“Welcome to the woooorld of tomorrow!”
I’ve made it no secret that I think distributing media through physical means is an archaic and rapidly shrinking trade. I sincerely believe that everything that can be digitalized will eventually be digitalized, whether you want it or not. It is a destiny that all media companies have to face and it can be an enormous opportunity for those who adapt fast.
And of course, it’s no different for anime. That’s right, it’s rant time.
Evolution
The theory of evolution has frequently been summed up by the phrase “survival of the fittest”, and indeed it is the perfect phrase to describe business models in our era of rapid technological growth. The “fittest” refers not to the strongest or the best, but the ones who can adapt and evolve to survive the next big change. Many mighty creatures had, over the millennia, fallen victim to the waves of biological revolutions in our planet’s short history, and yet the small and insignificant cockroach, whose ancestors once crawled in the shadows of dinosaurs, survives to this very day.
Today, technology has brought about such sudden but wonderful changes to our world that some of our existing frameworks which have existed for hundreds of years are starting to fail us. There will always be those who do not believe that everything they have held to be sacred truths for their lives is now change, evolving and improving for the better. Every effort will be made to build a dam around this torrent of change. At first they will succeed, but no dam can hold off the force of nature that is the power of technology. Pandora’s Box cannot be closed once it has been opened.
Okay, maybe I am getting a little too abstract here. Let us move back to anime.
Declining DVD sales in Japan
According to this ITmedia article forwarded to me by Soulshift, Japan’s DVD sales are dropping. Heck, I will agree with those people who claim that DVD sales everywhere are on the decline, even if I have yet to see conclusive evidence of it. Because it just makes sense. I for one certainly do not think that DVDs are worth their price tags, even if I do buy them for collecting purposes. I think a lot of people in the younger generations agree with me.
This is not to say that I think all media content should be free and no one should get paid for his/her works. I don’t. But I do think that the old way of doing things will not last for much longer. It has nothing to do with wanting to get things for free. I will pay for it if I have to, but the more important point is that I want it in my way, my format and at my convenience. You can air free anime on TV 24-hours a day and I won’t give a damn because I rather watch the shows I want to watch whenever I feel like watching them. Call it unreasonable if you want, but that is the kind of mindset that young people growing up with the Internet as their main source of entertainment will have. And those are the potential customers in this business.
当社ã®DVDãŒå£²ã‚Œãªã„最大ã®ç†ç”±ã¯ä½œå“ã®åŠ›ä¸è¶³ã ãŒã€æ¥ç•Œå…¨ä½“ã§ã‚‚アニメDVD販売ãŒä¸æŒ¯ã 。ãã®åŽŸå› ã¯1ã¤ã§ã¯ãªã„ã ã‚ã†ã€ã¨GDHã®å†…田康å²å‰¯ç¤¾é•·ã¯è¨€ã†ã€‚HDD＆DVDレコーダーã®æ™®åŠã‚„ã€YouTubeã®ã‚ˆã†ãªå‹•ç”»å…±æœ‰ã‚µã‚¤ãƒˆã¸ã®é•æ³•ã‚¢ãƒƒãƒ—ãƒãƒ¼ãƒ‰ã®å½±éŸ¿ãªã©ãŒã€DVDä¸æŒ¯ã®åŽŸå› ã¨ã—ã¦è€ƒãˆã‚‰ã‚Œã‚‹ã¨ã„ã†ã€‚
The ITmedia article interviewed GDH, the parent company of GONZO, and according to them, the main reasons why DVD sales are dropping in Japan are because of the spread of HDD and DVD recorders and the popularity of video streaming sites such as YouTube. You can whine and cry all you want, but that is not going to make technology reverse itself and uninvent things that are inconvenient for your business.
And not everything can be solved through legislation either. Sure, you can waste spend money to hire a bunch of people who sit around and do nothing but send out takedown letters to YouTube, but are you then going to lobby for a law that bans people from recording TV shows with DVD recorders too? It is just not possible. And it should be noted that P2P filesharing is not even a blip on Japan’s radar. I know very few Japanese fans who have heard of, much less utilize, BitTorrent.
