The business and distribution models are being subjected to shocks, and they'll have to adapt. Not a new event in an industry by any means; for example from about 1820 - 1840 the cost of a clock movement made in USA dropped from $200 to $2, and then to about 50 cents. (in 1840's dollars) Mostly because some guys in Connecticut figured out how to stamp gears from brass rather than cast gear blanks and hand-finish ALL the teeth on ALL the gears, one by one. This lead to some nasty trade & tariff wars between the US and England (where some of the best tool makers lived and worked,) and attempts by England to prevent emmigration to the US of people who were known to be top-notch machinists and toolmakers. "How is the industry going to survive - all our craftsmen will STARVE - if the market value of their work drops to ONE PERCENT of what it ...um... 'should be?' ")
The parallels in anime are things like:
- labor outsourcing of tweeners in China and other low-cost regions,
- a transition of technology from cel animation to all-digital,
- some Japanese talent moving to the US to produce work here
- 'looks-kinda-like-anime' and 'looks-kinda-like-manga' products are taking market share from 'real' (Japanese) anime & manga producers, just like cubic zirconium took a chunk out of the diamond market.
- The domestic market (Japan) has borne prices has high as $30USD per 25-minute episode, but has encountered strong downward pressure on pricing because global price expectations are much less that that.
Another possibility is that the fansubbers are filling niche demands that the conventional Japan-to-USA distribution channels miss. My guesses here are:
- a. Speed to Market. Fansubbers often get subtitled works to their core audience within a week or two. Not 9 - 18 months.
- b. Special services or value: Many fansubs include additional cultural information such as historical notes. Fansubbers often have a strong understanding of Japanese and preserve the nuances of the language and culture better than what is released by US-based licensees. The fansub audience is *quite* distinct from the Dubbed-Anime-on-US-cable audience, and one problem for licensees is that if they make a high-profile blunder (butchering content to serve the English-dub crowd as in CCS, graphics overlay in Nadesico, or re-naming 'Kimi ga Nozomu Eien' as 'Rumbling Hearts') they repel the fansub audience. Meanwhile, I'd bet the Cartoon Network crowd wouldn't find any interest in a show like 'Tenpou Ibun Ayakashi Ayashi,' or 'Nitabou.' So the US licensees either have to consider TWO product lines or TWO versions of the same product. Oh wait - remember when dub VHS tapes cost LESS than sub, even though there's obviously less WORK to produce a sub? There you go again, alienating your fanbase.
- c. Not forcing your customers to receive something they don't care about: The majority of the fansub audience doesn't consider English dub to be an added value, so they're not willing to pay extra or wait longer for that next ep. Might as well shrink-wrap a paperback book with an ammonia counter-top cleaner. The producer is like "Hey - look what you get FREE when you buy this book," and the customer goes "Are you nuts?!? I didn't NEED that!" Also, DVDs that force you to watch irrelevant ads before you get to the stuff you PAID for. Fansubs DON'T do this.
- d. Anonymity and privacy. With analog TV and radio, there was a vital and important disconnect between the broadcaster and the identity of the receivers. One way to keep that is pay cash when buying anime DVDs, but that's not always convenient. A new distribution model should respect the privacy and maintain anonymity of the payer, bith during purchase and playback.
- e. Advertisement support. In the old-school TV days, people felt that if you liked a show, you should make some effort buy the products advertised, and then let the company know you chose them over their competition in part for their sponsorship of the show. But that was back in the day of writing letters by hand or whacking <bing> away on the Smith-Corona or Royal typewriter <carriage return>
<zzzzick>
My wife and I did this with Pizza Hut in Code Geass - and we even use the phrase 'support the rebellion!' as a code to mean buying from Pizza Hut, and I *did* once go to their corporate site to thank them for their sponsorship of the anime studio.
Possible solution: a sub-only US-based licensee offering free d/l's of ad-supported avi's within 2-wks of the original air dates?
