Interest
German Fans, Anime Firms Launch Anti-Piracy Group
posted on by Gia Manry
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.
On June 8, North American manga publishers joined forces with the Japanese Digital Comics Association to form a coalition against sites hosting unauthorized scans of manga. Soon after, several sites underwent complete overhauls.
[Via InGame.de, Kaze-Online.de]
Image © Anime Copyright Allianz
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