The Anime Fansub Groups, Stealing From Anime Studio One Episode At A Time

The anime subculture is being populated by an ever increasing number of newer fans. But at the same time, these fans are being misinformed by a lot of misconceptions. This can easily make them become ignorant, immature, and shallow.

The First Amendment to the United States Constitution clearly stated that the public have the right to know. This means that we don't just have the right to request our information to be exact, we also have the duty to present our information to others without alteration. And personally, I see this as the highest form of respecting others through self-respect.

Therefore, I sincerely ask for your help in clearing up the misconceptions in anime subculture; those who would like to help themselves by getting well informed, and others who can offer to help. At the same time, please respect those that are only here to disturb the good intention of others, by promptly reporting them to the crunchyroll mods with a thank you note for their hard work.

And with that, I believe the time is right for myself to confess on a personal level, as a fromer fansubber.

Spoiler Alert! Click to show or hide

How fansub groups steal from anime studios:

Spoiler Alert! Click to show or hide

How illegitimate fansubs are rendering anime studios weak & unprotected:

Spoiler Alert! Click to show or hide

How anime studios pay TV stations to air anime, not the other way around:

Spoiler Alert! Click to show or hide

How anime studios can only protect themselves with licensing:

Spoiler Alert! Click to show or hide

How internet fansubs ruining anime subculture:

Spoiler Alert! Click to show or hide

DomFortress wrote:

I agree that fansubs help eliminating the cultural rejection on anime subculture. Let's pretend that fansubs never existed, would anime subculture ever had a chance then to reach the audiences outside of Japanese culture? No, it wouldn't.

Back when I was a part of the bootlegged VHS fansub group Arctic Animation, before the time of the internet, fansubs were relatively very hard to come by for an even smaller fan base. It was a backroom, underground operation, with a very limited release and distribution. I pulled out from the fansubbing circle as Arctic Animation ceased its operation, when legitimate anime VHS were made available and acceptable by the market. The fansubs had served their purpose by breaking the cultural barrier in the market.

However, the internet fansub groups went out of control, when they decided to release illegitimate HD digital files of aime both old and new, on the internet, ready for download at the internet users' discreet. This operation is damaging the current digital anime media market, and obviously overpopulating the online streaming market. It desecrated the anime subculture by cheapen it less than an art entertainment, but more as an unappreciated pass-time hobby. This is further proven as a fact, when internet fansubbers themselves admitted that they can't control all their online distribution. The fansubs are now destroying the global market, and reducing the anime cultural effect by eliminating its legitimacy.

In the mean time, major anime sponsors saw this as a chance for free global advertisements, paid by the internet users all over the world. And they took advantage at this opportunity, by forcing anime studios to make cheap and yet popular anime series. The anime studios, weaken and unprotected due to a saturated market on all media fronts, had no other choice but to depend their survival on their sponsors' executive decision. This results anime series made with high entertainment value based on popularity alone, but with low artistic value based on acting, creativity, and originality. The sponsors could even include the TV station fee as part of the overall budget , but pay the TV station in full while slash the actual anime production cost on the anime studios.

I can think of one such example, and that's the relation between Sunrise Studio with their parent company Namco Bandai Holdings. If you would just look at all the Sunrise made anime series that were sponsored by Bandai within the last 5 years, you will see just what I was talking about.

How anime studios can only make up their loses when making anime with DVD sales, but get nothing from anime related merchandise sales:

Spoiler Alert! Click to show or hide

How CR Community Support are more concerned about the selfish reasons of those that are clearly breaking the laws, rather than their individual right to up hold the International Copyright Act:

Spoiler Alert! Click to show or hide

An entry article on WikiRoll by Brennan about how licensing works to protect copyright holders:
http://wiki.crunchyroll.com/Licensing

Here's a reference made by CR user zendude and BrylleNoGotoku regarding anime business making compromise, with anime production value has dropped to 1/3 of it's former self since 12 years ago. I suspect this is mostly, if not by partial, due to illegitimate fansubs:

zendude wrote:

As you have mentioned before that the production quality of Animes have dramatically sloped due to competing with fansubs, thus leaving us with a bunch of second rate Animes.
http://zepy.momotato.com/2008/08/30/anime-business/

BrylleNoGotoku wrote:

zendude wrote:

Well, people need to hear the truth, even if they don't want it.

Truth be told!

http://zepy.momotato.com/2008/08/30/anime-business/

Some of the information.

It costed approximately 10,000,000 yen (US$92,000) per episode to make Bamboo Blade (info from leaked internal documents)

Escaflowne had a budget of 30,000,000 yen (US$276,000) per ep

Here are more news regarding the steady decline in anime industry, with the last link being a detailed report on The Current State of Anime Industry as of SEPT. 29th, 2008:

zendude wrote:

Something to add here.
A bit old.
http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2005-08-10/state-of-animation-industry-in-japan

The anime market sales in Japan declined from a high of 213.5 billion yen in 2002, to 191.2 billion yen in 2003(a 10.4% drop).