Old distribution model, new market paradigm
「当社ãŒã‚¢ãƒ‹ãƒ¡DVDを海外展開ã™ã‚‹å ´åˆã€å—幕や音声ã€ãƒ‘ッケージãªã©ã‚’海外仕様ã«ä½œã‚Šå¤‰ãˆã‚‹æ™‚é–“ãŒå¿…è¦ã§ã€ã©ã†ã—ã¦ã‚‚日本よりも後ã®ç™ºå£²ã«ãªã£ã¦ã—ã¾ã†ã€‚ã“ã®ã‚¿ã‚¤ãƒ ラグã®ã›ã„ã§ãƒ“ジãƒã‚¹ãƒãƒ£ãƒ³ã‚¹ã‚’逃ã—ã¦ã„ã‚‹é¢ã¯ã‚ã‚‹ã€
The same GDH representative goes on to say, “When we release our products overseas, it takes time to translate, dub and repackage, so the releases always end up being slower than in Japan. This time lag often results in many business opportunities being lost.”
I think this is a clear indication that they are slowly realizing the fact that the old system is showing its age. Foreign audiences are no longer contented to get slow and outdated releases. If they cannot get the series they want legally and fast, they will turn to the Internet. Illegal or not, the Internet is there and will always be there. Deal with it. The best way to go about solving this problem is obviously to cater to the global audience right from the start, instead of trying to pretend that regional markets are still clearly defined and segregated like they were twenty years ago.
The blame game
　ãŸã “犯人探ã—â€ã«èºèµ·ã«ãªã‚‹ã ã‘ã§ã¯ã€æ¬¡ã®ãƒ“ジãƒã‚¹ã¯ç”Ÿã¾ã‚Œãªã„。「時代ã¨ã¨ã‚‚ã«ãƒ¡ãƒ‡ã‚£ã‚¢ã¯ç§»ã‚Šå¤‰ã‚ã‚‹ã‚‚ã®ã€‚最も多ãã®äººã«è¦–è´ã—ã¦ã‚‚らãˆã€ãŠé‡‘を払ã£ã¦ã‚‚らãˆã‚‹å¯èƒ½æ€§ãŒé«˜ã„メディアを試ã—ã€ãƒ“ジãƒã‚¹ã‚’切り開ãå¿…è¦ãŒã‚ã‚‹ã€
The best quote: “Just searching for the ‘criminals’ is not going to do any good. It will not create any new business opportunities. Media has to change with time. There is a need for us to try out formats that bring us the greatest viewership and increase our opportunities to make money. We need to open up our business.” Exactly what I want to say. GDH has created a YouTube channel called “GONZO DOOGA” and is asking YouTube not to remove content that infringes on GONZO’s copyrights as long as they can serve as promotional material.
The same article goes on to say that illegal downloading has, ironically, proven a global demand for anime. What needs to be done is not to destroy this demand by isolating potential customers and calling them pirates. The content owners need to re-examine their business strategies and find out ways to tap into that newly-generated demand using the technology that enabled it all to happen: the Internet. Indeed, the GDH representative acknowledges the fact that illegal sites that charge users monthly fees to download anime are very popular overseas and that GDH sees it as a huge business opportunity waiting to be tapped in its quest to expand globally.
Online distribution
That brings me back to Odex. Some people think that I am against Video-On-Demand. That is not true. I am an fervent supporter of digital media distribution that actually achieves its true intention—being convenient. In fact, when I first suggested VOD to Mr. Peter Go many months ago, he was unreceptive to the idea. I am happy that a small step has now been taken in that direction, but it is really small indeed. And the way Odex has sequenced its actions certainly has not helped to bring about much enthusiasm for the minute change.
I mean, it simply makes no business sense to assume that the tech-savvy downloaders are an insignificant minority, provoke them into a frenzy, and then roll out a service that is targeted right at the very same group of people while pretending nothing happened. But of course the people at Odex know what they are doing because they did their market research, right? I sure hope they do.
Conclusions
It doesn’t matter how good DVD sales were in the past. It doesn’t matter how well the system used to work. I see only the future and I think the future will only get brighter for anime. But not for DVDs. Filesharing will not kill anything that is really important and has real purposes, it is simply a new paradigm that will serve to weed out the unevolved dinosaurs that fed on past inefficiencies in the system and profited disproportionately off the physical bottlenecks of old technology that no longer exist. It may make sense for most people to pay for movies on DVDs today, but a new system replacing it will soon emerge to reward creativity in a new and better way, just as a different incentive system used to exist before the invention of the video cassette.
