Forum - View topicNEWS: ADV Takes Over Geneon's Sales, Marketing, Distribution
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Karasuhebi
 Posts: 143 Location: Orlando, Florida (US) |
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Okay I've kept quiet while reading these past 8 pages of discussion but I feel like I need to say something now. Alaska52's post is indeed long, but I found it very interesting so don't rag on him just because he wrote a long post. I feel that if someone took the time to type up such a long post it's because they have something to say.
-Karasuhebi |
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HitokiriShadow
 Posts: 6251 |
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Geneon never had anything to do with Rurouni Kenshin. Media Blasters had the TV series, ADV had the movie and OVAs.
I sure can't comment on how accurate his perception of the industry may be, but I think that was one damn impressive first post. |
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Rubyfulcrum
Posts: 9 |
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I don't just know people like that (which I do), I am people like that. But my situation doesn't prove anything. I think anecdotes and opinions are too often used as substitues for facts, and with that said, I really appreciate the responses that jservakis has given. First hand knowledge and analysis based on direct experience is always interesting and informative... and makes the time I spent lurking on an internet forum seem worthwhile. Regarding the leaked Geneon letter, the first thing I thought was the sadness whenever I hear that someone is losing their job, because once you get past the corp. speak, that's the end result. Also, I noticed a lot of comments here about the effectiveness of advertising, and I wanted to try to submit something useful. Frankly, posting in internet forums makes me nervous, I don't want to waste anyone's time. I used to think I was "above" advertising... commercials don't work on me! The "man" can't control me! I'm untamed! Wild! But I'm older now, and it doesn't bother me anymore. When I see an ad saying, "I'm thinking Arby's," sometimes I end up thinking, "You know, I am thinking Arby's!" And sometimes magazine ads or trailers work on me, too. Heck, even internet banner ads! Obviously advertising doesn't work all the time on all people. I think it works best at convincing someone to do something they are already at least partially inclined to do. But a lot of time and money has been put into figuring out how to do just that. And here's what I think is the useful part of this already-too-long post: there was a great documentary from BBC 4 on the history and origins of the modern public relations/marketing machine called The Century of the Self. I have no idea what the legality of it is, but Google Video has had videos of all 4 parts available to view for over a year now, and I would highly recommend watching it. You'll never look at marketing the same way again! Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4. Start with Part 3 if you want to get to modern marketing, but I think the first 2 parts are interesting background. Ignorance may be bliss, but information is power! Last edited by Rubyfulcrum on Mon Aug 27, 2007 10:33 am; edited 1 time in total |
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jsevakis
Former ANN Editor in Chief
 Posts: 1684 Location: Los Angeles, CA |
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Out of curiosity I pasted it into Microsoft Word so I could do a word count... Just shy of 1900! Now, I have no problem responding to stuff and Karasuhebi seemed to enjoy it, but requiring anyone to slog through 1900 words of (admittedly) uninformed opinion to respond intelligently is asking a bit much IMHO.
While the links may be questionable (don't be offended if the mods remove them), this sure looks interesting, and I'll be sure to watch them when I have a minute. I wonder if it's out on DVD at all. I also found interesting your observations on your maturing thoughts on advertising. I work 2 blocks from Times Square, and so I get a bit tired of it sometimes myself. It's just so inescapable here! BTW, there's no need to be intimidated posting on this forum, as long as you're considerate about it. While there are definitely people on here that regularly waste people's time, the fact that you've even questioned that about yourself means that you're probably not going to be one of them. 
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Paploo
Posts: 1875 |
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1) has NEVER downloaded any anime fansub before I got into anime with VHS releases. When downloading on computers was new in campuses worldwide, I downloaded a few [2001-ish] that were craptacular, and I've since replaced everything...... 6 months in, I decided why not just get the real thing off Ebay for cheap? And I did. And I did. [though I haven't used Ebay for about 4 years since DVD's got cheaper/more available, so most of what I get now is new]. And I now own 700+ vhs/dvd. Fansubs suck. For a variety of reasons. 2) buys at least two or three anime titles each month, but not more than ten (this would count as "buying everything" in which case advertising is not relevant to such people) I buy about 5 dvd's a month, 10+ if there's a sale one. 3) buys all the anime magazines that come out I buy Newtype, Shojo Beat, SJump, and have bought Protoculture, Anime Insider and others in the past. I do think that companies should send out more advertising though, if only in terms of spreading itself over the internet a bit more, as I've met a lot of people who only frequent fansub sites who have no idea that an animes been licensed, or that it's available on dvd [including some titles tgat have readily been available for ages]. Sketchier Fansubbers like to keep fans in the dark about these things. Like say, sending posters out to fansub sites to do nothing more say "I work for this company, and we have title Z" though it's obviously a lot more difficult then that..... I wish Geneon nothing but the best- they're a great company, whose products were among the first I bought |
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Lyrai
Posts: 174 Location: Potatoes (Idaho) |
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Wow. This is very dark indeed.
