Forum - View topicChicks On Anime - Fansubs (Pt 1)
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0utf0xZer0
Posts: 80 |
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The proper analysis of the number of sales lost or gained is the number of DVDs a person buys when they do download fansubs compared to the number of DVDs they would buy if they didn't download. If the number is higher on the fansub side, we can say that fansubs increase sales to that user. Only if it is lower can we say that sales were lost to that's user's downloading. Any other measure of lost sales is unrealistic because it doesn't match what would actually happen if fansubs suddenly stopped. Not that the collective action problem means it is possible for some downloader's downloading to be a net positive even if the net effect of all downloaders is negative. |
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FaytLein
 Posts: 1260 Location: Williamsburg, VA |
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However, the US won't go after anyone who is broadcasting uncopyrighted material, that would be a case for Japanese authorites, and that is my point. If you factor in the already remote chance of being busted for copyrighted material, uncopyrighted material for most people probably empowers people to continue going since the chance of Japanese police coming down on you are about close to zero. |
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cyberbeing
Posts: 135 |
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No hard feelings. I was just trying to point out that your argument loses much of its weight if it looks like FUD. |
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Unit 03.5-ish
Posts: 1540 Location: This space for rent |
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But even with the argument that fansubs create net positive because they promote DVD sales, there are LEGAL, inexpensive options that promote sales as well. TV. Rentals. Borrowing from a friend. Crunchyroll. The fan has plenty of alternatives for viewing a show that are wallet-friendly; the only defense he has with fansubs are that he simply is not patient. This excuse is tenuous at best.
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Mohawk52
 Posts: 8202 Location: England, UK |
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Unit 03.5-ish
Posts: 1540 Location: This space for rent |
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To go right back to the TiVo thing, wouldn't this be the same as, again, making a digital file of the latest CSI or Lost and redistributing it over the Internet for free? |
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0utf0xZer0
Posts: 80 |
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Which works if these alternatives are available to you and you aren't looking for niche shows. Hence why I say that until free streaming is expanded in terms of regions and selection, there will still be users whose fansub downloading results in a net positive in sales.
The raws are posted with Japanese downloaders in mind, so stopping fansubs won't stop this (it's that nasty collective action problem again). There I consider this an in-theory only consideration that isn't worth factoring into a ethical calculation. So as I see it, the fansubbing of a niche show like EF is still more likely to have a positive than negative outcome. |
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LordRedhand
 Posts: 1472 Location: Middle of Nowhere, Indiana |
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If the show is niche, it proven that just fansub views are not an indicator of popularity or future sales, look at 2 series that by the fansub numbers should have been a success similiar to DB, MoHS and Gurren Lagan(sp?), one could and some have argued that becuase of fansubs those series were not as successful as they could have been.
Interms of your favorite show, first is there an R2 release whether tape, laser disc, DVD, whatever? If yes you'd buy it, but you say it's to expensive, but if you truly were a fan of that show, you'd find a way to support it as opossed to leading someone to the fansub group that does it, becuase you can't insure that that makes the series more likely to come out, you can't be sure that even if the person likes it that they would buy it in the future, thus your potentially lowering the value of your favorite series to those who might be looking at it to release legitimatally. And if you can't afford the R2? Tough, or save up for it if it is truly your favorite, must own series. |
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0utf0xZer0
Posts: 80 |
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Okay, my rule: Niche show: fansubs have positive impact. Non-niche show: fansubs have negative impact Gurren Lagann is too big to be a niche show. MoHS was a niche show at first, but the fansubs took it beyond niche to where negative results started to kick in. I suspect the net impact on sales compared to the non-fansub version is still positive, though.
I am simply operating on the assumption that the fansub does not compete with the R2 and is more likely to have a positive impact on sales than a negative. I believe that this assumption is more likely to be the case than other underlying assumptions I could make. Edit: As for the R2... I could afford it by cutting a large portion of the R1s I would otherwise buy this year. So while I've considered it, I haven't bought it yet because I consider the two choices to be pretty much equivalent (strong support for a single show I really like versus some support for a variety of shows I like... either could be considered a good goal for allocative reasons). |
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LordRedhand
Posts: 1472 Location: Middle of Nowhere, Indiana |
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Actually all anime are niche shows, don't like giant robots? Then guess what, you don't like Gurren Lagann. Don't like hoghschool series of any sort? Guess what MoHS is not for you. These are segments within the existing anime fandom that one could say have been or large parts of anime at one point or another. But if a show is to niche even in a niche market, you have to pay a premium for it just to financially successful or they won't continue with similiar series.