The ones who get to the new winning formula first will reap the most benefits. And I’m glad to learn that the Japanese studios are at least putting some thought into this. Perhaps one day we will pay $30 a month to download and watch all the anime series we want. A guy can dream…
We’ll need the old people to die first and wait for the new generation to run businesses to see something like this happening.
Excellent article, DM.
More people should read this. Any thoughts of sending this to one of the local papers? It needs a little bit of editing, but those are minor.
Nice article.
I still want the mousepad that comes with the DVD though. Dennou Coil?
I believe online anime distributing will be the way to go in the near future.
Who needs stacks of DVDs when episodes can be downloaded as they air, saved in a hard drive and provide hours of easy, hassle-free entertainment.
Of course, I’m talking about VOD, not BT.
The only snag will be the amount of hardcore otakus who insist on keeping a hard copy.
Value add from DVD is too hard to pass @_@
\o/
Nicely written if I say so myself…
What this means though, is that we are clearly on the path to a more democratic distribution system, with the terms of delivery dictated by the viewer, and not the corporation (as it should be, in a capitalist system!)
Clearly, the Odex affair is nothing but a minor bump in the road. The future of anime is online, whether they are ready or not…
There can still be DVDs. They will play the role of collector’s merchandises like they already do for many of us.
Wow… nicely done… :)
Agree that dvds will still be there… there will be people who are willing to fork out money for good quality DVDs especially for the animes they really like…
Then again, how is one to know what they like or not… ? Unless they watch it first… but thats another story.
Also agree with edogawaconan that valueadded DVDs will be another thing that would be hard to resist.
On a random aside… what do you think are the chances of the topic of file sharing becoming a topic for a GP paper?
GONZO is part of GDH, not the other way round.
So can we touch your hand now?
nice, we just to hope tat one company finds that winning formulae soon. Meanwhile, I will stick to ordering the DVDs :D
Nominate DM for president scholarship!
wow. that’s quite a rant. but u did hit all the right things. anime is definitely going the way of online streaming. even for me, after i stopped BT-ing, i immediately went after different online sources like veoh and crunchyroll.
if DM’s dream really does come true and we can get VOD for $30, i think everyone would love that too.
ps. odex is doing VOD for seto no hanayome and tokyo majin. i can understand for seto, but tokyo majin? boring. that’s not something i would put to try to attract people to use VOD.
Great insight of the entire Odex saga!
I’ll still try to buy DVDs. I’m one of those people who need to have a physical copy of anything I get digitally. ^.^
they should put stuff like Hayate no Gotoku and Lucky Star in there
@V: Same goes for me!!
but in this cases fansubs anime is much better then any other source, to me right now…
1. IT FREE THATS Y (anyway if i think the anime is nice i’ll get the DVD when i start working XD)
2. doesn’t need to waste time to encodec to other format to do video editing (fan made video) LIKE THIS
–> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5O9dZF2q6R8
(Haruhi Suzumiya AMV – She’s Just Oblivious)
Song: “Sharada” by Skye Sweetnam
3. you can keep forever if you want (till your grandchild is born XD)
“It has nothing to do with wanting to get things for free. I will pay for it if I have to, but the more important point is that I want it in my way, my format and at my convenience.”
I totally agree with this. The whole concept of bringing creative content, such as in the case of anime, or any other digital media content has got to do in catering to the needs of the customers Today, and Tomorrow, with the help of relevant technology.
I firmly believe that in any future business entity (and the right technology) that is able to perfect their distribution methods to the masses, while keeping the concept mentioned in mind will benefit greatly.
Hmmm, well, what i would usually do was preview one or 2 episodes first, then buy the boxed set or something similar, usually the japanese ones though, i bought odex once, and that was it, awful quality.
then soon after that my ex fiance stole all my DVDs, and i didnt wanna start all over again, so i downloaded them.
i’m wondering if you own the vcd/dvd, should you be allowed to download a better quality version if you could?
i mean, whats the difference, you already paid for it, so why shouldnt you be able to see a higher quality version of what you paid for, if the version lets say… ODEX is selling, is utterly crap?
hell, the subs are of a better quality, theres less ‘engrish’ and the video and audio are of much higher quality.
