In Defence of Bandai
Yes, defence. It’s British spelling, okay? Deal with it.
It seems like Bandai has been getting a lot of, to misuse tj han’s term, “negative energy” recently for the whole Solid State Society fiasco. Some people see my latest rant on the Long Tail phenomenon as an indirect attack on Bandai.
The truth is, as hypocrite as this may sound considering my rant on the Wind incident, I support Bandai in its business decision to protect its profits. Bandai exists not to spread the love for anime but to make money. Popularizing anime is one of the ways through which Bandai can make money but the difference between an end and a mean to an end must be made clear.
It does not serve Bandai’s purpose as a company responsible to its investors to continue to turn a blind eye on fansubbers, especially for its most popular franchises.
It’s illegal. GASP!
First thing first, fansubs are illegal. There is no possible defence. Most of the world belongs to the Berne Convention that establishes the shared international laws of copyright. All rights of all works of any value, monetary or otherwise, belong to their creators unless the creator explicitly releases it to public domain or a set time period has elapsed since the creator’s death.
These rights include the right to translate the work, the right to distribute the work and the right to make derivative works based on it. Fair Use is a clause to grants very limited rights to people to use very limited portions of a copyrighted material for special purposes such as education. You can quote a line from a novel in your school essay without seeking permission from the author. You can watch a DVD with your friends without buying a copy for every one of them. If you translate a movie for your friends and families, then it can probably be considered Fair Use. But once you start distributing the translation online in great numbers, good luck trying to convince the judge/jury (depending on your country).
Fansubbing has nothing to do with Fair Use. Fansubbing is illegal in all countries except certain African states and Pacific islands that you are most likely not living in if you are reading this entry. There is no “grey” area with regards to copyright laws and fansubbing.
That said…
However, fansubbing does have (or did have, if you ask certain experts on the subject) a very special difference from bootlegging and piracy in general.
Fansubs are created for people who fall outside the target audience. As mentioned in my arguments on Wind, fansubs serve to create new markets where there were none. This should always be the main purpose of fansubbing: to induce more fans into the hobby.
The purpose of fansubbing was never to let you “try before you buy” or get things for free if you don’t think they deserve your money. When you think that way, you are basically admitting the fact that those things are available in your local market and they are being sold with you as the target audience. That means that fansubbing, by that stage, has already lost its original meaning: to give us access to shows that have excluded us from their target audience. Because now we ARE the target audience and yet we choose to download pirated copies citing the same reasons that I have heard a million times before in the warez scene long before digital fansubbing took off in the Love Hina era.
It’s more convenient for us to download a fansub than to buy a physical DVD, I agree. That is a limitation of traditional distribution that has to be re-examined by the industry soon. But that does not grant us the god-given right to download and watch fansubs faster than the companies can bring them over to the English-speaking world.
The state of fansubbing
The truth is that fansubbing in America today plays a terribly minute role in promoting new anime series. It probably does a better job at promoting piracy.
Unlike the underground anime fandom of the last century and the ren’ai game community of now, anime has already achieved the amount of success needed to guarantee its continued survival and growth in North America. Fansubbing will occasionally create success stories of an obscure anime title being brought to fame by the internet, but that’s simply insignificant when you compare it to the market that Bandai, ADV and Geneon are enjoying right now. They don’t NEED fansubs.
Pulling statistics out of my ass (actually I think I read this somewhere before), only a very tiny portion of American fans was introduced to anime by fansubs. The anime on TV, the HUUUUUUUUGE variety of anime DVDs and manga you get in stores and the various major anime conventions held in America, those things do a LOT MORE to help promote anime than fansubs are doing now. Clearly, fansubs, at least for the anime market, are losing their original purpose of promoting anime. Without that purpose, fansubs are no different from bootlegs of Hollywood movies.
And indeed, Ghost in the Shell, along with most of Bandai’s portfolio, DO NOT need fansubs. Bandai is well-established in North America and Ghost in the Shell is already very popular there due to the previous titles in the franchise. The very same titles that you can just waltz into a store and purchase, i.e. they are marketed at you! GASP!
