I'm rather torn on the piece personally, folks. On the one hand, anime and manga hobbyists-- that is, after all, what we all are --are appallingly unwilling to spend money in support of the main chunk of their hobby. Hundreds of dollars are spent on trips to cons, costumes, figures, and other merchandise, but DVDs? Not so much.
On the other hand, the piece seems awfully alarmist-- and the man runs a company that specializes in English dubbing. Is it "anime" that's going to die, or Bang Zoom! as more and more studios experiment with sub-only releases? Sherman offers no facts, no inciting event, nothing but ranting and a few attempts to guilt and scare the reader.
He signs off suggesting that if people don't buy more anime, they won't be getting any new Bang Zoom dubs by this time next year-- which seems to me a problem more for dub fans, who ARE more likely to buy, than for fansub downloaders.
In any case, there's more than enough preaching going on in the piece that I don't feel the need to chime in with my own thoughts; you can read Sherman's piece here, and make up your own mind.
To be sure, part of the blame lies with some companies (in some cases urged on by corporate overlords, as happened with Geneon) pushing their luck. Many third-rate anime were licensed and dubbed during the "anime boom" that had no realistic chance of covering their costs.
But it's not all about the industry. It's also about the fans. FUNimation licenses Big Windup! It doesn't want season two because not enough fans bought the first season. The same happened to Kodocha and Galaxy Railways, and so on. Now look at Spice and Wolf. Season one came, now season two will come. Clearly because fans purchased it.
People wish that the Gurren Lagann movies were dubbed. Me too. Well, did you buy the DVD's for the series? I'm guilty, by the way. I settled for watching it on SyFy.
Today, streaming is becoming more and more common. Many anime are available legally on the internet long before they hit DVD. Everyone can try most titles before they ever buy them. This is ad-supported and there's actually money involved! And yet, anyone who's searched knows that there are torrents for Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood. This is insane. For some people, fansubbing is assuredly about false prestige and ego massaging instead of spreading anime around. How many older anime are practically ghosts to most of the fandom because "fans" try to sub the most current thing even if it's legally available on a legitimate website?
Money talks. So talk!
Long Live Anime!
Another issue is adapting to changing trends which this article also fails to address. Funimation and Viz have realized that more people are watching their favorite anime titles online and have started to create video sites or creating channels on sites like Youtube and Hulu for folks to have a legal means of watching any titles they have licensed or in the case of Funi, picking up streaming rights to titles that just recently came out in Japan. The same case with Crunchyroll being a legal means for folks to legally watch their favorite anime titles that have yet to be licensed. But still, not everyone is gonna legally buy or watch these titles because either the site doesn't have them (especially the case with older or niche titles) or they think themselves to be better at translating a title than the companies having to pay for the rights to stream or distribute said titles.
What I'm trying to get at is that there's no easy answer to resolve the issue of the anime fansub scene and this has been the case for many years now. Fansubs are both beneficial and a problem for the anime industry at large.
The login system sucks, it doesn't allow my web browser to remember name & password. I can't think of any other site that does it like this.
Anyway, when FUNi and Viz are the ones crying doom around every corner, that's when I'll get really worried. But they both seem to be doing perfectly fine. And as someone mentioned, ADV/Section 23 seems to be crawling slowly out of its hole. The industry looks fairly healthy when you watch them. Viz is a power house, but FUNi keeps rescuing titles left and right, redistributing Geneon's works, simulcasting, moving many titles to BR, etc.
Obviously there are deep flaws in the above thinking that put it completely at odds with today's business models and legal environment. But if that's the "premise", this sort of guilt trip article isn't going to do anything but confuse. What is the article telling fans to do? To buy without watching? Or are we expecting them to understand that watching video x on site y is bad, but if they watch it on site z it's okay, but that still doesn't absolve them of the duty to buy DVDs just because that's how Bang Zoom makes money. What? How are the uninitiated supposed to understand this? There's a whole new generation of fans out there whose entire anime experience has avoided the R1 industry entirely, so how can we expect them to care about Bang Zoom? It seems to me that the only people who will understand this article are the small and shrinking group of fans left over from the anime bubble who've lived under the old business model because it was all there was. And as Gia alluded to here, they're probably already the ones most likely to buy DVDs because they see the value in dubs. The rest probably won't close the window and go back to downloading torrents; they'll close the window and wonder what that torrent/DVD stuff was all about and go back to simply watching videos on the Web. That's how much the market has changed.
I will totally cop to watching scans- in the past. I've gone totally legit now; between legal online streams and renting DVDs, I'm all set! There are a very few anime I would like to see that are not licensed, but I am patient.
if there is no one paying for this content, it just won’t be made anymore. If no one bought tickets to a Lady Ga Ga show, she would not do the tour. That’s just how it works.
this is true. however i am sure that her album was stolen a million times over. so she makes her money in other ways. like concerts and merchandise. the same way anime did well in the 80s. no one was buying tapes of voltron and robotech. but i know i for one had all the toys.