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chronos02 wrote:

Well, that's fairly simple, UK and US english are similar safe for specific words and some idioms,

I do not think you will find one UK born citizen agreeing with you (whether it is subs or dubs would not change a thing). The thing is that most latino subtitles use a neutral language, where castilian subtitles are full of local slang you fail to recognize as local, so in the end in the day whether you like it or not, it is better to do translations over here than in the old continent, you should be pleading for basque or cataln subs if you really cared for spain as a whole :p

mangamuscle wrote:

chronos02 wrote:

Well, that's fairly simple, UK and US english are similar safe for specific words and some idioms,

I do not think you will find one UK born citizen agreeing with you (whether it is subs or dubs would not change a thing). The thing is that most latino subtitles use a neutral language, where castilian subtitles are full of local slang you fail to recognize as local, so in the end in the day whether you like it or not, it is better to do translations over here than in the old continent, you should be pleading for basque or cataln subs if you really cared for spain as a whole :p

Talk for yourself, I'm not Spanish, but from Belgium... latino Spanish variants are packed full of weird slang, whereas Spaniards (safe for some areas) use mostly neutral spanish, with some occasional regional idioms. Proof of that is the absurd hate latinos have for the RAE (Real Academia de la Lengua Española) which dictates what is correct and what is not, what is considered slang and what is not, etc. for Spanish. This isn't done because some old dude wants to and consideres that this is right or worng, but based on a system that studies the usage of the language in Spain (yes, Spain, since, well, it's Spanish), though that is not to say words that originate in the americas are not recognized, and are often added to the official language dictionary, though as 4th, 5th or even 6th acception in said dictionary.

On the other hand, latinos do not have an organized manner of determining what is neutral, slang, or whatever, they go ffa, and they like to call that "neutral" when it obviously isn't, since most of the time they can't understand eachother (as in, latin americans from different latin american countries), be it because of vocabulary, grammar, or context usage (yes, context, they depend so much on it that different kinds of context interpretetiaons can mean different things within a same situation for different latino spanish "dialects").

Also, on the "you won't find ONE UK bron citizen" thing, being someone who was raised in British English from day one, I can perfectly notice the differences between american and british english, but those differences are absolutely marginal compared to the difference between Spanish (Spain) and the different kinds of Spanish (Latin America). Someone from the UK will understand what the characters say in an american english movie, whereas a spaniard will probably not understand a thing when listening to a latino spanish character talk if he/she is not used to it. And I believe both american and british english speakers use plenty of verbal forms, but as I mentioned earlier, latinos do not use the full range of verbal tenses because they depend a lot on contextual speaking; for example, a latino will say "donde fuiste" to someone who just came in, that, for them, means "where did you go", however, for a Spaniard, that can mean "where did you come from, where did you go, where have you gone", etc., since they do not depend as much on context, the correct form in Spain would be "a donde has ido" or "de donde vienes", "donde fuiste" is used to ask for something that happened long ago, as in, where did you go on your past vacation. This happenes on multiple levels, and in most situations, confusing the Spaniards a lot when they listen to a latin american talking.

I know it means little to talk about this here, but I did a lot of lingüistic study on Spanish a few years ago, and the blatant conclusion was that latino spanish dialects are incredibly far from neutral spanish, to the point each latino country calls their variant the "neutral" one, filled with obscure words and word use that was never used in Spain even before 1492, nor in any other latino country with "Spanish" as their main language, though, really, each could give their language a name, for they can easily be considered their own so much has it changed. The study also concluded that the most neutral Spanish was between a specific dialect from spain, the known castillian (used exclusively in Castilla), and a very well used argentinian dialect which made full use of all the verbal tenses and avoided most of the regional words but, if I remember correctly, it was mainly used for some sort of... formal meetings, so it wasn't an every day use kind of Spanish, whereas Castellano (Castillian) is.

I could easily fill up hundreds of pages with more information, alas, this is not the place for it, I was simply saying that since Spaniards do not like, one bit, latino spanish, nor do they understand it very well, CR should have NOT used it on their subs for Spain, moreso when they stated in an official announcement that they would NOT use them.

chronos02 wrote:

Talk for yourself, I'm not Spanish, but from Belgium...being someone who was raised in British English from day one

For someone that could simply select the english subtitles (to the which you do not have objection), you know what? Thou doth protest too much, methinks.

Animegomaniac wrote:

That's where they are, yes but not what they were. I don't care if they're legal now but they've been muscling out the people who do things I like in favor of becoming the world's fansubber.

I like animation, I don't like subs and I know enough Japanese to turn subs off. What's in CR for someone like me?

You can turn subs off. I do it all the time. And what you get for subscribing to CR is directly helping the industry you probably claim to like.
Also, if you refuse to support any company that has ever done a bad thing, or tried to increase their market share, you should probably throw away the vast majority of your property including any electronic devices you have.

invalidname wrote:

The other thing I thought was interesting in the Crunchyroll announcement is that they have something like 25 million registered-but-non-paying users. So that means there's some revenue coming in from advertising. Moreover, it kind of explains to me why Crunchyroll has this full-court press with social media, appearances at an insane number of conventions, advertising, etc. While their growth in one direction is limited by the number of people that like anime at all (and the overwhelming number that don't), they have an enormous opportunity flipping some of those 25 million free viewers into paid subscribers. Getting Crunchyroll more ingrained into the casual fan's anime experience may be the way to do that.