This one is a bit recent.
http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/convention/2008/new-york-anime-festival-state-of-the-anime-industry

Notably, however, the drop in anime DVD sales has been more precipitous, despite the ever-growing interest in anime in the United States. Anime DVD sales netted roughly $600 million per year in the early 2000s, but have since decreased by $250 million.

According to Macdonald, one of the reasons the DVD market is shrinking is because of online competition. The presence of pirating, bootlegging, and fansubs means content that is not being monetized by the companies.

How fansub groups and North American licensing industry come out of the wood-works and shared with fellow fans:

zane14785 wrote:

BrylleNoGotoku wrote:

nicknatts wrote:

wait....what?

In summary, fansubs jeopardize the anime company.

Just wondering if you watched this vid yet.

http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/convention/2008/fansubs-and-industry-panel

As said in the video asking Fansubbers to stop isn't beneficial to the anime industry.

How legitimate anime series with subtitles are made available by anime industries:

zendude wrote:

Well the market is changing, so a hope for a cheaper subscription-like service would be more feasible for most of us. But considering how the Anime industry is, it would probably take years for things to become stable and adopt such a strategy, but it is getting there, hopefully.

http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2008-11-02/funimation-revenues-drive-navarre-2q-financials

Navarre Corporation, the parent company of the anime licensing and distribution company FUNimation, has announced that second quarter net sales for all of its units grew 18.5% from the same period last year.......
.......FUNimation's aggressive pursuit of deals to make its series available for digital distribution via YouTube, Joost, iTunes, the XBox Live service, and other channels also had a positive impact.

How anime studios can't protect themselves against illegitimate fansubs on the internet with licensing alone:

brennan wrote:

The problem isn't specific to the anime industry. I believe the problem is endemic in all industries that produce media. The only reason why it's affecting the anime industry so much is that the anime industry in comparison is much smaller than television or Hollywood, and is unable to bear the burden of heavy piracy.

Anime has saturated Japan, and it has become an unprofitable venture. However the Japanese are unable to export anime effectively, as most licensors have no guarantee that what is popular in Japan will be popular abroad. Essentially this means a one year lag period between the original airing date and it being available on the international market.

Yes, the strategy is to hope for a cheap subscription like service, or to have anime available online for a limited period of time, with advertisements inbetween very much like real television. But the industry is slow to adapt, the same way that the music companies have failed to adapt to meet the challenge of a rapidly evolving set of technology. To make it worse, the law on the matter hasn't adapted either - most lawmakers are aging gentlemen who have no head for the technologies that have evolved in such a short period of time. Effective legislation of piracy or countermeasures against it is impossible.

To be honest I'm not entirely optimistic. The only hope I have is that someone techy and smart can come up with a good business model to deliver high quality anime on time that can still give back to the studios. In a sense, Funimation, Gonzo, and Toei have my admiration for trying to adapt with the changing environment, instead of fighting it like the RIAA.

How aggressive online marketing can save the weak & unprotected anime studios:

brennan wrote:

zendude wrote:

I mentioned all those before somewhere in this thread but not as neatly organized as your statement.
Well, I want to see where this is going.

I certainly hope it's going in the direction of online broadcasting. The company that embraces this ideal with an effective method of distribution will undoubtedly come on top. I mean, look at the itunes model of music distribution. Sure it doesn't fight piracy, but it has made the acquisition of high quality music files legitimately easy.

An Industry round table titled Fansubs - The Death of Anime? held together by the North American licensing industries, Japanese animation production companies, and Japanese anime studios:

zendude wrote:
The experts are admitting that the Anime industry is diminishing due to illegitimate fansubs and releases from Winny or other channels.
* Experts or you? Well, I'll go with the experts.

Mullin opened the talk by acknowledging that fansubs are an "often emotional and difficult issue", especially as anime is clearly becoming more and more popular while anime DVD sales have declined by a fifth.

Industry roundtable: Fansubs - The Death of Anime?
Source: http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/convention/2008/anime-expo/industry-roundtable-fansubs-the-death-of-anime

And now I'll open the topic for discussion.

