Anime Defense

Western Japanese Anime

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Harvie) — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 06:09:00 +0000

Batman: Gotham Knight

Something interesting is going on with anime.

There has been a trend slowly cropping up in the anime industry where american properties are being turned into anime. It started back in 2002 with the release of The Animatrix, a compilation of 9 short films taking place in the Matrix universe, each done different by a different Japanese director and animation studio. Since then, there have been many similar projects done, such as Batman: Gotham Knight, Dante's Inferno, and Halo Legends. Out of these four, I was most surprised by Microsoft when they announced their plans for Halo anime shorts. Additionally, seasons 2 and 3 of The Boondocks featured segments animated by acclaimed Japanese animation studio Madhouse.

X-Men

More recently, American companies have turned to Japan to make anime versions of some famous properties. Marvel is working with Madhouse to bring us anime based on X-Men, Blade, Wolverine, and Iron Man. The latter two premiere this Friday on G4. More and more american properties are being made into anime at the behest of their American owners. There has been quite a lot of interest following these anime adaptions of these traditionally American series, and they've been getting a lot of support from the anime community. However the Marvel anime are not, in my opinion, the most interesting development in regards to western properties being turned into anime.

Supernatural: The Animation

Supernatural is a live-action television show on The CW (formerly The WB) that has just been renewed for it's seventh season. It follows the adventures of Sam and Dean Winchester, two brothers who spend their days fighting against the supernatural. In June 2010, the Japanese Warner Brother's website announced the Supernatural the Animation project. The English release will feature Jared Padalecki, the actor for Sam Winchester in the original series, as the voice actor for his character for the animated series.

This was the first time that an American, live-action television series was turned into an anime. I was personally ecstatic when I heard the news that Supernatural was getting an anime, partially because I am a fan of the series, but also be cause of what it means for other American properties. American properties, obviously, have a much bigger following in America than anime does. If anime can attach itself to American properties by making anime adaptions of them, it will have a much wider audience to sell to, which means more money for the anime industry.

Plus I would not complain if there were to be an anime adaption of Harry Potter.

In the Name of the Moon, I will Re-License You!?

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Harvie) — Fri, 15 Jul 2011 05:47:00 +0000

Things have been astir in the anime and manga world lately regarding an old classic: Sailor Moon. Last March, Kodansha USA announced that it would be releasing the original Sailor Moon manga in North America, and now, earlier this week, Great Eastern Entertainment (the merchandising company which handles almost all licensed anime merchandise in North America) has announced several pieces of Sailor Moon merchandise.

The merchandising company Great Eastern Entertainment lists four Sailor Moon products on its website as "coming soon" — a set of playing cards, a wall scroll, a notebook, and a binder [...]. The new products have a Toei Animation logo printed on them but also have "No Price Yet." Great Eastern Entertainment has produced Sailor Moon merchandise in the past.

Original Article at Anime News Network

These new developments with the old series are big news. In North America, Sailor Moon held a similar standing as Dragon Ball Z, but for girls (and most boys, but they won't admit that). The English adaption, however, was altered and much of the dialog was changed, in order to make it appropriate for younger audiences, and the final two seasons were never licensed for release. Fans have been begging for a re-release of Sailor Moon for ages, and its looking like that wish is finally starting to come true. There has been an "international revival" of the series happening globally, with the licenses being renewed in countries outside of Japan. However, as of yet, there has been no mention of the series being licensed in North America, but at this stage it seems only a matter of time.

Sailor Moon is such a big deal in the anime world, that whichever company gets the rights to release it in North America will be making lots of money. Several years ago, before the dissolution of ADV Films, David Williams (now working for Sentai Filmworks) once commented on how much he wished that Toei would let them license and re-dub Sailor Moon. Just this last April, at Anime Boston, Justin Rojas, the Social Media Manager at Funimation, said that the show is something that Funimation is definitely interested in.

It will be interesting to see who manages to acquire Sailor Moon, though I personally have my money on Funimation.

Fukunaga, Ledford, and Greenfield

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Harvie) — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 09:14:00 +0000

I've decided to take a break from the depressing topic of piracy this week and talk about something else. Since I'm working on obtaining my Entertainment Business Masters currently, why not talk a little bit about the origins of two of the most well known companies in the anime industry?

One of the most successful anime franchises in the United States is, without a doubt, Dragon Ball Z. Brought to the United States back in 1996, even today it remains one of Funimation's best selling series. The man who brought it to America was Gen Fukunaga, the President of Funimation Entertainment.

Gen Fukunaga was born in Japan, and grew up in West Lafayette, Indiana. Fukunaga spent his entire 8th grade year in Japan, where he became enamored with the Japanese style of animation. Years later, he would remember the cartoons he saw in Japan and would form a company with the sole purpose of bringing those shows to the United States.

Fukunaga's uncle was one of the producers for the hit series Dragon Ball, in Japan, and approached Gen about bringing the series over to America. Gen had been intent on starting his own company in order to bring Japanese animation to the United States, and Dragon Ball seemed to be a great starting point. Having drafted up his business plan for the company that would become Funimation, Gen began to meet with investors.

There was one particular investment group that was interested in Gen's business plan. Several years earlier, that had invested in another company bringing Japanese content over to the United States. That company, Nintendo, had done phenomenally well, so they were very interested in things coming over from Japan.

Fukunaga had all sorts of data about anime, which he laid out for the investors. However, they weren't all that interested until he mentioned one fact. Dragon Ball was the "#1 video game in Japan, and other territories." Once they heard that, they were hooked. They were convinced that regardless of whether or not the show succeeded or failed in the US, their investment would be saved by the video game.

They were, of course, in correct about that. While the video games have done will in the United States, their success pales in comparison to the success of the anime. However, when you are trying to get investors, you have to get their attention, and Gen succeeded in doing that. While not an integral part of his plan, the video game was able to hook his investors enough to get the funding for what he really wanted to do: which was the anime. In order to get investors, you need to have some tidbit that really catches their interest, even if it's not your main focus. As long as you get their interest, it doesn't matter how.

Matt Greenfield

John Ledford

Funimation isn't the only important company in the history of anime. ADV, while no longer in existance, was once the leader in the North American Anime market. The company was started by John Ledford and Matthew Greenfield, with their release of Devil Hunter Yohko.