I was a little bummed that Justin didn't mention that as well(20 million was the figure I saw). Maybe the revenue from those ads is so insignificant that it doesn't matter? I doubt that, but Justin overlooking it is a little surprising. I was under the impression that those users likely generated multiple millions on their own per year.

D00dleB0Y wrote:

Justin, haven't you heard of Dragon Ball Z? Sarcasm, obviously, but that series has easily sold millions of units. To claim that no anime has sold over 125,000 units since Ninja Scroll is absurd.

He means in the US. Although Crunchyroll has subscribers in other countries as well.

I think that Crunchyroll will continue to grow fast. It's the world's largest animation streaming service and it's grow will continue specially if it takes the markets in emerging countries.

They have 20 million non-paying users, most of whom are teenagers and young adults without income. Soon they will start making money and will gladly pay 7 bucks. Although, I might add, many if not most of the users who don't pay are from developing countries and 7 dollars in Brazil is like 30 dollars in the US. Which is not cheap.

I think that the ca. 100 million they make for the industry is a big deal since the cost of producing a single cour series is about 2 million dollars (you have to pay like 50 people in an animation studio for 6 months, that would cost about 1.1 million dollars in Japan plus other costs), so it's like enough to pay for dozens of season of stuff.

With the additional pull of the Chinese market and from other countries besides North America the industry will produce perhaps over a hundred more shows every year.

Crunchy was one of the more popular of the many anime sub aggregator sites back then. Around 2008 they asked for donations which set the net ablaze spinning it over the next 9 years into what you see today. Its quite the accomplishment to have that many paid subscribers especially when anime is niche. Crunchy had a big install base that is there for more than just anime. They need to convince people that their service is worth paying for.

Following the all the sub groups back then took work to see nearly everything that crunchy delivers on now. It's a good thing.

CR should be okay in the future, provided that there is no shady behind-the-scenes business stuff like what happened earlier. Sure, other factors play a role, but business screw ups can be one of the bigger factors.

Agent355 wrote:

I have a follow up question; if Crunchyroll has been successful in bringing more eyes and wallets to anime studios, why is it taking so long for manga publishers to follow suit? Crunchyroll only has a handful of manga titles themselves, and as far as I know, there is no other site that offers multiple digital manga series from a variety of different publishers for a single subscription fee or free with ads (I know there are titles available on Amazon's Kindle store, though I don't know how many are translated in English & available outside Japan). There were rumors of some scanlation sites going legit, but that didn't pan out. I've been dreaming of a "Crunchyroll for manga" for years, but compared to its anime collection, CR's manga library barely grows even though its been around for a while. I'm glad we're getting legal simulpubs of Attack on Titan and Princess Jellyfish, etc, don't get me wrong, but even counting Viz's Shonen Jump (and maybe Yen's two-dollars-a-chapter simulpubs), it doesn't come close to anime's numbers.

I'd ask about JPop's availability, too, but from previous columns I know that Japan's music industry is stuck in the early aughts. Are their manga publishers just as old fashioned?

I know that at least some of Kodansha's and Dark Horse's titles are on Comixology Unlimited, and at least Viz's, Kodansha's, Vertical's, and Dark Horse's catalogs are available on Overdrive (although that requires your local or state library to decide to purchase each individual volume, so it's not really something an individual can decide to buy into). These are no where near as ideal or comprehensive as Crunchyroll is for anime, but they're better than nothing I suppose.

TsukasaElkKite wrote:

Their in house subs are still shit tier. Laughing

I keep hearing this. I've never had much of a problem with their subs (Aside from their subs for the Yu-Gi-Oh! Series and now Dragon Ball Super). Where did the mentality of their in house subs being shit come from and what anime on their site are in house subs?

I wonder how much the Japanese companies are getting from Crunchyroll versus domestically. Certainly, I hope to see riskier, more experimental stuff in the future with this new source of revenue.

DmonHiro wrote:

I'm going to save this answer as a text file then use it every time someone says "The Japanese anime industry doesn't give a crap about the rest of the world" on a forum.

Well, certainly they used to not care. Any company head that's getting money like this from Crunchyroll would be a fool to still not care. (I wouldn't doubt at least one is still like this though. And if there is any studio like that, my money's on Toei.)

CorneredAngel wrote:

If nothing else, announcing the one million subscribers figure got
Crunchy some *NICE* publicity, with write-ups in the Wall Street Journal and Variety!

WSJ - https://www.wsj.com/articles/anime-specialist-crunchyroll-tops-million-subscriber-mark-1486638003
Variety - http://variety.com/2017/digital/news/crunchyroll-anime-1-million-paid-subscribers-1201982702/

Heh, it was amusing to read that Wall Street Journal article because they had to explain what anime is, and that it's not just Saturday morning merchandise shows like Pokémon. I think it shows how little the general public knows about anime.

