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Forum - View topicNEWS: ICv2 Interviews Funimation Founder Gen Fukunaga
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ruro niko
 Posts: 109 Location: Tennessee |
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I like to hear the shift away from single volume releases and Japanese companies becoming a bit more cooperative with the American companies in allowing straight box set releases and digital downloads. I hope he's right in that DVDs are staying for a while. While I think a shift towards more digital products are necessary, I still like getting those hard copies.
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matthewlow
 Posts: 147 Location: San Ramon, California |
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Gen seems to know what he's talking about. I'm glad to see someone high up to know the state of the industry.
Here's to hope Case Closed gets the season box release and picks up sales. The remastered DBZ movies sounds interesting. I have the specials preordered, but the movies I didn't hear about. Looking forward to picking that up as well. |
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quartears
Posts: 46 |
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talking about it again. it'll never end!
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Porcupine
 Posts: 1033 |
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Yeah, it's great to see that Gen Fukunaga and Funimation apparently are well-aware of the state of the industry and seem to be willing to make bold moves to repair it.
I thought it very interesting that he favors making anime CHEAPER still in America, despite the already huge price differences between anime in America vs Japan. In addition he also stated that boxset-only releases are probably the way of the future. Which is in line with being cheaper. This is great news for anime enthusiasts in America I think. I weakly agree with this idea (from an industry standpoint), although there are some major arguments against it. He also stated that anime may need to move away from DVD sales as the primary source of income. This is something I've been saying for quite some time. Personally I think broadcast television is the necessary solution, not paid Internet downloads, but if resources are available to achieve both then that's fine. But here is the scariest thing about this article, by far. Some readers may not have read to the end or missed it because it was small, but Gen Fukunaga hinted that ADVision is in big financial trouble. This especially concerns me because I had heard the exact same thing half a year ago from an employee at Suncoast. Instead, Geneon was the first company to fall. After that, I figured that the Suncoast employee didn't know what he was talking about. But now it seems that he did, so I'm doubly worried. If ADVision goes bankrupt too that will be catastrophe for the anime industry in the USA. |
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kokuryu
 Posts: 915 |
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Wow this is the first interview I have seen from someone who actually knows everything on all sides of the industry correctly. I think they will lose more than they gain though if they dont go the route of making zero-day anime available and rather instead try to go after the fansubbers and remove that side of the equation alone.
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GATSU
Posts: 15604 |
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It seems like the the priority should be for marketers try to get more women to buy particular anime titles geared towards them, not just sell them to fanboys who might like them, because the latter group is clearly not enough to sustain that genre... |
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ruro niko
Posts: 109 Location: Tennessee |
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I read that far, and with ADV ending the 24/7 Anime Network, Anime Advocates and Newtype, it does seem that way. It's very troubling too since ADV is such a big part of the US anime fandom that it going down hill would be a major blow to the fandom, one that it might not recover from. |
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GATSU
Posts: 15604 |
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I dunno. ADV's been around a lot longer than FUNimation. Just because they're cutting back doesn't mean they're hurting yet. If Geneon had made similar cutbacks sooner, I'd imagine they'd still be in the business. Plus, they still got the potential to co-produce a successful Eva movie. I can't say the same about FUNi and DBZ.
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Porcupine
Posts: 1033 |
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koku, I don't think that Gen Fukunaga wrote that he wants to "go after" fansubbers full-force or anything. He only stated that he thought that actively considering and doing something about the fansub-piracy issue was necessary. That doesn't necessarily translate to what you are probably thinking of.
