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2004 Year in Review


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Kazuki-san



Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 2251
Location: Houston, TX
PostPosted: Fri Jan 28, 2005 7:32 pm Reply with quote
Cgoten wrote:

Second problem here, let's say I have a copy of the book, and I let a friend borrow it, and he can read it just fine. If I owned the book in the first place, and he just borrows it, then no more books are sold than would have been sold otherwise. He just borrowed my copy, and no one profits in any way. How is that any better than reading a scanslation of the book?


The difference is, when you purchase a book or a DVD, you are not only buying the physical material, but also a license that allows you to watch/read it, let a friend watch/read it, etc. It doesn't, however, allow you to make copies of it and distribute them over the internet. That is a very different thing. The last fansub I downloaded had something like 738 seeds and 1024 peers just while I was actively downloading/seeding myself. I doubt that you would lend a copy of your book to 1,762 people, unless you were a library. The license, BTW is exactly why institutions like librarys can exist.
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Shibi



Joined: 28 Jan 2005
Posts: 3
PostPosted: Fri Jan 28, 2005 7:48 pm Reply with quote
When you consider that Tivo is now available with DVD burning it kind of makes any point regarding fansubs being illegal quite moot. Is burning a TV show recorded on Tivo onto DVD for storage and future watching any better than downloading a fansubbed episode of an anime and burning it onto DVD? Just because the average fansub watcher is more tech savvy than the average american tv viewer does not make them more of a criminal. Would it be okay to record and burn Gundam Seed (or any other series) offered on television than it would be to download and burn the fansubs? what about doing it to Alias or Lost or any other American TV series?

Now I'm not endorsing fansubs or telling people not to buy DVDs. In fact I have a library of over 400 R1 anime DVDs and it grows every day, but I do think that fansubbing can be a creative and powerful force for good. Sadly, in some cases it is the only way to see certain material. I encourage anyone who watches a TV series on fansub to support the DVD release, but at the same time I recognize that it isn't going to happen and have come to accept that.
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Kazuki-san



Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 2251
Location: Houston, TX
PostPosted: Fri Jan 28, 2005 8:10 pm Reply with quote
Shibi wrote:
Would it be okay to record and burn Gundam Seed (or any other series) offered on Television than it would be to download and burn the fansubs? what about doing it to Alias or Lost or any other American TV series?


Umm.. yeah.. it's been legal since the Betamax ruling in '84. Instead of merely recording on Betamax or VHS anymore, it's now Harddrives (Tivo, etc.) and DVDs. It's perfectly legal. It is NOT, however, legal to then mass produce copies of it and distribute it to people, for money or otherwise. It's just like comparing apples and oranges. The primary money maker for normal shows on TV is advertising. It's only very recently that money has been been made by selling DVDs of the seasons. In contrast, and anime series makes most of it's money by selling DVDs, and a very small amount by sellling broadcast rights.
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Tempest
I Run this place.
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Joined: 29 Dec 2001
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PostPosted: Fri Jan 28, 2005 8:33 pm Reply with quote
Post Removed - I'm turning it into an editorial

Last edited by Tempest on Fri Jan 28, 2005 8:45 pm; edited 2 times in total
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Kusanagi_Kei



Joined: 11 Dec 2004
Posts: 230
PostPosted: Fri Jan 28, 2005 8:40 pm Reply with quote
Cgoten wrote:
Ironically enough, I can cite a few instances recently where fan translators have gotten jobs translating for ToykoPop and Viz. So, I don't think you can claim it's all bad. It has actually lead to some people getting freelance jobs, which I think is pretty cool. If you care for specific examples of this, feel free to PM me or something.

What are saying? I meant that those fan translators and fansubbers are taking away the income of the actual employees in the anime industry. I'm not saying that those fansubbers/translators aren't making a living from their illegal acts, which they aren't anyway.

