CN does it again
T987654321
running that network are morons.
darkst...@gmail.com
> CN just randomly rearanged their Satrurday lineup - again. The people
> running that network are morons.
There's about a 30-post thread on that below.
My opinion is that, with anime no longer really viable on television
(or at least the anime they _have_), they are burying it all until
they can fulfill their contracts, then goodbye anime off of Adult Swim
and Cartoon Network.
Mike
Invid Fan
<95508313-ff89-4182...@q26g2000prq.googlegroups.com>,
<darkst...@gmail.com> wrote:
Or it's just a question of them not owning it, not that it's anime.
That is, if WB had an anime division their shows would find a home.
--
Chris Mack *quote under construction*
'Invid Fan'
Japanese Otaku in Tokyo
are not really serious about the business abroad. They are satisfied
with the revenue inside of Japan only. So they sell them to CN and
don't want to promote by themselves. In Japan, we have more complex
and multi layered industry. There is a lot of Character merchandise
including toys, note book for children, plastic models for adult.
Yosuke
On 9月15日, 午前10:21, Invid Fan <in...@loclanet.com> wrote:
> In article
> <95508313-ff89-4182-bd5c-90f86812c...@q26g2000prq.googlegroups.com>,
darkst...@gmail.com
wrote:
> One of the problem is Japanese Publishing companies who have copyright
> are not really serious about the business abroad. They are satisfied
> with the revenue inside of Japan only. So they sell them to CN and
> don't want to promote by themselves. In Japan, we have more complex
> and multi layered industry. There is a lot of Character merchandise
> including toys, note book for children, plastic models for adult.
Then why even bother (and some Japanese anime people have openly asked
this question) bringing anime over to America anymore?? Doing so adds
another $100K in expenses per episode just to license and ADR it, it
has been estimated. Why even bother with it, especially with the
copyright issues these days?
Mike
Derek Janssen
They do it to bug you, of course.
Derek Janssen (uh, hope you've been around here long enough not to
answer him, Otaku)
eja...@verizon.net
Brian Christiansen
"Derek Janssen" <eja...@nospam.verizon.net> wrote in message
news:r4ozk.137$UB3.128@trnddc07...
> They do it to bug you, of course.
>
What bugs me is that although Moriboto might have dismal ratings (but what
the heck else is going to happen to a show that has no advertising and gets
snuck on the schedule at 12:30 or 1:30 or whatever), I can't imagine them
thinking that "Tim and Eric..." or Squidbillies ( I think those are the
shows that replaced it) would get better, or that marketing research would
indicate it would.
I am still sticking by my dartboard theory, I guess we just got lucky for a
short time.
Brian Christiansen
Derek Janssen
>
>>They do it to bug you, of course.
>>
>
> What bugs me is that although Moriboto might have dismal ratings (but what
> the heck else is going to happen to a show that has no advertising and gets
> snuck on the schedule at 12:30 or 1:30 or whatever), I can't imagine them
> thinking that "Tim and Eric..." or Squidbillies ( I think those are the
> shows that replaced it) would get better, or that marketing research would
> indicate it would.
>
> I am still sticking by my dartboard theory, I guess we just got lucky for a
> short time.
I'm going with the theory that CN knows that Aqua Teen and Family Guy
stoner-comedy fans are going to be more zombiefied and religious about
brand loyalty <sweeps "And now a word from Antonio..."> than curious
Anime-on-cable fans--
And if there's one thing Warner knows, it's Brand Loyalty, And How To
Use It: They don't make money off of Funi's Code Geass DVD's, but
boy-howdy, how they make it off those Aqua Teen boxsets.
And when it comes down to a Sophie's-Choice about which gets more
mainstream exposure...
(And that's just Warner--As for the Willie Street Boys, what "wacky"
condescending/stereotype slap at their own anime-niche viewers are their
cards going to make next?
Given that they've become the "lucky" receipient of every
anime-broadcast negotiation in the industry, despite openly despising
their own fans, Adult Swim has rapidly become to anime fandom what Alec
Guinness was to Star Wars fandom.)
Derek Janssen (eager to hear more JP-side ideas of how they think we're
watching anime over here)
eja...@verizon.net
Brian Christiansen
> And if there's one thing Warner knows, it's Brand Loyalty, And How To Use
> It: They don't make money off of Funi's Code Geass DVD's, but boy-howdy,
> how they make it off those Aqua Teen boxsets.
> And when it comes down to a Sophie's-Choice about which gets more
> mainstream exposure...
>
I suppose so. I guess it is just that I can't really imagine anybody even
watching those shows, let alone paying for them by buying boxsets (though
they have screwed up and made a few comedies that are actully funny, like
venture bros., robot chicken, boondocks, and perhaps a few others), so I
suppose that never really occurred to me.
Brian Christiansen
Antonio E. Gonzalez
<eja...@nospam.verizon.net> wrote:
>darkst...@gmail.com wrote:
>> On Sep 14, 9:16 pm, Japanese Otaku in Tokyo <yosuke1...@gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>>One of the problem is Japanese Publishing companies who have copyright
>>>are not really serious about the business abroad. They are satisfied
>>>with the revenue inside of Japan only. So they sell them to CN and
>>>don't want to promote by themselves. In Japan, we have more complex
>>>and multi layered industry. There is a lot of Character merchandise
>>>including toys, note book for children, plastic models for adult.
>>
>>
>> Then why even bother (and some Japanese anime people have openly asked
>> this question) bringing anime over to America anymore?? Doing so adds
>> another $100K in expenses per episode just to license and ADR it, it
>> has been estimated. Why even bother with it, especially with the
>> copyright issues these days?
>
>They do it to bug you, of course.
>
He seems to be unaware who the $100K goes to . . .
DBBrandell
Before last night's Saturday ratings bump, AS ran a bump that said
something like this ( quoting from memory, not 100% sure ) :
The Mark Twain quote of the week
There are three kinds of lies:
lies, damned lies, and statistics.
Not that that has anything to do with ratings.
Next bump: Saturday ratings.
Then in the ratings bump they just put the word 'Sad' by itself on a
screen after the numbers.
I think the bump writers aren't crazy happy about the situation either.
I know CN is a Turner company, and I think the various Turner outfits
are just big corporate businesses, very bottom line, very numbers
oriented, in a biz where all the networks/outlets/whatever are notorious
for very frequent change. I don't like that style of management; in the
long run I think less change would be better to gain audience, but I
really don't expect the Turner corporate cultures to change. :(
BTW, the numbers ran something like (again, quoting from memory ) :
Bleach around 258,000
Venture Bros. ( early ) above 210,000
Venture Bros. ( later ) below 210,000
Compared to just six months ago, that's down more than 10%. And way
worse compared to the peak of the anime fad. If some level of
management is really numbers oriented, they probably are going to demand
change, any change, just so they can say they did something about it.
As for the recent changes, Bleach going to 11PM I can understand, but I
don't get why they pulled Venture altogether, unless close to 200,000 is
below some kind of a trigger point.
DBB
The Relic
least the first three seasons (and own the first two
boxsets). But like most of their shows, after the third
season, they started going downhill fast. The only
shows that they put out that were consistently good
was/is The Boondocks, Harvey Birdman, The Venture Bros
(the 2nd season wasn't great, but the new season is excellent)
and...pretty much that's it. Metalocalypse is good, but
can lapse sometimes, and 12 oz Mouse? Meh. Assy McGee?
Ass. Squidbillies? Blows. Stroker and Hoop? Keep it.
The Relic
> As for the recent changes, Bleach going to 11PM I can understand, but I
> don't get why they pulled Venture altogether, unless close to 200,000 is
> below some kind of a trigger point.
>
> DBB
Well, since they are showing VB during the week now, and they ended
the new season on Sundays, perhaps they worried that showing it on
Saturdays would be redundant...or perhaps I am giving them too
much credit for their intelligence ^_^.
darkst...@gmail.com
> darkstar7...@gmail.com wrote:
> > Then why even bother (and some Japanese anime people have openly asked
> > this question) bringing anime over to America anymore?? Doing so adds
> > another $100K in expenses per episode just to license and ADR it, it
> > has been estimated. Why even bother with it, especially with the
> > copyright issues these days?
>
> They do it to bug you, of course.
>
> Derek Janssen (uh, hope you've been around here long enough not to
> answer him, Otaku)
Uh, shut up, idiot. And I don't think he has been around long enough
-- which is one of the reasons I thought I could have an intelligent
conversation without the delusional shitheads like you running around
it.
That was, of course, meant as an intelligent question (by the by,
though that part of the blog is now down after the BVUSA/BEUSA merge)
from when the AnimeAnime Japanese-industry site gave those figures,
and there was open question why anime is even marketed to the United
States anymore.
Mike
Mike
darkst...@gmail.com
> On Mon, 15 Sep 2008 07:24:07 GMT, Derek Janssen
> >darkstar7...@gmail.com wrote:
> >> another $100K in expenses per episode just to license and ADR it, it
> >> Why even bother with it, especially with the copyright issues these days?
>
> >They do it to bug you, of course.
>
> He seems to be unaware who the $100K goes to . . .
Derek thinks I should be getting some of it... ;)
You do realize that that comes from $30-35K/ep licensing and $65K as a
middle number for ADR, dubbing, and the like, right?
Mike
Glenn Shaw
> They don't make money off of *Funi's Code Geass DVD's*
<snip>
(emphasis added)
Um, Derek, isn't Code Geass a Bandai property?
--
Glenn Shaw • Indianapolis, IN USA
To reply by e-mail, swap the net and cast
Pumbaa
That was, of course, meant as an intelligent question (by the by,
though that part of the blog is now down after the BVUSA/BEUSA merge)
from when the AnimeAnime Japanese-industry site gave those figures,
and there was open question why anime is even marketed to the United
States anymore.
Mike
Mike
I have some Bollywood Sci-Fi movies that are in the Hindi language. One or
more of them allows the viewer to choose from about a dozen different
language subtitles.
Why don't the Japanese just add English subtitles to all their commercial
DVDs and sell them to Americans? It would not stop the Chinese from
copying them but might make a few more dollars for Japan. The Japanese don't
mind selling Americans a USA versions of cars, tv sets, cameras, etc with
multiple language ability.
Invid Fan
<pinkert...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> Why don't the Japanese just add English subtitles to all their commercial
> DVDs and sell them to Americans? It would not stop the Chinese from
> copying them but might make a few more dollars for Japan. The Japanese don't
> mind selling Americans a USA versions of cars, tv sets, cameras, etc with
> multiple language ability.
>
The US market won't support Japanese prices, and the Japanese don't
want the Japanese buying cheaper re-imported versions, so either
setting up a US division (Pioneer, Bandai) or selling to a middleman
(ADV) so far has made more sense for them. It also allows them to not
have to worry as to what sells in the US as they get the money up front
and it's up to the US company to actually market and sell the thing.
DBBrandell
Ok, that makes more sense.
DBB
S.t.A.n.L.e.E
>
> BTW, the numbers ran something like (again, quoting from memory ) :
>
> Bleach around 258,000
> Venture Bros. ( early ) above 210,000
> Venture Bros. ( later ) below 210,000
>
> Compared to just six months ago, that's down more than 10%. And way
> worse compared to the peak of the anime fad. If some level of
> management is really numbers oriented, they probably are going to demand
> change, any change, just so they can say they did something about it.
>
*sigh*
Anime premieres beaten by the 2:30am EST repeat of Venture Bros....
(Not that it's a bad show, mind you.)
Laters. =)
Stan
--
_______ ________ _______ ____ ___ ___ ______ ______
| __|__ __| _ | \ | | | | _____| _____|
|__ | | | | _ | |\ | |___| ____|| ____|
|_______| |__| |__| |__|___| \ ___|_______|______|______|
__| | ( )
/ _ | |/ LostRune+sig [at] UofR [dot] net
| ( _| | http://www.uofr.net/~lostrune/
\ ______| _______ ____ ___
/ \ / \ | _ | \ | |
/ \/ \| _ | |\ |
/___/\/\___|__| |__|___| \ ___|
S.t.A.n.L.e.E
>
> I have some Bollywood Sci-Fi movies that are in the Hindi language. One or
> more of them allows the viewer to choose from about a dozen different
> language subtitles.
>
> Why don't the Japanese just add English subtitles to all their commercial
> DVDs and sell them to Americans? It would not stop the Chinese from
> copying them but might make a few more dollars for Japan. The Japanese don't
> mind selling Americans a USA versions of cars, tv sets, cameras, etc with
> multiple language ability.
>
Indians are more multilingual, particularly English, than Japanese.
Besides, the Japanese could make more money from foreign licenses.
I'm not sure Bollywood has that issue.
Invid Fan
<LostRu...@UofR.SlamSpam.net> wrote:
> Mon, 15 Sep 2008 8:38pm-0500, Pumbaa <pinkert...@hotmail.com>:
>
> >
> > I have some Bollywood Sci-Fi movies that are in the Hindi language. One or
> > more of them allows the viewer to choose from about a dozen different
> > language subtitles.
> >
> > Why don't the Japanese just add English subtitles to all their commercial
> > DVDs and sell them to Americans? It would not stop the Chinese from
> > copying them but might make a few more dollars for Japan. The Japanese
> > don't
> > mind selling Americans a USA versions of cars, tv sets, cameras, etc with
> > multiple language ability.
> >
>
> Indians are more multilingual, particularly English, than Japanese.
> Besides, the Japanese could make more money from foreign licenses.
> I'm not sure Bollywood has that issue.
>
And what's the quality of the translation?
darkst...@gmail.com
> Why don't the Japanese just add English subtitles to all their commercial
> DVDs and sell them to Americans? It would not stop the Chinese from
> copying them but might make a few more dollars for Japan. The Japanese don't
> mind selling Americans a USA versions of cars, tv sets, cameras, etc with
> multiple language ability.
That's what is probably going to happen, Pumbaa. I have no question
that you are probably right.
To do so, however, you'd have to eradicate the remaining dub market
(what little there is left, other than the mega-franchises), get rid
of the remaining R1 companies, and change the entire way you deal with
things so that the Japanese can actually enforce the ownership of
their material.
This is absolute common sense on the part of the Japanese, as it is
clear, with piracy, that there is no real market for anime left in
R1. Most series titles can't even make back their dubbing or
licensing costs, much less both.
But that's exactly what I see happening, especially if Blu-Ray ever
really catches on like a lot of the techno-philes hope. BR would
essentially obsolete the remaining R1 companies and create the
situation where, at import prices, you'd have to get the material and
they could only sub it for you. That's why you are seeing more and
more video game assignments for the dub artists who used to do so much
anime (Laura Bailey, as one example).
Mike
darkst...@gmail.com
> In article <R3Ezk.30256$kh2.9...@bignews3.bellsouth.net>, Pumbaa
>
> <pinkertonja...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> > Why don't the Japanese just add English subtitles to all their commercial
> > DVDs and sell them to Americans? It would not stop the Chinese from
> > copying them but might make a few more dollars for Japan. The Japanese don't
> > mind selling Americans a USA versions of cars, tv sets, cameras, etc with
> > multiple language ability.
>
> The US market won't support Japanese prices,
The US market won't support _US_ prices either. The fact is, the only
price that the US market will support is a price of ZERO.
THAT is why Funimation is going to lose at least a million dollars on
their biggest series title in years, Ouran High School Host Club.
(Sorry, Caitlin. And I know that's why you don't want to talk numbers
like that...)
The reason that I think BVUSA went that way is that they realized they
had to (to a much smaller audience, natch) to make back sufficient
money to continue. That they didn't killed BVUSA, and that the
supposed "market" won't support US prices either will take Bandai
Entertainment with it once Gurren Lagann and Lucky Star finish out.
