Forum - View topicHey, Answerman! - Think Of The Children
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Furudanuki
 Posts: 1874 |
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If you do not comprehend how access to this sort of information can be abused than you are even more of a naive fool than I have been taking you for, and that bar was set very low to begin with. You might want to start by reading up on why that repealed privacy law was passed in the first place. Hint - it involved a political figure who passed away recently. But when push comes to shove this can be summed up with a single question: "What compelling reason exists for making this information public?" I fail to see one. And I frankly find it both puzzling and amusing that you, of all people on this forum, have yet to grasp the fact that something you consider to be quite innocuous can turn around and bite you on the ass when it becomes public knowledge. |
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mike.motaku
 Posts: 160 Location: Indiana |
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So far the only honest justification for piracy that I've seen here is the guy who said basically, "I like to steal anime for free." It's not morally sound by my standards but at least it's honest.
It's the sense of entitlement that gets me every time. Who said you have an inalienable right to have anything you want the instant you want it? And why you specifically? Even Japanese anime fans have to pay to watch "free" anime on TV. Televisions & the electricity to run them & the homes to run them in are not a free birthright in Japan. Neither are computers. And the internet is certainly not free. Call me when you cure cancer or bring about lasting world peace & I'm sure we can come to some arrangement whereby what you think you deserve above & beyond everyone else is what you get. |
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Mikeski
Posts: 608 Location: Minneapolis, MN |
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I personally have no issue with people who actually buy the show watching it in another format. Pay the people who did the work, and you've done your part. (I've semi-cheated on that, myself, in that I've bought region-4 licensed imports of shows with no region-1 license, and played them in my region-1 home.)
Unfortunately, online piracy is still problematic, since most of it is done by a filesharing method where you both upload and download, and thus you're personally helping other people (many of whom aren't also-buying-the-discs) commit piracy. For the folks who buy a figurine and "count that" as buying the show... also a bit dicey. Sure, it gets royalties to the original author, and is thus WAY better than doing nothing, but I doubt much of it trickles down to the animation-software-coders or in-betweeners or seiyuu. (Just as buying DVDs doesn't likely support the figure sculptors or the chemical factories that provide the paint & PVC.) Would I ever justify piracy? In the case of something like Monster or Full Moon o Sagashite, where it was half-released and then the R1 company said "ha ha, suckers!", yes. Pirate the crap out of the missing episodes of those, and I won't think any less of ya. |
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dtm42
Posts: 14084 Location: currently stalking my waifu |
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Wow, you make it sound like non-Japanese don't have to pay for electricity and internet and televisions. I in no way shape or form and going to say that I have the right to download Anime just because I paid my power bill this month. That's not what I'm getting at. But your argument is atrocious. |
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TitanXL
 Posts: 4036 |
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Oh, of course. Anything is better than nothing after all. I'm just putting it out there people can contribute in their own, different ways, and not everyone who doesn't buy the official US release and just watches fansubs is some freeloader. It's not a simple black and white viewpoint as some people make it out to be.
Buying R1 would obviously keep companies like Viz and Funimation afloat and give their actors readily available jobs, yes. So if you like their dubs and stuff people can go ahead and buy them to support those. But usually people only complain about pirates not supporting the "creators", not the "licensors". And trying to pin Conan or any other series' failure on piracy is always questionable. Video game companies have used that as a scapegoat for years on why a certain game failed (ignoring all the other ones that did just fine despite 'piracy') I mean, One Piece and Fairy Tail seem to be doing fine, so why is Conan the only long-running Funimation series that suffered because of piracy? Well, that and Keroro Gunsou and Shin-chan. That case tends to be more of a case of the fanbase, or lack there of. Conan is obviously not as big as other long-running shounen like Naruto or One Piece in the US, which means less people are going to buy it. Shows like Conan, Keroro Gunsou, and Shin-chan don't seem like they would appeal to the average shounen fan given they're either 'cerebral whodunit' shows or comedy shows, rather than an action/adventure ones. Conan and it's other kind failed because it didn't really have an audience here. In Conan's case, it's a kid's show but they tried to market it for adults who watched C.S.I. or something, which doesn't really work. And they couldn't market it for kids on Nickelodeon because there's no way they'd show people being murdered and their corpse lying there for the entire case and go over how someone meticulously and brutally murdered someone else. You can't just edit out the blood and the more violent attacks and stick it on daytime TV like you can DBZ or Naruto. The whole series revolves around death and murder. Conan was just one of those shows that was doomed from the start. That's probably why they edited and altered the dub, to do everything they could to try to find an audience. |
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Kakugo
Posts: 163 |
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Now, this is a reasonable argument. 
