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NEWS: Industry Group Head Says Anime is a Bubble that Burst

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Japan to Create Fund to Boost Anime & More Overseas

Industry Group Head Says Anime is a Bubble that Burst

In 2007, domestic anime DVD sales fell further to 89.4 million yen (US$904 million).

Further, I guess you're not sick of the constant "heh, i'm so wise and intelligent and above all of this *grabs popcorn, downloads nanoha fansubs*" self-serving smug posts that pop up in every fansub-related thread, but I am, so I poked fun at that guy.

Quote:

Because any information that doesn't jive with whatever conclusion you've come to, even without doing any real research on the subject yourself, is "biased", and that means it's bunk, because you say it is.

Zac, that may go both ways...

Yay..."another" fansub debate....*grabs popcorn and moves the FF tab below aegisub*

I can tell you right now if Funimation came out and said "Fansubs are costing us X amount", the fans would scream bloody murder and would never, ever accept it as even close to the truth. And no organization exists that has the resources or the unlimited access to years' worth of sensitive sales data to independently study the matter.

Zac wrote:

I can tell you right now if Funimation came out and said "Fansubs are costing us X amount", the fans would scream bloody murder and would never, ever accept it as even close to the truth. And no organization exists that has the resources or the unlimited access to years' worth of sensitive sales data to independently study the matter.

Heh.
I couldn't help but notice the contradiction in this.

I don't discount there are some people who went from buying to downloading. That's just a given.

But I can't fathom a justification for these industries to state piracy is taking away from sales when those sales aren't going to happen anyway.

Distributor: Hey, don't download! Buy our DVDs because they're loaded with extras you can't find on a fan sub site!
Consumer: Okay!
*purchases* Extras: textless opening and ending theme songs and a few previews for other DVDs.
(yes, not all series are like this, but quite a few are)

Woo hoo. Add to this the extras content in Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya when these "extras" use propaganda regarding fan sub sites on purchased material.

Yeah, I'm so freakin' glad part of my $50 went to this crap.


And you know, I also can't discount the fact our monies are being spent going after these sites rather than utilizing them to market incentives to get these people to buy.

As a purchaser, I hope you can understand why I post regarding this topic.

Hmm, I had always thought that Japan was focusing on quality over quantity.

prime_pm wrote:

Then I found the forum has degraded to talks of fansubs that had absolute dick to do with the original topic.

Well, the article did mention fansubbing and DVD-rips as part of the problem outside of Japan.

I would personally love to see the other aspect of the article, too: quality over quantity. The problem is, will that translate into better sales? Or has it truly become a niche-market, where series with (usually unnecessary) bishoujo and mecha tack-ons is what it takes to get something to sell? Will experimental animation (think Kaiba) fall by the way-side because it isn't marketable?

Venturing into didactic animation might work in Japan, but I strongly doubt it will sell in America, so that's an internal, domestic solution.

Possible solutionsfor eliminating the need/appeal for fansubs?
1) Streaming. I don't use fansubs for any series that is streamed, and try to boycott groups that fansub streamed series.
2) Wider awareness of how to rent/borrow anime from stores and libraries.
3) A return to the sharing-your-stuff model of anime from back in the days of anime clubs etc. Not only will it encourage anime fans to actual get to know each other in RL, it will also encourage a legal network of sharing anime to preview it.

The more these solutions get implemented, the less fansubs will be necessary, and the more support real fans will give to companies seeking legal action against fansubbers who won't play by the new rules of the game. Note I say "real," because anyone who doesn't support the industry in some way or another isn't a fan, they're a leach.

vashfanatic wrote:

Descent123 wrote: I don't like moe shows, maids, fan service shows and etc. Neither do I, and while that stuff is overly popular, there's plenty out there that doesn't have anything in it, you just need to look.

I did, and it's just not that good compare to the stuff I grew up with or like.

They are often full of unclothed female characters doing things they couldn't show you on TV, sometimes you get a new episode or merchandise sometimes they even put a hentai episode on a DVD.

Don't loose hope just yet. Because I'm not done, so neither should you.

DomFortress wrote:

Don't loose hope just yet. Because I'm not done, so neither should you.

I'm far from done, but I don't like any of the new stuff at all. Then again I'm hoping that the new Cobra OVA/TV series and the Ai no Kusabi OVAs will be great.

Last week I went and purchase a bunch of laserdiscs off a guy and he pretty much said that there's no good anime anymore (according to the guy all the new shows are a joke to him), so he's pretty much semi-retiring from anime.

I noticed a decided lack of blame placed on fansubs...

I share his sentiment as well as yours. The 80's through early 90's were truly the golden age for Japanese animation overall mainly due to the massive OVA format and the steady theatrical releases of high quality anime series. Back then, anime was well made to simply tell a story, instead of today, when animated TV advertisements are being mass-produced to promote story elements that sell characters related merchandises. That, my friend, is the state that we're in, "quantity" overtook "quality".

And damn, LDs! You're more hardcore than I could imagine. The only LD I've seen was the Tehchi Muyo OVA that my sister owns, and she doesn't even have a LD player.