Ledford and Greenfield started the company by themselves, doing the majority of the work in David Williams living room. Initially they only gave the shows subtitles, but several years later began dubbing the shows into English.

The first show they licensed was Devil Hunter Yohko, which they licensed from the Japanese distribution company Toho for $100,000. Toho reluctantly licensed them the show, unsure whether or not they would be able to handle it. Ledford and Greenfield made their money back within three months.

While not initially looking for investors, Ledford and Greenfield needed to convince Toho to license them the show. Although Toho was skeptical about whether or not ADV could handle the distribution, nevertheless they did end up licensing them the show. Once they had succeed with the license, it was much easier for them to get additional licenses in funding, eventually culminating with a partnership with the Japanese investment firm Sojitz.

This just goes to show that the best weapon entrepreneurs have when trying to convince investors is success. If your business plan has proven sales, especially if they are as promising as ADV's were with their first license, that is something that investors want in on. The are almost guaranteed to make back their money, and more, which is what investors are looking for. Success is what investors want, so that's what you want to give them.

Sources: Interview with Funimation's Gen Fukunaga, Why Grow Up? - Forbes.com, ADV Teams up with Sojitz

Second PodKAAst and Beta.Funimation.com!

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Harvie) — Fri, 13 May 2011 18:28:00 +0000

The second episode of the PodKAAst is finally up! We discuss Anime Boston, TokoyPop, Sony, and allude to guests for future episodes. We've also got a super secret special announcement waiting after the ending music of the PodKAAst!

During the PodKAAst we mention Funimation's new site, which is currently in Beta and you can check it out at beta.funimation.com!

As is quite fitting for the leading anime distributer in the United States, Funimation is also the leader in social media platforms. During Anime Boston, their Social Media Manager, Justin Rojas, stated that they have over 200,000 likes on their Facebook page (rivaling Capcom), and over 20,000 followers on Twitter. This is far beyond what any other US anime company has, so they are pretty good at it. It's only fitting that their new site, Beta.Funimation.com, has been heavily influenced by social media.

Beta.Funimation.com has been the pet project of Adam Sheehan, one of Funimation's Marketing Managers. He said that Funimation's new website isn't trying to be the Facebook of anime, however that is clearly what it is. Don't worry though, Funimation, we like that. We like that a lot.

In addition to having all of the things we're accustomed too with the old Funimation site, like show info, free streaming anime, the Funimation Update Blog, etc, there are many new and cool things available with beta. There are now forums, convention info and reports, cosplay photos, cool new videos, and users can even have their own blogs. On top of all that, the site design just looks really cool and clean.

So go and check out Funimation's new website, currently at Beta.Funimation.com until they move it over to the real site once all the bugs have been worked out!

Don't forget to check out the PodKAAst and look for the special announcement as well!

Don't Blame Sony

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Harvie) — Fri, 06 May 2011 05:41:00 +0000

By now it's common knowledge that Sony has been hacked and that massive amounts of personal data was stolen. Now, while not directly related to anime piracy, it was very interesting to observe people reaction in wake of the theft. So many people are very angry that Sony allowed this to happen, and are less concerned with the hacker group that did the actual stealing.

As a programmer myself, I know how hard it is to make something hack proof. It is nearly impossible to account for every way your programs might be cracked, and some new way might crop up the next day because of some development in technology. Sony doesn't just sit around and let people break in. That's not very good for business, as recent events have shown us. I don't doubt that they make every effort to try and keep their network secure, as evidenced by their move against George Hotz in January. Sony operated the PSN for almost five years without this problem, so it's not as if the way to break in was obvious to anyone. If someone has the skill and is determined to hack your network, it is going to happen sooner or later. Because of this, I find it very hard to be angry with Sony, even though my own account on the PlayStation Network has probably been compromised.

The real ones at fault here are the hackers. Regardless of who they are, they are the ones who purposefully broke into the network and stole the information. They are the ones that stole the personal information, not Sony.

As I thought about this, I found the parallels between this and when the Fractale Production Committee ordered the halt of the Fractale simulcast earlier this year. It was stopped in response to the massive amount of illegal copies of the show that were available for free on the internet. Since the revenue for Fractale comes from the legal viewings of the show, the Fractale Production Committee decided to halt the simulcast until the amount of piracy was cut down on. Immediately, fans of the show were very vocal and very angry at the Fractale Production Committee for this decision. No one was angry at the people pirating it, or the people making it available online for free.

It is really unfortunate that this has been the way people have reacted to this sort of thing. I suppose it's because people find it easier to blame companies rather than an unknown group of people spread out across the internet. I don't blame the Fractale Production Committee, and I certainly don't blame Sony. They are doing their best to correct the problem, and people aren't helping very much by laying all the blame on them.

Hopefully people will wise up and place the blame on the people who are really responsible.

Source: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1380050/Sony-admits-Weve-hacked-PlayStation-Network-outage.html

Tokyopop Ends North American Distribution

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Harvie) — Mon, 18 Apr 2011 03:43:00 +0000

You know those days where you wake up, eat some breakfast, and then log on to the internet and low and behold, it seems that the world ended while you were sleeping and blissfully unaware?

That's what it felt like Friday when I heard that Tokyopop had announced that it was closing it's North American publishing division. I've been buying from Tokyopop since I first bought Marmalade Boy way back in 2005, so hearing that Tokyopop was shutting down it's North American division was quite disheartening.

Tokyopop was one of the leading manga distributors in the United States, along with Viz Media and DelRey. They were the first to pioneer publishing manga in it's original right to left reading format, instead of flipping it to be read left to right. With the trouble that manga industry has been facing due to illegal scans of manga being freely and easily available on the internet.

Tokyopop also cited Borders' recent filing for bankruptcy as one of the reasons for them closing. People are spending less and less time in physical bookstores, and I have personally noticed that the bookstores I frequent don't keep their manga stock very current.

What's even more discouraging is that last December Tokyopop opened up a print on demand store for some of their older titles. I was very excited about this, and was hoping that it would be a change to help the manga industry increase it's sales, since it would provide them with an additional revenue stream without the risk of not being able to sell all the stock they've purchased. Unfortunately, the print on demand store, along with the rest of their publishing, is not closed.