I actually think that nearly everyone has stirred up this big deal about fansubs are the only source of evaluating whether an anime is good or not. I think not. I think they say that because they are able to use fansubs to their advantage, i.e. while fansubs and fan translations are around might as well make the most of out them, use them for "previews"(?).

Like Kazuki-san and I noted, what is a preview? Pay for it, watch it and discard and be gone. Like Kazuki-san said, you don't have to watch the entire series before assessing the value or worth of the anime for purchase.

I feel that the existence of fansubs has made people totally reliant on fansubs for their concept of "previewing". Since they're around people are just too reliant on using them to evaluate anime. They're just put into the habit of having them around and they can't bare it without them, they "need" them. I believe, that if fansubs/fan translations hadn't existed, people would still be as able to purchase the ideal anime simply by their likes in genre and from their human instincts. I've done so many times, i.e. selecting/buying from instincts, and I've over 100 DVDs or so, which I have no fansub version of whatsoever. Because at that time I couldn't download fansubs. And still I'm purchasing many more anime DVDs solely by my favorite genre and the basic story behind them plus my instincts. I've already ordered my copy of Saber Marionette Complete Collection Boxset from Rightstuf, and I know that there is a DVD rip and fansub out there. I choose not to download it. Why? Because I know I'll like Saber Marionette, from those ratings and the story, characters, etc. I know I like it, hence I bought it without having any of those things which many anime fans rely on called "previews".

Fansub/fan translations have made anime fans soft, entirely. They are reliant on them now and forevermore shall fansubs continue (which they will). It's like drug-tolerance. Take away the drug and the tolerant effects rush out and the people are just dying for another drug (and this case fansubs/fan translations).
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Shibi



Joined: 28 Jan 2005
Posts: 3
PostPosted: Fri Jan 28, 2005 8:45 pm Reply with quote
Quote:
Umm.. yeah.. it's been legal since the Betamax ruling in '84. Instead of merely recording on Betamax or VHS anymore, it's now Harddrives (Tivo, etc.) and DVDs. It's perfectly legal. It is NOT, however, legal to then mass produce copies of it and distribute it to people, for money or otherwise. It's just like comparing apples and oranges. The primary money maker for normal shows on TV is advertising. It's only very recently that money has been been made by selling DVDs of the seasons. In contrast, and anime series makes most of it's money by selling DVDs, and a very small amount by sellling broadcast rights


Good point on the distribution. Personally the fact that it is broadcast over the airwaves leads me to think that the original station wants the material to be seen by as many people as possible. I view the internet as merely another avenue of distribution for those unable to afford a satellite and thus complying with the wishes of the original station.

The fact that Anime's economic structure is based on DVD sales rather than advertising and broadcast rights is not protection against recording it. There is no excuse not to support the sale of anime DVDs in the regions they are released (I'd never say that). And the Gundam Seed example leads to the same conclusion either way (no money) that was my point.
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Blues of Hadal



Joined: 11 Jan 2005
Posts: 34
Location: america
PostPosted: Fri Jan 28, 2005 8:57 pm Reply with quote
Quote:
Good point on the distribution. Personally the fact that it is broadcast over the airwaves leads me to think that the original station wants the material to be seen by as many people as possible. I view the internet as merely another avenue of distribution for those unable to afford a satellite and thus complying with the wishes of the original station.


i think you twisted that to kinda go your way
the original station wanted people to view it on their station
not the actual show
they want people to view the advertisments not the anime
the orignal station doesn't want you getting the anime from somewhere else
he meant that when you record it its for yourself
if you make copies and distribute it for everyone to see its pretty illegal
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Godaistudios



Joined: 12 Jun 2003
Posts: 2075
Location: Albuquerque, NM (the land of entrapment)
PostPosted: Fri Jan 28, 2005 10:21 pm Reply with quote
Kazuki-san wrote:
Cgoten wrote:

Second problem here, let's say I have a copy of the book, and I let a friend borrow it, and he can read it just fine. If I owned the book in the first place, and he just borrows it, then no more books are sold than would have been sold otherwise. He just borrowed my copy, and no one profits in any way. How is that any better than reading a scanslation of the book?


