August 15, 2012

Search Rank, Piracy, Anime’s Marketing Problem Part N

By omo

Google Search now consider DMCA takedowns in part of its rank algorithm. I want to know: how many people use Google Web Search for actual information, and not download links?

How many people use Google to search for download links anyways? When I did, pretty much one out of 4 or 3 links at best (first page) were legit, and rarely it’s the top link. Maybe one out of a handful of times. It’s very much a SEO game when we’re talking about obscure Japanese crap, the sites gets the better google ranks will bubble up, and often they have nothing to do with the search term I use. I guess I am just one data point, but I’m pretty much dissatisfied in the opposite case: when I google up a show, I don’t want to be shown half a dozen stream sites or scan sites that I’ll never click on because, well, I want to read up and research the show, not to pirate it.

This is kind of like, the ghettofying of the internet all over again. Wikipedia is great, but I don’t want to search specific sites if I can help it, and if Google supports that sort of cross-site search to begin with. It’s a totally different story when you google terms that are not some item in trade that you can’t just download.

I guess here’s the basic idea behind Google’s search. Basic in that, well, isn’t it ultimately about relevance? Regardless of the implementation, if the users don’t find what they are looking for, it defeats Google Search’s purpose. I believe by downranking download sites it is a win-win for Google, their whip-cracking masters in the media industry, and everyday Joe users like us.

I already whined about how anime industry in English-language realms have a marketing problem. Working with Google to get your links bumped up should be a priority, if anything, as a way to compete and provide a service that is currently filled by less-than-legit outlets. Funi submit DMCA notices for their stuff. I wish more poeple did; the internet is international and crap stream sites should only come up when people input the right key terms in their search queries.

In the case with social network type situations, there’s this. Yeah, why isn’t Youtube downranked (I guess it will be, however slightly; and probably not notably so if you do a video search), though I think they mean it in terms of DMCA takedown requests issued to Google Search, not Youtube or the website being ranked.

On the flip side, it’s generally something unpleasant when Google resorts to having DMCA takedowns as a metric. Not just the valid concerns in regards to the lack of transparency of the Google ranking process, but simply the DMCA takedown process is hardly foolproof and frequently causes false-positives. As anime fans, though, I feel this is one of those situations where if I look left, I see all this copyright infringing efforts, but if I look right I can’t even find a commercial or promo video or OP/ED of some show on Youtube, even for review/marketing purposes uploaded by the copyright owner. It’s really the same problem and the longer this problem is left to fester, the worse it’ll get for all of us.

7 comments | posted in English Language Modern Visual Fandom, Modern Visual Culture

August 13, 2012

Manabi Straight Blu-ray Versus the Most Worthless PQ Test

By omo

As I slowly work my way through the Manabi Straight Blu-ray box, you probably should expect a series of Manabi Straight blog posts. I think the show earned a spot on my list of favorites precisely because it evokes so much thought on watching it. And I really didn’t write all that much about it the first time around, just … a lot of posts “around” it. There are a lot of heavy themes and concepts thrown around in that show. Anyway, here are some more tl;dr about the Blu-ray release itself first.

My friend is a quality whore and he rigged his MPC-HC to whatever nonsense that these guys are saying. It makes some sense, when you own a Dell U3011, but to me the notion of “best” is kind of a lamer marketing term as PQ is to an extent subjective. When you start adding filters you are playing with fire. But I’m a live and let live sort of person, so it doesn’t bother me until the sharpening filter is depixelating grains or computer-generated visual effects from the video itself (which it invariably does with a show like this).

But man, my friend’s Dell U3011 is very nice. So we ended up watching some Manabi Straight side-by-side with whatever he found on BakaBT on his 27″ Dell monitor, whose model I forget (one of those 1440-line displays). We didn’t touch the BD video stream (played from a PS3) but he did (or whoever encoded it did) for the downloaded version of whatever it was. The results are pretty much what you’d expect. We also found how the home video went back and corrected some animation errors, mostly continuity sort of stuff.

We specifically checked out episodes 1 and 2 and I alone checked the last episode. We watched the first two because my friend actually never watched Manabi Straight beyond the first episode (his meticulous logging noted that he watched episode 1 in Jan 2007 at around 3:30 AM), and he didn’t quite remember what happened in the show besides Manabi’s “landing.” Olympics, right. The first two episodes make up a pretty solid pilot, if you recall.

To the meat of the post: the interesting revelation was that the last episode actually doesn’t look that much better, compared to the previous BD episodes. There were specific places where it did, but overall it feels mostly like just any other episode. The lines looked sharper than DVD, but compared it to a HD-broadcasted TV rip, there wasn’t really that much more details in the BD version. What survived largely were special effects and digital effects which died horribly on the TV rip both because of post-processing on my friend’s end or simply because the encode’s bitrate is just too low to capture everything. Like their later works, ufotable’s approach to composition is somewhat cinematic, featuring a lot of effects that create intentional blurring or things that look foreshortened. There is also a good deal of digital effects too, that as we know that tend not to survive upscaling well.