I'm hoping another company, like Viz, which has some of the most popular manga series like Naruto and Bleach, will make a move to do a print on demand model with some of their titles. While the popular ones will always sell in stores, it will hopefully be more economically safe for them to sell the more niche or older manga as print on demand purchases.

Here's hoping things start to look up, and as always, don't be a parasite.

Source: http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2011-04-15/tokyopop-to-close-north-american-publishing-division

PodKAAst

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Harvie) — Thu, 14 Apr 2011 23:26:00 +0000

Finally put up the first episode of the PodKAAst, where myself and other people involved with KeepAnimeAlive.com talk about the anime industry and what we are up to at KeepAnimeAlive.com.

Greg Ayres: State of the Industry Panel

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Harvie) — Wed, 13 Apr 2011 01:15:00 +0000

Having finally finished uploading the Bootleg Panel from Bakuretsu Con 2010, I've moved on to the other panel Greg Ayres hosted concerning the welfare of the anime industry.

Greg Ayres talks about the state of the anime industry as it currently stands, detailing the damage he's seen done to the industry in his time, as well as the difficulties the industry has faced in attempting anime simulcasts.

Bootlegs, Fansubs, Scanlations, oh my!

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Harvie) — Tue, 22 Mar 2011 08:08:00 +0000

I've talked a lot about the illegal downloading and internet piracy of anime, and it is one of the most prevalent problems facing the anime industry today. However, because of that, I often tend to forget the other, closely related problem of bootleg anime DVDs and merchandise.

When visited Bakuretsu Con last year, I attended and recorded Greg Ayres' new anti-piracy panel focusing specifically on bootleg DVD's and bootlegs. The complete panel is now up for viewing on KeepAnimeAlive.com.

Greg Ayres, whom I've talked about previously, is by and large considered to be the spokesperson on the war against anime piracy. During the panel, he points out many ways to identify bootleg items, and not just DVDs. All sorts of items are subject to being bootlegged, from DVDs, to soundtracks, to posters, to wall scrolls, and even to figurines. One of the key ways he mentions to recognize a piece of bootlegged material is check and see if it's missing a copyright statement. Almost every piece of legitimate anime merchandise will have the companies copyright written somewhere on it.

After doing my own research on the subject, and looking at the Piracy FAQ Greg mentions, I looked at some of my own merchandise, to verify whether or not they were legitimate items. Unfortunately, I discovered more bootlegged items that I'm happy to admit among my collection. Over 3/4s of my anime posters are most likely bootleg, lacking any sort of copyright information at all. I'll be saving these for a future project involving fire and various implements of destruction.

Additionally one of the things that Greg mentions is a court case where some studios sued a flea market to knowingly allow vendors to sell illegitimate and bootleg items. The court ended up ruling in favor of the studios, saying that it was illegal for a marketplace to knowingly allow illegitimate infringing items to be sold. I believe the case he was talking about was Fonovisa, Inc. v. Cherry Auction, Inc.

Now, my own stance on piracy is pretty solid. It's illegal, and it's hurting an industry that I am very passionate about. A benefit to this is that I have the motivation to start a website and blog about it, or go out and record interviews with industry professionals. One of the drawbacks however, is keeping a cool temper when I'm confronted with people defending piracy. In Episode 4 of Conflict of Interest the shows host discuss anime piracy, and specifically a study that was done earlier this year that implied that streaming piracy was helping anime DVD sales

According to the study every 1% increase of views on YouTube correlated to a 0.25% increase in DVD sales. This has been interpreted as meaning that piracy was contributing to DVD sales. Personally, this doesn't make any sense to me. You can't prove that the people that made up the 0.25% increase in DVD sales are part of the 1% viewing the show on YouTube. It makes far more sense to assume the the increase in both DVD sales and YouTube views were simply because the show was just more popular.

They do make many false statements in their podcast, such as the fact that Blu-Ray discs are not region encoded and will play on any bluray player in the world. Unlike with DVD regions, Japan and the United States are in the same bluray region, but there are regions none-the-less.

Now they also make mention of the common pro-piracy argument that piracy acts as free advertising for the show, and contributes to it's popularity in the United States. While this may have been true back when anime was barely known in the United States and didn't have as much of a following, more people are just using them as an alternative to purchasing the legal DVDs. Regardless of whether or not they help the industry, it is still illegal and infringing on the rights of the creators. For me, this is still the strongest argument.

I also listened to the bonus content of episode 116 of Anime Today, a podcast run by RightStuf.com. They interviewed Ed Chavez, the marketing director from Vertical, Inc. A very interesting thing that Vertical, Inc. does is that periodically, they will ask fans exactly which series that they would like Vertical to license. This really lessons the damages of piracy, since the titles they are licensing are ones that people are asking for specifically, so there are better chances of them having higher sales.

Interestingly enough, Chavez denies one of the claims that companies look at the number of illegal downloads to determine which series would do well in the US. Instead, he says that any heavily pirated series, they are far less likely to license that series. The anime and manga industry is already a niche market in the United States, and Vertical caters to an even more niche group of manga fans. They need to licenses things that aren't being pirated in order to make sure that they will get enough sales.

Additionally, they discuss that some Japanese authors, upon seeing their content being illegally translated and distributed, decide to never allow that series to be licensed by American companies as a result. They cite a recent development last year where many authors of Japanese work spoke out and voiced their disapproval of their content being pirated.

Chavez notes at one point that piracy and scanlations are making it less and less viable for companies to licenses content and distribute it over here, which could lead to the eventual collapse of the entire anime industry.

There are reasons why we have copyright laws in place, and reasons why we protect intellectual property. Unfortunately the internet has made it incredibly easy to infringe upon these rights with far less threat of ever being punished for doing so. It seems to me that the amount of pirated and illegitimate anime and manga far outweighs that which is legitimately obtained and watched. There is just so much out there, and very little means of controlling content available on the world wide web. At this point, there isn't much the anime companies can do. If they decide to exercise their rights and try to protect their content, they will be, as Greg Ayres has said, be "crucified" by the people who claim to be their fans.

It's clear that if the anime industry is to be saved, it has to be done by fans who decide to take a stand to protect the shows and comics that they love.