Bandai doesn’t need fansubs!
What can Bandai hope to ever gain if it allows fansubs for a series that was created with the obvious intention of being brought over to North America? NOTHING! So what if it appeased a few “fans” who absolutely must watch the series within two days of its Japanese release? There’s no guarantee that the fansubs will reach a bigger North American audience than what the series is already reaching. The only guarantee is that there is now a free and easily-available bootleg copy of the series before it has even been released in the North American market.
If you want to “try before you buy”? Go watch it on cable TV! I bet it’ll be there. You Americans have it all so good but yet you demand for more. There are anime that were created with YOU in mind. Just look for those sponsored by Geneon.
“I want my anime now!” Well it’s not YOURS, it’s BANDAI’S. Shut the fuck up and wait for it.
If you plan to download Solid State Society like I will be doing, please at least admit that you are a pirate. I download pirated games and movies all the time too. But it just sounds terribly silly if you start calling foul when the company tells you to stop pirating. :) Stop pretending to be fighting the good fight, it’s not the 1990s any more.
Repeat after me:
We are just selfish bastards who want to watch anime for free and we have no right to whine if Bandai chooses to do something about it.
We are just selfish bastards who want to watch anime for free and we have no right to whine if Bandai chooses to do something about it.
We are just selfish bastards who want to watch anime for free and we have no right to whine if Bandai chooses to do something about it.
In conclusion
There is a huge difference between fansubbing an obscure eroge-based anime that would never have had a 1/100000 chance of being released for the North American market and fansubbing a series that is pre-licensed and obviously made with the North American market in mind.
Doing the former produces the occasional success stories like KimiNozo (aka Rumbling Hearts).
Doing the latter pisses off the hand that feeds you.
Just some thoughts from a disillusioned ex-fansubber.
August 28th, 2006 at 7:49 pm
Hi, your first statement was in British English but the rest were all spelled American. Hurray for consistency!
Other than that, well done on a good article. Just look at Eureka seveN for a good example. After it showed on Adult Swim, the demand for the torrents shot up immensely. It wasn’t that popular before the American TV Showing.
But still, one area is the non-American market. Some dudes do not get to buy original even if they wanted to.
August 28th, 2006 at 7:59 pm
Well I’m not sure what you mean by American spelling unless you refer to the typos. Americans must spell worse than I thought then. D:
August 28th, 2006 at 8:38 pm
DO WHAT YOU WANT ‘COS A PIRATE IS FREE. YOU ARE A PIRATE.
YA HAR FIDDLE DEE DEE. BEING A PIRATE IS ALRIGHT TO BE. DO WHAT YOU WANT ‘COS A PIRATE IS FREE. YOU ARE A PIRATE.
Yeah I’m a pirate. But there’s a certain amount of money I can spend. You have to really impress me to make me buy your original R2s. Let’s see, the only original R2s I’ve bought are… First Press FF7:AC(J), Normal Edition FF7:AC(J), LE version FF7:AC(ENG), normal version FF7:ac(ENG), First press FF7:AC UMD(J+ENG). VCDs are next. I even collect the pirated versions, the bootleg versions and the download versions.
Otherwise, I’ll settle with manga and figurines. Wish I was in Japan. I’d just digitize all the shows. Don’t even need downloading.
August 28th, 2006 at 9:04 pm
So, from what I understand, fansubs are like advertisements on TV, newspapers, and other forms of media, expect without profit and no obligation?
August 28th, 2006 at 9:13 pm
Therefore, I state this publicly:
I am a pirate.
Nothing more, nothing less. That’s all about it. No need to justify.
I’m sure someone will release Solid State Society (even as a Hi-Q RAW) and I’m damn sure I’ll d/l it.