	Permalink Reply Quote Posted 11/1/08 , edited 11/9/08 The anime subculture is being populated by an ever increasing number of newer fans. But at the same time, these fans are being misinformed by a lot of misconceptions. This can easily make them become ignorant, immature, and shallow. The First Amendment to the United States Constitution clearly stated that the public have the right to know. This means that we don't just have the right to request our information to be exact, we also have the duty to present our information to others without alteration. And personally, I see this as the highest form of respecting others through self-respect. Therefore, I sincerely ask for your help in clearing up the misconceptions in anime subculture; those who would like to help themselves by getting well informed, and others who can offer to help. At the same time, please respect those that are only here to disturb the good intention of others, by promptly reporting them to the crunchyroll mods with a thank you note for their hard work. And with that, I believe the time is right for myself to confess on a personal level, as a fromer fansubber. Spoiler Alert! Click to show or hide I am the CR user DomFortress, I'm a Canadian and I've been living in the Greater Vancouver Area for more than 19 years. I've been a fan of Japanese Animation Subculture(anime) for 24 years. My first experience of anime was Mazinger Z at the age of 6, when I was living & Studying aboard in Taipei, Taiwan. After that, I was once and for all a fan of the Super Robot anime genre. In the winter of 1994, through personal interest, I discovered the then Vancouver based anime rental store Anime Jyanai(now closed for business as of 2003). Using the backroom of the store as its base of operation, was the now disbanded Arctic Animation Fansub Group. http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Teahouse/8513/this is all that remains of the once Arctic Animation http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Teahouse/8513/fan1.htmlhere is a list of fansubs that Arctic Animation had released as of Sept 9, 1999. This website has a detailed description by AMV maker Dugan Chen about the setup and the working condition inside Arctic Animation: http://www.vcn.bc.ca/~dugan/amvs.html Dugan Chen wrote: How I Started In 1997 I rented a fansub of the Sailor Moon R movie from a store called Anime Jyanai. That tape began (or was it ended? I can't remember) with a long string of music videos putting anime footage to English songs. I recognized one of the songs as being from the Last Action Hero soundtrack, and the footage from Patlabor 2. I was seeing music videos made by amateurs with their own editing equipment! The next day, I went to Anime Jyanai and said “I want to do one of those!” Anime Jyanai was, at that time, a front for a fansubbing group called Arctic Animation. The store proprietor is William Chow himself. He had back rooms where people went to subtitle master tapes. Extra VCR's worked around the clock to fill duplication requests. I made an appointment. Then, when it came, William Chow introduced me to the equipment (two VCR's, a laserdisc player, and a TV whose brightness was impossible to calibrate), demonstrated the controls (video-dub and the jog shuttle), and left me to my devices. Very few editors can claim to have worked under worse conditions than I did there. Because the equipment was in the back room of a store, I could not start before it opened (ostensibly at noon, inevitably between 12:30pm and 1pm) and had to be out by the closing time of 7pm. The editing room itself was windowless and dimly lit. The equipment was knee-high, and the room the size of a closet, so that you could neither sit nor stand comfortably. You had to squat or kneel. It wasn't even physically safe. Heavy objects weighing as much as VCR's would tumble off the top shelves and narrowly miss your head. Yet Arctic provided the equipment and, in many cases, the source footage that I could not afford. I took full advantage of the opportunity. By winding the tape back by five seconds and then counting them off, I could make cuts that were precise to the frame. I always had one good minute of completed work to show for every hour I spent editing. I made nine AMVs at Arctic. In the early winter of 1998, I took part in the subtitling on End of Evangelion Movie(Gainax) together with Arctic. We duplicated approximately 50 bootlegged VHS copies with subtitles, using the authentic End of Evangelion Movie Laser Disk(@$256 Canadian dollars plus shipping and handling, with custom and duty fee) as the source material. The bootlegged copies were only distributed among the 50 or so members of the local anime fan club called Vancouver Japanese Anime Society(VJAS). All funding and equipments that were used in this project were donations made by all the members of VJAS. I myself donated my VCR during the duplication process, which is how I got myself involved in fansubbing. Arctic Animation ceased all fansubbing in winter of 1999. The fansub group made a conscious choice to stop, in order to make way of the increasing legitimate anime licensing, that's making its way onto the VHS market. During the time I was a member of VJAS and Arctic, I was with a group of dedicated yet self-serving fans. Each and every member of VJAS supported the Arctic with their contributions, and Arctic operated as a group that gave back to the society by providing bootlegged VHS of anime series, with subtitles and barely viewable picture quality. We knew each others by face and on a first name bases. We had monthly anime showcases held at the local college lecture hall, featuring master subbed anime series in 1st gen quality running on projector. We borrowed some member's basement suite to setup shop for duplication. We ran graveyard shifts in order to make deadlines. We did not do this for free, for we serve ourselves. We all gave out our free time however, to make fansubs by fans for fans, starting with the purchase of authentic Japanese materials whenever we could. We had a legal business