The L33T Lawsuit

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Harvie) — Tue, 01 Mar 2011 05:09:00 +0000

Funimation made a big fuss in the anime community last month when they filed for a lawsuit against 1337 people who illegally downloaded a specific episode of One Piece through bit torrents. Initially, many people thought that Funimation's suit was a prank or publicity stunt, since the number of people being sued, 1337, is famous as the internet lingo for the word elite. However, there is an actual filing of the suit, and Funimation made clear their intention to follow through with it.

Funimation asks the court to stop the defendants from infringing on Funimation's copyrights for this episode and any other videos now or in the future. If another request in the suit is granted, defendants "shall destroy all copies of Plaintiff's [videos] that Defendant has downloaded onto any computer hard drive or server without Plaintiff's authorization and shall destroy all copies of those downloaded [videos] transferred onto any physical medium or device in each Defendant's possession, custody, or control." Funimation also seeks compensation for damages and legal costs.

...

Original article at Anime News Network

This is something that has more or less never been done before in the anime industry. Previously, the anime companies have only filed suits against retails sites producing and distributing bootleg copies of their copyrights, but never against anyone who has downloaded illegal copies.

The North American anime distributor FUNimation Productions is suing a group of related companies in Southern California for allegedly selling counterfeit DVDs of its licensed anime on a website. [...] Some of the DVDs are said to have included English dubbing.

...

Original article at Anime News Network

The anime industry has carefully avoided going after users who have downloaded anime. This was mostly because Funimation, ADV, and the other anime companies were fearful of upsetting the anime community and losing more sales as a result. The closest they had come to this previously was when Funimation sent out cease and desist letters on the behalf of their Japanese partners, demanding that certain series (which were not licensed in the US at the time) have all fansubbing stopped. Now, just over 2 years later, this is the first time that the anime downloaders themselves have seriously been targeted by the anime companies.

Unfortunatly for Funimation, suing the 1337 downloaders is proving to be harder than they had hoped:

On February 10, Senior United States District Judge Royal Furgeson ordered the anime distributor Funimation to "sever" or remove all defendants except one from its copyright infringement lawsuit over an episode of the television anime One Piece. [...] According to the judge's order, the actions of each defendant did not constitute "acting in concert" but rather acting individually, although identically. [...] Funimation can choose to pursue the other 1,336 defendants in individual, separate lawsuits within the next 30 days, if it submits filing fees for each case.

...

Original article at Anime News Network

Whether or not Funimation will chose to pursue the remaining cases is unknown, since each additional filing of a suit will cost them $350. Without the ability to sue down loaders en masse, it doesn't seem very economical to take action against downloaders. However, perhaps a lawsuit every once in a while will make people cautions enough to download less.

Here's hoping.

Ken Akamatsu and J-Comi

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Harvie) — Fri, 25 Feb 2011 07:17:00 +0000

It's easy to forget that the problem of anime piracy isn't something confined to the North American market. Piracy in Japan is just as bad. I mentioned in a previous article about Yana Toboso, creator of the Black Butler manga, and the emails she would receive from Japanese fans who had illegally downloaded her work.

Ken Akamatsu, creator of Negima, announced that he was starting a site where out of print manga and doujinshi would be posted online for free. Just recently, he posted some comments on twitter commenting on illegal scans.

Akamatsu suggested on Tuesday that illegal scans have "fallen into the category of 'property of the Internet'" and that it will be impossible to eliminate them. "The only thing we can do at this point is [launch our own free websites with the] 'advertising model.'"

Original article at Anime News Network

The website, J-Comi, which features a mascot very similar to the ermine Chamomile from Negima, launched on November 26th of last year. Unlike illegal manga scanlation sites, which display each individual page of the manga as a jpeg image, J-Comi provides high quality PDF downloads of it's content. Akamatsu himself has made his hit manga Love Hina available on the site.

While the website is currently only in Japanese, hopefully and English language version of the site isn't too far away. While it will be impossible to stop people from downloading the newest and latest manga illegally, hopefully by providing a free alternative, it will cut down on how much illegally obtained content people are viewing.

This is Otakudom

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Harvie) — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 08:37:00 +0000

One of the things that many people ask me is whether or not I oppose things like anime music videos (AMVs) or fan parodies. While they are technically copyright infringement, they do not hinder the anime industry. Most of the time they help the industry, and companies like Funimation consider it to be a form of free advertising.

The basic thinking going into fan videos is thus: if it whets the audience's appetite, we'll leave it alone. But if it sates the audience's appetite, it needs to come down. Does that make sense?

--Evan Flournoy, Chicks on Anime Interview, Anime News Network

If they don't hurt the industry, I have no reason to oppose them. There are so many anime I might not have decided to watch if it was not for AMV compilations like AMV Hell. I've made my fair share of AMVs myself, and I love watching fan parodies. Like AMVs, anime fan parodies use anime footage, except instead of editing them to music, fan parodies are generally re-edited and re dubbed by fans, creating something original and hilarious. Some of the more famous anime fan parodies are Dragonball Z Abridged, Evangelion ReDeath, or my personal favorite, This is Otakudom.

This is Otakudom is a fan parody project directed by Scott Melzer. It uses footage primarily from Fushigi Yugi, and chronicles the story of a group of anime fans, or otaku, attending their first anime conventions. It is one of the earliest and most famous fan parodies and has served as inspiration for the many that followed.

This is Otakudom

I have met Scott several times, and was able to interview him for Keep Anime Alive last year at Bakuretsucon. The video of the interview should be up sometime next month, but for now I'd like to talk about several of the key things we discussed.

Scott was inspired by the fan parody Koko wa Otaku, and as a result he and his group NoNDE Fanfilms began work on This is Otakudom. The fan parody played for the first time at Otakon in 2001, and quickly became a huge success. Scott had never expected that it would become such a hit. Currently he visits many conventions and runs panels talking about creating fan parodies, and tells the story of This is Otakudom. One of his most popular and successful events is the Fan Parody Panic, where the attendees record and create their own fan parody at the convention during the two hour panel.

One important thing to note about Scott is that he is a strong supporter of the anime industry and highly disapproves of piracy and bootlegging. In fact, his second fan parody, S.T.E.A.M. The Movie, is very anti-bootlegging and anti-piracy. At the time, Scott ran a video rental store, and piracy and bootlegging was something that hurt his business. He's always had issues with conventions that allow bootlegs to be sold in their dealers room. In addition, all the footage used in the movie are from DVDs that Scott owned -- none of it was downloaded illegally. If any of the anime companies ever tell him to stop distributing it, he will comply.