It does, however, ignore that the artist is putting potential fans in other areas of the world in a situation where they can't access the material at all. North America doesn't get access to Japanese broadcast TV, Japanese DVDs are region locked to prevent them from being played on North American hardware, and even if someone circumvents the region code protection, unless they're fluent in Japanese they're still up a creek as far as following the show. The obvious argument against them pirating the material is that "It's not made for them anyway." True. But does that mean they wouldn't enjoy it? Does it mean they don't deserve to be potential customers? Yes, piracy have removed the creators rights - and I'm well aware that plenty of them aren't too cool with that*. But they've lost that control at the cost of inadvertently introducing an entirely new audience a chance to learn that these titles exist, a subset of which will support the artist through it. Justifiable? Perhaps not. But it's better to their bottom line than not contributing a dime to their work, which would be the other option if they hadn't pirated it in the first place. (And if this all seems melodramatic, ask a fan in Northern Europe or Australia how much simulcasting they have these days...) In as little as a few years ago, fansubs were the only way for anyone to watch anime unless it was licensed - typically a few years after the fact, and plenty of titles were ignored. Anime in particular has a unique history that encouraged distribution of unlicensed content because there was no other way to get it. This evolved - mutated, if you like - into the fansub distribution channels we have today. The industry might not like it, and no, it might not have been justified... but it did create a market for simulcasting. The current landscape of Crunchy Roll and FUNimation giving foreign consumers the chance to watch titles within 24 hours of Japan exists because of piracy, and that piracy existed because there was no prior channel for consumers in that demographic to access it. Piracy is bad. Simulcasting is good. Simulcasting exists as a reactionary measure against Piracy. Don't know what to make of it all, but it's a largely unique response to a "problem" that exists in very few other communities. Justified? Beats the hell out of me. I just know it's a fascinating twist. Particularly in extreme scenarios - say, where the only way to legally see something is "Move to Japan for 3 months" - people turn to piracy because it delivers something in a format they want, and if you as a creator want to stay competitive, you need to change and evolve those methods by which you say the consumer can see their works.
Personally, I do continue to buy US Blu-ray releases. I typically skip DVD-only releases though, unless I'm sure that no HD materials exist. Successful shows get their budgets back via merchandising, and if you think buying a Figma instead of a DVD doesn't contribute back to the same overall pool, I... don't know what more I can say. Hopefully Justin Sevakis will have another "Economy of Anime" article next year to fill in the gaps? (Wink wink, nudge nudge?  )
Tokyopop imploded for a number of reasons - piracy is certainly one of them, but the death of Borders and the dwindling profit margins of the publishing industry in general has not been kind to the NA manga market. And Bandai wasn't closed down because they weren't making money, they just weren't making as much as many of their Japanese counterparts. Bandai-Namco is a media conglomerate, and they won't hesitate to shut down a small profit margin if they can re-invest its overhead into something that'll make them more, like a new gaming division or toy sales. Thanks for mentioning the H.O.T.D OAD though - I did buy the Sentai BD set, and figured we'd never get that bonus Stateside. 
That wasn't his argument at all, at least not as I understood it. "I paid for something. It doesn't work on my new machine. I'll DL a warez version to make it work, and I don't feel bad about it because I've already paid for it." You know, similar to my story a page earlier. 
[ *True Story, Bro! - A friend of mine bought, scanned, and paid to have several books worth of manga translated, because he knew the English market potential was basically non-existant. Said artist made a blog a year or two later and said he was "very disappointed" that a foreigner was distributing his titles without permission. My friend was crushed, and hasn't uploaded a new title since... not that said artists work will ever be translated officially, or that these titles were even in print in Japan to make the artist money.] |
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marcos torres toledo
Posts: 269 |
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Thank you Answerman now I know who to blame when I see censorship on Cable Television. It is now worst than the 50s to 70s remember the days when you could see fully naked people on television you had to view documentaries now they censor that too especially frontal nudity. Even BBC America does it on saturday night shows. As for Cartoon Network it programed by the Mad Hatter you never know what time a show you watching will be on or either they change the time or cancel it without notice they treat us viewers like trash.
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marcos torres toledo
Posts: 269 |
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Keep on fighting for freedom people
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Haterater
 Posts: 1727 |
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For new Kai episodes, its not going to be airing on Japanese TV, but it will for the overseas market. Not to mention the rumor that the merchandise in Japan wasn't up to par with Toei, so they pull the plug. If there was no money to be made from overseas market, they wouldn't have bothered, but it must have did very well to continue to fund for more episodes. And for Deadman, I think the NA DVDs did sell very well along with the good ratings, so there must be some higher ups in thinking there is potential there. I would look at it that some series could depend on foreign sales if that franchise bombed on their home turf to give it another shot. |
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enurtsol
 Posts: 14761 |
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It's a bit more complicated. Japan has been in stagnant deflation for years. The independent Bank of Japan (BOJ) prefers deflation over inflation because it is an aging yet dwindling population (the money retirees saved will be worth less in an inflation, but there won't be enough future young workers to support the pensions as more and more old people retire). The newly-elected Prime Minister Abe (who already was PM a few years ago) wants inflation because he believes that would spur the stagnant economy (in inflation, consumers would rather buy now rather than buy later when the prices would go up; in deflation, consumers would rather wait to buy later when the prices go down). And so, he has directed the independent BOJ to do so (essentially print more money), or else he would find a way to dissolve the BOJ. And this battle of wills has got the markets spooked, sending the value of the yen lower. |
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rojse
 Posts: 234 |
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In regards to the subject of pirating anime, let me emphatically state that pirating is wrong. It's also the only way to watch a lot of anime in English - not just recently-released anime where licencing deals are being negotiated or DVD volume releases are being waited upon, but anime that has been released for many years, if not many decades, and remain untranslated and unreleased for many different reasons unknown to the general public, all of which mean that there is not even a dubbed copy of an anime serial or OVA available.
