Mr. Shigeho Shinagawa Has Become JADMA's New President
The Japan Direct Marketing Association held its 21st general meeting on 28th May, 2004 in Tokyo. Mr. Kenji Ikemori has resigned from the President's post after serving 2 years, or one full term, and Mr. Shigeho Shinagawa, the President of the Japan Correspondence Course of Education Union, was elected as the new President of JADMA. Mr. Shinagawa had been an active Vice President of JADMA from fiscal 1995 to fiscal 2003. He served as Chairman of the General Affairs Committee for the same period.
The Japan Correspondence Course of Education Union was established in 1954 with capital of 110 million yen, marketing correspondence courses as well as of educational and entertainment audiovisual goods and software. Its sales for fiscal 2003 were 56 billion yen.

Tightening of Regulations
(1) Regulations on Advertisement
a) The Law for Preventing Unjustifiable Extra or Unexpected Benefit and　Misleading Representation (Premiums and Representation Law) was revised in November, 2003. Marketers presenting descriptions concerning the ability, capacity or effect of merchandise or services may be required by the Fair Trade Commission to submit reasonable grounds when such descriptions are considered aggravating. Should the marketer fail to submit reasonable grounds within 15 days after the request, the commission shall issue an order to remove the advertisement.
b) The Specified Commercial Transaction Law will be revised this coming November. Like the Premiums and Representation Law, it requires reasonable grounds for product claims. It also requires to　post hardware requirements for computer software sales through the direct marketing method. And for e-commerce, date of data updated should be posted on the web sites when marketers claim that merchandise is the newest model.

(2) The Personal Information Protection Law
The revised version of the above mentioned law will be effected from May, 2005. Under the law, private firms holding personal information of more than 5,000 individuals are obliged:
- to specify the purpose of use and not to use the personal data beyond such purpose;
- not to obtain personal data by inappropriate means;
- to update and keep accurate contents of the data;
- to safe-guard the personal data against loss, system failure and leakage;
- not to provide an individual's personal data to third parties without such individual's consent except in certain instances; and
- to disclose the purpose of use of, to correct, or to suspend using, an individual's personal data, upon such individual's request.

Revision of JADMA Guidelines
(1) Revision of Guidelines for Personal Data Protection
In response to the revision of the Personal Information Protection Law, The Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry issued Guidelines for Economic Industry in Regard to the Personal Information Protection Law in July. Accordingly, we are working to revise JADMA guidelines for Personal Data Protection for public release in October.

(2) Revision of Guidelines for TV Shopping
In response to the advertisement elimination order to DRTV marketers from the Fair Trade Commission, we are working to revise JADMA Guidelines for TV Shopping, which are also scheduled to be
released in October. The revised version should be more specific and practical than the current one. We plan to attach reference material to show specific guidance for TV commercial message production.

Action Line
We also have an action line which assists consumers who have an unresolved problem with a direct marketing transaction. In fiscal year 2003, we received 8,330 calls from consumers, which include mere questions and consultation for general sales transactions other than direct marketing. The number of complaints to JADMA members was 1,031, a 49.4% increase compared to the previous year, because a member company experienced a stock shortage and delay of delivery. As for non-members, 1,363 complaints were received. This is a 52.1% increase compared to the previous year. We presume that this is because The Fair Trade Commission ordered some marketers to eliminate ads claiming slimming effects for diet supplements.