Scott Melzer and fellow NoNDE member Jon Miller have a lot more to say on the subject of piracy in the full interview. Look forward to it on KeepAnimeAlive.com!

KeepAnimeAlive.com

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Harvie) — Tue, 25 Jan 2011 07:11:00 +0000

It's been a while since my last post, but I'm glad to say that it's because I've been really busy following the launch of my new website, Keep Anime Alive. The site launched on January 12th, with only a simple news feed for features. Since then we've updated the site with an RSS feed, as well as put in place a system for Sustain the Industry videos to be posted, along with a list of purchases. We still have many updates and improvements that we are working on, and will hopefully be updated soon.

Not long after we launched, we were featured on Anime News Network:

Anime fans Colin Harvie and Chris Perry have established a group called the Anime Defense Project whose primary project at this time is the newly created KeepAnimeAlive.com website.

...

Original Article at Anime News Network.

Anime News Network (ANN) is one of the most popular sites for anime related news, so being featured as an Interest article there was a big help to us. We soon topped about 1000 unique visitors shortly after being featured on ANN. A great many supporters sprung up for us on the ANN forums, but along with supporters came opposers.

Anime piracy has always been one of the most controversial subjects regarding anime for the past few years, and no where is it more apparent than on forums on the internet. Arguments are traded back and forth, before degrading into a slur of name calling. Because the internet removes the face to face interaction between people, they lose their inhibitions and the need to be polite and become increasingly irrational. Arguments very rarely come to a successful conclusion on internet forums, nor is anyone every convinced to switch sides. They just bunker down, and decide to hate everyone with an opposing point of view. Not very productive or helpful.

It's been said that one way to eliminate misunderstanding of tone or inflection is to communicate by written words or email. That is not necessarily true, especially when on forums. When reading the words another poster has written, the reader applies to it the tone or inflection that they associate with the poster, whether true, or not. In addition, when arguing over the internet, people seem more inclined to take things personally, whether or not it was intended as such. As soon as one person takes something personally, and resorts to name calling, retorts will fly back and forth, and the conversation falls apart. There are very few people on forums who can, or will, separate the people from the problem.

Because of this, we have been very hesitant on whether or not to include forums on our site. Even if they are arguing in our favor, it doesn't make us look good, and no one ends up being convinced of our point.

When I started Keep Anime Alive, the goal was to educate people about the dangers of piracy, provide evidence, and actually show people the harm that it's doing, in the hopes that they will come to the correct conclusion themselves and stop pirating anime. Unfortunately for the moment, the majority of our opponents seem to think that we're their to tar and feather anyone who doesn't hold the same view as we do. We're afraid that having a forum might contribute to this view, so whether or not we're going to have one is still up in the air.

In any successful negotiation, you need to be careful not to make the other party feel like they are being personally attacked. This is the reason why we chose to focus primarily on convincing people through education, keeping with objective criteria so that they don't feel like we are making an attack on their character or beliefs.

It's on uphill battle, but with the launch of the site, things are looking good!

Remember, don't be a parasite.

Fanservice - It's not all about the jiggles.

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Harvie) — Thu, 09 Dec 2010 06:20:00 +0000

Well, this is a pleasant surprise:

Sekirei The Complete Series, featuring voluptuous vixens, sold out at retail in its first week following its release on November 23. The title ranked #1 for new anime series releases for Nielsen VideoScan First Alert Week Ending Nov 28, 2010!

...

Original article at Funimation Update Blog

With the pitiful state that the anime industry is in, news like this is always welcome. One of Funimation's newest DVD releases, Sekirei, sold out at retail only a week after its release on November 23rd. This is great news, especially when it's a new title and not a remake of a series that already has a strong following, such as Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood. It just so happens that I was one of the few anime fans that were able to get their hands on this series before it sold out. I was, however, a bit skeptical as to whether or not the series would appeal to me.

Recently the anime industry has been marketing many of their licenses by focusing on how much nudity there is and how jiggly the breasts are. Now, while nudity and breast jiggle is all well and good, there is a point where it gets to be too much. I know several of my friends who didn't buy the series specifically because they didn't want to watch yet another anime that had its story completely squashed beneath the copious amounts of fanservice.

Luckily, despite Funimation's attempt to convince me otherwise, Sekirei was not all about the jiggles. While the series does contain a lot of fanservice, it does not detract from the plot. I'd go as far as to say that, at times, the fanservice even contributes to the plot. It's a lot like product placement, in that respect. When it pulls you out of the story, it's done wrong. When you don't notice it, or if it contributes to the story, then it is done right.

I'm glad Sekirei sold out, but I hope that the reason it sold out so fast was not because of the short skirt and large breasts on the box. I hope that it was because people who watched it told their friends that it was a great series. I want the industry to survive, but not if the series that get licensed are chosen because of the amount of T&A they contain. At that point, we might as forget about storyline and stick to licensing hentai.

Don't be a parasite....even if it is just for the breasts.

Media Blasters Dubs Previously Released Titles

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Harvie) — Fri, 03 Dec 2010 06:04:00 +0000

When I logged onto my favorite anime news site today, I nearly jumped out of my seat in delight at one of the headlines. It is something I've been waiting for for a long time: Media Blasters Confirms Loveless, Kashimashi Dub Plans

The North American anime distributor Media Blasters confirmed on Thursday that it will release the Loveless and Kashimashi television anime series with both English subtitles and English dubbing in early 2011. Both titles were originally released with only Japanese dialogue and English subtitles.

...

Original article at Anime News Network

By and large, the majority of anime fans are split between two groups: the sub fans, and the dub fans. I count myself among the latter. When anime companies, like Sentai Filmworks and Media Blasters started release mostly subbed DVDs, I was just a bit upset, since they tended to license shows I was looking forward to watching in English. However, aside from my personal preferences on watching anime, I was concerned that this move was going to hurt their sales.

Now, I'm not sure how much it costs to dub a single episode of anime, so I don't know how much money they are saving on production costs by not doing dubs, but the majority of US Anime fans that buy DVDs do so for the dubs. Although many sub fans do as well, because the DVDs contain the original Japanese audio as well as subtitles, sub fans are far more likely to illegally watch the series online. Dub fans generaly will not because they prefer the English audio, or at least the ability to watch the show without staring at the bottom of the screen the entire time. It seems to me that your sales would decrease drastically if you only release subs without the option of a dub, which is unrevealing to the majority of people who buy the R1 release DVDs.