front, so we can register as a none-profit organization in order to legitimately possess our properties, that include our subtitling equipments. We all knew exactly who and what we were in it for, and we all rejoiced when anime was legitimately appearing on store shelf. We had what's called a sense of community, comradely, contempt, and most of all, a sense of respecting the authority through self-respected practice. It was painful and expensive, but it was worth it from start to finish. This was the history and origin of fansubs as I know it, long before the internet was commonly affordable. And now, with the advance of internet technology, what was once a shining moment of my youthful ambition, has turned into a monster by anybody that can afford a basic internet subscription fee. Anime fans flaming and trolling the internet community with ill intents. False comradely due to lack of interpersonal relations. A lack of contempt due to cheap sense of value. And in the core of it all, a complete and utter lack of respect for the authority due to no respect to one's action. Yet fansubs are still being made, but at an exponential rate while at no extra cost from anyone, other than the standard internet cost. No contribution was made to the anime studios, for even the source materials were obtain via illegal uploads. Anyone with a standard internet connection can watch fansubs, but not even the fansub groups themselves know who's watching. I am DomFortress, I was a fansubber. And now I feel tire, wherry, and genuine sick of an international anime community that lacks moral. How fansub groups steal from anime studios: Spoiler Alert! Click to show or hide DomFortress wrote: And perhaps the biggest misconception of all, is to think that fansub groups didn't alter the content of anime series, thereby not violating copyright act. Unless the original sources were meant to came with subtitles, the fansub groups had already violated the original creators' consent by altering the original sources with subtitles. This alteration which changed the original sources into different materials entirely, is what preventing fansub groups from breaking International Copyright Act; they are not releasing the exact same things without the original creators consent, but rather they're somethings different. This is also why fansub groups are doing this for free; for what seems to be a generous act out of the kindness of their hearts, hides the fact that they can't demand recognitions nor contributions due to their illegitimate practice. How illegitimate fansubs are rendering anime studios weak & unprotected: Spoiler Alert! Click to show or hide DomFortress wrote: Working with well established entertainment industries like TV stations, movies and musics are tough, because they are well protected by their long establishment. But you need to understand that anime studios are small-time companies, breaking even only by licensing their series wherever they can. The TV stations and the merchandisers are the only big companies, and they don't care if anime studios are being hurt by illegitimate copies online. To them, anime studios are only making cheap advertisements for merchandisers, and they can't thank fansub group enough by helping themselves releasing free advertisements online. TV stations should also be grateful for fansub groups, now that anime studios have no choice but to go back to them, when nobody wants to watch the legitimate series online. So this is what we, the anime fans, want our anime to be, yes? By keep supporting illegitimate fansubs, we'll keep choking the weak and defenseless anime studios, so the TV stations and merchandisers can take over the anime studios' decisions, and make us watch whatever cheap advertisements that they want with illegitimate fansubs. How anime studios pay TV stations to air anime, not the other way around: Spoiler Alert! Click to show or hide DomFortress wrote: That's not how anime works on Japanese TV network. Most anime fans don't know this, but anime studios have to purchase the time slots from Japanese broadcast stations, just like any legitimate business does. This is why you see those business sponsors being mentioned at the beginning of each episode, because it cost a fortune to air anime series on not just one, but several networks at the same time in Japan. And only in Japan. If anime studios want to sell their works internationally, they need to rely on licensing due to International Copyright Act requests that a legitimate distributor to handle the distribution of copyright materials, as a method to protect the interest of the creators. How anime studios can only protect themselves with licensing: Spoiler Alert! Click to show or hide DomFortress wrote: International Copyright Act protects the rights of the original creators on their creations, and it does so by enforcing regional marketing strategy throughout the world. When it comes to anime, since the studio is registered as a company operating in Japan(region two). When it's time for the studio to market its materials in any region, the studio must rely on a legitimate licensing company of that region to distribute the materials. This gives authenticity to the materials through legitimacy, it's what makes anime Japanese. If we eliminate the regional marketing strategy and thus renders the International Copyright Act useless, then anyone can make claims on any material, even though they may or may not made it. But without legitimacy, there's no proof to their claims, and without proofs, they are innocent until proven guilty. In a more serious scenario, once we eliminate the global market by removing the regional marketing strategy, suddenly prices on all national resources will drop due to no legitimacy on their origins. And quite frankly, I don't think my passion for anime is worth that kind of risk. How internet fansubs ruining anime subculture: Spoiler Alert! Click to show or hide DomFortress wrote: I agree that fansubs help eliminating the cultural rejection on anime subculture. Let's pretend that fansubs never existed, would