> and the Japanese don't want the Japanese buying cheaper re-imported versions,
The problem with _that_ is you now have the ULTIMATE in "reverse
importation", using the Internet (as an immediate re-sourcing) as the
boomerang instead of the American "re-import version". Worse yet,
it's more popular, immediate, and _gives nothing back to the creators
of the product_.
In effect, you have the fans taking over the market and scuttling it.
> so either setting up a US division (Pioneer, Bandai) or selling to a middleman
> (ADV) so far has made more sense for them. It also allows them to not
> have to worry as to what sells in the US as they get the money up front
> and it's up to the US company to actually market and sell the thing.
This is where the Japanese will start losing studios left, right, and
up the center in the immediate future (if it's not already
happening). That money is drying out -- completely.
This is what's happening as the supposed fandom cheers the lowering of
licensing fees. Fact is that Gen Fukunaga wants them lowered even
further. (He'll get his wish when he's the only meaningful licensor
left early next year. Problem is, he'll be so over-extended that
Navarre is crushed under the weight of trying to control the entire US
anime industry.)
But those high licensing fees are what kept the Japanese studios
around.
Mike
sanjian
How many billions of gaijin are in the U.S. who would nut themselves over an
opportunity to clean up the translation, just for the chance to see an
animation studio and see their favorite voice actress walk by?
Invid Fan
sanjian <mun...@vt.edu> wrote:
Either it's too early in the morning, or that was an example of their
translation quality :)
Doug Jacobs
> One of the problem is Japanese Publishing companies who have copyright
> are not really serious about the business abroad. They are satisfied
> with the revenue inside of Japan only. So they sell them to CN and
> don't want to promote by themselves. In Japan, we have more complex
> and multi layered industry. There is a lot of Character merchandise
> including toys, note book for children, plastic models for adult.
More importantly, it's these tie-in deals that make the money - not the
show itself.
But in the US, the Japanese companies want to make that same kind of
money from just the show, resulting in relatively insane licensing fees
for a product that will realistically only sell a few DVDs.
Even the popular anime shows in the US barely have any licensed products
for them, despite the Japanese market literally being clogged with the
junk. Seriously, how hard would it be to just ship a few cases of
"Bleach" pens to the states? They'll sell, trust me.
--
It's not broken. It's...advanced.
Doug Jacobs
> Why don't the Japanese just add English subtitles to all their commercial
> DVDs and sell them to Americans? It would not stop the Chinese from
> copying them but might make a few more dollars for Japan. The Japanese don't
> mind selling Americans a USA versions of cars, tv sets, cameras, etc with
> multiple language ability.
You make 2 assumptions:
First, that the Japanese animation industry knows how to do business
outside of Japan.
Second, that the Japanese animation industry WANTS to do business outside
of Japan.
Other industries in Japan - like their automobiles and electronics -
learned pretty darn quick how to market to the west, even if they still do
odd things like releasing the better models as "Japan only". But their
animation industry seems stuck in a time warp that's stuck in the sandbox
where they've firmly planted their collective head.
Honestly, I just don't get it. There are a lot of things - SIMPLE THINGS
- the Japanese could do to improve the penetration of anime into the west,
which will utilmately result in - gasp! - more money for the Japanese
companies. Instead, I almost feel like we're dealing with the phone
companies from 15 years ago when they were literally being assaulted by
customers willing to throw money at them, and all the companies could say
was "well, we'll think about it."
Doug Jacobs
>> The US market won't support Japanese prices,
>
> The US market won't support _US_ prices either. The fact is, the only
> price that the US market will support is a price of ZERO.
That's not quite true either.
As DVD prices have gone down, anime prices have stayed the same, or worse,
skyrocketed. Consumers have caught onto the little game where the
distributor releases a series, one disc at a time, only to come back later
on and relase a boxset that represents a whopping 60% savings over what
suckers spent on the single disc versions. So, use Netflix to seek out
shows worth buying, then wait for a boxset and a sale.
Of course, even the box sets are still more expensive that comparable
American DVDs. Yeah, I know the reasons and excuses, and that may have
worked back in '98 or so, but come on now. Despite an ongoing explosion
in the population of anime fans over the past 15 years, American anime
comapnies have failed to boost their revenues as explosively?
> The reason that I think BVUSA went that way is that they realized they
> had to (to a much smaller audience, natch) to make back sufficient
> money to continue. That they didn't killed BVUSA, and that the
> supposed "market" won't support US prices either will take Bandai
> Entertainment with it once Gurren Lagann and Lucky Star finish out.
Charging Japanese-like prices for DVDs that contain 1 or 2 episodes is
just insane. I don't even think the Japanese market likes that - but then
again, last time I was in Japan, it was more about renting than buying
anyways. Trying to go after American fans with $50 DVDs containing 44
minutes of content is just suicide. It's as if they wanted to make sure
they failed so they could simply say "See? The Americans don't like anime
after all!" That's not true, of course, Americans just hate idiotic
pricing schemes.
>> and the Japanese don't want the Japanese buying cheaper re-imported versions,
>
> The problem with _that_ is you now have the ULTIMATE in "reverse
> importation", using the Internet (as an immediate re-sourcing) as the
> boomerang instead of the American "re-import version". Worse yet,
> it's more popular, immediate, and _gives nothing back to the creators
> of the product_.
>
> In effect, you have the fans taking over the market and scuttling it.
This is a much larger problem, and has roots in decades of constant
brainwashing the companies have done to convince the Japanese consumer
that Japanese Stuff Must Be Expensive. Prior companies I've worked for
had to take extra percautions to make sure Japanese customers couldn't
simply buy the US/International version of our product because it was
100-200% CHEAPER than the Japanese version - even though the only
difference here was that the Japanese version had "Japanese" set as its
primary language. Yes, that's right. 200% markup. And that was what the
resellers wanted. They claimed our US prices would make customers think
that our product was garbage if it was so cheap. So, we tripled the price
in Japan, and sales took off.
In the anime industry, we've seen several instances where a title couldn't
be released in the US, or at least not in the US with Japanese subtitles,
until a similar release had been done in the US. The original Mobile Suit
Gundam series comes to mind here. It's only available in the US with
English dub, no subtitles because the show hadn't been released in Japan
yet.
> This is what's happening as the supposed fandom cheers the lowering of
> licensing fees. Fact is that Gen Fukunaga wants them lowered even
> further. (He'll get his wish when he's the only meaningful licensor
> left early next year. Problem is, he'll be so over-extended that
> Navarre is crushed under the weight of trying to control the entire US
> anime industry.)
>
> But those high licensing fees are what kept the Japanese studios
> around.
The studios make most of their money by licensing product tie-ins. They
don't do that in the US, and so the studios are trying to make that same
amount of money from DVD sales. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
Anyone familiar with the marketing of Star Wars knows that the
merchandising made far more than the ticket or video sales. And unlike
videos, it's a bit harder to torrent a T-shirt...
S.t.A.n.L.e.E
"A few cases" might not be worth the trouble for meager profit.
A boatload, OTOH...
But what store(s) is gonna sell all those,
and how are ya gonna convice them to distribute it?
(Even Pokemon had a hard time at first.)
Laters. =)
STan
Derek Janssen
>>for them, despite the Japanese market literally being clogged with the
>>junk. Seriously, how hard would it be to just ship a few cases of
>>"Bleach" pens to the states? They'll sell, trust me.
>
> "A few cases" might not be worth the trouble for meager profit.
> A boatload, OTOH...
> But what store(s) is gonna sell all those,
> and how are ya gonna convice them to distribute it?
> (Even Pokemon had a hard time at first.)
Also, it's easier to sell Doraemon toothbrushes to Japanese kids when
Doraemon is on regular Tokyo stations every afternoon for little kids to
watch.
Just as most Japanese would be baffled at Powerpuff Girls merchandise,
except for the niche viewers who associate it with PPGZ.
Which is one of the biggest stumbling blocks to US/Japanese perception,
in that the "commercial" show is always more "prestige" on the other
side of the fence...
The Japanese are looking at it as if they're selling a mass product,
which, to their experience, they believe they are.
Derek Janssen
eja...@verizon.net
Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)
> darkst...@gmail.com wrote:
>>> The US market won't support Japanese prices,
>> The US market won't support _US_ prices either. The fact is, the only
>> price that the US market will support is a price of ZERO.
>
> That's not quite true either.
It's absolutely not true, as has been demonstrated to StarkyDarky
multiple times. His amazing talent of holding his fingers in his ears
and saying LA LA LA LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU allows him to keep asserting it
as though it WERE true.
--
Sea Wasp
/^\
;;;
Live Journal: http://seawasp.livejournal.com
sanjian
Still be better than what some "professional" subbers get.
Or, hell, they could just steal fansub scripts. I'm sure groups like
Shinsen would be willing to fork over for a pittance and some credit.
Derek Janssen
> Doug Jacobs wrote:
>
>> darkst...@gmail.com wrote:
>>
>>>> The US market won't support Japanese prices,
>>>
>>> The US market won't support _US_ prices either. The fact is, the only
>>> price that the US market will support is a price of ZERO.
>>
>>
>> That's not quite true either.
>
> It's absolutely not true, as has been demonstrated to StarkyDarky
> multiple times. His amazing talent of holding his fingers in his ears
> and saying LA LA LA LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU allows him to keep asserting it
> as though it WERE true.
And offers as empirical evidence to the contrary the fact that he
*thinks* something will happen--
Whereas it's perfectly obvious to anyone that the anime industry is
actually doomed because I THINK that atomic tests will trigger a
volcanic earthquake in the next three years that will sink the entire
island... :)
Derek Janssen (<Criswell> "Can you PROVE that it didn't happen?")
eja...@verizon.net
Doug Jacobs
> "A few cases" might not be worth the trouble for meager profit.
> A boatload, OTOH...
> But what store(s) is gonna sell all those,
Borders, Barnes & Nobel, comic book stores, Hot Topic...
> and how are ya gonna convice them to distribute it?
"It's anime."
Target the stores near colleges that have anime clubs. If you sell it,
they will come.
Derek Janssen
And if it's Barnes & Noble, tell them it's "Based on the hit manga".
No questions...will ever...be ASKED. -_-
Derek Janssen
eja...@verizon.net
Invid Fan
Jacobs <dja...@shell.rawbw.com> wrote:
And you probably can get them, at import prices. What you'd need is a
US retailer, such as Walmart, ordering them, or the Japaese pen makers
themselves making a push. The Japanese Studios are use to just
licensing the images and letting others worry about selling them. Put
the blame where it belongs :)
(and, again, this is a reason CN likes homegrown shows compared to
anime: they'd get any licensing money from their shows where as they
wouldn't get any from Bleach)
darkst...@gmail.com
> darkstar7...@gmail.com wrote:
> >> The US market won't support Japanese prices,
>
> > The US market won't support _US_ prices either. The fact is, the only
> > price that the US market will support is a price of ZERO.
>
> That's not quite true either.
>
> As DVD prices have gone down, anime prices have stayed the same, or worse,
> skyrocketed.
For one very simple reason:
Anime prices have to be high to support the continuance of _any_ anime
industry at all -- here or in Japan.
Let me use Ouran High School Host Club as an example: At $100,000 an
episode between licensing and ADR/dubbing and the like, Funimation is
going to probably need to sell somewhere north (between the two half-
season volumes) of between 80,000 to 100,000 copies at $60 per half-
season volume _just to break even on their costs_.
That's about 40-50K each.
Now I want to know who in their wrong mind actually believes they're
going to do that. But the point I'm making here is that if they
honestly believed for one second that there was a sufficient _buying
audience_ who could support the industry to make it a money-making
venture at, say, $14.99 or so for a volume of anime at MSRP, they'd do
so.
THAT is why I am not so adverse on BVUSA/Honnemaise's pricing level as
most anime "fans" are. They need to be high to make sure there is an
industry.
(This is one of the reasons I am, more and more, wondering what kind
of funny accounting is keeping the industry afloat, either over here
or in Japan, because the numbers do not, in any way, add up.)
> Consumers have caught onto the little game where the
> distributor releases a series, one disc at a time, only to come back later
> on and relase a boxset that represents a whopping 60% savings over what
> suckers spent on the single disc versions. So, use Netflix to seek out
> shows worth buying, then wait for a boxset and a sale.
Singles are, now, effectively a thing of the past. The real question
is going to be who is going to be stupid enough to keep that process
going before they are the next company to go. BE??
The real problem with this approach, although you are correct in it,
is that there is now even less probability that the industry can
sustain -- and this part of it even takes theft and piracy out of the
equation entirely!
> Of course, even the box sets are still more expensive that comparable
> American DVDs. Yeah, I know the reasons and excuses, and that may have
> worked back in '98 or so, but come on now. Despite an ongoing explosion
> in the population of anime fans over the past 15 years, American anime
> comapnies have failed to boost their revenues as explosively?
Because the entire basis of the former explosion has nothing to do
with any real hope of a latter explosion.
There would've been no real explosion of anime over the last 15 years
-- and certainly no real explosion over the last 5 or so, without the
open stealing of basically any and all anime off of the Internet.
Criminality and arrogance on the fanbase + incompetence and
stubbornness on the industry = no more industry. It's dead, gone, and
cannot be saved -- in this or any perceived future form.
> > The reason that I think BVUSA went that way is that they realized they
> > had to (to a much smaller audience, natch) to make back sufficient
> > money to continue. That they didn't killed BVUSA, and that the
> > supposed "market" won't support US prices either will take Bandai
> > Entertainment with it once Gurren Lagann and Lucky Star finish out.
>
> Charging Japanese-like prices for DVDs that contain 1 or 2 episodes is
> just insane.
What if it's the only way the company believes that they can recover
their costs? (Talking Bandai-Namco here.)
Here's the final kicker: What is to say that the entire act of
bringing anime over to the United States and attempting to Americanize
it (dubs, ADR, and the like) is not similarly insane? Take a look at
the lists of popularly selling anime over the course of time and find
out how few new series actually make said lists in any real capacity!
That Japanese companies still consider America a market at all (much
less a viable one) is similarly insane!! And there are people within
some of the Japanese companies who have been understanding this,
little by little, over the course of the last 12 months or so.
If Japan were smart, R1 would cease -- today. No choice but to throw
the mess out.
> I don't even think the Japanese market likes that - but then
> again, last time I was in Japan, it was more about renting than buying
> anyways. Trying to go after American fans with $50 DVDs containing 44
> minutes of content is just suicide. It's as if they wanted to make sure
> they failed so they could simply say "See? The Americans don't like anime
> after all!" That's not true, of course, Americans just hate idiotic
> pricing schemes.
Again, it can be easily shown that, for most supposed fans, ANY NON-
ZERO PRICE is similarly idiotic.
What people don't understand is that THIS SHIT AIN'T CHEAP. It's
$100-180K an episode to create over in Japan, and about $100K an
episode to bring over here. Where the fuck are they going to recover
the costs if they don't charge a high price for the product they own
and licensed out?
> >> and the Japanese don't want the Japanese buying cheaper re-imported versions,
>
> > The problem with _that_ is you now have the ULTIMATE in "reverse
> > importation", using the Internet (as an immediate re-sourcing) as the
> > boomerang instead of the American "re-import version". Worse yet,
> > it's more popular, immediate, and _gives nothing back to the creators
> > of the product_.
>
> > In effect, you have the fans taking over the market and scuttling it.
>
> This is a much larger problem, and has roots in decades of constant
> brainwashing the companies have done to convince the Japanese consumer
> that Japanese Stuff Must Be Expensive.
See above. If they honestly had a paying fanbase who could support
the industry and halve the costs, I firmly believe they would do so!
(Which would, I think we can all agree, have the desireable side-
effect of perhaps increasing the fanbase further = win for all parties
involved.)
The reason I think the prices have been held in line and increased
here in America is because of the fact that America's anime industry
has been dying (for some time), and the only way to try to keep it
going is to charge what they are charging. They cannot, otherwise,
recover their costs.