Yay. xD
August 28th, 2006 at 9:21 pm
I’m just saying that as pirates we have no right to whine about Bandai’s decision. That is all. I’m not trying to judge since I am one myself.
August 28th, 2006 at 9:46 pm
I’m a big big big pirate …
Even as much as I want … its so damn hard to find DVDs that are only subbed minus the dub …. cause I dun wanna spend 60 bucks on 2 episodes that has stupid shitty dubs that I dun even wanna listen to … (referernce to ADV *cough*cough*)
As much as odex is concerned … if they released DVD instead of lousy VCDs and in a much faster pace … I would definately buy them
August 28th, 2006 at 10:26 pm
I wont pay a cent for DVDs but I’ll blow money on figures. Am I a pirate?
August 28th, 2006 at 10:33 pm
Actually, it’s defense. Defence is the noun.
August 28th, 2006 at 10:35 pm
Eleutheria, you are thinking practice and practise.
Defense is not a word in British English.
August 29th, 2006 at 1:19 am
Defence is a variation of Defense, or vice versa, yes.
Only bone I have to pick with the poignant essay is its internal inconsistency. Not just in the spelling of things, mind you, but a little bit of topical consistency like, wth is fansub useful for? It’s still useful right? And While I totally agree that Bandai and others don’t need fansubs, it’s still useful.
August 29th, 2006 at 1:44 am
Well perhaps I didn’t make my points distinctive enough because I was just writing out my sleep-deprived messy train of thought.
Basically, if a series was made with a foreign audience in mind, then fansubbing it would be no different from piracy. And as pirates, we shouldn’t be the ones whining when the shit hits the fan, i.e. a company tells us to stop.
That is the gist of it I guess.
August 29th, 2006 at 2:24 am
You made some very good points especially the lessened influence of fansubs over time. Every issue of Newtype USA now comes with 2-3 sample episodes per issue. DVD reviews are readily available from many websites like AnimeOnDVD.com so if someone sees an ad for an anime and doesn’t really know what it’s about, they can do a little research themselves without having to download fansubs.
omo: There was an article in the NY Times a few weeks ago about people in China subtitling American TV shows that have no chance of being seen on Chinese television stations. These fans of shows like “Desperate Housewives” takethe English raw and slap on Chinese subtitles and I would call those fansubs just as I would call English-language (or any other language) subtitles put on top on Japanese TV raws.
Fansubs are still useful to allow people in territories where they may not be able to see relatively obscure series to experience them. However, if it is readily available in your particular territory, you should try to purchase the discs.
Finally, I will admit that I do download TV shows and my half-assed justification is this: if I’m already getting the over-the-air signal from NBC/CBS/FOX for free, I should be able to download a copy of an episode I missed because of scheduling conflicts or forgetting to record it. I am not going to wait for the entire season to come out five months later on DVD just to see a couple missed episodes. Basic cable and HBO/Showtime are different because those are paid services and downloading shows airing on those channels would constitute piracy. I still do it for 1-2 shows, though, because cable is costly and I view American television as a disposal medium much like radio.
August 29th, 2006 at 2:52 am
This sucks.. I live in South Africa, and while I can import stuff from America it costs a fortune!
Nevermind the insane internet prices and slow speeds - I’m screwed both ways!
Most of my anime are fansubs, but I do have a few series on region 1 DVD, imported as mentioned.. from the US of A.
Bleg.
August 29th, 2006 at 4:41 am
When I can get recent episodes of the shows I like online for a reasonable price or on television (sorry, Eureka 7, you don’t count) I’ll buy them or watch them with the advertisements. I got a pirated copy of each of the first season Battlestar Galactica episodes that I missed. When the second season came around, anything I missed was available online for a reasonable price (USD0.99 for an hour-long episode), and I bought anything I needed to catch up on.
Disney-ABC’s television branch has found that making shows available free online (with advertising built in) is a successful model for fans to get their content and the company to make its revenue. Right now Bandai doesn’t need fansubbers, but they could benefit from legitimate digital distribution.