The difference is, when you purchase a book or a DVD, you are not only buying the physical material, but also a license that allows you to watch/read it, let a friend watch/read it, etc. It doesn't, however, allow you to make copies of it and distribute them over the internet. That is a very different thing. The last fansub I downloaded had something like 738 seeds and 1024 peers just while I was actively downloading/seeding myself. I doubt that you would lend a copy of your book to 1,762 people, unless you were a library. The license, BTW is exactly why institutions like librarys can exist.


While that statement is certainly valid, it begs the question as to where the line is to be drawn. Where is the threshold on lending out one's own copy? If I do lend out a DVD and it gets passed around 1000 times, at some point a company might calculate some number of that into lost sales because some of those individuals might have bought it if I hadn't lent it out. Certainly, some people would buy it because I lent it, but by that same logic, there are others who won't buy it because I lent it out.

It also makes me wonder how many people don't buy stuff because they did preview the series first, found out how crappy it was and it resulted in lost sales not because they were able to pirate the whole thing for free, but instead found out it wasn't worth collecting.

So many possibilities, and so many different angles, yet no hard numbers provided by the companies to really indicate just what the fansub market is doing to the industry. Until we have some hard numbers to play with, all we have are assumptions and opinions about what it's doing to the industry (legal arguments not withstanding.) Certainly we can logically conclude that many people would not have bought it, but a true lost sale only is accurate if it would have been bought in the first place.
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Kazuki-san



Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 2251
Location: Houston, TX
PostPosted: Fri Jan 28, 2005 10:35 pm Reply with quote
Godaistudios wrote:
Certainly we can logically conclude that many people would not have bought it, but a true lost sale only is accurate if it would have been bought in the first place.


True, and you and I both know such numbers would be impossible to calculate.

As for the line, you can lend it out as much as you want, what you can't do, is make copies of it and distribute them, but you know this already. A normal person is certainly not going to lend out their DVDs to 1,000 people.
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Blues of Hadal



Joined: 11 Jan 2005
Posts: 34
Location: america
PostPosted: Fri Jan 28, 2005 11:33 pm Reply with quote
i agree
a large portion of the anime audience might be a bit anti social
not to mention you don't wanna hand it out to people you know will damage the disc, or might steal it so that cuts people out
you will also want it back and you'll want it in good condition so you might stop lending it(this is a reasonable assumption) to people when it starts to show damage. also most people don't want their friends to lend their dvds to other people that they don't know.



its hard to tell how it affects the anime industry but to think it does nothing to it is just being naive
you can tell someone might not buy something that shows up on dvd if the series isn't bad but they don't think its worth buying again after they have it
and people keep in their archives alot of titles that they don't buy.

well it is illegal
why is the law being broken for no reason, its not like the government is doing something evil and we're acting agaisnt it

i also think the act is as bad(cause i don't care really) as the rationalizations and justifications(somewhat redundant but i thought i should stress it) people come up with just to keep doing it
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Godaistudios



Joined: 12 Jun 2003
Posts: 2075
Location: Albuquerque, NM (the land of entrapment)
PostPosted: Sat Jan 29, 2005 12:40 am Reply with quote
Kazuki-san wrote:
Godaistudios wrote:
Certainly we can logically conclude that many people would not have bought it, but a true lost sale only is accurate if it would have been bought in the first place.


True, and you and I both know such numbers would be impossible to calculate.

As for the line, you can lend it out as much as you want, what you can't do, is make copies of it and distribute them, but you know this already. A normal person is certainly not going to lend out their DVDs to 1,000 people.


Of course I know that copying and distribution is a bad thing, but I also have had DVD's that I know have been passed around at least 10-20 times before I saw them back. Even that's probably a high number for personal property, but if there are 100 other people like me with title "X", that's still quite a few showings that weren't paid to the original company. (although it may generate a few more sales from those who liked what they saw.)