You see, this all gets back to cost recovery. Again, this shit ain't
cheap. This is why you have Sea Gnat openly proposing that any real
future anime has will be doujinshi-level -- effectively amateurs
acting out their yaoi/hentai fantasies with animation software on
their computers and going to Comiket and the like.
> Prior companies I've worked for
> had to take extra percautions to make sure Japanese customers couldn't
> simply buy the US/International version of our product because it was
> 100-200% CHEAPER than the Japanese version - even though the only
> difference here was that the Japanese version had "Japanese" set as its
> primary language. Yes, that's right. 200% markup.
Again, cost recovery. It gets back to the same argument I spoke with
Vic Mignogna about in January on that YouTube clip I referenced. Many
of the Japanese need to charge that kind of money, especially for
series which aren't as merchandise-able as others, just to stay in
business. This is why, for example, Gonzo has been declared insolvent
for about the last six months.
A number of the series that were already started in Japan would never
have been completed -- they'd have been yanked off the air -- without
charging so much for their DVD's (if not asking for American money
before the first such R2 DVD's were released!).
Again, I see the anime pricing models as a necessary evil. Halve the
prices, and no one stays in business -- not at the present costs of
production (on either side of the Pacific).
> And that was what the
> resellers wanted. They claimed our US prices would make customers think
> that our product was garbage if it was so cheap. So, we tripled the price
> in Japan, and sales took off.
Funny thing is, chances are that perception was correct.
> In the anime industry, we've seen several instances where a title couldn't
> be released in the US, or at least not in the US with Japanese subtitles,
> until a similar release had been done in the US. The original Mobile Suit
> Gundam series comes to mind here. It's only available in the US with
> English dub, no subtitles because the show hadn't been released in Japan
> yet.
That could be a signal that they needed further funding to even
complete said project.
> > This is what's happening as the supposed fandom cheers the lowering of
> > licensing fees. Fact is that Gen Fukunaga wants them lowered even
> > further. (He'll get his wish when he's the only meaningful licensor
> > left early next year. Problem is, he'll be so over-extended that
> > Navarre is crushed under the weight of trying to control the entire US
> > anime industry.)
>
> > But those high licensing fees are what kept the Japanese studios
> > around.
>
> The studios make most of their money by licensing product tie-ins.
Explain, then, why several studios had to beg for licensing money (on
series no less than "Full Metal Panic", for one example) just to
complete. I have no problem with you saying that, but the problem is
that the studios have to get _that far_. What I am saying is that,
more and more, studios won't even be able to get to the point of
merchandising (I assume that's what you mean here...) before the
projects go broke.
> They don't do that in the US, and so the studios are trying to make that same
> amount of money from DVD sales. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
Which is why the US market needs to _go the fuck away_. Fold the
entire US industry and throw not one more good yen after bad.
Understand that this would make the anime itself ABSOLUTELY WORTHLESS
and UNSALEABLE (here nor in Japan!!). Because what the anime then
becomes is nothing short of an advertisement for merchandise.
If that's the case, the entire model is wrong at that point. No such
anime should ever see the storyboards without corporates coming in and
finding out how the franchise can be exploited (and you can basically
take that term however you wish) as far as merchandise is concerned.
I mean, you guys know my favorite anime is Kaleido Star. I've never
seen ONE Kaleido Star piece of merchandise brought over to ANY show
I've been to. NOT -- ONE.
And there isn't that much to begin with... I've seen one satin jacket
-- a couple character pillowcases -- a couple CD's and the like. Not
much else.
Fact is, that fact alone should've scuttled Sato's dream project.
Kaleido Star was a three-year project, and probably ate $5-8 million
on each side of the Pacific. And one can assert it probably took a
bath, both ways.
The point I'm trying to make is that you are making the same point
that Al Kahn got reamed up the ass for in December of 2007 -- anime
without merchandising should not be made in any way, shape, or form.
> Anyone familiar with the marketing of Star Wars knows that the
> merchandising made far more than the ticket or video sales. And unlike
> videos, it's a bit harder to torrent a T-shirt...
Perhaps. But understand that that approach really makes the animation
unsaleable -- and, for many franchises, an unnecessary expense to the
extreme!! Why not just go manga at that point -- which see Shonen
Jump...
Mike
darkst...@gmail.com
<seaw...@sgeinc.invalid.com> wrote:
> Doug Jacobs wrote:
> > darkstar7...@gmail.com wrote:
> >>> The US market won't support Japanese prices,
> >> The US market won't support _US_ prices either. The fact is, the only
> >> price that the US market will support is a price of ZERO.
>
> > That's not quite true either.
>
> It's absolutely not true, as has been demonstrated to StarkyDarky
> multiple times. His amazing talent of holding his fingers in his ears
> and saying LA LA LA LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU allows him to keep asserting it
> as though it WERE true.
It's absolutely true -- that you choose to ignore it (because you are
participating in it) is not my problem.
See what I told Doug: It's about _cost recovery_. The American
companies have to make back $100K an episode, on average. Now I can
see why that's a foreign concept to you -- it's a foreign concept to
most anime fans, who somehow continue to insist that either the anime
companies are committing fraud to the customer or committing fraud to
themselves, their stockholders, etc. (and it's one or the other) and
that the books will continue to be cooked to somehow balance out to
some extent.
If enough people were to buy anime that they could cut the prices in
half, they'd do so. If you don't believe that to be true, then
explain why prices have held the line, even though they're losing
their shirts.
Mike
darkst...@gmail.com
> Whereas it's perfectly obvious to anyone that the anime industry is
> actually doomed because I THINK that atomic tests will trigger a
> volcanic earthquake in the next three years that will sink the entire
> island... :)
Nabeshin: "This is anime! Explosions solve everything!!!"
Mike (Just had to throw that ridiculous quote in on that
ridiculousness. Carry on.)
Derek Janssen
>
> (and, again, this is a reason CN likes homegrown shows compared to
> anime: they'd get any licensing money from their shows where as they
> wouldn't get any from Bleach)
Also--as we see from Sci-Fi Ani-Monday fans--anime fans are willing to
get their free broadcast anime from ANY cable channel that shows it.
That's not good for brand loyalty.
And if you're wondering why cable channels don't show reruns anymore,
and why Disney Channel has been taken over by Camp Rock and High School
Musical, it's because cable channels are more interested in creating
private Guyana-like demographic "colonies" through Original Programming.
Programming that nobody else can license or air on another channels and
take away from them--And which, while kept working for the company, can
create a useful Cult of Personality for the network, which can be
employed to DVD sales, personalized cross-promotional advertising
tie-ins (that GM truck commercial with Meatwad still baffles the heck
out of the other networks that show it), and all other forms of
specially customized ancillary marketing, with a percentage out of every
license.
And when it's Warner, AND Cartoon Network, AND Adult Swim, simply
put...they don't like Other People's Shows. It's not in their
beneficial interest to show them.
Bleach gets ratings, if it does, but that's *all* it brings in, if Funi
or Bandai get the sales. And corporate cable's since gotten greedier
for other things.
Derek Janssen
eja...@verizon.net
darkst...@gmail.com
> Pumbaa <pinkertonja...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> > Why don't the Japanese just add English subtitles to all their commercial
> > DVDs and sell them to Americans? It would not stop the Chinese from
> > copying them but might make a few more dollars for Japan. The Japanese don't
> > mind selling Americans a USA versions of cars, tv sets, cameras, etc with
> > multiple language ability.
>
> You make 2 assumptions:
>
> First, that the Japanese animation industry knows how to do business
> outside of Japan.
Obviously demonstratably false. Another reason they need to cut R1
off completely now before they lose their entire industry in Japan (an
inevitable fate, essentially, anyway, but this will ensure it).
I think what he's saying here is agreeing with you that they don't
know what they are doing vis-a-vis an outside market.
> Second, that the Japanese animation industry WANTS to do business outside
> of Japan.
Yes. And here's the kicker: If you take a look at the timeline on a
number of series and you understand what's going on economically, it
becomes evident (if not obvious!!) that the only reason that the
Japanese even want to do business here in the first place is because
getting our money is a matter of life and death to many of these
productions.
(Full Metal Panic and Kaleido Star are the first two examples I can
bring you.)
I've said for a long time that I do not believe, at all, that the
Japanese really like what America "has done to anime" -- how we
cosplay, how we act, the translations, blah blah blah. We are nothing
but a very necessary evil to them. They don't like how we approach it
(but are too culturally placid to really come out and say it -- which
see the furor over that one performer's blog -- face is more important
than actually coming out and protesting what's really going on), but
they need our money to get from creation to merchandising to DVD sales
on their end.
If the Japanese could sustain their own side of matters from creation
to merchandising to DVD sales without needing our money, there would
be no R1 industry because there would be no desire to have one. For
many shows, however, licensure by R1 is what gets them from creation
to what _might_ bring back in the money.
> Other industries in Japan - like their automobiles and electronics -
> learned pretty darn quick how to market to the west, even if they still do
> odd things like releasing the better models as "Japan only". But their
> animation industry seems stuck in a time warp that's stuck in the sandbox
> where they've firmly planted their collective head.
The fact is that they shouldn't be marketing to "the West" at all.
Especially now when the West's market has been cleanly undercut by a
concept similar to their feared reverse importation they never really
saw coming in the first place.
> Honestly, I just don't get it. There are a lot of things - SIMPLE THINGS
> - the Japanese could do to improve the penetration of anime into the west,
> which will utilmately result in - gasp! - more money for the Japanese
> companies. Instead, I almost feel like we're dealing with the phone
> companies from 15 years ago when they were literally being assaulted by
> customers willing to throw money at them, and all the companies could say
> was "well, we'll think about it."
Which is why they need to throw in the towel on the West vis-a-vis
anime. Their cultural norms will not allow them to understand why
they are so fucked here.
Mike
darkst...@gmail.com
You see, this is where I think anime, as an entire art form, needs to
be re-thought.
If this statement is true (and I want to make clear I make ZERO
ARGUMENT that it probably is!), then the entire anime industry as
presently constructed needs to be dismantled.
Gone.
Kaput.
In it's place:
An admission that not every anime that was made is going to be made.
You're a Japanese anime-maker, and you want that anime made?? Then
you have to pitch it to the merchandising companies _before you even
make the first ink to storyboard on the concept_ as to what
merchandising tie-ins are going to be made and whether they will
actually be able to make enough money to justify even _starting_ the
anime.
Effectively, the merchandisers become the only sponsors. The anime
itself is absolutely worthless (as a means to itself), as it is
nothing more than an infomercial for the merchandisers and their
product. DVD's, if sold at all, are seen wholly and completely as
logo merchandise.
Anime which cannot be rammed down the throat of the populace with
merchandising is never made. And that merchandise is on the shelves
Episode One. And if, say, by Ep. 10, it's not selling as well as
expected, the series can be yanked at any time that the financials do
not justify its continuance.
Anime ceases as a self-reliant art form -- it becomes nothing more
than a vehicle to sell shit. It is nothing more than the infomercials
cluttering up overnight and morning television here in the States.
Mike
darkst...@gmail.com
wrote:
> Tue, 16 Sep 2008 12:32pm-0500, Doug Jacobs <djac...@shell.rawbw.com>:
>
>
>
>
>
> > Japanese Otaku in Tokyo <yosuke1...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > > One of the problem is Japanese Publishing companies who have copyright
> > > are not really serious about the business abroad. They are satisfied
> > > with the revenue inside of Japan only. So they sell them to CN and
> > > don't want to promote by themselves. In Japan, we have more complex
> > > and multi layered industry. There is a lot of Character merchandise
> > > including toys, note book for children, plastic models for adult.
>
> > More importantly, it's these tie-in deals that make the money - not the
> > show itself.
>
> > But in the US, the Japanese companies want to make that same kind of
> > money from just the show, resulting in relatively insane licensing fees
> > for a product that will realistically only sell a few DVDs.
>
> > Even the popular anime shows in the US barely have any licensed products
> > for them, despite the Japanese market literally being clogged with the
> > junk. Seriously, how hard would it be to just ship a few cases of
> > "Bleach" pens to the states? They'll sell, trust me.
>
> "A few cases" might not be worth the trouble for meager profit.
> A boatload, OTOH...
> But what store(s) is gonna sell all those,
> and how are ya gonna convice them to distribute it?
> (Even Pokemon had a hard time at first.)
This is why the Japanese should simply dump R1 -- especially if they
want to go this route.
Without massive penetration of merchandising (which see Pokemon), they
have no prayer.
Take a look at the big sellers over here and tell me how few of the
big sellers are NOT huge merchandising megafranchises...
Mike
Aya the Vampire Slayer
>personalized cross-promotional advertising tie-ins (that GM truck
>commercial with Meatwad still baffles the heck out of the other
>networks that show it)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vcx0g6Rzc4I
What. The. Heck.
Was this because of the ATHF movie (and not just the TV series)? -_-
--
"Care must be exorcised when handring Opiticar System as it is apts to
be sticked by dusts and hand-fat." --Japanese Translators
"Keep your fingers off the lens." --Elton Byington, English Translator
Derek Janssen
> Derek Janssen <eja...@nospam.verizon.net> wa:
>
>>personalized cross-promotional advertising tie-ins (that GM truck
>>commercial with Meatwad still baffles the heck out of the other
>>networks that show it)
>
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vcx0g6Rzc4I
>
> What. The. Heck.
> Was this because of the ATHF movie (and not just the TV series)? -_-
No, this was years before the "movie" (which was miles off the radar
anyway), and back when AS was trying to craft its own custom
commercials, to exploit their cult minions--
For those who remember Brak palling around with the Cool Nestea Snowman.
Derek Janssen
eja...@verizon.net
Doug Jacobs
> For one very simple reason:
>
> Anime prices have to be high to support the continuance of _any_ anime
> industry at all -- here or in Japan.
Which is just a fancy way of saying "they need to make a profit."
Fair enough, but the anime industry in Japan is very different from the
one in the US.
For one thing, the majority of the money made from a show in Japan isn't
from DVD sales! You've got marketing tie-ins, and advertising time for
broadcasts even before your typical series even comes out on DVD. This
doesn't even take into acount things like CDs, novels, art books, and even
video game spinoffs. Furthermore, the Japnese market has always charged
more for DVDs - ALL of their DVDs. So while an anime DVD may cost Y6800,
so does that latest Hollywood blockbuster.
For the most part, the US market is only centered on one product - the
DVDs themselves. For whatever reason, the US companies just haven't been
looking into other areas for making money. Now, this may be a limitation
of the licensing rights they've bought from the Japanese company - but for
Japanese entities like Bandai, this wouldn't be an issue anyways.
Even if the American companies are restricted in how they can use the
licenses they're purchasing, surely they could be doing more to get the
shows a wider audience. You're telling me that amongst the 100s of cable
stations out there, they can't find some that would be willing to pick up
a few anime shows? Early in the US anime industry, this "make all the
money from the videos" model made sense. First off, they were mainly
dealing with known properties, like Ranma. Folks had already seen these
shows elsewhere, and were eager to buy them. Second, there was so little
material being licensed, that even when they published an unknown title,
people would still buy it, just out of desparation of being able to buy
anime at all. I did this with quite a few shows - some hits...some misses.
That was fine back in '98 or so. Everyone was eagerly buying DVDs to
replace their VHS copies (legal or not) and were also taking chances on
unknown shows since there wasn't too much stuff available at the time.
Now skip forward 10 years.