I guess the conclusion on this stuff is that the BDs are definitely the best version of Manabi Straight you will be able to find. But the TV rips were pretty good, if you can live with it. It’s not a night-and-day kind of a difference as with, say, episode 5 of Kara no Kyoukai. It’s probably less drastic than watching the DVDs (I guess I owe you guys that at some point) side-by-side to the BD. Of course this is also ignoring that the content is slightly different. The animation is patched up a little on the home video release. But with enough post-processing crap laid on top of it, the TV rips are passable, if that’s your sort of thing.

Continue reading

Leave a comment | posted in Manabi Straight, Modern Visual Culture

August 10, 2012

The Post-Simulcast World Is No Different

By omo

It’s jumping the gun a little bit, but it might be safe to say that simulcast is here to stay. I think it’s jumping the gun because once you remove Crunchyroll from the picture, there’s not much left. And despite the rosy picture painted by that Californian start-up, it is not a quantity that has fully solidified in my mind. Or at least in the back of my mind. Sometimes I worry that it is doing too good of a job, that there is nobody to replace them if something goes wrong. Which is to say that’s probably worrying too much.

I got a press account to FUNi’s elite doohicky and, guess what, it works like a lazy panda: ie., it doesn’t really work all that well. I tried to use it to watch some Eureka 7 AO on two separate occasions. Couldn’t get the video to load both times. I wonder if I will have better luck on mobile or on a tablet. Perhaps more importantly, FUNi (and similarly Viz, and to a lesser extent, Aniplex) pick and choose titles they want to simulcast, a bit like a strategic decision to deliver a full cross-marketing experience for their customers. The “full” deal markets the goods in a variety of channels, because after all we do not live in a vacuum; we do not buy our $700+ box sets of Fate/Zero or even super-delayed FUNi boxes of their ex-Simulcasted shows without first hearing about it from somewhere. By the time we wanted to pick up Bakatest we have already have made our minds up on it, and by “our minds” I mean the internet hive mind. Individual mavericks are still going to buy things blind or out of reasons unrelated to the show itself, but the internet word-of-mouth machine has a huge say on a small subcultural genre like ours. There are exceptions of course, maybe shows like Kenichi, but that strategy only works in the very rare cases to create entire markets from scratch. Simulcast or not, the internet hive mind will have an opinion on some show somehow. It takes no effort on the foreign distributor’s part to seed hits; it’s like wild flowers, tended by fansubbers and anime clubs and what have you. All they could do is to gently lend it a hand, and slowly change things in harmony.

Unfortunately doing nothing is probably not a great business model. I think this is why I worry about CR; the business of delivering simulcast as their main product is tenable but it doesn’t leave a lot of room to compete. If you do, you compete on the basis of quality of service and price. Thankfully they are bar none, but I suspect that is also why they are so good at delivering a positive customer experience, because that is their bread and butter.

But for the rest, they’re in for the long haul. When Funimation signs up one of their shows, they do a new dub, they do a neat little marketing doohicky. They declared war on pants! The joke aside, the full business from streaming to re-release to Amazon deals to whatever, is the sort of resources they commit to their titles. They can’t afford flops. So what happens if one of their simulcast titles flop? I’m thinking that is just the current status today. This is why they do a lot of license rescuing too; because they’re all vetted. Seems like a no-brainer.

I’m going to just say that simulcasting is one of those things that ultimately when the business is to make money selling home videos, it’s really not all that important. For one, you might be spending money on shows that will tank. Some say it cannibalizes home video sales, some say it does not. I don’t think it matters. Unless you play to win in streaming, the only thing you can do is partner up with people who do play to win, or else you get this Funi elite POS. So I’m glad FUNi streams on Youtube and Hulu, because those sites also play to win. But at the same time, it makes me wonder what choices did FUNi have in this matter. It’s like they want to make some money from simulcasting, because it is a thing they are doing and they might as well try to make a dime on it, or at least not lose out too much.

In the end, the simulcast broadcast is just one part of the broader, deeper, more complicated marketing strategy. Especially the pay-to-air model of media-mixed anime, when the original thing exists because there’s a manga or a light novel or because GSC’s logo is pasted on it or some such. Often anime is just a small derivative, even if sometimes, that is all we want. From another perspective, simulcast just one of the little things, like the rights to the seiyuu interview clips on R2 releases–either you have it (or pay to get it) or you don’t, does it matter to your bottom line?

I think that’s the ultimate question. I’m thinking it does in terms of protecting the brand, but what else?

As  a follow-up to that noitaminA post, I think looking at the side-by-side sales/viewership figure tells you a lot about what anime does well versus what anime does well for the home video publisher. Maybe some smartass down in Texas has a spreadsheet or two that figures this out by some kind of factor, so they can decide what price to license what and how much to spend on marketing. But the idea that some shows are widely viewed but nobody buys is hardly a secret. How to take that into account seems to be the key factor in licensing non-duds. Yes, even simulcast numbers tell you only so much about sales. This is why it is like pulling teeth to get Funi to release anything from noitaminA: nobody buys this crap. And I suspect this is why their year-long partnership ended unceremoniously.

Well, as stated in the previous noitaminA post, clearly people do buy Guilty Crown. This is why FUNi is doing a Blu-ray (looking forward to that). But I guess the smartass among you might ask about Mononoke, which I would have to point you to Ayakashi’s sales number and what happened in the US. At the very least, they tried, so I can’t fault them.

The take-home, I think, is that ultimately simulcasts don’t matter, unless you make your bread and butter from pushing stuff through the stream. And it shows.

PS. At least you would think simulcasting reduces fansubber drama. HA HAHAHAHA. Yeah. Sure.

PPS. Can someone explain to us how did Fractale get a release LOL.

3 comments | posted in English Language Modern Visual Fandom, Modern Visual Culture

August 9, 2012

The Underrating of Nobuna Oda

By omo

I don’t want to pick on anyone, but it’s easier to just point you to an example. Take a look at this.

Is that a fair statement? I think it’s a valid opinion and probably a common opinion, and the post itself seems fine. The opinion might be fairly considered given what he has stated. It’s just as someone who’s just 5 episodes in, I think the show has long since survived the falling-on-swords-of-mary-sue-moe-genderswapped-sengoku-reenactment. Five episodes! Is that so much to ask for people who review anime? In fact since episode 3 my opinion on Nobuna hasn’t really changed. The latest addition, the Yui Ogura loli-kei character, feels like a major distraction actually. Granted, she is kind of a cool character for what she is (ie., loli fanservice draw), the show is rock solid with or without the latest Nobuna haremite.

Of course, I am just as biased. After 5 episodes of this Sengoku gender-swap mary-sue, it is still impressing me, and it does not go by the name of “Sengoku Collection.” (Actually, Sencolle stopped impressing me after episode 8, in which it pulled the Alice-in-Wonderland directorial schtik; it isn’t to say Sencolle is no good now, but my expectation has long since adjusted to match.) I really didn’t expect Nobuna’s Ambition to be the show that it is today, however, so I find that kind of criticism I linked valid only in that magical, alternate universe where the anime ended after 1 or 2 episodes.

And that’s just it. It’s a game about expectations and consistently blogs confound their opinions and feelings with actual critical judgment. The funny thing in the example I quoted was that there was actually a lot of nods on what Nobuna has done well. It’s the assumption that it’s just another moe sengoku genderswap anime which makes the review incredibly shallow. To clarify, that’s like assuming a root beer float is a root beer float, so it’s bad? What’s wrong with this particular version of the sengoku genderswap (or any version)? The lack of burly dudes in lead roles (wait, which part of “genderswap” did you not get)? Dumb characters? Nobuna’s right tit? I have no idea, after reading that post.

In the grand scheme of things, Nobuna is still just your average, garden variety of romance/comedy/adventure anime. It might not be worth writing home about unless you enjoy historical game/RPGs especially the various Nobunaga’s Ambition spinoffs. It might not be as charming as Ankori Pasta Rice, but who would have given either show a second thought if they were thinking any anime with a main character and a harem was no good? Well, maybe it is no good, if by good you mean “Cowboy Bebop” or LOL “Redline.”

Come to think of it, on a very basic level, there just are not too many adventure anime these days that has those components, and still can be finished in a cour or two. Nobuna’s Ambition fits that description. We won’t retread what is good: the solid writing and good animation/direction. We won’t even talk about the way how the main character actually sticks to just Nobuna, despite his unavoidably awkward interaction with the rest of the (and like in-game generals, disposable) female cast. Certainly we won’t talk about that there’s an intended audience for this show, which may be a valid justification for someone like the guy I quoted to react in the way he did. Maybe some people don’t like cute girls in their anime, or ninjas that stutter. Or anything to do with mary-sues. Maybe this is why replay novels never really took off in the west.

