TV Tokyo announced through a press release today that they have partnered with Crunchyroll to broadcast 5 shows online worldwide, 1 hour after they air on TV in Japan. Starting Jan 8th, Crunchyroll will stream the latest episodes of Naruto Shippuden and Gintama, with 3 other works yet to be named, subtitled into English. The streaming will be available to anyone around the world (except within Japan) for a monthly subscription fee, and then one week later they will be made available through free, ad supported streaming.
At the same time, Crunchyroll has agreed to remove all user-uploaded content on the site and only stream video which they have explicit distribution contracts with the content providers for. Currently Crunchyroll has deals with Toei Animation, Gonzo (which was revealed to have a 20% stake in Crunchyroll in recent financial reports), and a few other smaller content providers.
Also announced today, Viz Media will make these episodes of Naruto Shippuden available on their own website (as well as Hulu and Joost) the same time that Crunchyroll releases the episodes for free streaming, one week after airing. Viz will also make the already aired episodes of Shippuden available, eight per week, until every episode that has been aired in Japan is completely available for streaming from their site. Dubbing for this Naruto season has already been started, however the future of the show’s broadcast on Cartoon Network is somewhat in doubt since the cancellation of Toonami.

This announcement of Crunchyroll’s intent to completely remove all user uploaded content from their website, of which almost all is fansubbed anime, has been met with shock and surprise by many of Crunchyroll’s users. It remains to be seen whether Crunchyroll can maintain its userbase when it no longer offers a huge library of fansubbed anime for streaming, and whether it can turn a monthly subscription model, plus ad supported streaming one week after airing, into a viable business plan. This move was not unexpected however, since most content providers in Japan are extremely wary of dealing with a company whose business model is founded on the illegal distribution of copyrighted video files.

shinji wrote: