After several years of booming manga sales in the U.S. that drove the popularity of comics and graphic novels in the traditional book market, sales of manga in the U.S. have declined more than 30% from a high of $210 million in 2007 to $140 million in sales in 2009, according to pop culture news site ICv2.com. Many manga publishers and retailers who used to believe that scanlations actually attracted new readers, now blame the sales decline on the rise of giant for-profit scanlation sites that have allowed a new generation of fans to grow up reading manga for free online.
From this article discussing this issue.
As you can see from threads such as this one show that people are in an uproar over this. "How dare they!" "This is unjust!" "Those damn corporate bigwigs!". Baw, baw, baw; wah, wah, wah.
SHAME ON YOU.
You say you love anime? Alright, go out and BUY IT. It's called support. By downloading free and illegal anime and manga, you are seriously hurting the very thing you love. You want better dubs, cooler DVDs, more official merchandise? Well, those things take money. Money that you are not giving to the industry because you are pirating their property.
I'm disappointed with how otakus are handling this, but then again, I am not surprised. This is immature and ignorant behavior.
If you want to read manga but can't afford it:
-Go to a library. If they don't have manga or the series you want, request it.
-Sit your ass down at a bookstore and read it. Yes, that means you will have to leave your house.
But what about a series that has not been licensed yet? There is a good chance that if manga sales improve, companies will be more in a hurry to license new series because there is now more money involved.
Also consider this: if a series is making good money, there is a good chance for more seasons/episodes/OVAs. The creators of Princess Tutu said that they would consider making more seasons if the series did well, but so far there is no third season in sight.
So shut up and buy your manga.
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I do support mangaka, but I'd like to point out that the economy is tanking. A 30% loss in revenue over a two year period caused only by those who read scanlations is unlikely.
ReplyDeleteHow is reading manga in a bookstore any less a form of theft? How is reading it in a library "support"?
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