with the current depositing system is with regard to administrative fines. The
NDL has the power to levy administrative fines on publishers who do not deposit their publications. However,since the NDL only uses publication lists from agents to check for depositing deficiencies, there is a problem
in the fairness of imposing administrative fines. Because publications that are not handled by agents are notbeing assessed by the NDL, it is impossible to penalize publishers that sell publications without using agentseven if they do not deposit their publications. If only publishers who use agents are penalized, publishers
may choose to avoid using agents. Moreover, this could possibly cause agents to stop cooperating with the
NDL.
Non-deposition due to intensification of restrictions on child pornography
The “Ordinance to protect children from being harmed by crime” was established on June 2005 in Nara
Prefecture in Japan. It was publicly announced on July 1 in the same year. This ordinance was designed
to prohibit simple possession (possession regardless of intent to distribute) of “child pornography,” defined
as material that contains pornographic photographs of children under 13. Inclusion of regulations punishingsimple possession is being demanded for the “Act on Punishment of Activities Relating to Child Prostitution

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and Child Pornography, and the Protection of Children” as well. In this environment of harder stances on childpornography regulations, in April 2006, viewing was disallowed for 120 NDL-stored publications that weredeemed as child pornography. Further, it became difficult to actively urge publishers to deposit publications
that bordered around the definition of child pornography. As mentioned above, Core Magazine had only
deposited its publications when it was urged to do so by the NDL. Thus, the aforementioned fluctuation in
depositing along a time gradient is believed to originate in the fact that they published many publications thatbordered around child pornography.
Impression of comstockery
Although their number is small, there are some publishers who avoid depositing their publications because
they feel that the NDL is an “institution that practices censorship.” Shobunkan is one such publisher. A partof the response we received from Shobunkan when we asked them to participate in the interview survey isquoted below.
“We were fighting for the constitutional right of freedom of expression, so it is very unfortunate thatthe result came out the way it did. We plan to continue fighting alongside like-minded publishers to protect
the freedom of expression and to not allow unjust intervention by governmental forces. Throughout history,
the national library collection has been generally limited to tame items deemed to hold no threat to thepreservation of the establishment. In fact, it can be said that the books not collected in the national library
have the most value.”
This type of a response is most likely based on the following background. Depositing publications with
the Ministry of Interior, mainly for the purpose of censorship, was obligatory in prewar Japan. Publications
that were submitted and deemed not problematic were deposited in the Imperial Library (or its predecessor,
the Tokyo Library). However, over half of these publications were deemed “blatantly obscene material”(NDL, 1974) and general usage was not permitted. With this historical backdrop, Shobunkan has an imageof the NDL as a censorship institution, and this is the most likely reason why they do not deposit their
publications. Such a problem is believed to exist because publications for mature readers have been targeted
for restrictions by both the national government and society throughout history.
Conclusion
In this study, we surveyed the state of deposition of publications for mature readers in the NDL, conductedinterviews at related institutions, and clarified the problematic issues in Japanese legal deposit system.
Japanese legal deposit system came to operate in 1951 in a format that is reliant upon agents, as seen in
the current system. Sixty years later, the publishing distribution framework has changed significantly. The
time is ripe for redesigning this legal deposit system in several areas.
In order to ensure exhaustive deposition, the NDL must be able to better assess the status of publications
not handled by agents. To achieve this, in addition to relying on the new publication lists that have been usedtill date, other lists should be used from sources such as Amazon.co.jp. Moreover, with regard to publications
for which only sales and not deposition is commissioned, the NDL should work together with agents touncover such cases quickly and promote their deposition. These types of measures would be effective in
minimizing the problem of non-deposition. Furthermore, it will most likely be necessary to initiate a wide
range of activities to raise awareness that the purpose of the legal deposit system is to collect and preserve
Japanese cultural objects and not to conduct censorship.
On the subject of publishers, there were no publishers who did not deposit even one publication to the
NDL among the publishers targeted for this survey. This indicates the fact that all publishers appear tohave at least some sort of knowledge of the legal deposit system. Publishers should be aware that Japanesepublications for mature readers are considered to be Japanese cultural objects in other countries, and therefore,
they should actively deposit even publications that are not sold through agents.
Lastly, although we investigated the deposition patterns of publishers in this study, in the future, we wish

