`Quiet book', `soft book', `busy book', `cloth book', these words are the same thing. They are made from cloth, buttons, snaps, fasteners, magic tapes, strings, embroidery, and so on. They are mainly used by babies, and toddlers with and without handicaps. In Japan, busy books have been made mainly by volunteers for disabled children. Japanese Copyright Law permits anybody to uncommercially make busy books for disabled people. Busy books can be divided into two kinds; one is original, the other is derivative. The stories and pictures of derivative busy books are gained from printed picture books. So the copyright of original printed picture books hinder the making of derivative busy books for the sake of healthy children. Under U. S. Copyright Law, these derivative busy books are allowed on the fair use doctrine, when the number of book made by volunteers is small. The author thinks that both of original and derivative busy books should be made by volunteers for every child, so that Japanese stakeholders have to spread active advocacy in order to change the construction and practice of their copyright law. If things would go well, Japanese public libraries could provide busy books to all users, the author hopes.
著作権法的視角からみた`布の絵本'についての試論的検討
山本順一
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