On a very fundamental level I could say that our act of gauging our expectation is influenced by the show we watch, however little. Perhaps you can find that type of mismatch as a result of the show. However, for example, I know for every whiner about Horizon in the Middle of Nowhere’s character designs and fanservice, there’s a genuine concern about either cultural smashing or simply a distaste for aesthetics or something like that, which is invariably going to happen as long as the world has more than one flavor to choose from. That is opinion worth taking into consideration. But that’s a very different thing to talk well of shows you like and talk badly of shows you drop. It’s a very different thing to judge a show based on your incorrect assumptions. It’s like reviewing a sports car as a mini-van. Or chocolate ice cream for someone who’s tired of chocolate.

Which is again really just the continuing and constant problem of decontexualization that oversea fandom of anime suffers from ever since the very beginning.

12 comments | posted in English Language Modern Visual Fandom, Modern Visual Culture, Oda Nobuna no Yabou

August 8, 2012

Best noitaminA Show Is the Most Mainstream One

By omo

A lot of anime fans I know likes noitaminA. It’s probably because I know too many internet people; the sort of people who like non-mainstream stuff (not that they don’t like mainstream stuff, as we will see). That Fuji TV programming segment tends to favor the kind of anime that you don’t see often outside of it. It also helps that some of the shows on noitaminA are based on franchises that were fan favorites even before those respective things turned into anime, in some cases, new versions of older anime.

Here’s just a poll from some Japanese site on who likes what. You can read more about it over there if you wish. This is the results of “3,125 votes from 1,097 people.” All disclaimers about internet polls, etc, apply. I didn’t read the original post to get if there’s any specific or special about this polling group or poll or whatever. Anyway:

1: Anohana (306 votes)
2: Kids on the Slope (213 votes)
3: Mononoke (211 votes)
4: Moyashimon Anime (191 votes)
5: Library Wars (173 votes)
6: Tsuritama (163 votes)
7: Guilty Crown (158 votes)
8: NO.6 (135 votes)
9: Eden of the East (135 votes)
10: Nodame series (128 votes)
11: Rabbit Drop (118 votes)
12: Natsuyuki Rendezvous (104 votes)
13: UN-GO (95 votes)
14: Honey & Clover series (85 votes)
15: Shiki (83 votes)
16: Ayakashi (82 votes)
17: Trapeze (78 votes)
18: Kuragehime (73 votes)
19: Tokyo Magnitude 8.0 (72 votes)
20: Tatami Galaxy (65 votes)
21: Thermae Romae (60 votes)
22: Black Rock Shooter (57 votes)
23: Hakaba Kitarou (56 votes)
24: C (51 votes)
25: Antique Bakery (43 votes)
26: House of Five Leaves (35 votes)
26: Jyuousei (35 votes)
28: Live Action Moyashimon (30 votes)
29: Hourou Musuko (24 votes)
30: Genji Monogatari Sennenki (21 votes)
31: Fractale (16 votes)
32: Paradise Kiss (14 votes)
33: Hataraki Man (10 votes)

Yep, Fractale is not the worse, but it’s likely a minor aberration. Hataraki Man and Parakiss are probably too old for this demographic.

The highest-ranked show I didn’t watch is Mononoke, but not for lack of trying. Next is #16, Ayakashi. Then it is #23, Hakaba Kitarou. Do you see a trend here? Maybe not, because I also skipped #25 (fujoshi crap), #26 (fujoshi crap), #28 (not anime), and #30 (see previous trend). Please note that by calling any given noitaminA anime “fujoshi crap” is like saying anime is from Japan; that is kind of the given.

I get the feeling there are way too many people voting up Mononoke, more so than a reasonable group of random internet anime-viewers should. I mean yes I get it, but really? Actually the fact that Kids on the Slope came in #2 (look at the ratings) probably speaks volume about the people who voted, given how it averaged out to be the same as BRS/Guilty Crown. It definitely seems to confirm this previous theory/observation, in a way that is self-contradictory. I mean Kids on the Slope sold poorly, overall, while Guilty Crown still charts (in a way that respects its #7 rank). Actually those two titles typifies a lot of Noitamina shows; they either get a lot of love from the mouth and no love on home video, or a lot of hate and some love from people buying them. Of course, what is for sure is that Anohana both sold well (also see Guilty Crown on that list) and did well on TV. The elusive, the anecdote quoter’s favorite: a hit. And then there’s Fractale.

If you dig back a few years, you can tell a lot of the lower ranked shows did no worse than the higher ranked ones on TV. It just seems kind of arbitrary. Which is why I’m wondering why Mononoke did so well; it wasn’t particularly better rated than, say, Hataraki Man. Why the big gap between the two? (If you are curious, the MAL link has the answer, or see here.)

PS. There’s a follow-up to this observation. Maybe it will become a post!

9 comments | posted in Ano Hi Mita Hana no Namae o Bokutachi wa Mada Shiranai., Guilty Crown, Modern Visual Culture