Recently many of the companies that were mostly releasing sub-only DVDs have started to re-dub their previously sub-only releases into English. Sentai has recently done this with Blue Drop, CANAAN, and Tears to Tiara, all of which were original released in a sub-only format. I'm really glad to see that Media Blasters has decided to start doing the same thing with their licenses.

I'm interested to know whether this is a result of their profits just being better, or because only releasing subs has been hurting them. Perhaps I'll get an interview with someone over there who can answer these questions...

As always, don't be a parasite.

Manga Anti-Piracy Coalition

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Harvie) — Wed, 17 Nov 2010 12:36:00 +0000

Until recently, the anime industry never made much mention of piracy, for fear of alienating their fans. With the exception of Greg Ayres, the industry made a point of ignoring piracy and not talking about it, silently hoping that the problem would go away. Well it didn't go away, and now the at least the manga industry at has decided to do something about it.

On June 8th of 2010, Viz media made an announcement that a multi-national manga anti-piracy coalition was formed.

San Francisco, CA, June 8, 2010 – Today a coalition of Japanese and U.S. publishers announced a coordinated effort to combat a rampant and growing problem of internet piracy plaguing the manga industry. “Scanlation,” as this form of piracy has come to be known, refers to the unauthorized digital scanning and translation of manga material that is subsequently posted to the internet without the consent of copyright holders or their licensees. According to the coalition, the problem has reached a point where “scanlation aggregator” sites now host thousands of pirated titles, earning ad revenue and/or membership dues at creators’ expense while simultaneously undermining foreign licensing opportunities and unlawfully cannibalizing legitimate sales. Worse still, this pirated material is already making its way to smartphones and other wireless devices, like the iPhone and iPad, through apps that exist solely to link to and republish the content of scanlation sites.

Participants in the coalition include the 36 members of Japan’s Digital Comic Association, Square Enix, VIZ Media, TOKYOPOP, Vertical, Inc., the Tuttle-Mori Agency and Yen Press. Working together, the membership of the coalition will actively seek legal remedies to this intellectual property theft against those sites that fail to voluntarily cease their illegal appropriation of this material.

...

Original article at Viz Media

Although relatively new, just the creation of the coalition has had an effect on piracy. Shortly after it's creation, two of the largest manga scanlation sites announced that they were removing all of their content due to the the stance taken by the industry against scanlation. If the top two scanlation sites removed their content simply because the manga industry decided to form a coalition against piracy, one has to wonder what the effect would be if the rest of the anime industry were to stand up and express their displeasure.

Earlier this year, a coalition of American comic publishers, including Marvel and DC, recently had the largest internet distributor of American comics shut down, with support from the FBI. Perhaps the Manga scanlation sites' swift action in removing their content was sparked by worry that the Manga coalition would soon follow suit, and shut them down in a similar fashion.

While the formation of the coalition and the scanlation sites' responses is brightening the outlook for the future of the industry, there has not been much news from the coalition since it was announced in June. As of yet, they do not even have an official website and other than the initial article detailing the formation, there is very little information about it. Hopefully we will see some new developments with them soon.

As always, don't pirate your manga and anime, and don't be a parasite.

Bakuretsucon and Greg Ayres

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Harvie) — Fri, 05 Nov 2010 05:02:00 +0000

I attended Bakuretsucon two weekends ago. It's a small anime convention in Vermont. Although they are a smaller convention (attendance this year was 529) when compared with conventions like Anime Boston (17,236) or Anime Expo (44,000+), Bakuretsucon is the convention I look forward to every year. They always have amazing industry guests, and the attendees are very respectful and nice, which sadly isn't always the case at many conventions. However, other than this, one of the things which Bakuretsucon prides itself on is that it's dealers room is free of any anime bootleg DVDs or merchandise.

Remember the interviews for KeepAnimeAlive.com that I hinted at in a previous post? When I went to Bakuretsucon, I was expecting to maybe get an interview with Greg Ayres, if I was lucky. However, once the other guests and the convention chair heard about what I was doing, suddenly there was no shortage of people to interview. In the end, I was able to interview Greg Ayres, Chris Ayres, Chris Cason, Scott Melzer and Jon Miller of NoNDE Fanfilms, and the Convention Chair Valerie Tatro. All of these interviews, and video of Greg Ayres' Bootlegging and The State of the Industry and You panels, will be available at KeepAnimeAlive.com when it launches next month.

Greg Ayres is, of course, the big name in the industry for speaking out about anime piracy, and I'd like to talk a little bit about him for the rest of the post. It was only after hearing him speak at Anime Boston in 2008 that I started my work against piracy. Immediately after hearing him speak out against piracy, I stopped watching fansubs and became more conscious about buying legal anime DVDs and merchandise. As is probably obvious at this point, Greg is someone I respect and admire very much.

One of the things he says when you hear him speak at his anti-piracy panels that really spoke to me, was that he runs these panels as a fan, and not as a voice-actor. Greg Ayres loves the anime industry. He left a very high-paying job in order to become a full time voice actor for anime, and not because the pay was better. As a voice actor, he makes "less than the lady that greets you at Walmart."

He was also the first person to really speak out against piracy in anime industry. He first started after seeing many of his friends who work in the industry, both in Japan and the US, have trouble finding work. When he started speaking out against piracy, everyone else in the industry tried to ignore the issue, afraid that if they spoke out, there would be a negative backlash from the fans. Indeed, when Yana Toboso recently voiced how upset she was with "fans" downloading her work illegally, she was essentially crucified and flamed by the so-called "fans" reading he work. Greg Ayres himself comes under fire a lot on online communities, but he choses not to care and pushes forward in his struggle against piracy.

Greg was once described by someone as the perfect person to speak out against anime piracy, because he was "the only person I know who could walk into a roomful of people and give them the finger." Now, while quite unprofessional, it does show the strength of his convictions. This is something that people higher up in the industry, like the executives of Viz or Funimation can't do because they have to maintain that professional attitude. Greg wants to see the anime industry survive, even if he has to estrange himself from the rest of the industry in order to do so.