With terms of your most favorite show ever, you don't like it enough, becuase you would've had it or find a way to have it. Cutting back on your R1 spending, fine, as you'd be getting the, what you consider, the best anime series ever as oppssed to okay series. Sure the R1 companies want you to buy their works but you, as you say, have to prioritize what series you purchase. So becuase you put your "Favorite series of all time" on the back-burner of your list, it must not be that important to you. Edit: I mean if you as a fan won't invest in your favorite series, then why should a company or anyone else invest in it? |
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0utf0xZer0
Posts: 80 |
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Okay, I've spent like two days arguing this, and at this point personal circumstances dictate I HAVE to get other things done.
Just thought I'd let you know because I hate waiting around for people to post (that's what gets me into trouble with these threads). Edit: Damnit, it appears thoughts of this thread won't leave me alone until I get this one off my chest: Yes, I haven't figured out whether $300 of non-top three but excellent shows on R1 or one top three show on R2 is a better allocation yet. I'm working on it. Feel free to lambast me for my lack of willpower to keep out. Ugh. Last edited by 0utf0xZer0 on Fri Feb 06, 2009 12:41 am; edited 1 time in total |
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Cait
 Posts: 503 |
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Wow, half a day and I am 5 pages behind. This one's going to be long, so bear with me...
No, I was saying (or rather quickly trying to this morning because I needed to leave for work like ten minutes earlier) that it is hard for anti-fansubbers (and seriously, is there a better word for us than this? I'm tired and I can't recall if there is one) to argue against fansubs without bringing up the law. The law is part of the moral framework of the issue. Intellectual property rights are actually a fairly new concept in the world, and certainly international copyright laws are even newer, especially as the economy becomes more and more globalized (we can't ignore the outside world forever, folks, the internet has irrevocably changed us, rendering any attempts like the former Japanese isolationism or pre-WWII American apathy towards global crisis from ever finding fruition again). Four hundred years ago Shakespeare never dared to publish (ie, print for sale) a single one of his plays because intellectual property rights did not exist then and publishing a script was akin to handing your competition all your hard work. The reason we have Shakespeare's plays in print today is because of the 16th (and early 17th) century versions of anime pirates would go to the shows and transcribe the scripts. At the time, this act would have been incredibly troubling as it would have directly affected the business Shakespeare's company was trying to run (when those "copy writers" took those scripts back to their own theatre companies and mounted the same shows against his). Today we are sort of grateful because we have these wonderful plays that theatre companies do not have to pay royalties to anyone to produce, but for Shakespeare back then, it would have been his ruin to allow such a thing as copyright infringement. Think about copyright laws this way: without them we would be missing the openness of shared popular culture. Creators would be too afraid to show anyone else their work, lest it be stolen and any viable market for it destroyed. It would take a miracle for the next Shakespeare to be discovered like this. Honestly, I think it is a miracle that we even have Shakespeare's plays at all. Think about how many other wonderful playrights of the last centuries we've actually missed out on because they didn't want their work stolen so they didn't leave any copies behind for posterity. The thing about copyright law is that it was never meant to make intellectual property something "commercial" forever. It is meant to protect the interests and economic viability of the creator/copyright holder for the lifetime of that creator (and his heirs). Copyrights expire after a certain number of years (I think it is around 50-75 years after the death of the original creator/copyright holder) because after the person who created it makes his money (and by that I mean his living) from the product it no longer needs to be protected (and the people who created the law understood this). Anime is the same way, and that fact drives my opinions about fansubs. Fansubs completely ignore, or try to marginalize, the fact that a lot of people are making their living (very modestly I might add, as most of the employees of these companies do not make a lot of money) from producing these works. Fansubbers are only concerned with the end-user: themselves. They talk about the "ideals" surrounding the "free sharing" of art, etc., but they fail to grasp the fact that just because they volunteer themselves to the task doesn't mean "free" is the noblest, and therefore "best," course. The difference between a "professional" and an "amateur" is that the professional is paid for his work, while the amateur is willing to do it for free. The professional thinks enough of himself to not only expect to be reimbursed for his efforts, but devote his entire working life to the task and honing his skills for it. An amateur may or may not have skills, but it does not make him better than the professional simply because he offers those skills to others for free, especially when he is offering those skills for free to the detriment of the professional who is relying on the income from doing the same job. I would even go so far as to argue that the professional, who devotes all of his energy to his task (not as a "hobby," like the amateur does) will almost always perform better than the amateur. The fact that people choose the amateur over the professional is due, therefore, to the "free" nature of the amateur's work, and not to its quality. This is why I will never accept the argument, "fansubs are better than official releases." Anyway, what I actually wanted to strike up in this conversation with my post was a not-so-simple question: putting aside for the moment whether or not fansubs are obsolete, which one do the people of this thread want fansubs to be? Do you want them to be obsolete or do you not want them to be obsolete? I'm curious to know, particularly among the people here who defend fansubs, whether or not they are actually ready to let them go. Would you still choose to get fansubs for free if you could watch all the same shows on the internet for a small fee or ad-supported (albeit probably a few weeks later than you could get them for free through illegal means)? Is there actually a point for you guys where the industry will have "done enough" to satisfy you? Where is that point? And for the anti-fansubbers here, when will fansubs be marginal enough that you stop railing against them? When they are only for out of print licensed titles? Or maybe only unlicensed or unlicensable titles? When they are gone completely? Where is your line on the subject? |
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LordRedhand
Posts: 1472 Location: Middle of Nowhere, Indiana |
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I'll say fansubs will be marginal enough when there is no more of a demand for the service. Thus trying as best as possible to releasing the series in some way.