anime subculture ever had a chance then to reach the audiences outside of Japanese culture? No, it wouldn't. Back when I was a part of the bootlegged VHS fansub group Arctic Animation, before the time of the internet, fansubs were relatively very hard to come by for an even smaller fan base. It was a backroom, underground operation, with a very limited release and distribution. I pulled out from the fansubbing circle as Arctic Animation ceased its operation, when legitimate anime VHS were made available and acceptable by the market. The fansubs had served their purpose by breaking the cultural barrier in the market. However, the internet fansub groups went out of control, when they decided to release illegitimate HD digital files of aime both old and new, on the internet, ready for download at the internet users' discreet. This operation is damaging the current digital anime media market, and obviously overpopulating the online streaming market. It desecrated the anime subculture by cheapen it less than an art entertainment, but more as an unappreciated pass-time hobby. This is further proven as a fact, when internet fansubbers themselves admitted that they can't control all their online distribution. The fansubs are now destroying the global market, and reducing the anime cultural effect by eliminating its legitimacy. In the mean time, major anime sponsors saw this as a chance for free global advertisements, paid by the internet users all over the world. And they took advantage at this opportunity, by forcing anime studios to make cheap and yet popular anime series. The anime studios, weaken and unprotected due to a saturated market on all media fronts, had no other choice but to depend their survival on their sponsors' executive decision. This results anime series made with high entertainment value based on popularity alone, but with low artistic value based on acting, creativity, and originality. The sponsors could even include the TV station fee as part of the overall budget , but pay the TV station in full while slash the actual anime production cost on the anime studios. I can think of one such example, and that's the relation between Sunrise Studio with their parent company Namco Bandai Holdings. If you would just look at all the Sunrise made anime series that were sponsored by Bandai within the last 5 years, you will see just what I was talking about. How anime studios can only make up their loses when making anime with DVD sales, but get nothing from anime related merchandise sales: Spoiler Alert! Click to show or hide DomFortress wrote: You can see that in this production flow chart, anime production is subcontracted under TV broadcast, as a part of advertising project. This means anime studios alone gets whatever leftover budget there was , after the production company help themselves with the remaining 16% of the total overall budget to subcontract the art, voice acting, and music production. That means ainme series produced by this business structure are only advertisements paid by the sponsors to be aired on TV networks. And this structure is used to make over 90% of the anime series up to date. What this means is that anime studios only get the right to use the designs off from anime related merchandises manufacturers, while the manufacturers(often major anime sponsors themselves) get to profit from sales of merchandises, and pay royalty only to the merchandises designers. Anime studios can only claim the right to their series, and can only get royalty from anime DVD sales. Also, because they aired their series on Japanese TV network, they have to wait for at lease 3 months before they can release the aired episodes onto anime DVD, due to Japan TV broadcasting Act that protects the right of Japan TV stations. Therefore, I'm sorry to say this, none of your money span on anime related merchandises had got back to the respective anime studios. And since all this time you've only been watching fansubbed prepaid advertisements, distributed all over the world for free by fans for fans on the internet, the anime studios already got paid dirt cheap for their work, and can barely pay their own staff & employees with a already saturated domestic DVD sales. Since most anime studios only own the right for their anime series, as they're the original creators of their works, they need to pay a Japanese licensing company in order to manufacturer & print the DVD, then distribute the DVD on the Japan market. How CR Community Support are more concerned about the selfish reasons of those that are clearly breaking the laws, rather than their individual right to up hold the International Copyright Act: Spoiler Alert! Click to show or hide DomFortress wrote: And it olny made more difficult when CR policy isn't picking up their slack when it comes to protecting North American licensed materials on CR site, either. This was the email reply that I got from CR support BasouKazuma, when I made a report about the illegitimate North American licensed materials materials on CR site: BasouKazumawrote: Hello DomFortress, Currently our policy is to only remove videos if we get an official DMCA takedown request for it sent to [email protected]. So thanks for pointing it out but it will be left alone unless we are contacted through the proper channels. Best of Luck, ~BasouKazuma Abbas Jaffery Community Support Manager Crunchyroll, Inc. [email protected] This is the content of my email report: DomFortress wrote: I'm the CR user DomFortress and I'm here to report that there are 2 anime that are licensed in US but still on CR, plase remove them: http://www.crunchyroll.com/library/Nausicaa_of_the_Valley_of_the_Wind is licensed by Disney http://www.crunchyroll.com/library/Mahou_Shoujo_Tai_Arusu (Tweeny Witches)is licensed by Media Blaster An entry article on WikiRoll by Brennan about how licensing works to protect copyright holders: http://wiki.crunchyroll.com/Licensing Here's a reference made by CR user zendude and BrylleNoGotoku regarding anime business making compromise, with anime production value has dropped to 1/3 of it's