So, I'm not going to try and justify downloading and viewing fansubs of, for one example, "Legend of Galactic Heroes". However, if someone wants to provide me with the opportunity to purchase this on Blu-ray or DVD with English subs, even if I am required to pay at Japanese rates, then I would love for the opportunity to recompense all of the people involved in the original production and in the translation of this work. |
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Chrno2
 Posts: 6171 Location: USA |
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Well I'll admit I've bought into the piracy thing. From old piracy where people would buy master tapes and duplicate them for sale to digital DL to some illegal streaming sites. While I could say that I've bought and collected what I liked as well as other fan goods, used the methods to help recommended titles for my job's collection, it still can't justify that I used some form of piracy. Not to mention I still have HDD full of shows that will never be licensed. I'll also admit that if it wasn't for fansubs and the like I would have never heard of these shows, some that made it stateside and others not. There was a time when I did import. But after awhile I couldn't shell out for shows that would eventually end up here. Of course how could I have known that. My first real import was 'Space Pirate Mito' on LD. At that time digital fansubs were still in their infancy. Some still used the old LD master to VHS duplication method. Sometimes I made blind buys based on magazine ads. I bought Devilman Lady on LD based on the fact it was a Go Nagai project and an ad (had to buy an LD player to play them). Then ADV releases the series a few years later. I imported Brigadoon based on no info other than it being mentioned on Tokyopop's site eons ago. Who would have thought that a extremely niche title like that would get picked up? That was the last release from TP. Yeah, I did the whole buy a VHS copy duplicated from a master or duplicated from a master to a copy from a copy to a copy. I realized it was a piracy, but there was also that whole deal that I used to hear years ago about what you do with your audio possessions was fine as long as you weren't selling it for a profit. That's how I got access to shows through trade. But I'll admit that I did buy from pirate mail orders. Even when I'd hear about cons trying to crack down on those types of vendors. Of course the one bit of pirating that puzzled me was when Japanese video stores would do this sort of thing. They both rented and sold shows that they duplicated from either a master or network. I often wondered why they could do this here in the states and get away with it. How were they allowed to implement such a system? Because to me it still looked like pirating.
I even imported the Devilman features because Manga didn't release a hybrid DVD release despite having released both a dub and sub version on VHS. I'm still angry at them for doing such a stupid move. Thanks a lot.
I know friends from the old days of tape trading to digital DL and make copies for friends. Even though they buy. But they seem to be DL and burning more than buying. As the scene has changed I stopped doing digital DL. I didn't want my computer getting clogged up with junk. Not to mention now with sites like ANN and Crunchyroll I've started getting on the legal bandwagon. Not out of moralizing but because 1) I want to support a legal system, and 2) I sort of outgrew the whole DL scene. Unfortunately I barely watch anime now despite that there are better alternatives. So I'm not going to "justify" my methods or judge anyone else on this matter. That's a whole different argument. I look forward seeing a massive change to digital DLs. I would like to see more legal streaming sites that show older and newer anime content that will in turn create a continued market for distribution or "DL to own" or just generate revenue even if no-one buys. Kind of like what we have here. Even as far we've come there will still be piracy but hopefully the change will move in a direction where these alternative methods will become obsolete.
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flawed
Posts: 37 |
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Ahh the age old Napster argument. Anyways the problem with it is that you buying stuff after illegally previewing are the rare exception. Most pirates will not do so, thus why it's considered wrong.
As TitanXL said, Japanese company won't make much off of the medium sales. These companies make money off of the contractual licensing fees and there's a whole lot of negotiating that takes place to balance the annual or possibly a lump sum licensing cost with royalty percents. This was basically the start of doom for Conan in the states as it's a high-end premium license. Last edited by flawed on Mon Dec 31, 2012 6:27 am; edited 3 times in total |
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dtm42
Posts: 14084 Location: currently stalking my waifu |
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For those "pirates" such as myself who do follow up a watch with a purchase, it isn't a problem. True, in general it is a problem for the industry, as most people who download fansubs or rips do not then purchase the show. But I'm not going to let anyone guilt me into thinking what I'm doing is morally wrong. Illegal, yes, but not wrong. What others do or don't do is not my problem or concern. As long as I take responsibility for my personal fansub-watching ways (by then purchasing the show) then that's all I need to care about. |
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flawed
Posts: 37 |
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Morals are concoctions so that a person can live with their actions. I'm not even going into the rights and wrongs there since they can be ephemeral and personally based. At the end of it all everyone will see themselves as being "morally right."
Law is so that a citizen can live with other citizens in a society and promote harmony among the people. Law has dictated "internet pirating" as being wrong and puts it into a negative light. |
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