From what little I know from what you’ve said, it looks like Anime studios just might be the first to jump on the online distrubution model bandwagon (as opposed to our movie and music industries…) It would actually be a really cool way for Anime to gain attention.
Frankly, with DVD recorders to record down your favourite anime series, you have to wonder how much longer are people going to splurge on DVDs in Japan (which are overpriced anyway, if you ask me). And with the anime industry reaching saturation point, it’s hardly surprising that competition for the otaku’s money will be stiff.
I think what the industry refuses to acknowledge is that falling DVD sales is a reflection of market reality. It’s about a market that has enjoyed years of growth but is now saturated. The otaku market is hugely profitable, but it’s still a niche market; and there’s only so much these people can and will spend. It doesn’t have to be entirely about technology.
But I do agree that in the digital age, companies have to rethink ways of distributing and marketing their content. Likewise, with old copyright laws like Berne Convention becoming more irrelevant, IP issues must be clearly addressed too. The problem is, given how fast technology changes these days, IP laws and copy-protections will always be playing catch-up.
And let’s not forget that to reap the benefits of new technologies, the market must have the right infrastructure in place. Bear in mind that not every country has a fibre-optic network like Japan; in some regions, low broadband penetration probably means there will still be a market for more traditional media formats like DVDs.
The way I see it, we’re likely to see Internet and the TV being integrated. Video-on-demand–which had been conceived more than 10 years ago–can finally be realised with today’s technologies. But don’t write off the DVD just yet (or newer, similar media like Blu-Ray or HD DVD).
Actually yeah, TV is another thing that has just got to change.
Scheduled broadcast is really only good for one thing: Live events. (i.e. news and sports cast)
Your command of the english and analytical skills are admirable for someone of your age. Btw, nicely written post as the many before.
Besides, the VOD needs another form of payment such as pre-paid caids like those for MMOs since most anime viewers are students who do not own credit cards
Pingback: End to the Odex saga? « Gatou?
@DM: what would you say to those skeptics who feel that VoD videos would get hacked/cracked and distributed for free?
The way I see it, switching to online distribution will effectively counter-balance the money lost in DVD sales (as you’ve already said). I feel that the transition from DVD to Internet will happen suddenly–one company will make the switch, witness a great increase in profits, and all the doubts that other companies hold will be abolished and follow in suit–it’s only a matter of time before this necessary change is carried out.
> what would you say to those skeptics who feel that VoD videos would get hacked/cracked and distributed for free?
@exalt dragon: How would that be any different from ripping a subbed DVD / VCD? In fact, the latter is probably simpler.
“And the way Odex has sequenced its actions certainly has not helped to bring about much enthusiasm for the minute change.”
I couldn’t agree with you more on this. As a casual anime consumer who own a couple of anime titles plus other merchandise, I had never heard of Odex till the news exploded on da interwebs. Fact is should the VOD come before the “punitive” action, Odex will have my business.
Hey, about the Japanese p2p thing, most of them don’t use bittorrent, they have Winny or Share
Exactly the reason why the decline for free TV channels and demand for private TV channels. But yeah, I don’t like to abide to the TV schedule – I want the TV schedule to abide to me.
The idea of distributing VOD must be thought out carefully.
It certainly is a proper means of legal anime distribution, the things which should be considered are:
1. Quality – it must be at least on par or of higher quality than those of fansubs (eg. shinsen subs, eclipse, mishicorp). If the quality is inferior, this will undermine the existence and image of VOD distributors.
2. Pricing – it must not be too expensive. I am aware that anime studios have to earn money too, but as VOD does not incur costs associated with DVD distribution, it should pass the savings to the end users. The pricing strategy is a double-edged sword; used judiciously, it may bring in many new customers. but too expensive, ppl would not be interested, esp if there’s no extra bonus material.
3. Subtitles – in order to appeal a more globalised audience, the range of subtitle language should be expanded from the current English, Mandarin and French. Focus on SE Asia market would mean expansion of subtitles in bahasa indonesia, malay, thai etc.
Of course, these are only viable in countries where there’s a huge penetration of broadband internet. Where there isn’t one, dvds are a more effective way of distribution. I am quite sure that there are hardcore otakus out there in SE Asia who prefer originals to pirated dvds.