Personally, I think we are currently at a time where fansubbing is no longer helping the industry as a whole regarding sales - but I don't think it's hurting it either. I figure it's currently at a neutral position where you have some that buy it because of the fansubs and those who would buy it but figure the fansubs are good enough. Then there is the large ground of those who will eventually buy the series because of exposure in the U.S. One thing can be said for fansubs - instant fanbases are never a bad thing, and those series that were fansubbed first do have a tendency of selling faster upon initial release. It's for this reason that I think the U.S. industry is walking on eggshells here and they are well aware of it. They must keep handling it with the kid gloves or it will affect their bottom line.
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Blues of Hadal



Joined: 11 Jan 2005
Posts: 34
Location: america
PostPosted: Sat Jan 29, 2005 1:48 am Reply with quote
Quote:
that's still quite a few showings that weren't paid to the original company. (although it may generate a few more sales from those who liked what they saw.)


in the end these people won't walk away with the actual video, instead of having it copied in their hard drive, so they won't be able to see it when they want

Quote:
no longer helping the industry as a whole regarding sales -]but I don't think it's hurting it either. I figure it's currently at a neutral position where you have some that buy it because of the fansubs and those who would buy it but figure the fansubs are good enough.


if they're not helping then they lost the moral ground they had and they've done their job right?
and its still illegal so its disregarding the law for no reason that isn't beneficent anymore.
you make it sound like you know that the group who will then buy the series on dvd is larger than the one that won't, thats smart if you're a politician or something but you said you don't have the numbers to say how large which group is.

the best point you do make is the instant fanbase
maybe as anime gets more exposure on t.v (because for now when it has television esposure it has had a greater fanbase than fansubs almost always)
but the people that download and buy the anime already know all about whats getting hype(the hype can come from more than one place) and can find information on it easily not quite the same, but some titles that have been pirated and don't develop a following have had good sales and/or built it up afterwards, sometimes the name of a director or studio is all it needs.
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fullmetalfatigue



Joined: 29 Jan 2005
Posts: 4
Location: Redditch England!!!
PostPosted: Sat Jan 29, 2005 5:08 am Reply with quote
why do people always try to justify getting stuff for free? Its against the law to download fan subs and wether people like it or not there the facts.
Thats not to say i don't agree with fan subs as i have seen many and got into whole series through watching them. I just wish there was a way to download fansubs and for a small price, say £2-£3($3-$4) and have that money go to the anime industry(i.e. those with the rights to the series).
i personally would have no problems paying a small fee to see something i enjoy, and would still support the dvd when lauched(i order about $300 worth anime dvd's and get them imported each month.)
i know not everyone has that kind of money, and know i am very lucky to be able to spend that kind of money on anime, but i am propably in a miniority that would be willing to pay. and that is where the problem lies.....
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Blues of Hadal



Joined: 11 Jan 2005
Posts: 34
Location: america
PostPosted: Sat Jan 29, 2005 11:17 pm Reply with quote
if someone was to make it so you can download episodes online then only opne person has to do it
and they can just put it up so others can take it for free using any number of p2p programs

nor if it were to have 4 eps like most dvds do the cost wouldn't be much lower(like 2-3 bucks less)

it'd be good if a person just wanted one episode so the price might be less around(5 bucks if the dvd was 25$ with 5 eps)
but that might be better served with something like digital cable or something like it
normally things have more if bought in bulk i don't know if that would accept the price so it'd be like 7 bucks for one ep
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Tempest
I Run this place.
ANN Publisher


Joined: 29 Dec 2001
Posts: 10419
Location: Do not message me for support.
PostPosted: Sun Jan 30, 2005 12:54 am Reply with quote
fullmetalfatigue wrote:
why do people always try to justify getting stuff for free?


People sleep better at night after they've justified their behaviour.

-t
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