By now, most folks have replaced their VHS libraries with DVD. The
shelves in the stores are now flooded with dozens of unheard of titles -
it's almost too much to keep up with really and certainly too expensive to
be buying disc 1 of a show to see if it's worth collecting. Ignoring the
whole fansub/downloading subculture for a minute, services like Netflix
and even the local library make it easy and affordable to sample new anime
shows. Even if a show is interesting enough to finish, that doesn't
necessarily mean it's interesting enough to actually buy and collect. The
days of the "gotta collect them all!" have passed. Yet the US companies
haven't changed much at all. They still produce single volumes, and then
follow up with a nice boxset at something like 40% off the single volume
price. This just punishes people from trying a new show. Of course now,
if someone is curious about a new series, he'll just toss it onto his
Netflix queue. If he likes it well enough, he'll rent the rest of the
discs as they're released and will buy the discounted box set when it
arrives later on. Furthermore, DVD prices have gone down - but not for
anime. You'll still see $20-25 for the same 4 episode, half-full DVD
right next to US TV shows which are now selling for $20-40 for an entire
season. "But anime is a niche market!" they say. Yes, OK, in '96 and '98
I would agree, but with AX pulling in over 50k attendees - that's no
longer "niche". The fact that the US anime companies have failed to grow
their revenues with the growth of the fandom is a larger sign of failure
on a management level.
I ignored the fansub/download subculture, which I know is a favorite
scapegoat for some around here. So let's talk about them. Yes, there are
certainly folks who are downloading anime, and even those who are doing so
with the intention of never, ever buying a DVD or anything else for that
matter. Those types of people are always going to exist. The larger
problem is that the US market is lagging at least a few years behind the
Japanese one. As a result, it's possible to download and watch an entire
show years before it even makes it to the shelves. Even if someone
samples a show, likes it, and wants to buy it on DVD, they're looking at
quite a wait. First, the show must be relesaed on single DVDs at about 1
every month or two. Then when the final volume is released, another 12-18
months on top of that we'll see the discount boxset come out. Now, since
this person has already seen the show, he doesn't need to buy the single
disc version to determine if he likes it or not. And he also knows
there's no way he's going to buy the single volumes, only to get sucker
punched later on when the boxset is released. So...he'll wait. And
wait. And wait. And about 3 years later(!) the box set finally arrives.
Who knows, maybe he'll still be interested in buying the show.
This model that the US companies are using just doesn't make sense. It
alienates and even punishes the hardcore fans who are going to be more
likely to spend money on stuff - not just DVDs either. I'm talking
t-shirts, CDs, books, novels, stationery goods, toys, models, you name
it. WHY WHY WHY WHY isn't this stuff being brought over to the US in
larger quantities? Sure, I see the ocassional Bleach and Dragonball
T-shirt (though I wonder if they're officially licensed or not) but why so
few?
> THAT is why I am not so adverse on BVUSA/Honnemaise's pricing level as
> most anime "fans" are. They need to be high to make sure there is an
> industry.
Pricing yourself right out of the market is no way to make money. If you
really feel the need to be charging such outrageous prices, either there's
a really good reason, or your business manageent skills suck.
Surely the prices for producing a show and the DVDs must be at least as
expensive in Japan - if not moreso. Yet the Japanese companies don't seem
to have a problem making a profit from shows with a smaller overall
audience. Huh. You'd think that the US companies might get curious about
that and try to find out how they do it... Even if it meant higher
licensing fees up front, it would most definitely mean more money to the
company from being able to sell show-related items, yes?
> (This is one of the reasons I am, more and more, wondering what kind
> of funny accounting is keeping the industry afloat, either over here
> or in Japan, because the numbers do not, in any way, add up.)
I doubt there's anything nefarious like that. Just that the Japanese
companies aren't relying on DVD sales to make 100% of their money + profit.
>>?Consumers have caught onto the little game where the
>> distributor releases a series, one disc at a time, only to come back later
>> on and relase a boxset that represents a whopping 60% savings over what
>> suckers spent on the single disc versions. ?So, use Netflix to seek out
>> shows worth buying, then wait for a boxset and a sale.
>
> Singles are, now, effectively a thing of the past. The real question
> is going to be who is going to be stupid enough to keep that process
> going before they are the next company to go. BE??
I still see singles being produced. I don't think you can effectively cut
them off, either. After all, what are you supposed to do for the folks
who want to try out a show? You're seriously going to have them buy the
whole show only to find out in episode one it sucks? No one's going to do
that. Then again, even when volume 1 costs more than an entire season of
a US TV show, you aren't going to be selling many single volumes either.
> There would've been no real explosion of anime over the last 15 years
> -- and certainly no real explosion over the last 5 or so, without the
> open stealing of basically any and all anime off of the Internet.
> Criminality and arrogance on the fanbase + incompetence and
> stubbornness on the industry = no more industry. It's dead, gone, and
> cannot be saved -- in this or any perceived future form.
Then answer this for me. Anime fans and clubs have existed for far longer
in Japan than in the US. When the VCR came out, Japanese fans started
copying tapes - even rental tapes - and set up networks to exchange copies
with each other. Still, the anime industry chugged along - blossoming,
some would say. Surely you don't think that the same sorts of
downloading and electronic trading isn't going on in Japan as in the US,
do you? But yet the industry is still healthy. Why is that, do you think?
> What if it's the only way the company believes that they can recover
> their costs? (Talking Bandai-Namco here.)
As I said, if you're charging that much, you're just going to scare off
your customers. In Japan, all DVDs cost about the same - anime,
non-anime, even imports from the US. But that's not the case over here.
Either the Japanese companies need to learn that, or they're just going to
create a self fulfilling prophecy that the US doesn't have any fans
because they aren't buying overpriced DVDs. Yes, piracy will always be an
issue, but that's the case with many other industries as well - yet
they've managed to flourish - even grow - despite of it.
> Here's the final kicker: What is to say that the entire act of
> bringing anime over to the United States and attempting to Americanize
> it (dubs, ADR, and the like) is not similarly insane? Take a look at
> the lists of popularly selling anime over the course of time and find
> out how few new series actually make said lists in any real capacity!
So all anime in Japan is a big hit, eh? That's not the case and you know
it. Part of the problem with the US industry is that it's been forced to
swallow a lot of duds from Japan. You want something popular like
Bleach? Well, you'll have to take these other 3 shows that utterly bombed
in Japan too, oh and we're charging the same price for all of them. So
you basically have to now make 4x the profit off 1 decent show. Yeah,
good luck with that... The result of this not only puts a drain on the US
company's resources, but also dilutes the US market with crummy product no
one wants.
Also, if you look at the shows that are considered popular, you'll find
that the vast majority of them were all broadcast on TV. That should be
pretty telling by itself. If the US companies want to at least improve
the chances of a show becoming a big hit, they should get it on the air.
Adult Swim has done a lot to show that there IS an audience for this
material. So...why aren't we seeing more anime on TV? Why hasn't someone
over at, say, MTV gotten the idea to try and ressurct their old animation
block? Heck, given their current obsession with hip-hop, I would think
something like Afro Samurai would slide in really well.
> That Japanese companies still consider America a market at all (much
> less a viable one) is similarly insane!! And there are people within
> some of the Japanese companies who have been understanding this,
> little by little, over the course of the last 12 months or so.
>
> If Japan were smart, R1 would cease -- today. No choice but to throw
> the mess out.
And then what? You're basically saying "that's it! pirates have won!"
You're basically saying that if you want to be an anime fan, the only
recourse you have is to go the digital download route. Oh, wait, or do
you mean have the companies start doing English dubs & subs on their R2
discs? Yeah, that'll work... :p
> Again, it can be easily shown that, for most supposed fans, ANY NON-
> ZERO PRICE is similarly idiotic.
>
> What people don't understand is that THIS SHIT AIN'T CHEAP. It's
> $100-180K an episode to create over in Japan, and about $100K an
> episode to bring over here. Where the fuck are they going to recover
> the costs if they don't charge a high price for the product they own
> and licensed out?
Yeah, yeah. Stuff ain't cheap. Now ponder this - Friends and Seinfeld
were costing over $1mil an episode to create. Yet I can go into a store
and buy a season of Friends or Seinfeld for less than half of what a single
season of anime costs.
That makes no sense.
Until you realize...Friends and Seinfeld were never created with the
intention of ONLY selling DVDs! And you know what - NEITHER IS ANIME.
It's only the US market that tries to do this. Even at $100k an episode,
that's less than $3mil for a standard 26 episode show. Let's just say
$3mil - that includes everything - licensing, ADR, marketing,
manufacturing - the works.
Single discs priced at $15 each means you'd have to sell 200k discs just
to break even. That's fewer than the number of people who watched Bleach
last week (according to AS' posted numbers, anyways.) And that's over the
whole set of 6 discs, mind you. Now let's say instead you skip the single
disc releases and do a whole show boxset priced at...let's say $35. You'd
have to sell just under 86k boxsets. Seriously? If sales of anime discs
is this bad, why are the stores even wasting their warehouse space to
carry it?
Heck, let's say it costs $6mil to license and produce a R1 release. The
numbers STILL don't work out. You should be able to make a profit with
less than 200k units sold AT A REASONABLE PRICE.
Huh, maybe you're right. The numbers don't add up. How are the companies
failing so horribly? And no, piracy isn't the (only) answer here.
Chris Sobieniak
Being reminded much of this had been mentioned many times till the
cows came home on the Anime World Order podcast, especially in an
interview they had once with Steve Harrison where he discussed these
very same reasons. People should check that out to hear a few guys
bitch 'n moan about it like we do!
Chris Sobieniak
I've already came to this conclusion a few years ago.
Rob Kelk
<Sobi...@gmail.com> wrote:
>On Sep 16, 7:29 pm, darkstar7...@gmail.com wrote:
<snip>
>> Anime ceases as a self-reliant art form -- it becomes nothing more
>> than a vehicle to sell shit. It is nothing more than the infomercials
>> cluttering up overnight and morning television here in the States.
>>
>> Mike
>
>I've already came to this conclusion a few years ago.
Wow... It looks like Mikey is finally - *FINALLY* - Getting A Clue.
(Ever see any of the the mountains of "Sailor Moon" merchandise, back in
the day? Or the large-hill of "Voltron" merchandise, back in its day?)
Except that he appears to think that all anime is like this, instead of
most anime.
--
Rob Kelk Personal address (ROT-13): eboxryx -ng- tznvy -qbg- pbz
"Aggresive killfiling. I highly recommend it. It isn't personal;
there's just a limited number of hours in the day."
- Russ Allbery (<http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>), in message
<yl66l68...@windlord.stanford.edu>
Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)
> On Sun, 21 Sep 2008 04:27:24 -0700 (PDT), Chris Sobieniak
> <Sobi...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> On Sep 16, 7:29 pm, darkstar7...@gmail.com wrote:
>
> <snip>
>
>>> Anime ceases as a self-reliant art form -- it becomes nothing more
>>> than a vehicle to sell shit. It is nothing more than the infomercials
>>> cluttering up overnight and morning television here in the States.
>>>
>>> Mike
>> I've already came to this conclusion a few years ago.
>
> Wow... It looks like Mikey is finally - *FINALLY* - Getting A Clue.
You mean he actually thought of anime as a "self-reliant art form"???
Dorkstar, that's just hysterical. They're COMMERCIAL PRODUCTS meant to
be used as vehicles for selling merchandise. They've been that way AT
LEAST since the late 70s (Gundam) and on.
I wonder if he ever SAW any of these in raw Japanese with the
commercials. First-run anime shows, and they're CONSTANTLY interspersed
with commercials for ... products based on the first-run show. Costumes
so you can transform into the character, mugs, beds, computers, gum,
condoms...
darkst...@gmail.com
<seaw...@sgeinc.invalid.com> wrote:
> You mean he actually thought of anime as a "self-reliant art form"???
Yes, I did.
And there's no need for it to continue (at all, certainly not exported
to the United States), especially in a market where an infomercial
would probably do the job for much cheaper and much more effectively
if it is:
a) only an infomercial for merchandise (which should eliminate a
number of shows from ever having been made!)
and
b) hence, worthless as a saleable product. In that realm, trying to
sell an anime on DVD becomes about as feasible as selling an
infomercial on DVD, because the preceding are, then, equivalent.
Again:
The cost of an anime to create and make in Japan is somewhere in the
$90-180K range and episode.
The cost to bring it over to America adds another $100K an episode
(minus whatever licensing fees are being begged for to cover the
former costs - something Gen Fukunaga is trying to eliminate).
This is all _ADDITIONAL COST_ to the cost of trying to promote
whatever merchandise you are promoting, creating a situation where
more of that merchandise has to be sold before the company even breaks
even on the project.
As Shonen Jump has already shown, it is *FAR MORE EFFECTIVE*, then, to
go manga -- which is:
a) cheaper
b) a more profitable enterprise on the first level
and c) still seems to have great penetration over in Japan!
What you are, then, proposing, is that the anime industry (the dub
industry triply so) should dissolve and three years ago...
> Dorkstar, that's just hysterical. They're COMMERCIAL PRODUCTS meant to
> be used as vehicles for selling merchandise. They've been that way AT
> LEAST since the late 70s (Gundam) and on.
Then there should have been no anime explosion -- none -- here in the
States.
Because, should that be the case, there should be many times the
amount of merchandise for sale here in the States as there are -- and
there should be NO expectation, of ANY kind, that this stuff should be
Americanized/English dubbed in the least!!
An infomercial would've done the job more cleanly and more
effectively.
> I wonder if he ever SAW any of these in raw Japanese with the
> commercials. First-run anime shows, and they're CONSTANTLY interspersed
> with commercials for ... products based on the first-run show. Costumes
> so you can transform into the character, mugs, beds, computers, gum,
> condoms...
But you should see the problem (but _you_ personally don't):
At that point, there's NO NEED FOR THE ANIME. NONE.
Basically, what you are proposing is that all anime is just the
equivalent of:
*audience behind Darkstar responds at his prompt*
"SET IT AND FORGET IT!!!"
There is no value (and even less point) to the anime at that time.
Mike
darkst...@gmail.com
> darkstar7...@gmail.com wrote:
> > For one very simple reason:
>
> > Anime prices have to be high to support the continuance of _any_ anime
> > industry at all -- here or in Japan.
>
> Which is just a fancy way of saying "they need to make a profit."
Exactly. But the fact is that the prices (even here in America) often
have to cover the costs -- not only of the people in America, but,
through either pre-licensing funding deals (the series I've mentioned
as examples) or the licensing fee being that high to cover the costs
of Japan creating the show -- of the people in Japan as well.
> Fair enough, but the anime industry in Japan is very different from the
> one in the US.
>
> For one thing, the majority of the money made from a show in Japan isn't
> from DVD sales! You've got marketing tie-ins, and advertising time for
> broadcasts even before your typical series even comes out on DVD. This
> doesn't even take into acount things like CDs, novels, art books, and even
> video game spinoffs. Furthermore, the Japnese market has always charged
> more for DVDs - ALL of their DVDs. So while an anime DVD may cost Y6800,
> so does that latest Hollywood blockbuster.
That's fine -- but that's also one of the reasons they have to get
money to get to the point where the venture can even attempt to become
profitable.
I think you see how ridiculous this is: If what you say is correct
(and, again, not disputing that it is!), then there should be not
frame one of the concept storyboards to the beginning process to
creating the anime until they can sit down and decide how the anime
can be properly exploited to make the maximum amount of money through
merchandise -- and, if it can't be so exploited, it's never made (Bye
Bye, Kaleido Star).
Al Kahn pissed off a lot of people when he said that last December --
because HE -- WAS -- RIGHT.
> For the most part, the US market is only centered on one product - the
> DVDs themselves. For whatever reason, the US companies just haven't been
> looking into other areas for making money. Now, this may be a limitation
> of the licensing rights they've bought from the Japanese company - but for
> Japanese entities like Bandai, this wouldn't be an issue anyways.
The thing is that's the only thing they get license to, the DVDs and
the creation thereto.
That's the problem: Because if the anime is only an "infomercial" for
all the merchandise, then America shouldn't even be getting more than
the very rudimentary anime mega-franchises (Pokemon, Yu-Gi-Oh, what
have you) -- if even those!! Even bringing the product over to
America adds significant cost to the process -- and, again, if this is
all advertising costs, wouldn't it be better, then, to actually put it
into a product which is more relevant and not been completely hijacked
to Hell and back three times?