Just my two cents.
@Noob22: Lucky Star and Hayate no Gotoku haven’t been licensed by Odex, which is partly why i get them off veoh (no dvd/vcd releases here, and odex can’t send you the letter anyway). I was pretty surprised not to find them on the AVPAS list given their popularity.
This is very interesting. I live in America right now and DVD cost so fucking much. So I choice to download fan-sub. When ever I am in Hong Kong I get many VCDs and some of the more affordable DVDs.
When I make my anime it going to be an international thing. Simultaneously releasing in Japan, Hong Kong, and the USA.
In ten years or so, the anime industry won’t face the problem of slow international marketing. The Universal Translator will be invented and with only a person or so, can correct any mistake that the translator might have made. The voice dubing will still be slow, but at least they can release their show internationally via their own VoD or other method with in days. The cost of the media will also be cheapter with a Universal Translator, less people to pay!
Interesting rant, VOD does seems like a viable alternative but I’m skeptical about how the industry will react to this. Just as DM said before, the television without VOD is a dying breed of media. But on the other hand, if a well-rounded online distribution model already exists, the production industry would have tried to implement it already (for drama, movies and whatnot).
Surprisingly, this scenario reminds me of the music sector and all the startup companies that are trying to get a piece of the market at the moment. I think the main issues really comes down to: “How much is the industry willing to lose due to piracy and illegal distribution? vs The additional turnover from online distribution”.
Every production company knows that once a piece of media has made it out onto the net, there will be people who will try to obtain these illegally. However, I don’t think they realize a good portion of these people are only resorting to these measures because they cannot obtain what they want legally in good time, quality, and reasonable prices. Being a resident of HK, I must say acquiring anime has been an increasingly painful process. Pirated dvds are being scourged from the city, and legal dvds takes forever to be released (not to mention some of them lack English subs).
Most of us are already paying quite a bit more than $30 to our ISP and same goes for our TVs, electricity and even the MMO games. I don’t see why any of us would have any objections to pay a reasonable monthly fee to download and watch all the anime we can legally.
Then again… all the dvd producers and production companies will cry foul and demand a royalty from this new business sector. In the end, nothing is likely going to be implemented or resolved soon. I can just pray I don’t get ODEXed soon in HK.
It’s a lot more complicated for the music industry and what not because there are just so many players involved.
The anime industry is basically all in Japan and it’s not a huge community of business people. Monthly subscription can work if they all contribute to a single VOD service and then receive a percentage of each customer’s monthly payment that is proportionate to the popularity of the titles that belong to them.
It doesn’t even have to start off so huge. You just need three or four bigger distributors to start the ball rolling and the others will come once it is shown to be profitable. The only problem is that they may choose to set up their own separate service… Hmmm… Oh well. Not going to happen any time soon anyway.
someone did say something about buying a hard copy and still be able to download the same title as what u buy without being known as pirated?
if that is possible, is there any other way like getting a agreement with odex that your allow to download this 1 title by paying an amount of money (not their VOD service) so you will be able to obtain this certain file format for your own convenience.
but guess this will be hard to do, cause of some cons and pros they/we might have.
so that means i pay and get what i want. thats it happy ending. they earn their money i get what i want.
I would still prefer DVDs though.
Nothing compares to the nicely packaged DVDs then to the ugly external HDD I use to store some anime currently.
Unfortunately I still think some Japanese companies are way too hardheaded about this sort of thing. You look at Sunrise. It disgusts me.
I suppose since Japanese users never really demanded anything of this sort and were just happy to buy and do whatever the companies wanted them to do, until Youtube and stuff came around and expanded the idea of “watching on the internet” to the average anime watcher and even the average person…
The japanese firms should try to be more proactive in the campaign to promote anime and change their business practice, esp in the SE asia.
I know it sounds over simplified, but if they don’t start to shift focus from local market, anime market overall will suffer stunted growth.
This will affect not only the companies, but also the distributors and talented-but-measly-paid seiyuus.
Think about it.
it’s difficult. Suppose if I were the president of some local anime production here. and if I received reuqest from overseas Otaku to release localized package, the first thing I need to care is: “profittable” or not.