Unfortunetly for older series or the "unlicensible" , even if they were to be released in the R1 market, we'd still here detractors as the relelase doesn't compare to that user's favorite fansub group, which in reality of things they would never be your customers. Also there is normally a reason why a series gets picked over another one, sometimes licensing issues or its not going to sell or it has too many cultural references that make the series unlikely or unable to be released in the R1 market, but that does not allow the fansubs of those series to continue, becuase then your detracting the value of that series if you could get it. Myself, I think "Just becuase it's released in Japan, means it does not have to come here." As not all series should come here, as I look at some people preening for a straight-dub release of Ghost Stories, after trying to sit through the straight-sub on the disc, the show at best was average, and pretty boring, so if what the "fans" of Ghost Stories got what they wanted, we'd see a failed release as it wouldn't recoup its costs. And we are seeing a move towards obsoletness by the release of season boxsets, streaming video links that if supported could expand, as well as legitiamte options for those who just want to have or watch a series like buying the R2, renting, the library. And for some anime fans, there is also the older R1 releases that they haven't seen before, myself as an example, watched Project A-ko for the first time this year, surely there are other anime fans who haven't seen it who can becuase it is available here in the R1 market. |
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Top Gun
 Posts: 4575 |
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*jumps back into the fray despite himself*
I would gladly have fansubs be completely obsolete, which is why I'm such a big fan of the first steps that companies on both sides of the Pacific have taken to try to recognize the "try-before-you-buy" mentality. Given the choice, I'll always watch something from a legal streaming source first, since I know that it does support the industry (and saves me a lot of bandwidth and hard drive space in the process). The only real trouble at this point is that such efforts are still mostly few and far between, from both Japanese production companies and American distributors. It's all gravy if you're a fan of Naruto or one of the shows on Crunchyroll, or if you're trying to see something that FUNi has on their site, but there are whole reams of companies on both sides who don't have anything at all available. And that's not even counting the massive amount of older series out there that most companies might not even think of uploading anywhere. If the day ever comes when most big-name series are available soon after their Japanese broadcasts, and American distributors have the freedom to stream good portions of their own catalogs, I'll gladly state that fansubs have little reason to exist (other than super-niche and vintage titles, perhaps). Also, I know a few people mentioned Gurren-Lagann earlier as an example of a title that may have been adversely impacted by fansubs, and I won't argue that particular point. But one could just as easily look at things the other way, too. Would Gurren-Lagann ever have become the raging Internet sensation that it did without a whole bunch of people around the globe watching it at the same time? It may not have done much for Bandai's bottom line if most of those people wound up not buying, as it seems they didn't, but one wonders if ADV and then Bandai would have taken as big of a shot with the series as they did without that rabid fanbase. |
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0utf0xZer0
Posts: 80 |
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You had to ask one of the few questions I consider important enough to draw me back in, didn't you? I'll try and provide a quick answer even though time will probably keep me out of a full debate anytime soon.
I don't like the video quality of services like Crunchyroll along with a few minor factors, but the site is pretty much at the level I'd be willing to settle for if the shows I wanted were available. Crunchyroll does the promo/sampling thing fansubs are useful for and does it one better by providing a revenue stream for the creators. The only issue I have right now is that the shows I'm interested in are largely unavailable through such a service. Realistically though, I suspect there will still be a use for fansubs in the long term because not everyone is going to sign with Crunchyroll. Still, I think Crunchyroll type services will be able to eliminate the need for fansubs of a great many shows. The main question with that site, however, is a Catch-22: it needs money to buy licenses and expand, but I suspect that it will need to expand to draw in the revenues to do this. I'd really love for shows like EF, Spice and Wolf, and Kurenai to be available to the public via a Crunchyroll type service, and I'd like to be able to buy direct downloads of these shows as a way of supporting the creators. Preferably in HD. Hey, a man can dream, right? |
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