Please look forward to the video of his panels at Bakuretsucon and his interview once KeepAnimeAlive launches. I'm not able to post them until I get confirmation from Greg that everything is in order with them. In lieu of them, here is a video showing one of his Fansub panels at Sogen Con 2007.

Remember, don't be a parasite.

Keep Anime Alive

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Harvie) — Wed, 20 Oct 2010 06:39:00 +0000

I suppose that the time has come to talk a little more about KeepAnimeAlive.

Originally I was hoping to launch the site this previous weekend, but making the site completely cross-browser compatible is taking slightly longer than I had intended. I'm hoping to finish everything up and finally launch the site in the next day or two. In the meantime, I thought I'd take the time to explain the site in all its glory.

The idea for the site started many years ago, when I attended a panel at Anime Boston run by Greg Ayres, where I heard him speak about the damage piracy was causing the industry. Since then, it's been a dream of mine to do something to help the industry. Since then, I've kept a close watch on the anime industry, and watched with dismay as the US anime market has dwindled from it's $550 million high in 2003 to its current value of approximately $180 million. With the recent distress the anime industry has been in, I decided that I would be one of the fans to step up to the plate and actually do something. As a result, the idea for KeepAnimeAlive came about.

KeepAnimeAlive is an non-profit online center and community for news, interviews, and other resources regarding piracy involving the anime industry. The site seeks to inform anime fans of the damaging effect piracy has on the industry, provide information on where to legal online streaming sits, and provide a community for fans who want to help the industry. In addition, it will feature many entertaining, yet informative podcasts, as well as interviews with industry professionals.

KeepAnimeAlive is meant to be more than just a news site. It's a place where anime fans can gather and work to support the industry they love.

Having my idea firmly in mind, I began to plan out the project.

Having a background in web design and programming, I knew that I could handle the creation and maintenance of the website myself. Web hosting is insanely cheap currently, so I could easily pay the projects initial startup cost out of pocket. However, for the project to succeed and to grow into what I intend it to be, a lot more planning was needed, in order to fully flush out the scope of the project.

One of the most important assets KeepAnimeAlive has is the planed association with Sustain the Industry. As I have mentioned in previous posts, I have been in talks with theRAofEdwardElric about incorporating Sustain the Industry directly into the site, providing a place for members to keep track of their monthly purchases and post their YouTube videos.

Another of the big assets to the site will be the interviews with industry professionals and experts. We currently have two interviews that we're waiting on confirmation for. I won't name any names in case the interview falls through, but one of them is a very big name in the anime industry.

Additionaly, KeepAnimeAlive will have various videos and podcasts that are related to the combat of piracy, as well as being entertaining. One such show is the Bootleg Bomber. Similar to the Chibi Project, Bootleg Bomber is a monthly podcast involving the violent and highly entertaining destruction of bootleg DVDs and merchandise.

We've also planned out many ways to draw visitors to the site. We hope that our interviews with some of the big name's in the anime industry, especially ones that speak out against piracy themselves, will draw visitors to the website. In addition, we are going to attempt to create several viral marketing videos for KeepAnimeAlive.

As the site grows and more elaborate videos and projects are planned, it will become much harder for myself and the others involved to pay for the sits budget out of pocket. It's our hope that, as KeepAnimeAlive grows, we will eventually be able to get sponsored by major players in the anime industry, like Funimation.

One thing we've had to take into a account while planning out the site is the vulnerability to hacking and internet attacks. This is always a problem on the internet, however the topic of piracy and anime is such a controversial one, that the sites very existence is assured to draw the attention of many people who wish to undermine the site. As such, we been planning out strategies to confront the threat, such as daily backing up the site's database.

So. That is KeepAnimeAlive. Look forward to its launch later this week!

As always, don't be a parasite.

Teamwork

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Harvie) — Wed, 06 Oct 2010 08:08:00 +0000

Many times, when discussing the issue of piracy, I'm presented with the argument: "I'm just one person. It doesn't really matter one way or another if I download anime. I really don't make a difference." This truly is a hard argument to respond to, because it is partially true. The actions of a single person often don't make much of a difference.

In most cases, one person alone can't change much. That is why people gather others and work together. When people come together and work towards one goal, what was impossible for one person suddenly becomes possible. Fortunately, the desire to oppose and combat piracy has become a growing desire among many anime fans in recent months.

I mentioned the Sustain the Industry movement on YouTube in a previous post. Since my post, the movement on YouTube has grown in size, as more and more people band together to "sustain the industry." Robert's Anime Corner Store, an online retailer of anime and related products, has issued a challenge to fans, saying that whoever buys the most from their store and makes a Sustain the Industry video about it will be given a $25 gift certificate. I also previously mentioned that I am working with Sustain the Industry to launch the KeepAnimeAlive website later this month.

As I said, it takes teamwork to really accomplish something, and fans worldwide are realizing that. Recently, some German anime fans have started the Anime Copyright Alliance:

Fans in Germany have established an initiative called the Anime Copyright Allianz (Anime Copyright Alliance, ACA) whose stated goals are to promote respect for the copyrights of anime titles in Germany and to educate fans on relevant copyright law. The alliance's members include fan-run websites and clubs as well as the Viz Media Europe-owned Anime-Virtual/Kaze labels and the Japanese company Animax, which runs anime television channels in Germany and other European countries. Two fansub websites are also on the list of ACA members.

The group's official website focuses primarily on the removal of anime titles that have been licensed for release in Germany, and encourages users to report licensed series that have been uploaded for illicit download. However, the ACA says it will not pursue legal action against uploaders, but only report illegal uploads to the sites that host them, such as YouTube and RapidShare.

The German news site Gulli reported today that one of the group's members, AnimeFansubs.org, has been subject to denial-of-service attacks, and as of this writing only a cached copy of the website could be accessed. According to Gulli, other members' sites have not been heavily targeted.

Original article at Anime News Network

Fans are stepping up their game, working together to accomplish things that one fan could not alone. While they currently focus only on series that have been licensed in Germany, it is still a big step. They are one of the first fan run groups to actively fight against illegal uploads.

