Originally Posted by Jash View Post
wotfok -.-
"In cooperation with 15 major anime production companies and manga publishers, the Japanese government will next month start a huge extermination operation against 580 foreign sites which have illegally uploaded anime and manga contents on the web without the copyright holders' permission, NHK reported on July 28. While the government has started supporting the genre as one of their important cultural exports, there appears to be no end of illegal uploading of anime and manga via pirate sites, mainly operated by Chinese. The Cultural Affairs Agency estimates the loss caused by the Chinese pirate sites last year was amounted to at least 560 billion yen (about US$ 5.5 billion).

On August 1, the government will start simultaneously sending requests to delete illegal anime and manga contents to the operators of the 580 foreign pirate sites which they have found. In addition, the operation will launch a new site to guide the fans to a legitimate site offering some 250 titles including
the latest ones at a cost of several hundred yen."
LOL, biggest load of shit. But then again, those imaginary numbers are made to look threatening.

Those numbers are based off of worldwide numbers, including US, EU-- whatever. They are saying they lost 5.5Billion because of encoders who BROUGHT many different series to the west by subbing them independently; and ignoring the fact that THOSE SALES WOULDN'T EXIST ANYWAYS BECAUSE THEY AREN'T AVAILABLE IN ANYTHING OTHER THAN JAPANESE-- both subbed and dubbed. Imports don't do shit if the consumer can't understand what's going on regardless, so THAT'S out of the question.

Now I understand with sites like Crunchyroll with subscription fees that, more than likely, royalties go to the creators. This is fine. But what about all the shows they can't grab ahold of? This is where the "other" groups come in and grab these shows. Now that we know this ONE show actually exists, maybe there's a possibility of foreign sales for those can CAN understand the language.

I don't understand why big companies can't grasp the concept of FREE advertisement and shove these incorrect "possible monetary gain" digits down or throats. It's the same with every other form of media-- just unfortunately if you aren't popular or lack the resources to BECOME popular, you're shit outta luck. It's how the world works.

The only thing that is happening to sales is that Japanese consumers aren't buying shit that's 10,000x (factoring the fact THEY can read/write the damn language while we can't) more available to them.

Wanna know why video games hasn't been a HUGE problem in this regard? Because foreign titles consistently become localized hence become more available. Oh my, it's as if there's a connection.