> Even if the American companies are restricted in how they can use the
> licenses they're purchasing, surely they could be doing more to get the
> shows a wider audience. You're telling me that amongst the 100s of cable
> stations out there, they can't find some that would be willing to pick up
> a few anime shows?
Not in the age of rampant downloading and fansubbing. (One of the
reasons there will be no more anime on Cartoon Network in the imminent
future, save maybe the occasional movie/OVA special.)
No one is watching on TV anymore -- not enough to make it worth it.
Look at the AS numbers compared to the fansubbing numbers and tell me
CN hasn't seen the writing on the wall several times over and is
preparing to eliminate all anime from the CN schedule... (And
probably rather quickly, judging by we didn't even see the Toonami
termination coming until the _day it occurred_.)
Now, if you want to make that case for, say, 2000, 2001, 2002...
We'll have a discussion. But the horse is way too damned out of the
barn now.
> Early in the US anime industry, this "make all the
> money from the videos" model made sense. First off, they were mainly
> dealing with known properties, like Ranma. Folks had already seen these
> shows elsewhere, and were eager to buy them. Second, there was so little
> material being licensed, that even when they published an unknown title,
> people would still buy it, just out of desparation of being able to buy
> anime at all. I did this with quite a few shows - some hits...some misses.
> That was fine back in '98 or so. Everyone was eagerly buying DVDs to
> replace their VHS copies (legal or not) and were also taking chances on
> unknown shows since there wasn't too much stuff available at the time.
Here's the kicker, though: If they were never given any more rights
than to do that, they still had to continue covering their own costs,
some of which started becoming tied to unrecovered (as yet, if ever)
costs in Japan. This is true even if they continue to only be given
visual rights -- only able to sell the DVD (or, later, legal downloads
no one wants to purchase).
Hence, it had to become a self-sufficient, self-supporting
enterprise. If it didn't (and it most certainly isn't now), then
there's no need for it to continue, because it's an unnecessary cost
which increases (without the need to do so!) the necessary recovery to
have made the franchise worth continuing.
> By now, most folks have replaced their VHS libraries with DVD. The
> shelves in the stores are now flooded with dozens of unheard of titles -
> it's almost too much to keep up with really and certainly too expensive to
> be buying disc 1 of a show to see if it's worth collecting. Ignoring the
> whole fansub/downloading subculture for a minute, services like Netflix
> and even the local library make it easy and affordable to sample new anime
> shows. Even if a show is interesting enough to finish, that doesn't
> necessarily mean it's interesting enough to actually buy and collect. The
> days of the "gotta collect them all!" have passed. Yet the US companies
> haven't changed much at all. They still produce single volumes, and then
> follow up with a nice boxset at something like 40% off the single volume
> price. This just punishes people from trying a new show.
The problem is that they still need people to actually buy it as a
"new show" to sustain the process. The 40% cut basically ends up a
"we need to get rid of a lot of this stuff, or we need to repackage it
because we came nowhere close to our targets to make it sustainable to
continue.
(Which see the ADV thinpaks.)
Ouran is a perfect example. Now, instead of 6 volumes (or maybe even
7) at $25, they get 2 volumes at $60 (a much higher initial
investment, and they have to sell almost 40-50K copies of each of the
two volumes to _BREAK EVEN_.
Funi will lose at least a million on Ouran. Maybe 2.
(And, no, Caitlin, it won't be your fault.)
I mean, consider: How many series have made any degree of money for
the anime companies in the last 5 years? I'd assert the number is
fewer than 20.
> Of course now,
> if someone is curious about a new series, he'll just toss it onto his
> Netflix queue. If he likes it well enough, he'll rent the rest of the
> discs as they're released and will buy the discounted box set when it
> arrives later on. Furthermore, DVD prices have gone down - but not for
> anime. You'll still see $20-25 for the same 4 episode, half-full DVD
> right next to US TV shows which are now selling for $20-40 for an entire
> season. "But anime is a niche market!" they say. Yes, OK, in '96 and '98
> I would agree, but with AX pulling in over 50k attendees - that's no
> longer "niche". The fact that the US anime companies have failed to grow
> their revenues with the growth of the fandom is a larger sign of failure
> on a management level.
No, it's a sign of failure on a police level. It's a failure on an
enforcement level. I can tell you right now that there would not be
20,000 people at AX (and wouldn't have ever gotten to that number)
without rampant illegal downloading. Anime is a niche _market_ -- if
you can even refer to it as a "market". That's why I've said for a
long time -- way too many fans, shows, studios, and still probably at
least one too many major licensors (if any should remain of the last
at all).
You see, this is where I part company: I see a lot of the people here
supporting rampant thievery by passing the buck of blame from the
criminal "fanbase" of anime to the management. I will say that I
think management needs to take blame for this one point: Either go
RIAA on the fanbase, or stop making the shows because you don't have
the money to enforce a saleable price on the product -- hence, you
have no money to make the product.
> I ignored the fansub/download subculture, which I know is a favorite
> scapegoat for some around here. So let's talk about them. Yes, there are
> certainly folks who are downloading anime, and even those who are doing so
> with the intention of never, ever buying a DVD or anything else for that
> matter. Those types of people are always going to exist. The larger
> problem is that the US market is lagging at least a few years behind the
> Japanese one.
That's intentional - and, if you want a Japanese (or an American, see
below) market, necessary. Reverse importation and the like.
(In fact, the rampant thievery becomes the ultimate case in why this
is necessary -- it's the ultimate in "reverse importation". One can
not even watch the TV shows anymore, pick up the "imported" fansubs,
and pay (for the purposes of the companies) NOTHING. At least, in
reverse importation, the companies would've gotten something out of
the deal.)
The fact is that the American market can't match the Japanese market
for time, or -- wait for it, delusionals (not necessarily whom I'm
replying to) -- THERE'S NO NEED FOR AN R1 MARKET!!
You go same-day or even worldwide release, there's little to zero need
for an American market whatsoever. This is what I see Bandai doing in
the exceedingly near future -- everything will just come out of Bandai-
Namco in Japan, sub-only (probably Blu-Ray), no American releases
whatsoever (no R1).
> As a result, it's possible to download and watch an entire
> show years before it even makes it to the shelves.
And there's the bugaboo -- they have no right to do so, and should be
stopped from so doing.
Otherwise, there would be no market even WITH a simultaneous release.
Again, you've still got to deal with the concept of "the ultimate in
reverse importation". Why would an anime fan buy a DVD when he can
rip the whole process off the Internet and get similar quality for
FREE (or essentially as such).
> This model that the US companies are using just doesn't make sense. It
> alienates and even punishes the hardcore fans who are going to be more
> likely to spend money on stuff - not just DVDs either. I'm talking
> t-shirts, CDs, books, novels, stationery goods, toys, models, you name
> it. WHY WHY WHY WHY isn't this stuff being brought over to the US in
> larger quantities? Sure, I see the ocassional Bleach and Dragonball
> T-shirt (though I wonder if they're officially licensed or not) but why so
> few?
Fact is that, if what people are telling me is correct, no anime
should be brought over to the United States without a massive
merchandising push from episode one -- or even before!!
> > THAT is why I am not so adverse on BVUSA/Honnemaise's pricing level as
> > most anime "fans" are. They need to be high to make sure there is an
> > industry.
>
> Pricing yourself right out of the market is no way to make money.
Then you have no market. If you can't, at least, sustain the mess,
you have no market. That's the problem. Especially without the
merchandising streams, you are looking at a situation which has to be
self-sufficient -- otherwise, you open the door to wonder if the same
kind of funny accounting is going on in anime companies as has been
for the $600-700 trillion derivatives market.
> If you really feel the need to be charging such outrageous prices, either there's
> a really good reason, or your business manageent skills suck.
The "really good reason" is the sustainability of the company. But,
if people are so dead-set on stealing the product the day it comes on
Japanese television, even the current US prices (probably even the
discounted prices of the box sets) are "outrageous", as I was trying
to tell some of the delusionals.
The market can't sustain itself on the _US_ prices... My assertion is
that there is no non-zero sustainable market price -- and this will
become more true as "disposable/discretionary income" completely
becomes a thing of the past.
> Surely the prices for producing a show and the DVDs must be at least as
> expensive in Japan - if not moreso. Yet the Japanese companies don't seem
> to have a problem making a profit from shows with a smaller overall
> audience. Huh. You'd think that the US companies might get curious about
> that and try to find out how they do it... Even if it meant higher
> licensing fees up front, it would most definitely mean more money to the
> company from being able to sell show-related items, yes?
If the people even bothered to buy _those_ -- and, I'd assert, outside
the convention crowd (and only a small subset at that!!), that doesn't
happen. Most of these companies probably get an idea as to how much
of the merchandise sells at some of the bigger shows they attend.
Understand two things further:
1) This would add an additional expense to the process. (You'd have
to license the
2) This would eventually require (as should be the similar case in
Japan if such a model were implemented) an out clause to terminate all
release of an anime should the sales of the merchandise not meet
certain minimum expectations.
> > (This is one of the reasons I am, more and more, wondering what kind
> > of funny accounting is keeping the industry afloat, either over here
> > or in Japan, because the numbers do not, in any way, add up.)
>
> I doubt there's anything nefarious like that. Just that the Japanese
> companies aren't relying on DVD sales to make 100% of their money + profit.
I disagree -- because one has to, now, wonder how the numbers could
add up at all. It's like what Sea Wasp finally admitted -- knowing
the numbers as I've presented them, there should be NO INDUSTRY AT
ALL.
The entire thing should be kaput.
Why isn't it?
> > Singles are, now, effectively a thing of the past. The real question
> > is going to be who is going to be stupid enough to keep that process
> > going before they are the next company to go. BE??
>
> I still see singles being produced. I don't think you can effectively cut
> them off, either. After all, what are you supposed to do for the folks
> who want to try out a show?
Episode 1 or maybe even 2 on the official website of the company.
Even pay to download sites like Funimation are getting that concept
for some of their series.
> You're seriously going to have them buy the
> whole show only to find out in episode one it sucks? No one's going to do
> that. Then again, even when volume 1 costs more than an entire season of
> a US TV show, you aren't going to be selling many single volumes either.
The cost being necessary to sustain the industry, that's why I see
singles dying. Think: If Ouran High School Host Club can't be put
out in 6 or 7 single volumes, what series is worth doing in singles
anymore?? ANY SERIES...
You're not going to have singles anymore except for the stubborn few
or the mega-franchises.
> > There would've been no real explosion of anime over the last 15 years
> > -- and certainly no real explosion over the last 5 or so, without the
> > open stealing of basically any and all anime off of the Internet.
> > Criminality and arrogance on the fanbase + incompetence and
> > stubbornness on the industry = no more industry. It's dead, gone, and
> > cannot be saved -- in this or any perceived future form.
>
> Then answer this for me. Anime fans and clubs have existed for far longer
> in Japan than in the US. When the VCR came out, Japanese fans started
> copying tapes - even rental tapes - and set up networks to exchange copies
> with each other. Still, the anime industry chugged along - blossoming,
> some would say. Surely you don't think that the same sorts of
> downloading and electronic trading isn't going on in Japan as in the US,
> do you? But yet the industry is still healthy. Why is that, do you think?
I've heard more than one reference to that some anime is actually
partially subsidized by the Japanese government.
But why is the Japanese industry healthier than the US? Because of
the amount of money (in pre-funding and the licensing fees) they get
from the US. Otherwise, why keep this dead "market" going long enough
to take down the home market?
It should come as no surprise that one of the major studios (Gonzo/
GDH) went insolvent and is now being taken over. Real healthy there.
And if they're insolvent, fear for the smaller ones...
There is ZERO reason for them to continue to release to the United
States' supposed "market" unless they absolutely had to to sustain the
Japanese side.
> > What if it's the only way the company believes that they can recover
> > their costs? (Talking Bandai-Namco here.)
>
> As I said, if you're charging that much, you're just going to scare off
> your customers.
Then you have no real customers, and no real market.
You have to recover costs to sustain your business, unless you're
fudging the balance sheets seriously.
> In Japan, all DVDs cost about the same - anime,
> non-anime, even imports from the US. But that's not the case over here.
> Either the Japanese companies need to learn that, or they're just going to
> create a self fulfilling prophecy that the US doesn't have any fans
> because they aren't buying overpriced DVDs.
The US doesn't really have that many true anime "fans" -- that's why
quite the number of companies have gone down in the last 12-13 months,
and the rest aren't doing so well. Again, the costs wouldn't be so
high if they didn't have to do that to recover the costs they paid to
Americanize the process -- a process, bluntly, which is becoming
irrelevant and unnecessary and damaging to Japan.
> Yes, piracy will always be an
> issue, but that's the case with many other industries as well - yet
> they've managed to flourish - even grow - despite of it.
Only through enforcement.
> > Here's the final kicker: What is to say that the entire act of
> > bringing anime over to the United States and attempting to Americanize
> > it (dubs, ADR, and the like) is not similarly insane? Take a look at
> > the lists of popularly selling anime over the course of time and find
> > out how few new series actually make said lists in any real capacity!
>
> So all anime in Japan is a big hit, eh?
Irrelevant to my question -- unless I'm missing something. The
problem is that Americanization adds cost to the process. And,
especially if the anime industry is nothing more than infomercials,
then there's no way that any unnecessary costs should be so added.
> That's not the case and you know
> it. Part of the problem with the US industry is that it's been forced to
> swallow a lot of duds from Japan.
Failure to do so, frankly, kills the Japanese industry outright.
Again: The only reason there is an R1 market is to sustain the Japan
market until what series can make enough money can do so. If Japan
were, through merchandising or sponsorship or whatever you choose,
able to self-sustain, they should divorce themselves forcefully from
the supposed American "fanbase".
AND, if merchandising is the only point to anime, then there should be
a termination clause in all contracts: If the franchise doesn't sell
X yen worth by whatever timeframe in the process you want, it goes off
the air -- immediately and without further recourse by the studio.
There is, then, no point in making any anime which can't be
"merchandised to death".
> You want something popular like
> Bleach? Well, you'll have to take these other 3 shows that utterly bombed
> in Japan too, oh and we're charging the same price for all of them.
Failure to do so kills the studios which made the three duds for the
same company -- that's why you get the package deals. The package
deals sustain the other products.
In fact, when you do that, you then have to factor in the costs of ALL
FOUR series' Americanization before you decide whether you can take
"Bleach" (which, almost certainly will have to pay for all four).
Unless the contract actually requires you to execute the rights to an
actual R1 release, I don't understand, then, why the other three
series are even released!! License all four, only make "Bleach", and
roll the dice. You basically have four licenses, but only one of them
has the costs of Americanization on it, so you can at least cut the
costs by the costs of Americanizing three useless duds.
(That is, unless the licensing contract forces you to make all four
anime. Then you're really stuck, and have a much harder decision to
make.)
> So you basically have to now make 4x the profit off 1 decent show. Yeah,
> good luck with that... The result of this not only puts a drain on the US
> company's resources, but also dilutes the US market with crummy product no
> one wants.
Yes, and, essentially, that's the decision a Viz has to make when it
wants to license Bleach and is forced to take the other three shows to
license Bleach. Bleach now has to sustain 4 titles, not just itself.
It's the same concept as to questioning whether Bleach could sustain
itself -- if it can't sustain the entire package, then the entire
package, no matter how much Bleach might be worth alone, can't stand.
> Also, if you look at the shows that are considered popular, you'll find
> that the vast majority of them were all broadcast on TV. That should be
> pretty telling by itself. If the US companies want to at least improve
> the chances of a show becoming a big hit, they should get it on the air.
But you then have to assure people are going to watch it, because that
will demand a dub, at $100K an episode, on top of all the other
stuff. What's happened at CN should tell you what's really going on
in that regard.