If anything, one thing Gen said which I totally agree with, is that despite taking an active view towards fansubs, it is better if the anime industry can lie low and let Hollywood hopefully deal with the piracy issue for them. Since the piracy issue plagues them as well (arguably to a far lesser extent, though) and they have more power to stop things. I don't think that will work though but if it does that would be awesome. GATSU, I could be wrong on this since I'm not Gen, but I think his attitude is that marketing towards women is somewhat futile. He thinks that males are the ones who buy DVDs despite anyone's best efforts to reverse that trend. He said that it's not specific to anime, it applies to all videos, Hollywood movies, etc. He even said that lots of females already watch, it's just that they do not buy. Marketing will not help a problem like that. Marketing only gets people to watch. Marketing does nothing to prevent piracy. Again though, I'm not Gen Fukunaga. That is just my interpretation of what he said. GATSU, ADV isn't just cutting back. The fact that they are cutting back is indicated by the evidence that ruro niko just said. But what Gen Fukunaga just said, and what I heard from a Suncoast employee half a year ago, is that ADV is hurting financially, a great deal. It's true that ADV has been around since the beginning but I think (I could be wrong) US Manga is just as old as them and they went into total hibernation in the past as well (they are currently coming back though). Pioneer/Geneon was also a reasonably old anime company. |
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Serge
 Posts: 162 |
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I liked the interview, it was short and sweet, and it had stuff which I really liked to hear, especially shortening times with R2 and R1 Releases, and boxsets instead of single releases, because I've noticed that FUNimation boxsets are much much cheaper than buying seperately. (Baki the Grappler for example).
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jel123
Posts: 108 |
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I agree that this is someone that appears to "get it" when it comes to anime distribution today.
That said I disagree with some of his statements; On the question of expanding download-to-own:
And on the future of the DVD format (vs. download):
Overall the interview has some good info. |
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Maidenoftheredhand
 Posts: 2634 |
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That was a very nice interview. I liked that unlike some other industry reps Gen Fukunaga didn't try to blame the fans. Instead he focused on what Funimation is doing to solve the issues. I like the sound of more box sets.
Although I am definitely worried about what he said about ADV. After what happened with Geneon, it would be horrible to lose another anime distributor. And ADV is one of my favorite companies. Although I disagree that women don't buy DVDs. Maybe women don't buy DVDs because they are never marketed too. The best selling series usually get mainstream TV exposure, which female orientated series never get. |
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Dargonxtc
 Posts: 4463 Location: Nc5xd7+ スターダストの海洋 |
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Good things I heard:
Remember, these files are not going to be in .ogm or .mks format. This is for obvious reasons. If they make there own format, it will be labeled as proprietary and boycotted. 
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kokuryu
Posts: 915 |
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Hollywood has begun to take steps to end all DRM in their downloadable movies. I dont think many people realize this yet, but essentially a few movie studios have already gotten the message that DRM is a bad thing when it comes to digital downloads. So when people purchase items they are removing the DRM, and only keeping DRM for digital rentals. However Japanese companies still seem to think that DRM is a good thing. This is where the conflict will arise in the end.
In general there is zero need for DRM on anything - its just a matter of making everything available for a price that people are willing to pay for. Someone who is going to pirate something will do so whether or not it has DRM on it, so DRM does NOTHING to prevent piracy. It only increases the production costs for an item. They just need to provide the video in a format that everyone wants and make it easy for people to purchase it and have a good variety for whats available - that is all. So far in the few test markets this has been done in the rate of piracy has DROPPED and not increased, so it seems to be a viable solution for the long run. |
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Greed1914
 Posts: 4660 |
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I definitely like the sound of shorter waits and lower prices, but if skipping single volumes and going to sets is what happens then the download-to-own aspect needs to be a big focus because I'd be willing to spend a reasonable price to sample a show, but I wouldn't really consider buying a set with little knowledge of it. However, faster sets would be awesome especially compared to getting one volume every couple of months and waiting who knows how long for the set.
Also, it's good to know that the Japanese companies are finally loosening the contracts because that's something that makes it harder for companies over hear to meet demand. ADV doesn't surprise me considering all the cut backs they've had lately. I also agree with his point that bandwidth and other issues present a big problem for downloading. Storage is a pricey aspect that people won't like and since I prefer dubs, I'd really only be buying downloads as a sample and not as part of the real collection, provided that what he said about the downloads being primarily subs. |
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