I have a hypothetical question. Let's take all this to an extreme - what happens if the US anime industry crashes completly? It becomes so unprofitable that they all just close doors? A stupid what-if question? Possibly. But I'm genuinely curious as to what would happen - both on the consumer end of things and on the anime in japan industry - if such an extreme thing happened. Plus, Alaska52's giant wall of text sort of knocked the wind out of me and made me rethink what I was going to post originally. (Damn nice first post, though) |
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Mohawk52
 Posts: 8202 Location: England, UK |
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Mindless Watcher
Posts: 68 |
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The other 96% of humanity would continue to enjoy their anime. 
First of all, the by far most important market for anime is Japan. As long as anime remains popular in Japan, it will be produced no matter if it sells in the US or even in the rest of the word. Maybe a little less, which is good since it's already hard to keep an overview over all the stuff that is produced every year.  Even if the overseas markets break away, fansubs will fill the gap for the remaining hardcore fans. Or the Japanese themselves, hiring professional translators to sub their anime (The costs are insignificant compared to producing the anime in the first place.) So the real question is: will the Japanese market crumble?
It's of course not impossible that in 20 years from now a new generation of Japanese will simply lose their interest in anime at least to a degree where nobody will buy all the merchandizing stuff anymore. Even in that case anime won't vanish totally of course but much less will be produced. But 20 years is a long time, there's not much you can do about it (except if you want to force people to watch anime), and cartoons that have their roots in anime will probably be produced around the world by then, very different but much more popular than the original anime just like modern pop music has its roots in blues, while blues fans are a minority nowadays. Feel free to consider this development a good thing or blashemy. Actually, I see this happening rather sooner than later. It's not that Disney is too stupid to produce something anime-ish it's just that the market has been to small up to now for them to care. Next question is: Will piracy destroy anime in Japan? I frankly don't know but somehow it looks contradictory to me that a market destroys itself due to the popularity of its products. And Bach created music before there was a copyright, and Shakespeare was a pirate by himself and yadda, yadda. You know the discussions. The important point is something else: piracy is not the problem of the anime industry but of the whole media industry everywhere. And before anime dies, where shows are first broadcasted on TV anyways and where loyal otaku spend all there money on DVDs and all the merchandizing stuff, before that happens some other sectors of the media industry will die first. As long as companies like EMI and Universal are still standing I wouldn't be too worried about anime in Japan. Bottom line: Don't fear the withdrawal, your drug will continue to flow for quite some time. |
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WEKS
 Posts: 82 Location: Finland |
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Man, I remember the good old days when Geneon was Pioneer. Now... well I don't know, something just isn't quite right .
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Goodpenguin
Posts: 457 Location: Hunt Valley, MD |
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Lyrai worte:
There have been a few takes on your question that are typical of 'Fansubbers Fantasy', but the reality of a (relative) total domestic market crash would move anime (domestically) from niche hobby/subculture back to obscure interest. A certain segment of anime fandom would have you believe a R1 collapse would lead to a paradise of 'hardcore' fans watching all the shows they want, easy-as-pie on fansubs, with quality and tone of the entertainment completely untouched. Just touching on the domestic situation, over a (relative) short period of time most fansubbing groups would largely whittle away. A strong appeal (outside of just seeing the shows of course) of watching/being in a fansubbing group/culture is being on the 'hardcore' side of a large subculture 'mainstream'. Since an end of the R1 market (which would entail not just DVD's, but Cons, network shows, etc.) would by common sense erode a vast portion of the fanbase, suddenly there's no 'mainstream' anymore, and also no real social 'cool' bonus. Fansubbers may stick around awhile, but without a sizable (in context) audience a lot would drift away. Since a R1 collapse (in your 'extreme' question) would also mean the end of (virtually) all professional domestic internet (ANN, AoD, etc.) and print publications (nothing to domestically advertise, so no advertising revenue), a fan,or more specifically a fansubbing group that wants to keep the hobby going domestically, is going to have to be not only 100% fluent in Japanese, but totally familiar with Japanese subculture in order to navigate various outlets to keep up with new shows/anime news. That's a heck of a lot of work to entertain a very, very small audience. On the Japanese end, anime would of course go on, but (as already spelled out by Japanese producers) without foreign (re: US) investment/opportunities, especially in light of heavy production costs, anime shows would further segment into 'safety' slots largely made of otaku-oriented niche programs for late-night, and young teen/tween melodrama-fest's/endless shonen adaptions, complete with lower quality animation. Being this is something fans on both sides of the Pacific are currently complaining about, it's acceleration wouldn't seem to portend a rosy outlook for the Japanese market (outside of traditional 'all-ages' material), or much of interest to the few remaining domestic fansub fans. |
