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ANNCast Classic: The Life and Kime of Geneon, USA


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ActionJacksin



Joined: 16 Dec 2012
Posts: 112
PostPosted: Thu Oct 17, 2013 11:24 am Reply with quote
So is this the same audio from 2009, or what? Are there some sections of the interview that have expanded upon maybe?
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ljaesch



Joined: 03 Apr 2009
Posts: 299
Location: Enumclaw, WA
PostPosted: Thu Oct 17, 2013 11:40 am Reply with quote
I think this is a great idea, so people like me who started listening later in the podcast's run can hear some older classic episodes without having to dig through the archives. Also, this allows an ANNCast to be available each week whether or not a new podcast has been recorded.
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Mesonoxian Eve



Joined: 10 Jan 2012
Posts: 1858
PostPosted: Thu Oct 17, 2013 12:16 pm Reply with quote
This is one of the most informed interviews of what was really going on behind the scenes of early anime, and removes many of the false beliefs people have of why Geneon failed.

If you've never listened to an ANNCast before, make this one the first.
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Happiness for Subaru
Subscriber



Joined: 24 Feb 2011
Posts: 242
PostPosted: Thu Oct 17, 2013 12:43 pm Reply with quote
ljaesch wrote:
I think this is a great idea, so people like me who started listening later in the podcast's run can hear some older classic episodes without having to dig through the archives. Also, this allows an ANNCast to be available each week whether or not a new podcast has been recorded.

Seconded. I really appreciate it being reposted to iTunes too!
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Fronzel



Joined: 11 Sep 2003
Posts: 1906
PostPosted: Thu Oct 17, 2013 12:47 pm Reply with quote
Back in the days when the ANNCast would list more than two time indexes for topics.
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Charred Knight



Joined: 29 Sep 2008
Posts: 3085
PostPosted: Thu Oct 17, 2013 12:54 pm Reply with quote
Ah yes the Life and Kime of Geneon, USA the podcast that makes me you cringe that a company thought that Cybuster could sell over 10,000 units.

This is the best podcast simply because Geneon operated on the belief that the 20 percent growth year after year was not a fad, or a bubble but permanent constant growth, and as soon as it stopped growing 20 percent a year Geneon went out of business. I think you could have hired 20 random people on this forum and they could have run the company better.
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Fronzel



Joined: 11 Sep 2003
Posts: 1906
PostPosted: Thu Oct 17, 2013 12:55 pm Reply with quote
Charred Knight wrote:
This is the best podcast simply because Geneon operated on the belief that the 20 percent growth year after year was not a fad, or a bubble but permanent constant growth, and as soon as it stopped growing 20 percent a year Geneon went out of business.

The American Way!
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Blood-
Bargain Hunter



Joined: 07 Mar 2009
Posts: 23743
PostPosted: Thu Oct 17, 2013 12:56 pm Reply with quote
I missed this the first time around and look very much to listening to it soon. I like this idea of replaying key ANNcasts when the regular version is on hiatus.
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MentalMachine



Joined: 09 Oct 2013
Posts: 74
PostPosted: Thu Oct 17, 2013 1:42 pm Reply with quote
Fronzel wrote:
Charred Knight wrote:
This is the best podcast simply because Geneon operated on the belief that the 20 percent growth year after year was not a fad, or a bubble but permanent constant growth, and as soon as it stopped growing 20 percent a year Geneon went out of business.

The American Way!


Here's the problem. Geneon USA wasn't run by Americans. It was run by Japanese, who somehow thought Japanese esque pricing works in the USA. It did not and they failed hard. Yeah, Trigun, Akira, Tenchi Muyo, Hellising+Hellsing Ultimate and maybe FLCL are some of the best selling anime they had, but a lot of other just imploded right in their faces, because Geneon USA were incompetent and couldn't market for shit.
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belvadeer





PostPosted: Thu Oct 17, 2013 2:16 pm Reply with quote
That reminds me, I still need to watch all of Demon Lord Dante.
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ikillchicken



Joined: 12 Feb 2007
Posts: 7272
Location: Vancouver
PostPosted: Thu Oct 17, 2013 2:34 pm Reply with quote
MentalMachine wrote:
Fronzel wrote:
Charred Knight wrote:
This is the best podcast simply because Geneon operated on the belief that the 20 percent growth year after year was not a fad, or a bubble but permanent constant growth, and as soon as it stopped growing 20 percent a year Geneon went out of business.