And here's another thing: ADV was trying to get TTGL (Gurren Lagann)
on television (which, they felt, was absolutely necessary for the
release of the title) for HOW LONG?? And it only took Bandai
Entertainment ONE MONTH from the moment they got the license from
Sojitz. You also have to wonder how well the companies can work with
the television networks even willing to so air.
> Adult Swim has done a lot to show that there IS an audience for this
> material.
No, it hasn't. At least not recently -- see the entire concept of
this thread to begin with.
Again, that might've been true several years ago, but, with the bulk
of anime now being stolen hand over fist off of the Internet,
television is becoming less and less relevant, and, hence, they don't
care about keeping a consistent audience for the Adult Swim titles,
bye-bye Toonami off of CN with less than one day public notice, and,
sooner than later, bye-bye all anime off of CN.
> So...why aren't we seeing more anime on TV? Why hasn't someone
> over at, say, MTV gotten the idea to try and ressurct their old animation
> block?
MTV needs to find its identity or change it's letters.
> Heck, given their current obsession with hip-hop, I would think
> something like Afro Samurai would slide in really well.
_MAYBE_ -- if you can get Samuel L. Jackson himself to promote it, it
is quite possible, yes.
> > That Japanese companies still consider America a market at all (much
> > less a viable one) is similarly insane!! And there are people within
> > some of the Japanese companies who have been understanding this,
> > little by little, over the course of the last 12 months or so.
>
> > If Japan were smart, R1 would cease -- today. No choice but to throw
> > the mess out.
>
> And then what? You're basically saying "that's it! pirates have won!"
Since CrunchyShit got the venture capital money, and then AX gave
CrunchyShit a place at the legitimate table, yes, that's it -- the
pirates have won.
Exactly. There is no sustainable future for anime in America -- and,
little by little, bit by bit, people are beginning to see that.
Might not please them, but that's the case.
> You're basically saying that if you want to be an anime fan, the only
> recourse you have is to go the digital download route.
Worse. If you want to be an anime fan, the only recourse, now, as a
logistical means of keeping up, is to steal the product.
> Oh, wait, or do
> you mean have the companies start doing English dubs & subs on their R2
> discs? Yeah, that'll work... :p
Dubs are going away. Probably within a few months as the last
companies trying them fall by the wayside one by one.
But dubs are a thing of the past.
Any future anime would have would have to be worldwide release
(probably on Blu-Ray), sub-only. And then you STILL have to enforce
the monetary value.
> > Again, it can be easily shown that, for most supposed fans, ANY NON-
> > ZERO PRICE is similarly idiotic.
>
> > What people don't understand is that THIS SHIT AIN'T CHEAP. It's
> > $100-180K an episode to create over in Japan, and about $100K an
> > episode to bring over here. Where the fuck are they going to recover
> > the costs if they don't charge a high price for the product they own
> > and licensed out?
>
> Yeah, yeah. Stuff ain't cheap. Now ponder this - Friends and Seinfeld
> were costing over $1mil an episode to create.
And already paid for by the ad revenue BEFORE THE FIRST AIRING OF A
GIVEN EPISODE.
That's the difference that anyone trying to equate the US television
industry to the anime industry doesn't get. This is why you see
American TV shows canned after one airing -- the ratings sucked so
much shit that they can't recover the costs of even episode _two_ from
the ad revenue.
That does not happen in Japan for the anime. That's why you see some
of the studios (like the FMP makers) come hat-in-hand, trying to get
enough money from the licensure to actually finish the anime so they
CAN try to make the money through whatever means they choose.
(Sorry, pet peeve of mine with some of the delusionals. Don't take it
personally. Gave me a chance to set that out again. Thanks.)
> Yet I can go into a store
> and buy a season of Friends or Seinfeld for less than half of what a single
> season of anime costs.
See above. Friends and Seinfeld are already paid for by that point
(with syndication on a big series, a number of times over!!!!) -- not
the case with anime, especially if you're talking the $100K/ep to
Americanize it alone!
> Until you realize...Friends and Seinfeld were never created with the
> intention of ONLY selling DVDs! And you know what - NEITHER IS ANIME.
> It's only the US market that tries to do this. Even at $100k an episode,
> that's less than $3mil for a standard 26 episode show. Let's just say
> $3mil - that includes everything - licensing, ADR, marketing,
> manufacturing - the works.
Then there is no real need FOR the US market -- it provides an
unnecessary expense which cannot be feasibly recovered. (Which see
Ouran as a great example of this -- the disappointment of sales for
Haruhi Suzumaya or however that's spelled is another...)
> Single discs priced at $15 each means you'd have to sell 200k discs just
> to break even. That's fewer than the number of people who watched Bleach
> last week (according to AS' posted numbers, anyways.) And that's over the
> whole set of 6 discs, mind you. Now let's say instead you skip the single
> disc releases and do a whole show boxset priced at...let's say $35. You'd
> have to sell just under 86k boxsets. Seriously? If sales of anime discs
> is this bad, why are the stores even wasting their warehouse space to
> carry it?
Good question -- and you're seeing less and less stores actually do
it. I know that, in the last months I was in San Francisco, the local
Best Buy and Virgin were cutting back their space. Now, it's hard to
even _find_ the space in the DVD sections of many of these stores.
And not to mention the outright closures of Tower, Suncoast, etc. etc.
etc.
> Heck, let's say it costs $6mil to license and produce a R1 release. The
> numbers STILL don't work out. You should be able to make a profit with
> less than 200k units sold AT A REASONABLE PRICE.
You'd be talking, if 1/2 the money goes back to the creators (and, by
this, you're talking about a 52-episode series), that you'd be looking
at charging only about $1 an episode for the entire process (about $60
for the entire 52 eps.), and you'd STILL have to sell 200,000 copies
(the entire core fanbase of the US anime industry, according to the
head of Bandai Visual last year!!!) to make THAT price worth it.
Understand how difficult that is, especially with the equivalent of
about 120,000 such 52-episode seasons being stolen off the Internet by
US anime thieves EVERY SINGLE FREAKING WEEK!!
> Huh, maybe you're right. The numbers don't add up. How are the companies
> failing so horribly? And no, piracy isn't the (only) answer here.
I disagree strongly. If they had taken out piracy, anime would've
never made it as apparently big as it was perceived to have gotten.
Then, fewer shows come over, fewer licensors, costs are less...
Mike
darkst...@gmail.com
> On Sun, 21 Sep 2008 04:27:24 -0700 (PDT), Chris Sobieniak
>
> >On Sep 16, 7:29 pm, darkstar7...@gmail.com wrote:
>
> <snip>
>
> >> Anime ceases as a self-reliant art form -- it becomes nothing more
> >> than a vehicle to sell shit. It is nothing more than the infomercials
> >> cluttering up overnight and morning television here in the States.
>
> >> Mike
>
> >I've already came to this conclusion a few years ago.
>
> Wow... It looks like Mikey is finally - *FINALLY* - Getting A Clue.
> (Ever see any of the the mountains of "Sailor Moon" merchandise, back in
> the day? Or the large-hill of "Voltron" merchandise, back in its day?)
> Except that he appears to think that all anime is like this, instead of
> most anime.
Well, all anime which should be made -- understand what I said to
which he responded that he came to that conclusion years ago:
THE ENTIRE INDUSTRY would have to be completely halted -- now.
No more anime made, produced, etc. that cannot be immediately
exploited to the moon and back.
No more Kaleido Star.
No more Full Moon.
Nothing which can't be essentially Shonen-Jump level exploited beyond
all semblance of repair.
Secondly, no US industry -- unless someone wants to be stupid enough
to bring over scads and gobs of merchandise and pray it gets sold.
Third, any series can be cut off of television and production at any
time without recourse by the makers if insufficient merchandise is
sold.
If you're right -- they're doing it all wrong.
Mike
Derek Janssen
> On Sep 21, 7:39 am, robk...@deadspam.com (Rob Kelk) wrote:
>
> Well, all anime which should be made -- understand what I said to
> which he responded that he came to that conclusion years ago:
But we just assumed you THOUGHT you understood the presumption to which
question he commented upon answering weeks ago, when we wondered whether
he had proposed the possible question to our assumption of--
<brain explodes>
Derek Janssen (clear as mud, and twice as tasty)
eja...@verizon.net
Rob Kelk
>On Sep 21, 7:39=A0am, robk...@deadspam.com (Rob Kelk) wrote:
>> On Sun, 21 Sep 2008 04:27:24 -0700 (PDT), Chris Sobieniak
>>
>> <Sobien...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> >On Sep 16, 7:29 pm, darkstar7...@gmail.com wrote:
>>
>> <snip>
>>
>> >> Anime ceases as a self-reliant art form -- it becomes nothing more
>> >> than a vehicle to sell shit. =A0It is nothing more than the infomercia=
>ls
>> >> cluttering up overnight and morning television here in the States.
>>
>> >> Mike
>>
>> >I've already came to this conclusion a few years ago.
>>
>> Wow... =A0It looks like Mikey is finally - *FINALLY* - Getting A Clue.
>> (Ever see any of the the mountains of "Sailor Moon" merchandise, back in
>> the day? =A0Or the large-hill of "Voltron" merchandise, back in its day?)
>> Except that he appears to think that all anime is like this, instead of
>> most anime.
>
>Well, all anime which should be made -- understand what I said to
>which he responded that he came to that conclusion years ago:
>
>THE ENTIRE INDUSTRY would have to be completely halted -- now.
Why? It's a functional and functioning business model; why does it need
to be stopped?
(Note that I will not accept "because it isn't what I want" as an
answer.)
<snip>
David Johnston
wrote:
No, informercials are really boring.
David Johnston
wrote:
>Because, should that be the case, there should be many times the
>amount of merchandise for sale here in the States as there are -- and
>there should be NO expectation, of ANY kind, that this stuff should be
>Americanized/English dubbed in the least!!
>
>An infomercial would've done the job more cleanly and more
>effectively.
No it wouldn't. Merchandising is ineffective unless you have something
to merchandise.
>
>> I wonder if he ever SAW any of these in raw Japanese with the
>> commercials. First-run anime shows, and they're CONSTANTLY interspersed
>> with commercials for ... products based on the first-run show. Costumes
>> so you can transform into the character, mugs, beds, computers, gum,
>> condoms...
>
>But you should see the problem (but _you_ personally don't):
>
>At that point, there's NO NEED FOR THE ANIME. NONE.
You are a very silly man.
Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)
> On Sun, 21 Sep 2008 22:34:30 -0700 (PDT), darkst...@gmail.com
> wrote:
>
>
>> Because, should that be the case, there should be many times the
>> amount of merchandise for sale here in the States as there are -- and
>> there should be NO expectation, of ANY kind, that this stuff should be
>> Americanized/English dubbed in the least!!
>>
>> An infomercial would've done the job more cleanly and more
>> effectively.
>
> No it wouldn't. Merchandising is ineffective unless you have something
> to merchandise.
Exactly. Infomercials work -- to the extent that they do -- because
they are a show telling you about something that will, in theory, do
something cool for you. It may be some super vacuum cleaner, a new food
storage device, or a way for you to Make Money Fast, but the infomercial
is merely there to let you know this thing is available.
Anime/manga merchandise is of no use or value to anyone WITHOUT the
anime/manga to sell it. You don't buy "Sailor Moon Costumes" unless you
know Sailor Moon, enjoy the story, and want to look like the characters.
This doesn't mean the anime or manga has to be self-supporting, just
popular enough to serve as the source of interest. Which works whether
it's paid for, or downloaded.
Downloading cannot get you the merchandise.
>
>>> I wonder if he ever SAW any of these in raw Japanese with the
>>> commercials. First-run anime shows, and they're CONSTANTLY interspersed
>>> with commercials for ... products based on the first-run show. Costumes
>>> so you can transform into the character, mugs, beds, computers, gum,
>>> condoms...
>> But you should see the problem (but _you_ personally don't):
>>
>> At that point, there's NO NEED FOR THE ANIME. NONE.
>
> You are a very silly man.
He is indeed. We point and laugh and laugh and laugh, and he never
realizes that it's because he's funny. He thinks it's because he's a
misunderstood genius.
"They laughed at Galileo! And Einstein!"
"Yeah. They also laughed at Bozo the Clown."
Rob Kelk
<sea...@sgeinc.invalid.com> wrote:
>David Johnston wrote:
<snip>
>> You are a very silly man.
>
> He is indeed. We point and laugh and laugh and laugh, and he never
>realizes that it's because he's funny. He thinks it's because he's a
>misunderstood genius.
>
> "They laughed at Galileo! And Einstein!"
>
> "Yeah. They also laughed at Bozo the Clown."
Actually:
"They laughed at Columbus, they laughed at Fulton, they laughed at the
Wright Brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown."
- Carl Sagan, "Brocas's Brain"
And a related quote:
"When a person can no longer laugh at himself, it is time for others to
laugh at him."
- Thomas Szasz, "The Second Sin"
Which leaves me without a directly-applicable .signature for this post,
so I'll go with one that's almost-applicable instead...
--
Rob Kelk <http://robkelk.ottawa-anime.org/> e-mail: s/deadspam/gmail/
<http://ars.userfriendly.org/cartoons/?id=20080822>
<http://ars.userfriendly.org/cartoons/?id=20080826>
darkst...@gmail.com
> On Mon, 22 Sep 2008 00:16:14 -0700 (PDT), darkstar7...@gmail.com wrote:
> >Well, all anime which should be made -- understand what I said to
> >which he responded that he came to that conclusion years ago:
>
> >THE ENTIRE INDUSTRY would have to be completely halted -- now.
>
> Why? It's a functional and functioning business model; why does it need
> to be stopped?
It's function_ing_.
"Function_al_", I will have a serious issue with. This is true
especially if the anime is only made as an infomercial to a
merchandising blitz.
This is why I have the statement that they need to cut the whole thing
off now and re-evaluate everything from top to bottom. If the anime
is just for merchandising purposes, explain the existence of an
American industry at all to me -- again. They don't ship enough
merchandise here to keep the situation going very long, with the
_possible exception_ of the mega-franchises like Yu-Gi-Oh and
Pokemon. You know that and so do I.
The thing I am trying to make clear (and the thing I think you're
missing) is that, under the scenario you prescribe, most anime should
never be started -- and much anime which is started should not be
completed. If the whole thing is merchandising, then the
merchandising should come _FIRST_, _FOREMOST_, and _ONLY_.
If the whole thing is merchandising, then there's no point in having,
really, a plot, a storyline, or much of anything else outside of
things blowing up (for mecha series) and panties flying all over the
place (for all the fan-service geeks).
If the whole thing is merchandising, it's completely ass-backwards in
Japan, much less here (where it's outright useless).
> (Note that I will not accept "because it isn't what I want" as an
> answer.)
Wasn't going to give that -- that's a personal answer, and I'm
speaking more generally here.
Mike
darkst...@gmail.com
> >Anime ceases as a self-reliant art form -- it becomes nothing more
> >than a vehicle to sell shit. It is nothing more than the infomercials
> >cluttering up overnight and morning television here in the States.
>
> No, informercials are really boring.
But if that's all anime is, the anime itself puts far too much of an
expense out there -- I mean, think: Do the infomercials you would see
at 4 AM cost a million dollars a half-hour to make?
Mike (God, I hope not, for their sake...)
darkst...@gmail.com
> On Sun, 21 Sep 2008 22:34:30 -0700 (PDT), darkstar7...@gmail.com
> wrote:
>
> >Because, should that be the case, there should be many times the
> >amount of merchandise for sale here in the States as there are -- and
> >there should be NO expectation, of ANY kind, that this stuff should be
> >Americanized/English dubbed in the least!!
>
> >An infomercial would've done the job more cleanly and more
> >effectively.
>
> No it wouldn't. Merchandising is ineffective unless you have something
> to merchandise.