former self since 12 years ago. I suspect this is mostly, if not by partial, due to illegitimate fansubs: zendude wrote: As you have mentioned before that the production quality of Animes have dramatically sloped due to competing with fansubs, thus leaving us with a bunch of second rate Animes. http://zepy.momotato.com/2008/08/30/anime-business/ BrylleNoGotoku wrote: zendude wrote: Well, people need to hear the truth, even if they don't want it. Truth be told! http://zepy.momotato.com/2008/08/30/anime-business/ Some of the information. It costed approximately 10,000,000 yen (US$92,000) per episode to make Bamboo Blade (info from leaked internal documents) Escaflowne had a budget of 30,000,000 yen (US$276,000) per ep Here are more news regarding the steady decline in anime industry, with the last link being a detailed report on The Current State of Anime Industry as of SEPT. 29th, 2008: zendude wrote: Something to add here. A bit old. http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2005-08-10/state-of-animation-industry-in-japan The anime market sales in Japan declined from a high of 213.5 billion yen in 2002, to 191.2 billion yen in 2003(a 10.4% drop). This one is a bit recent. http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/convention/2008/new-york-anime-festival-state-of-the-anime-industry Notably, however, the drop in anime DVD sales has been more precipitous, despite the ever-growing interest in anime in the United States. Anime DVD sales netted roughly $600 million per year in the early 2000s, but have since decreased by $250 million. According to Macdonald, one of the reasons the DVD market is shrinking is because of online competition. The presence of pirating, bootlegging, and fansubs means content that is not being monetized by the companies. How fansub groups and North American licensing industry come out of the wood-works and shared with fellow fans: zane14785 wrote: BrylleNoGotoku wrote: nicknatts wrote: wait....what? In summary, fansubs jeopardize the anime company. Just wondering if you watched this vid yet. http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/convention/2008/fansubs-and-industry-panel As said in the video asking Fansubbers to stop isn't beneficial to the anime industry. How legitimate anime series with subtitles are made available by anime industries: zendude wrote: Well the market is changing, so a hope for a cheaper subscription-like service would be more feasible for most of us. But considering how the Anime industry is, it would probably take years for things to become stable and adopt such a strategy, but it is getting there, hopefully. http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2008-11-02/funimation-revenues-drive-navarre-2q-financials Navarre Corporation, the parent company of the anime licensing and distribution company FUNimation, has announced that second quarter net sales for all of its units grew 18.5% from the same period last year....... .......FUNimation's aggressive pursuit of deals to make its series available for digital distribution via YouTube, Joost, iTunes, the XBox Live service, and other channels also had a positive impact. How anime studios can't protect themselves against illegitimate fansubs on the internet with licensing alone: brennan wrote: The problem isn't specific to the anime industry. I believe the problem is endemic in all industries that produce media. The only reason why it's affecting the anime industry so much is that the anime industry in comparison is much smaller than television or Hollywood, and is unable to bear the burden of heavy piracy. Anime has saturated Japan, and it has become an unprofitable venture. However the Japanese are unable to export anime effectively, as most licensors have no guarantee that what is popular in Japan will be popular abroad. Essentially this means a one year lag period between the original airing date and it being available on the international market. Yes, the strategy is to hope for a cheap subscription like service, or to have anime available online for a limited period of time, with advertisements inbetween very much like real television. But the industry is slow to adapt, the same way that the music companies have failed to adapt to meet the challenge of a rapidly evolving set of technology. To make it worse, the law on the matter hasn't adapted either - most lawmakers are aging gentlemen who have no head for the technologies that have evolved in such a short period of time. Effective legislation of piracy or countermeasures against it is impossible. To be honest I'm not entirely optimistic. The only hope I have is that someone techy and smart can come up with a good business model to deliver high quality anime on time that can still give back to the studios. In a sense, Funimation, Gonzo, and Toei have my admiration for trying to adapt with the changing environment, instead of fighting it like the RIAA. How aggressive online marketing can save the weak & unprotected anime studios: brennan wrote: zendude wrote: I mentioned all those before somewhere in this thread but not as neatly organized as your statement. Well, I want to see where this is going. I certainly hope it's going in the direction of online broadcasting. The company that embraces this ideal with an effective method of distribution will undoubtedly come on top. I mean, look at the itunes model of music distribution. Sure it doesn't fight piracy, but it has made the acquisition of high quality music files legitimately easy. *An Industry round table titled Fansubs - The Death of Anime?* held together by the North American licensing industries, Japanese animation production companies, and Japanese anime studios:** zendude wrote: The experts are admitting that the Anime industry is diminishing due to illegitimate fansubs and releases from Winny or other channels. * Experts or you? Well, I'll go with the experts. Mullin opened the talk by acknowledging that fansubs are an "often emotional and difficult issue", especially as anime is clearly becoming more and more popular while anime DVD sales have declined by a fifth. Industry roundtable: Fansubs - The Death of Anime? Source: http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/convention/2008/anime-expo/industry-roundtable-fansubs-the-death-of-anime And now I'll open the topic for discussion.