In everything from Evangelion, to Kyōryū Sentai Zyuranger (the Japanese series that would later become Mighty Morphin Power Rangers), we are shown the importance of teamwork. If we are to make any progress in the fight against piracy, it is important for fans to work together. Sustain the Industry has had a huge impact in the anime fandom in the few months since it started. These teams of people that come together to work towards the common goal of helping the anime industry can do much more than just one individual working alone.

I urge any fan who is serious about supporting the anime industry to go out there and joint a team dedicated to supporting the anime industry, or even start your own. Whether it be in your local community, or your internet community, gather people together and work together to support the industry. Don't fall into the trap of thinking that you are just one person, and nothing you do will change anything. Sustain the Industry started when theRAofEdwardElric posted a simple video on YouTube asking fans to join her in her quest to sustain the industry, and now the movement is bigger than imagined it would ever become.

While it's true that a single rock thrown won't stop a landslide, it can also start one.

Be that rock, and don't be a parasite.

Feed the Starving Manga Artists

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Harvie) — Fri, 17 Sep 2010 03:51:00 +0000

Anime News Network recently posted an article about Yana Toboso, the creator of the successfull manga and anime Black Butler. Toboso recently posted on her blog, condemning illegal downloads of her creations.

Toboso reports that she has been getting more email messages and letters from fans like the following:

"I read them from ROMs I borrowed from a friend. LOL"

"I found and watched all of them on an overseas video site!"

"I became a fan with the second season, and then I watched the entire first season on an overseas video site. lol It was very amusing!"

Toboso said these actions are "unmistakably" illegal and added, "It is the same as shoplifting or leaving a restaurant without paying the bill." According to Toboso, if people watch anime illegally or download them without authorization, "we creators and voice actors will not eat; this is no joke, we will starve and die. This is not 'lol.'" She then said, "These actions, to paraphrase a certain Fullmetal character, goes against the Law of Equivalent Exchange! If you continue doing them, I really cannot make either anime or manga again. […] Unauthorized videos + downloads are wrong, absolutely!"

...

Original article at Anime News Network

An argument that many people who download anime and manga use (flawed though it is), is that while the North American industry might suffer from their lack of purchases, the Japanese industry remains completely unaffected. This is not true. The Japanese anime industry has nearly failed several times, and it's only still here today because it was bailed out by the United States and Canada. There are even several anime series, such as The Big O, which were only given a second season because the US Networks that had licensed it were providing the funding. Shinjichi Watanabe, director of popular anime like Excel Saga and The Wallflower, stated in an interview that he has been forced to give up smoking, because it came down to a choice between buying his cigarettes, or buying food for his newborn son. As Toboso says, "we creators and voice actors will not eat; this is no joke, we will starve and die."

The Black Butler manga and anime were only recently licensed in North America, by Yen Press and Funimation Entertainment respectively. Many people who download anime believe that it's legal so long as the anime or manga in question has not been licensed yet. I myself was under that assumption, back when I also downloaded the latest fan subtitled anime from Japan. However, this is not the case.

On March 1, 1989, the United States became party to the Berne Convention, an international treaty where all parties agree to uphold and respect the copyrights of all member countries, including Japan. As a result, if it's illegal to download material copyrighted in the US, it is also illegal to download material copyrighted in Japan.

North American fans need to realize that if the North American anime industry collapses, odds are that Japan will soon follow. The industry is doing everything it can to combat piracy, but it's not enough. Fans need to step up and do their part, giving the industry what it needs in order to grow, instead of feeding off of it whilst giving nothing in return.

Don't be a parasite.

Sustain the Industry

noreply@blogger.com (Colin Harvie) — Fri, 10 Sep 2010 07:17:00 +0000

Welcome to Anime Defense.

Anime Defense is about Piracy and the Anime industry. Piracy is one of the biggest problems facing the anime industry today. In the last few years, we've seen the demise of Geneon USA, Central Park Media, and ADV Films, the company which once held the dominant position in the US anime market. It's very hard for these companies to sell DVDs, which provides the majority of their income, when the entire show is already available online, for free. Funimation has had to change the entire way they approach distribution, in order to combat the adverse affects of piracy. Even manga distributors, like Viz, have enormous problems dealing with the illegal "scanlations" of their licensed material.

Fortunately, however, there has been some positive change put into motion by fans of the industry. One devoted fan has recently begun a video series on YouTube which she calls Sustain the Industry.

In recent months a movement has appeared via YouTube titled "Sustain the Industry," in which fans detail their monthly anime-related purchases in an attempt to encourage fans to purchase anime DVDs, manga volumes, and/or merchandise.

The movement appears to be traced back to user theRAofEdwardElric, who announced her own "Sustain the Industry" series on June 12 and launched its first episode on June 24....

Original article at Anime News Network

Many fans have begun posting videos of their monthly purchases of anime in response to theRAofEdwardElric's videos. Her original video can be viewed here (warning, contains language).

Recently, theRAofEdwardElric announced that YouTube had contacted her, offering her their IVP (Independent Video Partnership) program, which would allow her to make money from the ad's YouTube places on her page. She has declined the offer, stating that it was not the kind of partnership she wanted.

Her video has been mentioned all throughout the industry, and several important figures in the industry have begun to follower her Twitter feed.

I was very impressed by what she had accomplished, and so I contacted her regarding a website myself and a few others have begun work on. KeepAnimeAlive.com is a site where that will provide people with information about piracy and industry news. In addition, it will feature interviews with industry professionals, links to sites that legally stream anime for free, links to online retailers, and various other related information. Sustain the Industry seemed like a perfect match for the site, so I contacted theRAofEdwardElric, asking if we could make Sustain the Industry a part of Keep Anime Alive.

She was grateful to hear from me. She had been planning to create a similar website once Sustain the Industry had gotten big enough, but she lacked the skill to do so. She eagerly agreed to my request that her series become a part of the Keep Anime Alive website.

Sustain the Industry will be a featured part of Keep Anime Alive when the site launches next month. Members will be able to use the site to keep track of their monthly purchases, as well as link to their Sustain the Industry YouTube videos.

The anime industry itself is doing all it can to combat the threat of piracy, and now it's times for fans themselves to enter the stage and play their part in helping the industry. theRAofEdwardElric has more than proved that she is a true fan of anime and manga.

A few years back, I was at a convention, and one of the industry guests said something regarding what a fan is that I shall never forget.

"If you watch anime or read manga without supporting the original creators, you are not a fan. You are a parasite."