Beatdigga wrote:

I think it's more accurate to compare the Crunchyroll number to UFC Fight Pass and the WWE network, two similarly niche (as opposed to having multiple genres of media) streaming services, with the latter having anywhere from 1.2 - 1.8 million subscribers depending how close it is to Wrestlemania. That's still massive business for a niche product.

That's pretty interesting insight and a point of comparison. (And like anime, pro wrestling is something that has a big fanbase with tons of dedication but the mainstream largely doesn't care about. Though unlike anime, UFC and WWE market a lot to non-fans.)

Agent355 wrote:

I have a follow up question; if Crunchyroll has been successful in bringing more eyes and wallets to anime studios, why is it taking so long for manga publishers to follow suit? Crunchyroll only has a handful of manga titles themselves, and as far as I know, there is no other site that offers multiple digital manga series from a variety of different publishers for a single subscription fee or free with ads (I know there are titles available on Amazon's Kindle store, though I don't know how many are translated in English & available outside Japan). There were rumors of some scanlation sites going legit, but that didn't pan out. I've been dreaming of a "Crunchyroll for manga" for years, but compared to its anime collection, CR's manga library barely grows even though its been around for a while. I'm glad we're getting legal simulpubs of Attack on Titan and Princess Jellyfish, etc, don't get me wrong, but even counting Viz's Shonen Jump (and maybe Yen's two-dollars-a-chapter simulpubs), it doesn't come close to anime's numbers.

I'd ask about JPop's availability, too, but from previous columns I know that Japan's music industry is stuck in the early aughts. Are their manga publishers just as old fashioned?

In addition, I think part of that is attributable to how Shueisha has partial ownership of Viz. A result is that Viz gets dibs on anything Shueisha produces, which is a LOT of iconic series. Considering Kodansha has its own US branch, I think the Japanese comics publishers' approach is different than that of anime companies in that they each want their own dedicated overseas branches. Thus, you're not going to get an inter-company service like with Crunchyroll, at least before the companies can learn to get along and share.

Still not paying for it. Crunchyroll is garbage here where i live.

Justin Sevakis wrote:

Hulu is the smallest of the "big three," and the last subscriber number they announced was 12 million -- and they ONLY service the United States (not even Canada).

Correct me if I'm wrong but I thought that Hulu had streaming available in Japan? A quick Google search shows that they launched back in 2011, got acquired by Nippon TV in 2014, and reached 1 million Japanese subscribers in 2015.

http://www.hulu.jp/
https://www.cnet.com/news/hulu-officially-launches-streaming-service-in-japan/
http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20140227006802/en/Nippon-TV-Acquires-Hulu-Service-Japan
http://www.ntv.co.jp/english/pressrelease/20150330.html

tactics wrote:

If they can get licensing for most of their shows they have for US viewers to other countries, they'll see their figures soar.

I'm not a subscriber on CR because the UK library is simply not worth it. If I had access to the US library, I'd do it. I'd pay monthly. I know it's not ultimately their fault because licensing is a weird thing but if they put more effort into the licensing problem, I think it'd pay out in the long run.

If I'm gonna pay, I want full access. Why should I pay the same price as a US citizen and get access to half the shows? Therein lies the problem of legal streaming. They all suffer from it. Netflix especially. UK Netflix SUCKS in comparison to US. Why do you think so many people went through the loophole and it got to the point where Netflix had to do something about it. No doubt it's happening to CR as well.

These legal streaming services are definitely a step in the right direction, and I'm pleased CR is doing well and thriving, but this licensing issue is the next step to tackle if they wish for, as you put it, "world domination".

You can get yearly subscription to Unblock-Us for $50 and to Crunchyroll for $60. This is the best I can offer for full access.

Hulu, Amazon, and Netflix have a bigger revenue than Crunchyroll and more subscribers. However, I think CR has those 3 beat in terms of being dedicated to showing anime. That is probably a big reason why they just past the millionth subscriber line.

Animegomaniac wrote:

stuff that get the views will get more views if there's more of it and they'll get the money. The rest will get the shaft, just not that one.

Under the years of pirate rules, two or three flagship titles carried those illegal site while all the myriads of interesting stuff came along for the ride. However, if you have to pay for it, no sense getting the stuff your audience doesn't want.

I might be kinda confused by your post, but I think this isn't true at all. This is just my opinion, but Crunchyroll has licensed a lot of titles that made me think "how many people are going to watch that?" If Crunchyroll wasn't around, I don't think any fansubbers would have picked up things like Tesagure! Bukatsumono or Shonen Ashibe. If World Trigger came out in the days of fansubs, I feel like it would have been dropped pretty quickly.

I experienced having had a certain anime I really liked dropped by all its fansub groups way back when. It was completed eventually, but it would have been nicer to be able to watch it week by week. If Crunchyroll then was like it is now, I could have.

Anyway congrats to Crunchyroll, and thanks for everything, but especially for continuing to charge me in Canadian dollars, haha.

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