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zendude 66638 cr points Send Message: Yo Mama's House Offline	Permalink Reply Quote Posted 11/1/08 , edited 11/8/08 Good read as always. I am just going to transfer some of the ideas from the other thread to this one. If only there is some figures to see how much fansubs/legal subs are affecting the Anime industry. - The things that I could only assume is: 15 Downloads = 1 DVD Sale 1,500 Downloads = 1 DVD Sale 15,0000 Downloads = 1 DVD Sale x Downloads= 1 DVD Sale - So what will be a good indicator of the positive/negative affects of legal internet distribution of Anime? As you have mentioned before that the production quality of Animes have dramatically sloped due to competing with fansubs, thus leaving us with a bunch of second rate Animes. http://zepy.momotato.com/2008/08/30/anime-business/ - So why not a standstill? I partly understand the concept of "Business as usual," but why should the Anime keep going while it is getting screwed? Standstill = Stop making crappy generic Anime Standstill = Retreat and strategize again Standstill = Limit what they are releasing I will consider that it is really hard to stop uploaders, though that is currently changing with the laws being passed in Japan. I know that campaigning in sites like crunchyroll will costs money, and will only be limited to a number of viewers, most likely North America. But this, in my opinion, this will ensure quality and somewhat of a growth. Quick Question: - Do you know the details behind the deal with Gonzo and crunchyroll with Strike Witches*? This actually kind of confusing considering what you said about International Copyright laws. So does the Gonzo company in the U.S. already have the rights for it so it can be seen in the U.S., or something totally different? http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2008-07-09/judge-compares-anime-file-sharing-to-stealing-bread
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	Permalink Reply Quote Posted 11/1/08 , edited 11/2/08 zendude wrote: Good read as always. I am just going to transfer some of the ideas from the other thread to this one. If only there is some figures to see how much fansubs/legal subs are affecting the Anime industry. - The things that I could only assume is: 15 Downloads = 1 DVD Sale 1,500 Downloads = 1 DVD Sale 15,0000 Downloads = 1 DVD Sale x Downloads= 1 DVD Sale - So what will be a good indicator of the positive/negative affects of legal internet distribution of Anime? As you have mentioned before that the production quality of Animes have dramatically sloped due to competing with fansubs, thus leaving us with a bunch of second rate Animes. http://zepy.momotato.com/2008/08/30/anime-business/ - So why not a standstill? I partly understand the concept of "Business as usual," but why should the Anime keep going while it is getting screwed? Standstill = Stop making crappy generic Anime Standstill = Retreat and strategize again Standstill = Limit what they are releasing I will consider that it is really hard to stop uploaders, though that is currently changing with the laws being passed in Japan. I know that campaigning in sites like crunchyroll will costs money, and will only be limited to a number of viewers, most likely North America. But this, in my opinion, this will ensure quality and somewhat of a growth. Quick Question: - Do you know the details behind the deal with Gonzo and crunchyroll with Strike Witches? This actually kind of confusing considering what you said about International Copyright laws. So does the Gonzo company in the U.S. already have the rights for it so it can be seen in the U.S., or something totally different? That link you posted is a good find! I'll edit my first post to use it as a reference, thank you. Now about your question regarding Gonzo streaming Strike Witches* on crunchyroll. To put it quite simply: The Japan based Gonzo studio, through the help of GDH(Gonzo Digital Holdings) as its international representative, had licensed the North America based podcast community crunchyroll as their legal North American podcast station. This means that North American crunchyroll users have the right to watch and download legitimate anime series by Gonzo studio, using crunchyroll as their channel. This will allow Gonzo studio to market their anime series throughout the North America region, with crunchyroll as their legal licensing company in North America.
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	Permalink Reply Quote Posted 11/1/08 , edited 11/2/08 zendude wrote: SkyLightSun wrote: Ehh.Ehh?Ehh.?Ehh!Ehh?!Ehh.?! Sky or Lunar, whatever. This is actually one of the more serious threads here, not some Narutards, fangirls, or something totally random. Please, at least be a bit considerate. remember 3/4 of the population in crunchyroll are a bunch of idiots....... hold on let me read this stuff..
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daisuke_dark 1160 cr points Send Message: 24 / F / Fantasy Land Offline	Permalink Reply Quote Posted 11/1/08 , edited 11/2/08 didn't understand
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	Permalink Reply Quote Posted 11/1/08 , edited 11/2/08 zendude wrote: SkyLightSun wrote: Ehh.Ehh?Ehh.?Ehh!Ehh?!Ehh.?! Sky or Lunar, whatever. This is actually one of the more serious threads here, not some Narutards, fangirls, or something totally random. Please, at least be a bit considerate. Fine.I'll read it and then I'll give my opinion about this.Happy?
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	Permalink Reply Quote Posted 11/1/08 , edited 11/2/08 do you people not read? are you guys always served with a butler and his silver platter? damn.....lazy ok i read it. hopefully i get this shit down. so you're saying that the companies who make anime anime lose money from people fansubbing. shit i'm lost now. and it takes a lot of money to make one episode and that they don't really get it back. they use the internet to stream their animes to save money and buying DVD's cost less? shit. hopefully i get the just of it