If there’s no big market down there, why do we need to sell our package outside of Japan? We have strong anime buyers and otakus here in locally and our marketing priority shall go to these acitive consumer, is quite natural.
anime distribution is not the volunteer, it’s business in any way, and that’s the point all non japanese anime fan should take an account; “how can we get their attention more?” okay?
you should find your own market competitiveness that appeal to these japanese anime companies.
we did not advertise karaoke machines or sushi-go-round units outside of Japan but for some unknown reason, they’ll come and purchases it because they have found some interests in our products, anime is not exemption.
The thing is this, Japanese generally care more about stability than anything else. Most of them wouldn’t think of getting into a new market if their current style of working is fine, especially not when the method in question is fairly low quality and relatively new (Compared to concepts such as DVDs and VCDs). This means that only the really big companies actually stand a chance of getting into this business, and it would most defnetely take some time for them to act.
Meanwhile, we get shit like Odex’s “Big plan to earn money”, which, judging from my point of view, is more of an attempt to discredit the bittorent program than anything else (Frankly, I don’t see the difference bewteen P2P sharing and the online Direct download that Odex currently provides, only that the latter takes more time and requires an extremely fast connection; does make you wonder what exactly Steven has in mind when he luanched the program.)
If nothing else, it generates more bad media attention than customers and more or less stains the genre of Anime, which is already pretty bad since most people define anime as “That shit with ninjas and swords and stuff” or “That animated porn stuff?” (I blame this on the N.A. media companies.). This further delays the possiblity of a VoD system comming anytime soon (which is already long enough) as well as inciting rage amongst thousands of fans (I never had more fun dicussing the number of ways to kill someone until now). All in all, the possiblity of a VoD system anytime soon is very slim.
Quoting loltehnos :
“Unfortunately I still think some Japanese companies are way too hardheaded about this sort of thing. You look at Sunrise. It disgusts me.”
Sorry…what exactly did Sunrise do again ?
They were one of the earlier people pulling videos off Youtube *including* just plain old promos, if I wasn’t wrong. Anyway they are generally kind of niao about copyright. Heck, on their official page http://sunrise-inc.co.jp/s_atten/index.html they explicitly say they do not allow people to make their own fanfics/fanart based off Sunrise properties (unless it’s on their webspace thing which you have to pay for and it’s just 5 pathetic MB if I read correctly)
This is just *fan* created stuff, let alone uploading of their images and so on. Of course people still make loads of it – but it’s this sort of thing which is why Japanese fanartists are so paranoid it seems bizarre (strict no-linking rule, very protective over their art, etc.)
That isn’t anime per se, but if they’re so niao just about *derivative* works… Any Japanese company would like to protect their copyrights, of course. And just cos they write it on their home page it doesn’t mean they will necessarily carry it out. But I can’t think of any other anime companies with explicit wording like that. So I think Sunrise is one of the most aggressive when it comes to anime companies, however – and that when they get to that extent, I think it’s just a disgustingly outdated mindset.
Glad that this saga is finally coming to an end. Not a too catastrophic one at that, at least no one got murdered or got jailed anyway.
My view about Odex’s future though is pretty grim though, they probably need some time to get rid of that bad air and start building their image of a “Higher quality & affordable choice” for consumers (If they intend to).
I agree that the media industry is steering towards the digitalized era.
But problems with VOD and piracy will alway exist, the only problem is how to make ppl respects IP and not be a freeloader? It probably take a genaration of education in Singapore. Like how the 80’s batch of kids were taught “brainwashed” that chewing gum is O.K but ppl were not responsible enough. LOL!!!
I’m just wondering.. (i’m going to sound stupid now) Does ODEX even have a solid case on people who downloads anime? The impression that i am getting is that they don’t. Then if they offer the ‘olive branch’, that doesn’t really change the fact that they could still resume suing whoever is stubborn enough to carry on.
And if that occurs, does ODEX has the right to start suing?
Sorry, i just felt that the ‘olive branch’ they offer is not only a PR stunt, but also to cover their back in a legal sense, unless they indeed have the right to go about catching us for downloading anime. If so,then feel free to let me know.
I truly find it ridiculous if they try to assume a ‘watchdog’ role when in actual fact they are merely profittering from these legal suits!!
loltehnos – Thanks for the insight.
