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>What you're missing is that those things only exist for purchase because someone invested capital in their production True. Most of the time at least. This is

by Nadya 11y ago

>What you're missing is that those things only exist for purchase because someone invested capital in their production True. Most of the time at least. This is assuming it isn't some indie project, but for the most part I'll agree and say it is true. >you only learn about the original media because money was spent on marketing in its home territory. I hate to enter a semantic debate but I don't consider announcements to be marketing, although I can understand how one could interpret them as such. People learn about the original media through the fansub groups who learn about the product through announcements of upcoming works from the studios and/or the native TV rippers (I forget their actual name). Only a small, niche market of foreigners who happen to also speak Japanese hear about it from marketing in the home territory. There are fangroups who, at the start of each season, compile the upcoming works from each studio. That is all the marketing that most of the pirating consumers get - and none of it is from marketing the product in Japan. >If all you have is the IP and no capital, which is the position that most authors are in, then you can't easily cash in on the merchandising possibilities or purchase the marketing resources to focus public attention on your product at scale. Which is why free advertisement from pirates is a benefit. Which is part of what I'm getting at...then there's the entire doujinshi market which runs counter to this claim. Many doujinshi artists become very popular because of a single sale that is then scanned and distributed to people who then pirate the work. The artist can gain a lot of popularity through this pirating of their work, which results in more sales in the future. >Have you ever tried to sell a creative product? Maybe you should. I have. > The reality is that 'potentially free marketing' is a terrible bootstrap strategy for many creative products. I already replied to this. >I can understand not encouraging it or even encouraging buying the product but not acting like piracy is a heinous crime that robs them. >If your only marketing option is to give it away free Nowhere did I say that. >Look, if you sat down, learned to draw, and made your own anime book and put it up on the internet for free without caring about copyright, do you think money just comes rolling in? It won't, even if it's good and popular. Ignoring your bad assumptions, do you think an artist would make money if their initial marketing, at some level, wasn't free? How many artists would make sales without a portfolio or free display of their work? How many musicians would get signed to a label without an EP?

sosborn 11y ago
I don't totally disagree with much of what you say, but in the case of anime, it is important to remember that the works that are highly successful in Japan are produced solely on the premise they will rake in cash for the IP owner. The income they get from non-domestic consumers is a drop in the bucket. Take away that incentive and there is a good chance that overall quantity and quality of content would decline.
- Nadya 11y ago
  Perhaps I should have used manga/doujinshi as my example as it doesn't require an entire production studio to create. Off the top of my head I can only think of 1 or 2 quality anime doujinshi that were subbed - making it a worse example for "for-free artists". Many doujinshi will hand out free copies of their manga though when starting out, to gain popularity. Even if it is initially a loss for them. For anime, it's produced for-profit, that's correct, but piracy arguably helps their for-profit motives more than it harms them. If they spent a bunch of money, time, and effort preventing all piracy of their IP - they'd lose out on countless international sales of merchandise... and for what exactly? Because they own the IP? That's nice. As long as it's profitable for them, why should they care? This is why Comiket is tolerated. It's costly to sub an anime for a foreign release where it isn't guaranteed to do as well as it did in Japan. Often times unpopular anime from Japan is very popular overseas, so it can be difficult even choosing what to release overseas. They're essentially getting free labor from fansub groups which results in sales they would have had to pay for (by releasing their own sub/dub). That's a win-win for the studio. This is less applicable to Hollywood movies that lack merchandise deals (e.g. anything that isn't superhero related) and music. I'm aware of that, but each form of media has its own arguments. Over 1/2 of my music library was purchased only because I originally heard of the artist because a friend pirated their music or I was listening to their music for free (I use AdBlock, so they aren't making money off ads) on YouTube. I would not have discovered the artist or purchased their music without this method of discovery, which is reliant on my friends or other people pirating their music and "broadcasting it" to the world. So it becomes an issue of "if 1 pirate results in greater than or equal to 2 sales, it is profitable to let the pirate pirate" and measuring (and quantifying) the pirates "free marketing" aspect. While I can personally quantify which items my friends have pirated and determine whether it was, in the end, profitable for the company to let them pirate or not. The company has no way of measuring what sales of their sales occurred because of pirates. They only know that piracy means they "lost a sale"; which might not have happened even if piracy wasn't an option. This is where the problem lies and opinions differ. I'm of the opinion that the free publicity piracy provides outweighs the lost sales that occur from piracy, therefore tolerating, but not promoting, piracy is an overall net gain. This argument is different than one I would use for a painter or photographer. Where stealing is a lot more harmful to the artist, especially since attribution is almost never given for stolen works. In this form of media, piracy steals recognition and publicity rather than giving it. That's actively harmful and is more easily provable that it harms the artist.

by Nadya 11y ago

sosborn 11y ago

I don't totally disagree with much of what you say, but in the case of anime, it is important to remember that the works that are highly successful in Japan are produced solely on the premise they will rake in cash for the IP owner. The income they get from non-domestic consumers is a drop in the bucket. Take away that incentive and there is a good chance that overall quantity and quality of content would decline.

Nadya 11y ago
Perhaps I should have used manga/doujinshi as my example as it doesn't require an entire production studio to create. Off the top of my head I can only think of 1 or 2 quality anime doujinshi that were subbed - making it a worse example for "for-free artists". Many doujinshi will hand out free copies of their manga though when starting out, to gain popularity. Even if it is initially a loss for them. For anime, it's produced for-profit, that's correct, but piracy arguably helps their for-profit motives more than it harms them. If they spent a bunch of money, time, and effort preventing all piracy of their IP - they'd lose out on countless international sales of merchandise... and for what exactly? Because they own the IP? That's nice. As long as it's profitable for them, why should they care? This is why Comiket is tolerated. It's costly to sub an anime for a foreign release where it isn't guaranteed to do as well as it did in Japan. Often times unpopular anime from Japan is very popular overseas, so it can be difficult even choosing what to release overseas. They're essentially getting free labor from fansub groups which results in sales they would have had to pay for (by releasing their own sub/dub). That's a win-win for the studio. This is less applicable to Hollywood movies that lack merchandise deals (e.g. anything that isn't superhero related) and music. I'm aware of that, but each form of media has its own arguments. Over 1/2 of my music library was purchased only because I originally heard of the artist because a friend pirated their music or I was listening to their music for free (I use AdBlock, so they aren't making money off ads) on YouTube. I would not have discovered the artist or purchased their music without this method of discovery, which is reliant on my friends or other people pirating their music and "broadcasting it" to the world. So it becomes an issue of "if 1 pirate results in greater than or equal to 2 sales, it is profitable to let the pirate pirate" and measuring (and quantifying) the pirates "free marketing" aspect. While I can personally quantify which items my friends have pirated and determine whether it was, in the end, profitable for the company to let them pirate or not. The company has no way of measuring what sales of their sales occurred because of pirates. They only know that piracy means they "lost a sale"; which might not have happened even if piracy wasn't an option. This is where the problem lies and opinions differ. I'm of the opinion that the free publicity piracy provides outweighs the lost sales that occur from piracy, therefore tolerating, but not promoting, piracy is an overall net gain. This argument is different than one I would use for a painter or photographer. Where stealing is a lot more harmful to the artist, especially since attribution is almost never given for stolen works. In this form of media, piracy steals recognition and publicity rather than giving it. That's actively harmful and is more easily provable that it harms the artist.