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xrewindit 618 cr points Send Message: 25 / F / United States Offline	Permalink Reply Quote Posted 11/1/08 , edited 11/2/08 Wait.. I don't really get the point..? Can someone explain, please? In more simple terms...
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zendude 66638 cr points Send Message: Yo Mama's House Offline	Permalink Reply Quote Posted 11/2/08 , edited 11/2/08 Something to add here. A bit old. http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2005-08-10/state-of-animation-industry-in-japan The anime market sales in Japan declined from a high of 213.5 billion yen in 2002, to 191.2 billion yen in 2003(a 10.4% drop). This one is a bit recent. http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/convention/2008/new-york-anime-festival-state-of-the-anime-industry Notably, however, the drop in anime DVD sales has been more precipitous, despite the ever-growing interest in anime in the United States. Anime DVD sales netted roughly $600 million per year in the early 2000s, but have since decreased by $250 million. According to Macdonald, one of the reasons the DVD market is shrinking is because of online competition. The presence of pirating, bootlegging, and fansubs means content that is not being monetized by the companies. Notes to your thread: - Mention the main source of revenue for Anime. - Mention that the companies themselves are the ones paying for time slots.
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Erehe 5166 cr points Send Message: 29 / M / Heretic's Keep Offline	Permalink Reply Quote Posted 11/2/08 , edited 11/2/08 Seriously, I don't think so, Since most anime that gets subbed these days are anime that are showing in Japan, and most of the people who download it are merely Gaijins who just want to watch the anime episode that's subbed, That's no different from watching it in Japan except for watching it late, If the fansubbing industry is killing an industry that is associated to anime, It would be the anime dubbing industry(which is quite evident after what happened to Geneon USA)
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	Permalink Reply Quote Posted 11/2/08 , edited 11/2/08 daisuke_dark wrote: didn't understand Then ask the right question and help yourself by being informed. Stealing is bad, and fansub groups are stealing from the anime studios. Your_Typical_Friend wrote: ok i read it. hopefully i get this shit down. so you're saying that the companies who make anime anime lose money from people fansubbing. shit i'm lost now. and it takes a lot of money to make one episode and that they don't really get it back. they use the internet to stream their animes to save money and buying DVD's cost less? shit. hopefully i get the just of it You're getting there. Just remember that anime studios can only get paid when they license their series, but fansub groups are stealing their thunders by releasing illegitimate copies of anime on the internet. xrewindit wrote: Wait.. I don't really get the point..? Can someone explain, please? In more simple terms... Just look at my last reply, and let me know if there's anything that you don't understand.
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DemonWithin912 14835 cr points Send Message: 26 / M / California Offline	Permalink Reply Quote Posted 11/2/08 , edited 11/2/08 Holy CARP YTF in the forums. /I'll edit when I read this.
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	Permalink Reply Quote Posted 11/2/08 , edited 11/2/08 DemonWithin912 wrote: Holy CARP YTF in the forums. /I'll edit when I read this. you're like the 5th person to say that.....
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xrewindit 618 cr points Send Message: 25 / F / United States Offline	Permalink Reply Quote Posted 11/2/08 , edited 11/2/08 Spoiler Alert! Click to show or hide DomFortress wrote: daisuke_dark wrote: didn't understand Then ask the right question and help yourself by being informed. Stealing is bad, and fansub groups are stealing from the anime studios. Your_Typical_Friend wrote: ok i read it. hopefully i get this shit down. so you're saying that the companies who make anime anime lose money from people fansubbing. shit i'm lost now. and it takes a lot of money to make one episode and that they don't really get it back. they use the internet to stream their animes to save money and buying DVD's cost less? shit. hopefully i get the just of it You're getting there. Just remember that anime studios can only get paid when they license their series, but fansub groups are stealing their thunders by releasing illegitimate copies of anime on the internet. xrewindit wrote: Wait.. I don't really get the point..? Can someone explain, please? In more simple terms... Just look at my last reply, and let me know if there's anything that you don't understand. Ahh, I get it now. Thanks.
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Furlong 1643 cr points Send Message: 26 / M / Canada Offline	Permalink Reply Quote Posted 11/2/08 , edited 11/2/08 Erehe wrote: Seriously, I don't think so, Since most anime that gets subbed these days are anime that are showing in Japan, and most of the people who download it are merely Gaijins who just want to watch the anime episode that's subbed, That's no different from watching it in Japan except for watching it late, If the fansubbing industry is killing an industry that is associated to anime, It would be the anime dubbing industry(which is quite evident after what happened to Geneon USA) If you download anime, you have (the potential) to keep it forever, which will indefinitely affect DVD sales, unlike watching it one-time-only on TV. As for the dubbing industry, the creators still get money so thats not really a problem.
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