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to conduct surveys measuring the state of deposition categorized by format (comic books, novels, photographcollections, magazines, etc.), by subject matter (SM, moe (anime and manga idols), homosexuality, etc.),
by sales route (real bookstores, online bookstores, specialist stores, convenience stores, etc.), or level ofextremity in depictions. Moreover, we want to conduct a more detailed analysis into the situation in France
and make international comparisons with other countries as well.
References
National Diet Library. (2007). Rules of Legal Deposit System; Apr, 2007.
Nemoto, Akira. (1986). Bibliographic Controls of Local Publications: Aiming at Publications of Aomori
Prefecture. Annals of Japan Society of Library Science, 32(3), 97-107.
Hirao, Kouzou & Matsushita, Hitoshi.(1983). Library and Audiovisual Material of Computer Age, (pp.
19-25). Music Library Association of Japan.
Thompson, Jason. (2007). MANGA The complete guide. Del Rey Books, xxix, 556.
Uchida, Youko. (1996). The Ladies Comic in Japan Greatly Becomes Popular in Italy. Shokun. 28(7),220-225.
Sekiya, Kazuhiko, (2004). French Erotic Prints of The 18th century and Japanese Syunga. Foreign language
and foreign cultural research 13, 167-189.
Editorial Commitee of Introductry Textbook of NDL. (1998). Introductry Textbook of NDL. San-Ichi Shobo.
281.
Yagiri, Takayuki. (1996). Senses Literature. Asahi Sonorama. 206.
Yokoyama, Shin. & et. al. (2005). Figure of Woman Drawn in Comic and Body image of Japanese Young
Woman. Publications of the Nagano Prefectual College. 37-44.
Nagaoka, Yoshiyuki. (2004). Shobunkan Trial. Michi Syuppan. 2004, 279.
National Diet Library. (1998). Encyclopedia of the National Diet Library. Syuppan News sya, 414.
Lunn, Jean. (1981). Guidelines for Legal Deposit Legislation. Paris, UNESCO. iii, 36.
Larivière, Jules. (2000). Guidelines for Legal Deposit Legislation. Paris, UNESCO, viii, 61.
Japan Society of Library and Information Science. (2002). Terminological dictionary of Library and Information Science 3ed. Maruzen. 186.
UNESCO. Recommendation concerning the International Standardization of Library Statistics [Online]. Retrieved 11 September 2008
from http://portal.unesco.org/en/ev.php-URL ID=13086&URL DO=DO TOPIC&URL
SECTION=201.html.
National Diet Library. National Diet Library [Online]. Retrieved 11 September 2008
from http://www.ndl.go.jp/index.html.
National Diet Library. Pamphlet(private publications) [Online]. Retrieved 11 September 2008
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National Diet Library. (1974). Imperial Library Annual.

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Table 1: What percentage of the books that are listed in 50 top seller books in each Amazon categories are not found in NDL-OPAC
Category
NDL-OPAC
books.or.jp
Literature and commentary
3 ( 6.0%)
1 ( 2.0%)
The humanities and thought
5 (10.0%) 10 (20.0%)
Society and politics
4 ( 8.0%)
6 (12.0%)
Nonfiction
5 (10.0%)
3 ( 6.0%)
Geography and history
4 ( 8.0%)
4 ( 8.0%)
Business, economy, and career
4 ( 8.0%)
8 (16.0%)
Investment, finance, and company management
4 ( 8.0%) 12 (24.0%)
Science and technology
10 (20.0%) 11 (22.0%)
Medicine and pharmacology
3 ( 6.0%) 18 (36.0%)
Computer and Internet
7 (14.0%) 14 (28.0%)
Art, construction, and design
7 (14.0%) 12 (24.0%)
Practical use and sports hobbies
9 (18.0%)
8 (16.0%)
Qualification and authorization
9 (18.0%) 16 (32.0%)
Living, health, and bringing up a child3 ( 6.0%) 11 (22.0%)
Travel guide4 ( 8.0%) 13 (26.0%)
Language study, various dictionaries, and yearbooks
6 (12.0%)
7 (14.0%)
Education and examination
5 (10.0%) 10 (20.0%)Child0 ( 0.0%)
7 (14.0%)
Comic animated cartoon and BL
0 ( 0.0%)
1 ( 2.0%)
Talent photograph collection
8 (16.0%) 16 (32.0%)
Game capture book1 ( 2.0%) 21 (42.0%)
Entertainment
7 (14.0%) 17 (34.0%)
New book and pocket edition
3 ( 6.0%) 10 (20.0%)
Score, and music book
6 (12.0%) 27 (54.0%)
Adult
40 (80.0%) 46 (92.0%)

About the Authors
Keita Tsuji earned a BA in Education from University of Tokyo in 1994, an MS and Ph.D. in Education from
University of Tokyo in 1997 and 2003, respectively. He is currently an associate professor of University ofTsukuba, and specialized in automatic thesaurus construction and LIS education.
Akemi Kikawada earned a BA in Library and Information Science from University of Tsukuba in 2008.
She is currently a student of Master Program, Graduate School of Library, Information and Media Studies,
University of Tsukuba.

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