Personally, I feel that VOD will only supplement anime dvd sales but won’t supplant it. Fans who have watched a particularly series will still want to buy say, a tangible, bonuses filled dvd boxset that adds to the feeling of real ownership. I for one don’t care much about storing my animes on harddisks, and I believe many would feel the same way.
Nevertheless, interesting discussion going on here.
ah… my previous post flagged with stars and stripes but it should be sun with the white background (means I am Japanese)
anyway, I am a BIG Gundam original fan and for that reason, I fully understand Sunrise claim.
Quote from loltehnos>
This is just *fan* created stuff, let alone uploading of their images and so on. Of course people still make loads of it – but it’s this sort of thing which is why Japanese fanartists are so paranoid it seems bizarre (strict no-linking rule, very protective over their art, etc.)
as I am Gundammer, I fully understand this. I am so glad to hear that my fellow Gundammers are taking “strict no-linking rule, very protective over their art” as their own rule.
Because I don’t want Sunrise to stop making another Gundam stories. If any of Gundammer’s action could stop Sunrise to do their job, it’s no good for us too. Without Sunrise, we have no way to enjoy Gundam stories anyway so I think Sunrise deserve this strong position to be offensive to their “fans who doesn’t care copyright that much”.
I don’t welcome such attitude but I understand there is no other way than to control their copyright a bit harder at this moment, we are still in the middle of transition (internet and all these technology assosiate with anime and intelectual properties) and nobody’s sure tomorrow yet.
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ã‚ã®ãã€DarkMirageã•ã‚“ãŒè¨€ã„ãŸãŒã‚‹ã®ã¯ã„ãら大ããªã‚¢ãƒ‹ãƒ¡ä¼šç¤¾ã§ã‚‚ã“ã®ç§»ã‚Šè¡Œã時代ã®æµã‚Œã«ä¹—らãªãゃã ã‚ã ã¨ã„ã†ã“ã¨ã 。SunriseãŒã“ã‚“ãªã“ã¨ã‚’ã™ã‚‹ã®ãŒè‡ªåˆ†ã«ã¨ã£ã¦ä½•ã®åˆ©ç›Šã‚‚得られãšã€æå‚·ã‚‚é¿ã‘られã¾ã›ã‚“。ã—ã„ã¦è¨€ã£ã¦ã‚‚ã€ãŸã ファンãŸã¡ã‚’怒らã›ã‚‹ã ã‘ã （ã‚ãªãŸã¯ãŸã‚‚ã‹ã）。
ã“ã‚Œã“ããŒé©å‘½ã 。インターãƒãƒƒãƒˆã®æ „ãˆã«ã‚ˆã‚‹é©å‘½ã§ã‚る。新時代ã®è‹¥è€…ã¨ã—ã¦ã¯ã€ãれをå—ã‘入れãªã‘ã‚Œã°ãªã‚‰ã‚“ã¨ã„ã†ã“ã¨ã 。å¤ã„考ãˆæ–¹ã¯ã‚‚ã†é€šç”¨ã—ãªã„ã®ã ã‹ã‚‰ã€ã‚¢ãƒ‹ãƒ¡ä¼šç¤¾ã‚‚ãã‚ãã‚対応ã™ã‚‹ã¹ãã 。
ã‚ãŸãã—ã¯ä¸€å¿œãƒ‰ãƒ©ãƒžã«ç§»ã‚‹ã“ã¨ã«ã—ã¾ã™ã€‚ã¡ãªã¿ã«ã€ã€Œè¯éº—ãªã‚‹ä¸€æ—ã€ã¯ã™ã”ãé¢ç™½ã„ã§ã™ã‚ˆã€‚ãœã²ã”覧ãã ã•ã„。
blauereiter:
I guess physical media will always (at least for our generation) have the “collector’s value” and indeed that’s what many of us anime fans buy them for. But even now they are pretty useless if you want to watch the latest episodes available.
What I’m saying is that it’s not good enough as the main form of distribution. In Japan, that role belongs to television broadcasts. In the rest of the world, except perhaps America, DVDs and VCDs play a much larger role as the primary distribution method, especially since most series don’t make it to TV broadcast here. That, in my opinion, is what will change eventually.
IMO, DVDs should only be for collecting the way figurines and other merchandises are. LOL.
P.S. I’m honoured to have a Sunrise CG artist commenting on my blog. XD
to #48 Pear san
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