A-HA!! That may be the case, but, understand, there are those here
who are saying that that merchandising is the WHOLE AND ENTIRE POINT
of creating and making the anime. Should that be the case, for the
reason you give, much of the anime made should never have been made --
because there's nothing, really, to merchandise off of a lot of
titles.
> >But you should see the problem (but _you_ personally don't):
>
> >At that point, there's NO NEED FOR THE ANIME. NONE.
>
> You are a very silly man.
Why? If the whole point is to advertise merchandise for otaku to
waste their money on, then wouldn't it be better just to present it in
a cheaper and more obvious form??
Mike
darkst...@gmail.com
<seaw...@sgeinc.invalid.com> wrote:
> David Johnston wrote:
> > No it wouldn't. Merchandising is ineffective unless you have something
> > to merchandise.
>
> Exactly. Infomercials work -- to the extent that they do -- because
> they are a show telling you about something that will, in theory, do
> something cool for you. It may be some super vacuum cleaner, a new food
> storage device, or a way for you to Make Money Fast, but the infomercial
> is merely there to let you know this thing is available.
If you actually believe the tripe you just spewed, you haven't been
watching many infomercials. Most of the stuff is abject shit.
> Anime/manga merchandise is of no use or value to anyone WITHOUT the
> anime/manga to sell it. You don't buy "Sailor Moon Costumes" unless you
> know Sailor Moon, enjoy the story, and want to look like the characters.
No. I think you have it backwards -- if you're creating the anime for
the purpose of moving merchandise, the anime is worthless without the
merchandise. (I _MIGHT_ wish to meet you halfway and claim each
depends on the other -- but the anime is worthless, then, without the
merchandise if that's the reason anime is made.)
> This doesn't mean the anime or manga has to be self-supporting, just
> popular enough to serve as the source of interest. Which works whether
> it's paid for, or downloaded.
>
> Downloading cannot get you the merchandise.
But, if the anime is, to the end, worthless financially (except as a
"source of interest"), then the whole manner in which anime is
marketed is basically completely backwards.
(And, in many cases, utterly useless and dooming to the project as a
whole.)
> >> At that point, there's NO NEED FOR THE ANIME. NONE.
>
> > You are a very silly man.
>
> He is indeed. We point and laugh and laugh and laugh, and he never
> realizes that it's because he's funny. He thinks it's because he's a
> misunderstood genius.
Oh, I realize that you THINK I'm funny.
I also see some of you (including you personally) as fools worthy of
being spat at or even worse.
That you don't even see the absolute ridiculousness of how people
market this stuff, if that's what the anime is made for, just boggles
my mind. If it's simply an infomercial for merchandise, the anime is
worthless, nothing more than advertising cost, and wholly ineffective.
> "They laughed at Galileo! And Einstein!"
And at Herb Stempel too.
> "Yeah. They also laughed at Bozo the Clown."
Turns out Bozo is smarter than you.
Mike (How else could he have done so well on WGN far past the time
that that kind of show ever did so well in most other areas?)
Rob Kelk
>On Sep 22, 5:14=A0am, robk...@deadspam.com (Rob Kelk) wrote:
>> On Mon, 22 Sep 2008 00:16:14 -0700 (PDT), darkstar7...@gmail.com wrote:
>
>> >Well, all anime which should be made -- understand what I said to
>> >which he responded that he came to that conclusion years ago:
>>
>> >THE ENTIRE INDUSTRY would have to be completely halted -- now.
>>
>> Why? =A0It's a functional and functioning business model; why does it nee=
>d
>> to be stopped?
>
>It's function_ing_.
>
>"Function_al_", I will have a serious issue with. This is true
>especially if the anime is only made as an infomercial to a
>merchandising blitz.
>
>This is why I have the statement that they need to cut the whole thing
>off now and re-evaluate everything from top to bottom. If the anime
>is just for merchandising purposes, explain the existence of an
>American industry at all to me -- again.
That's like saying "If the sky is green, explain rainbows."
You're arguing from a faulty premise - you think that, because most
anime has associated merchandising, that all anime is designed as a
merchandising vehicle. That doesn't follow from the presented facts.
That's why I said you were beginning to Get A Clue, not that you
actually had Got A Clue. You got one fact but overgeneralized from it.
<snip discussion based on faulty premise>
>> (Note that I will not accept "because it isn't what I want" as an
>> answer.)
>
>Wasn't going to give that -- that's a personal answer, and I'm
>speaking more generally here.
Thank you.
--
Rob Kelk <http://robkelk.ottawa-anime.org/> e-mail: s/deadspam/gmail/
"They were engaged in a calm and dignified discussion of important
issues of the day. No, wait, that was somebody else. *These* two
were all but screaming at each other at the tops of their lungs."
- from "Drunkard's Walk V/Oh My Brother II"
darkst...@gmail.com
> On Mon, 22 Sep 2008 17:13:29 -0700 (PDT), darkstar7...@gmail.com wrote:
> >On Sep 22, 5:14=A0am, robk...@deadspam.com (Rob Kelk) wrote:
> >> On Mon, 22 Sep 2008 00:16:14 -0700 (PDT), darkstar7...@gmail.com wrote:
>
> >> >Well, all anime which should be made -- understand what I said to
> >> >which he responded that he came to that conclusion years ago:
>
> >> >THE ENTIRE INDUSTRY would have to be completely halted -- now.
>
> >> Why? =A0It's a functional and functioning business model; why does it nee=
> >d
> >> to be stopped?
>
> >It's function_ing_.
>
> >"Function_al_", I will have a serious issue with. This is true
> >especially if the anime is only made as an infomercial to a
> >merchandising blitz.
>
> >This is why I have the statement that they need to cut the whole thing
> >off now and re-evaluate everything from top to bottom. If the anime
> >is just for merchandising purposes, explain the existence of an
> >American industry at all to me -- again.
>
> That's like saying "If the sky is green, explain rainbows."
>
> You're arguing from a faulty premise - you think that, because most
> anime has associated merchandising, that all anime is designed as a
> merchandising vehicle. That doesn't follow from the presented facts.
No. You're backwards, at least from what I'm gathering from other of
the delusionals on this forum.
If anything, I'm arguing the reverse: Since all anime is designed as
a merchandising vehicle (and that it's the only thing it's designed
_as_), THEN most anime has associated merchandising, and that which
does not (of which there are more than a few) should never have been
made in the first place (and that the anime, as a standalone, isn't
worth more than an infomercial would be -- it's financially
worthless).
But THAT premise is what Sea Gnat and the like are kinda going "He's
only getting this _NOW_???" about... So, from what I read, I think
you've got me reversed...
> That's why I said you were beginning to Get A Clue, not that you
> actually had Got A Clue. You got one fact but overgeneralized from it.
I "overgeneralized" to the only real conclusions which could be drawn
by that "one fact" -- that if that "one fact" were true, then the
whole damn thing is being done so ass-backwards...
Mike
David Johnston
wrote:
>On Sep 22, 10:25 am, David Johnston <da...@block.net> wrote:
>> On Sun, 21 Sep 2008 22:34:30 -0700 (PDT), darkstar7...@gmail.com
>> wrote:
>>
>> >Because, should that be the case, there should be many times the
>> >amount of merchandise for sale here in the States as there are -- and
>> >there should be NO expectation, of ANY kind, that this stuff should be
>> >Americanized/English dubbed in the least!!
>>
>> >An infomercial would've done the job more cleanly and more
>> >effectively.
>>
>> No it wouldn't. Merchandising is ineffective unless you have something
>> to merchandise.
>
>A-HA!! That may be the case, but, understand, there are those here
>who are saying that that merchandising is the WHOLE AND ENTIRE POINT
>of creating and making the anime.
No, making money is the point of creating and making the anime.
Merchandising is not the only revenue stream.
Should that be the case, for the
>reason you give, much of the anime made should never have been made --
>because there's nothing, really, to merchandise off of a lot of
>titles.
That isn't true. Merchandise can be based of any title you care to
name.
>
>> >But you should see the problem (but _you_ personally don't):
>>
>> >At that point, there's NO NEED FOR THE ANIME. NONE.
>>
>> You are a very silly man.
>
>Why? If the whole point is to advertise merchandise for otaku to
>waste their money on, then wouldn't it be better just to present it in
>a cheaper and more obvious form??
No. It would be better to present it in a way that works.
David Johnston
wrote:
No. That's part of why they're really boring.
David Johnston
wrote:
>On Sep 22, 5:14 am, robk...@deadspam.com (Rob Kelk) wrote:
>> On Mon, 22 Sep 2008 00:16:14 -0700 (PDT), darkstar7...@gmail.com wrote:
>
>> >Well, all anime which should be made -- understand what I said to
>> >which he responded that he came to that conclusion years ago:
>>
>> >THE ENTIRE INDUSTRY would have to be completely halted -- now.
>>
>> Why? It's a functional and functioning business model; why does it need
>> to be stopped?
>
>It's function_ing_.
>
>"Function_al_", I will have a serious issue with.
Anything that functions is functional.
This is true
>especially if the anime is only made as an infomercial to a
>merchandising blitz.
That the current bug up your butt. It doesn't have anything to do
with reality.
Rob Kelk
>On Sep 22, 5:42 pm, robk...@deadspam.com (Rob Kelk) wrote:
>> On Mon, 22 Sep 2008 17:13:29 -0700 (PDT), darkstar7...@gmail.com wrote:
>> >On Sep 22, 5:14 am, robk...@deadspam.com (Rob Kelk) wrote:
>> >> On Mon, 22 Sep 2008 00:16:14 -0700 (PDT), darkstar7...@gmail.com wrote:
>>
>> >> >Well, all anime which should be made -- understand what I said to
>> >> >which he responded that he came to that conclusion years ago:
>>
>> >> >THE ENTIRE INDUSTRY would have to be completely halted -- now.
>>
>> >> Why? It's a functional and functioning business model; why does it need
>> >> to be stopped?
>>
>> >It's function_ing_.
>>
>> >"Function_al_", I will have a serious issue with. This is true
>> >especially if the anime is only made as an infomercial to a
>> >merchandising blitz.
>>
>> >This is why I have the statement that they need to cut the whole thing
>> >off now and re-evaluate everything from top to bottom. If the anime
>> >is just for merchandising purposes, explain the existence of an
>> >American industry at all to me -- again.
>>
>> That's like saying "If the sky is green, explain rainbows."
>>
>> You're arguing from a faulty premise - you think that, because most
>> anime has associated merchandising, that all anime is designed as a
>> merchandising vehicle. That doesn't follow from the presented facts.
>
>No. You're backwards, at least from what I'm gathering from other of
>the delusionals on this forum.
>
>If anything, I'm arguing the reverse: Since all anime is designed as
>a merchandising vehicle (and that it's the only thing it's designed
>_as_),
I've already told you that this supposition is incorrect.
You've stated an absolute. Disproving an absolute requires one
counter-example. In this case, one of the counter-examples is "Nausicaa
of the Valley of the Wind" - that anime was not designed as a
merchandising vehicle.
<argument from incorrect premise snipped>
>> That's why I said you were beginning to Get A Clue, not that you
>> actually had Got A Clue. You got one fact but overgeneralized from it.
>
>I "overgeneralized" to the only real conclusions which could be drawn
>by that "one fact" -- that if that "one fact" were true, then the
>whole damn thing is being done so ass-backwards...
You went from the one fact "most anime has associated merchandising" and
turned it into "all anime is nothing but merchandising". That's the
incorrect generalization ("most" becoming "all" and "associated"
becoming "nothing but") that you made.
Continuing to say "no, I'm right" without supporting evidence only goes
to show how delusional you are.
And since you haven't really changed your delusional behaviour, back
into the killfile you go. I don't have time to teach you the critical
thinking skills that your high-school teachers should have taught you.
Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)
> And since you haven't really changed your delusional behaviour, back
> into the killfile you go. I don't have time to teach you the critical
> thinking skills that your high-school teachers should have taught you.
>
I never saw high-school teachers showing people critical thinking. Or
if they did, it was a mistake, in spite of rather than supporting the
curriculum. High school isn't there to teach you to think.
Rob Kelk
<sea...@sgeinc.invalid.com> wrote:
>Rob Kelk wrote:
>
>> And since you haven't really changed your delusional behaviour, back
>> into the killfile you go. I don't have time to teach you the critical
>> thinking skills that your high-school teachers should have taught you.
>>
>
> I never saw high-school teachers showing people critical thinking. Or
>if they did, it was a mistake, in spite of rather than supporting the
>curriculum. High school isn't there to teach you to think.
I guess we had different curricula and teachers, then...
--
Rob Kelk <http://robkelk.ottawa-anime.org/> e-mail: s/deadspam/gmail/
"I'm *not* a kid! Nyyyeaaah!" - Skuld (in "Oh My Goddess!" OAV #3)
"When I became a man, I put away childish things, including the fear
of childishness and the desire to be very grown-up." - C.S. Lewis
Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)
> On Tue, 23 Sep 2008 08:36:14 -0400, "Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)"
> <sea...@sgeinc.invalid.com> wrote:
>
>> Rob Kelk wrote:
>>
>>> And since you haven't really changed your delusional behaviour, back
>>> into the killfile you go. I don't have time to teach you the critical
>>> thinking skills that your high-school teachers should have taught you.
>>>
>> I never saw high-school teachers showing people critical thinking. Or
>> if they did, it was a mistake, in spite of rather than supporting the
>> curriculum. High school isn't there to teach you to think.
>
> I guess we had different curricula and teachers, then...
>
Obviously. I've seen some effort towards those areas in recent years,
although I've also seen annoying trends towards tolerating behaviors
that simply would've gotten you kicked out of school when I was a kid. I
applaud the first, condemn the second.
darkst...@gmail.com
his first mistake, believing that I would ascribe to his brand of
"cognitive thinking" his second. I'll discuss that when I get there.
But there is something I wish to leave on the table with this post
before I continue on in the thread...)
On Sep 23, 4:55 am, robk...@deadspam.com (Rob Kelk) wrote:
> On Mon, 22 Sep 2008 18:26:56 -0700 (PDT), darkstar7...@gmail.com wrote:
> > Rob Kelk wrote:
> >> You're arguing from a faulty premise - you think that, because most
> >> anime has associated merchandising, that all anime is designed as a
> >> merchandising vehicle. That doesn't follow from the presented facts.
This is exactly the premise Sea Wasp made when Sea Wasp wrote the
following three days ago in this thread, shocked I actually believed
anime to be a financially independent art form:
====
> You mean he actually thought of anime as a "self-reliant art form"???
> Dorkstar, that's just hysterical. They're COMMERCIAL PRODUCTS meant to
> be used as vehicles for selling merchandise. They've been that way AT
> LEAST since the late 70s (Gundam) and on.
====
Those who believe as Rob Kelk does should answer that statement.
Don't worry about answering me first -- answer Sea Wasp. Because if
you truly believe that, and that strongly about it, you can come to no
other realistic conclusion than to that anime is only an infomercial
for the merchandise which, to many beliefs, sustains the entire
Japanese anime (and manga!!) industry(/ies).
If that is the case, then there can be no R1 industry without a
massive merchandise blitz which, we all better understand, would never
take -- and that the Japanese industry is done backwards. Exploit it
for major merchandising dollars _first_ -- if you can't do that,
there's no need to throw an extra couple hundred million yen after a
bad project.
(And then always leave an out clause to terminate any project, pulling
it off the air immediately, if it doesn't meet merchandising targets.)
> >No. You're backwards, at least from what I'm gathering from other of
> >the delusionals on this forum.
>
> >If anything, I'm arguing the reverse: Since all anime is designed as
> >a merchandising vehicle (and that it's the only thing it's designed
> >_as_),
>
> I've already told you that this supposition is incorrect.
Sea Wasp, whether he/she wants to admit it or not being another
question, seems to state otherwise -- and is rather shocked that I
would believe that were not the case.