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Paploo
Posts: 1875 |
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Well, we certainly be seeing less anime being made- the Hellsing OVA, Big O II and the Cowboy Bebop movie are all examples of producrs that wouldn't of been released at all without US anime distributors involvement. Chance Pop Session, BubbleGum Crisis 2040, and SuperMilkChan are all examples of ADV coproductions. And I'm pretty sure 100% of what Gonzo produces relies on a domestic company coproducing it [which is why their titles always get picked up, get picked up quickly, and tend to go to one company in big batches]. Likewise, Production IG. There's a fair amount of productions that rely on foriegn licensing revenues- just look at the number of shows whose Japanese credits included Geneon USA, to be on topic. Every US distributo has coproduced their fair share of titles- Manga Entertainment and X/1999, Street Fighter Generations, Blood, Highlander, and lots more, Media Blasters and the upcoming Kite sequel..... even on the manga end of things, Tokyopop is behind the continuation of Alichino. If Geneon USA is coproducing less shows, it means less shows get made, and the animation's at a lower budget for those that do. And here's where Fansubs add the extra suck- they often bootleg LICENSED shows, and RIP THE SHOWS DIRECTLY OFF THE DVD'S. Think before you download people. You're choices do affect the continued production of new anime, and the continued existence of quality domestic producers like Geneon. I'd give fansubbers more credit if more stuck to "fansub ethics" of the olden days, but the fact of the matter is that a)most don't, and b)most are subbing Naruto. |
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Craeyst Raygal
 Posts: 1383 Location: In the garage, beneath a 1970 MGB GT. |
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Hmmm, could've sworn Pioneer did the "Samurai X" nonsense around the same time they were calling Fushigi Yugi "Mysterious Play". Ah well, my memory fails me but my point remains the same. And as far as an R1 collapse is concerned, folks, there are a lot of "failsafes" that actually will keep the industry and anime (from an American consciousness perspective) around. DVD's have proven a much cheaper and durable format than VHS, so limited production of even the most obscure titles by companies that start up and fold practically after the final pressing have become a part of the industry (Risky Safety and Interstella 5555, anyone?). Hollywood icons have stepped forward with their appreciation like Roger Ebert, the Wachowskis, and James Cameron. The internet has taken the old "Hey that was cool, what was it" search from months to minutes (Remember how long it was before you learned the series that comprised Robotech or that Sailor Moon's name was Usagi, not Serena? Seems pretty laughable today that that information was hard to find before). Basically, anime is more visible now, and its fandom more populated. I would bet that if the remaining licensors only sold one out of evry five DVD's sold today, they'd still exceed the VHS sales (and VHS sales profit margins) of 10 years ago. |
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Paploo
Posts: 1875 |
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To be fair, Risky Safety was produced by AN Entertainment, who have since release 3 more shows...... maybe you're confused as it went out of print recently? They've still got the excellent Hare+Guu being released.
Still, it's sad to see a company go under, especially after the recent slowdown of CPM. These large industry chnages aren't something that can just be brushed aisde. You also have to keep in mind.... -Larger distribution=bigger returns on unsold items. There's larger financial risks involved overall. -Higher Licensing Fees [this is partly due to percieved demand due to popularlity of shows via fansubs- the problem is that the demand was articifical, as a lot of fans had no intentions of buying] |
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Porcupine
 Posts: 1033 |
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Lyrai, my thoughts are that if the US anime industry crashes (or recedes significantly) it won't be disaster for anime in general, because as Mindless Watcher said...
I also hear what Mindless says about it theoretically being impossible for piracy to destroy anime in Japan. I have thought about that too. I agree that in the end it is theoretically impossible for piracy to make anime 100% extinct, but I still think that it is theoretically possible that rampant piracy within Japan could severely lower the quality and quantity of anime that are produced.
In my state we don't see that situation because I think we went in reverse. There have always been 0 FYE in my state. Right now we have 2 Sam Goodys and 2 Suncoasts and they pretty much monopolize the local anime retail industry. I am not certain but I think one of these Suncoasts may have even opened after the ownership transfer to Transworld (or if it existed before, it was in real bad shape and few people knew about it). We used to have a 3rd Sam Goody but it closed last year...it didn't matter for anime anyway since it was located next door to a Suncoast in the same shopping mall. Also, after the transfering of ownership the Suncoasts became like a new store, as you said. Their business practices changed and I think their sales skyrocketed. People who work at the Suncoasts here have claimed to me that about 40% of their sales are now anime (which I believe since I can see for myself what people in line are buying) and that they are the #1 selling Suncoast in the nation (which I'm not sure I believe, but if I take into account how poor anime is supposedly selling elsewhere in the USA then they might even be right). It's interesting that the situation elsewhere in the USA is so much more bleak. |
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Greboruri
Posts: 380 Location: QBN, NSW, Australia |
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