The American Way!


Here's the problem. Geneon USA wasn't run by Americans. It was run by Japanese, who somehow thought Japanese esque pricing works in the USA. It did not and they failed hard. Yeah, Trigun, Akira, Tenchi Muyo, Hellising+Hellsing Ultimate and maybe FLCL are some of the best selling anime they had, but a lot of other just imploded right in their faces, because Geneon USA were incompetent and couldn't market for shit.


Are you sure you're not thinking of Bandai Visual? As far as I know Geneon never tried any Japanese pricing. They did singles of course but that was exactly what every company was doing at that time. And it worked just fine for a while if not in the long run. But again, that wasn't a Geneon specific thing and it was far from their biggest problem.
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penguintruth



Joined: 08 Dec 2004
Posts: 8459
Location: Penguinopolis
PostPosted: Thu Oct 17, 2013 2:56 pm Reply with quote
Geneon was that company that licensed titles that I figured I'd wait later on to get. Titles I was interested in, but that generally took no priority in my collection. I regret that attitude somewhat, but with Funimation having saved a lot of those titles, I find myself still putting off collecting them, so how interested could I have been, really?

It's kind of a bummer that the second Lupin III TV series never did any real DVD numbers. I wish that Discotek could at least get the episodes that Geneon dubbed. I could put it next to their release of the first TV series.
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SpacemanHardy



Joined: 03 Jan 2012
Posts: 2509
PostPosted: Thu Oct 17, 2013 3:27 pm Reply with quote
ikillchicken wrote:
MentalMachine wrote:
Here's the problem. Geneon USA wasn't run by Americans. It was run by Japanese, who somehow thought Japanese esque pricing works in the USA. It did not and they failed hard. Yeah, Trigun, Akira, Tenchi Muyo, Hellising+Hellsing Ultimate and maybe FLCL are some of the best selling anime they had, but a lot of other just imploded right in their faces, because Geneon USA were incompetent and couldn't market for shit.


Are you sure you're not thinking of Bandai Visual? As far as I know Geneon never tried any Japanese pricing. They did singles of course but that was exactly what every company was doing at that time. And it worked just fine for a while if not in the long run. But again, that wasn't a Geneon specific thing and it was far from their biggest problem.


Geneon might not have had exact Japanese pricing, but they were by far the most expensive anime company besides BV back in the day.

While everyone was doing $30 singles, FUNimation, ADV, and to a certain extent Bandai would support discounts and coupons. Geneon, however, insisted on selling their products at the highest possible cost, would not honor coupons and rarely, if ever, put their items on sale. If you were to go to a Best Buy during the "good ol' days", you'd notice that a typical FUNimation DVD would cost between $14.99 to $24.99, but every single Geneon DVD, regardless of episode count, would be $30.

Not only that, but while the other companies would later release their shows in boxsets at a greatly reduced cost, Geneon would only put out certain shows in boxes, and would charge EXACTLY the same amount as the combined price of all the singles. Not only that, but oftentimes they would include exclusive special features that you could only get by buying the boxset, so anyone who had been collecting the singles up to that point would pretty much be S.O.L.

And of course, we can't forget those "special edition" Hellsing: Ultimate releases, which ran around $40 for a show that was only 48-50 minutes....

So yeah, Geneon may not have been mirroring the Japanese price model as exact as Bandai Visual did, but they most definitely were taking some pointers from it. And there's one particular man you can thank for that... Evil or Very Mad
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nightjuan



Joined: 22 Jan 2008
Posts: 1473
PostPosted: Thu Oct 17, 2013 3:34 pm Reply with quote
This was indeed a great podcast about the unfortunate end of Geneon, though I'm admittedly not going to revisit it right now. But hey, if it works for others or those who might have missed it, that's totally fine by me. I'm not opposed to the idea of re-releasing iconic episodes.
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Fronzel



Joined: 11 Sep 2003
Posts: 1906
PostPosted: Thu Oct 17, 2013 4:52 pm Reply with quote
penguintruth wrote:
It's kind of a bummer that the second Lupin III TV series never did any real DVD numbers.

That fact that it takes several score episodes before the second series truly hits its stride might have something to do with it. There's a lot of mediocrity in that earlier stuff.

I really liked their dub, too. Great casting. Shame about the "updated" script.
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