> You've stated an absolute. Disproving an absolute requires one
> counter-example. In this case, one of the counter-examples is "Nausicaa
> of the Valley of the Wind" - that anime was not designed as a
> merchandising vehicle.
And how much money did Nausicaa lose?
You see, here's the problem with your statement: Look at the American
industry as a nice counter-example to your concept and name me ONE
series that hasn't been merchandised to death that has realistically
made anything worth its being released over here. I'll await the
responses.
If Sea Wasp's declaration is correct, then Nausicaa should never have
been made. Again, I'm only drawing off what I read is some other
people's baseline assumptions about anime (which would explain a lot
about how they support the product getting ripped off to shreds -- if
it's nothing but an infomercial, it's financially worthless on its
own...).
> >I "overgeneralized" to the only real conclusions which could be drawn
> >by that "one fact" -- that if that "one fact" were true, then the
> >whole damn thing is being done so ass-backwards...
>
> You went from the one fact "most anime has associated merchandising" and
> turned it into "all anime is nothing but merchandising". That's the
> incorrect generalization ("most" becoming "all" and "associated"
> becoming "nothing but") that you made.
And, as I said before, Rob has it backwards. He's trying to think I'm
arguing A -> B -- I'm stating that there are those who are telling me
that it is "Sun rises in the East"-level obvious that B is true (that
all anime is basically only put out there to satisfy merchandising for
the product), to which A then clearly follows (B -> A).
He's got it backwards. Until he unravels that, we're at opposition
and this is the only real result he can do at that point:
> Continuing to say "no, I'm right" without supporting evidence only goes
> to show how delusional you are.
No, you guys are the delusional ones -- you need to be to remain anime
fans at this point, so I can only be very angry at the lot of you and
not really specific ones.
Understand how ludicrous a lot of what you support is, and you'll
understand why I draw that conclusion. You cannot hope for a future
to this industry (of any kind!!) if you truly support half of what
you've said here.
> And since you haven't really changed your delusional behaviour, back
> into the killfile you go. I don't have time to teach you the critical
> thinking skills that your high-school teachers should have taught you.
Unkillfiling me was your first mistake.
Ahh, then you pull the "critical thinking in school" canard. One of
the last bastions of the damned wrong.
Let me tell you something about American education, Mr. Kelk, even
though you will never read this:
All the American education system is is:
1) A babysitting motif to keep the kids in line while the parents work
for the corporations.
2) "Critical thinking" is thinking critical of anything (and any_one_)
different than the norm. If you don't act like everyone else, think
like everyone else, and subscribe to the same canards as everyone else
(beliving even page one of the shit they throw you in Civics class is
a prime example), you are cast out. If you're simply "that
different", you get laughed at, scorned, and otherwise shamed into
leaving or submission. If you start fighting back, or have the
perception that you can _really_ fight back, then you can be deemed a
lot more than just "different".
They will send you home before you become another Columbine.
Mike
darkst...@gmail.com
> >A-HA!! That may be the case, but, understand, there are those here
> >who are saying that that merchandising is the WHOLE AND ENTIRE POINT
> >of creating and making the anime.
>
> No, making money is the point of creating and making the anime.
> Merchandising is not the only revenue stream.
There are those who strongly argue the Japanese model says otherwise.
Even the DVD releases are little more than logo merchandise, augmented
often by what we could call "Limited Editions" over here with
merchandising inserts.
> >Should that be the case, for the
> >reason you give, much of the anime made should never have been made --
> >because there's nothing, really, to merchandise off of a lot of
> >titles.
>
> That isn't true. Merchandise can be based of any title you care to
> name.
That may be the case in theory, but in execution?? The thing is, for
Sea Wasp to be correct, it _has to be the way you're proposing_. One
Jonathan plushie, a couple of pillow covers, a couple CD's, and a
satin jacket does not a merchandising campaign make!
> >Why? If the whole point is to advertise merchandise for otaku to
> >waste their money on, then wouldn't it be better just to present it in
> >a cheaper and more obvious form??
>
> No. It would be better to present it in a way that works.
That is why anime is a very poor choice for it, as Shonen Jump's
massively-popular manga-based mega-franchises show. It adds about
$100-180K an episode to the advertising costs of such a merchandising
campaign -- and, at least over here, we can all admit it doesn't work.
Mike
darkst...@gmail.com
<seaw...@sgeinc.invalid.com> wrote:
> Rob Kelk wrote:
> > And since you haven't really changed your delusional behaviour, back
> > into the killfile you go. I don't have time to teach you the critical
> > thinking skills that your high-school teachers should have taught you.
>
> I never saw high-school teachers showing people critical thinking. Or
> if they did, it was a mistake, in spite of rather than supporting the
> curriculum. High school isn't there to teach you to think.
Nope. As I just got done saying to Rob.
Now, they'll _TELL YOU_ otherwise...
Mike
Derek Janssen
> (I know that he's already killfiled me again -- unkillfiling me was
> his first mistake,
On this, we can all agree. -_-
Derek Janssen (truer words, etc.)
eja...@verizon.net
Rob Kelk
Yes - silly of me to think he'd actually learned something. Sorry about
that, everyone...
Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)
> On Wed, 24 Sep 2008 06:17:20 GMT, Derek Janssen
> <eja...@nospam.verizon.net> wrote:
>
>> darkst...@gmail.com wrote:
>>
>>> (I know that he's already killfiled me again -- unkillfiling me was
>>> his first mistake,
>> On this, we can all agree. -_-
>>
>> Derek Janssen (truer words, etc.)
>> eja...@verizon.net
>
> Yes - silly of me to think he'd actually learned something. Sorry about
> that, everyone...
>
It's okay, we all make mistakes like that.
Mikey makes lots more of them.
For instance, taking my emphasis on the merchandising purpose of anime
to mean that it's impossible for there to be a non-merchandising purpose.
Miyazaki anime are clear exceptions -- but that's rather like the old
Disney or current Disney/Pixar, in that they're the only animated
offerings that could RELY on making their money back without
merchandising (not that Disney won't merchandise its stuff, mind you!)
The point being that anime isn't some kind of Special Art Form.
It's a BUSINESS. One in which -- ESPECIALLY in Japan -- the major
expected form of revenue isn't from the show. If the show makes it big,
hey, great, but that's not the point for most of them.
A few people get to make anime that has something to do with what THEY
want it to be. Usually AFTER they've managed to make something that hit
it big.
But most of it is there to make money, and the company DOES NOT CARE
how it makes money. Merchandising is apparently the main one in Japan,
and if the merchandising contracts/material can't cross the pond, hey,
that means the industry's going to be smaller.
Smaller of course does not mean dead, nonexistent, kicked the bucket,
shuffled off this mortal coil, gone to meet its Maker, joined the
bleedin' Choir Invisible!, but Starky will of course think it DOES.
Farix
Around a year ago, I stated that anime's popularity was a fad and that
fad was fading. Mikey originally scoffed at my premise because he was
trying to lay the blame of the industry's problems on fansubs.
Nevertheless, I appear to be one who was right.
Farix
Derek Janssen
And six months before THAT, I blamed it on studios overdealing and
overlicensing their series acquisitions on unsellable current titles,
and the customer "Boxset" move away from buying single-volume disks--
I appear to have been righter than *you*... ^_^
Derek Janssen (neener, neener!)
eja...@verizon.net
bobbie sellers
make a comeback when the US economy gets better,
and when some of the anime is good enough on all
counts to penetrate the Saturday morning kiddy
market. Another Pokemon, Card Captor Sakura,
Sailor Moon or even Yu Gi Oh is needed imho.
And there is no reason for it not to sell the models
or action figures or whatever. A game based on
the power-ups in SM might not be a loser. But
we all may be living in Second Life by that time.
Except for old crocks like me of course.
later
Bobbie
--
bobbie sellers - a retired nurse in San Francisco
Ningen banji Human beings do
Samazama no Every single kind
Baka a suru Of stupid thing
--- 117th edition of Haifu Yanagidaru published in 1832
darkst...@gmail.com
<seaw...@sgeinc.invalid.com> wrote:
> For instance, taking my emphasis on the merchandising purpose of anime
> to mean that it's impossible for there to be a non-merchandising purpose.
You make it sound as if it's obvious -- _OBVIOUS_ -- that the only
purpose to anime is to merchandise stuff.
I mean, think a second -- you're making it sound like that's the first
thing they tell you when you enter the anime fandom -- "Hey, all this
stuff is just put on video to make you buy shit."
It's like the first day of our radio broadcasting class when I went to
college, they basically told us straight-out: The only purpose to
radio is to get people to buy shit. It's all bringing an audience to
the advertisers. The actual entertainment product is only of value
with an audience to take to the advertisers.
> Miyazaki anime are clear exceptions -- but that's rather like the old
> Disney or current Disney/Pixar, in that they're the only animated
> offerings that could RELY on making their money back without
> merchandising (not that Disney won't merchandise its stuff, mind you!)
Ummm, Sea Wasp: You ever step in a Disney Store the last few
years??? With all the movie-laden stuff they have now...
As for the Miyazaki... I've seen a number of art books and videos and
wallscrolls and the like for his projects too. That the ads don't
come every ten minutes doesn't mean it's still not advertising product
-- unless it's counting on Japanese cinema to support the project, and
then STILL there's all this subsidiary product.
> The point being that anime isn't some kind of Special Art Form.
Then it's worth nothing -- financially, it's worthless. It is, and,
for there to be an industry, HAS TO BE a Special Art Form. Else
there's no point.
I mean, THINK (for the first time in a long time on this newsgroup):
You are putting out a product which costs you $4-7K a minute to make
-- and that's just TV-level. Cinema is, obviously, much higher. If
it's not a Special Art Form, and is put out there to move product,
then why can't it be done cheaper, more effectively, and less likely
to be legally hijacked?
Think Shonen Jump there. Think manga there. I mean, look, for
example, what happened with Viz the last couple of years -- they
released Full Moon on both manga and DVD. Without sufficient
merchandising behind the project, it died before they could finish and
release just over half of the English dub.
Once they finished releasing the English-translated manga, Full Moon
was DOA. Hence, why not -- here's the point -- JUST RELEASE THE
MANGA???
> It's a BUSINESS. One in which -- ESPECIALLY in Japan -- the major
> expected form of revenue isn't from the show. If the show makes it big,
> hey, great, but that's not the point for most of them.
Then the show shouldn't be first. That's the point I've been making.
(Of course, if someone credible to you had been making this point,
you'd discuss it with them.)
Since the show is not the point for most (I'd say more than most,
given your comments...), then why not either find another, more
effective advertising vehicle (especially international!) or not green-
light the project without an immediate merchandising blitz? Then, no
need to go begging for money -- unless the whole project goes up in
flames first.
> A few people get to make anime that has something to do with what THEY
> want it to be. Usually AFTER they've managed to make something that hit
> it big.
And then it becomes a financial dud like Kaleido Star -- because it
had no real merchandising to speak of.
(Junichi Sato's dream project. Took him three years to make it
reality.)
> But most of it is there to make money, and the company DOES NOT CARE
> how it makes money. Merchandising is apparently the main one in Japan,
> and if the merchandising contracts/material can't cross the pond, hey,
> that means the industry's going to be smaller.
No, it means the industry cannot exist at all -- for all the OTHER
REASONS I've tried to ram down your throat without success.
And now that there will essentially be no such thing as disposable or
discretionary income in the frighteningly near future for over 90% of
America, all the more reason for Japan to cut out.
> Smaller of course does not mean dead, nonexistent, kicked the bucket,
> shuffled off this mortal coil, gone to meet its Maker, joined the
> bleedin' Choir Invisible!, but Starky will of course think it DOES.
Yep. Especially given the expenses involved, Sea Gnat.
Mike (Or do I need to go through those numbers _again_???)
darkst...@gmail.com
> Around a year ago, I stated that anime's popularity was a fad and that
> fad was fading. Mikey originally scoffed at my premise because he was
> trying to lay the blame of the industry's problems on fansubs.
> Nevertheless, I appear to be one who was right.
Six million stolen episodes a week (now by two surveys, just American
"fans" counted) show you are wrong.
You're thinking like the Bandai Visual head that put the number of
core anime fans at 200K.
Anime _itself_ is not a fad. _Paying for it_ IS!!
Mike
darkst...@gmail.com
You don't license what you don't believe the fanbase will buy because
they want the product.
The problem is is that the product, if the anime itself, was already
stolen from the licensor within a couple or three days of the show
airing in Japan.
There would not be "overlicensing" if fansubs weren't such a massive
problem.
There would not be "overdealing" if fans stole the vast, vast, VAST
majority of all anime viewed in America.
Because then the companies would be able to get that anime, as an
industry, would be the fad that Farix believes he is right about.
Only because of the fans' criminal and civil misconduct is there any
concept of overlicensing, overdealing, too many shows, too many
studios, too many licensors.
It is all YOUR FUCKING FAULT AS A FANBASE.
But, at this point and time, anime is not a fad until they start
enforcing copyright.
Mike
Invid Fan
<dhstr...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> Around a year ago, I stated that anime's popularity was a fad and that
> fad was fading. Mikey originally scoffed at my premise because he was
> trying to lay the blame of the industry's problems on fansubs.
> Nevertheless, I appear to be one who was right.
>
"Fad" might be a bit too strong, as we are talking about something with
a 20 year history in the marketplace (dating from the first uncut
commercial subtitled anime releases). More like a bubble that is
bursting, with the market contracting a bit to more natural levels.
--
Chris Mack *quote under construction*
'Invid Fan'
Chika
Maybe. The thing with fads, however, is that while they are in, people
jump in with both feet. The true test is how many of them leave once the
fad is superceded by something else. At that point, a fad becomes a cult,
and they tend to have much more of a lifespan to them.
Trouble is that cults often attract their share of naysayers, such as
Mikey, whose only concern is to point out all the negative stuff. You can
often contact such folk at an address in Fibberville, capital of the
Planet of the Hopeless Liars (wonder how many folk will get the reference
this time?!?)
--
//\ // Chika <miyuki><at><crashnet><org><uk>
// \// Mitsuo... Menda... naha naha...
... 1st we shoot all the lawyers, 2nd we strangle them, 3rd..
darkst...@gmail.com
> In article <gbem2h$fi...@news.parasun.com>, Farix
>
> <dhstran...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> > Around a year ago, I stated that anime's popularity was a fad and that
> > fad was fading. Mikey originally scoffed at my premise because he was
> > trying to lay the blame of the industry's problems on fansubs.
> > Nevertheless, I appear to be one who was right.
>
> "Fad" might be a bit too strong, as we are talking about something with
> a 20 year history in the marketplace (dating from the first uncut
> commercial subtitled anime releases). More like a bubble that is
> bursting, with the market contracting a bit to more natural levels.
That is not possible without copyright enforcement... Period.
Mike (Unless a "more natural level of the market" is zero...)
darkst...@gmail.com
> Maybe. The thing with fads, however, is that while they are in, people
> jump in with both feet. The true test is how many of them leave once the
> fad is superceded by something else. At that point, a fad becomes a cult,
> and they tend to have much more of a lifespan to them.
So you're basically saying that there's a chance anime may be becoming
more of a "cult", perhaps a "cult of personality" or something to the
effect?? In which case, definitely see my response below.
> Trouble is that cults often attract their share of naysayers, such as
> Mikey, whose only concern is to point out all the negative stuff. You can
> often contact such folk at an address in Fibberville, capital of the
> Planet of the Hopeless Liars (wonder how many folk will get the reference
> this time?!?)
Well, that's basically because you're probably in the cult and
brainwashed to believe what the cult wants you to believe.
Now, that actually _DOES_ sound a bit like anime fandom as a whole,
come to think of it. And, as such, needs all the debunkers it can get
to expose it as full of shit.
Mike