Do You Think PiracyIs Killing Or Helping The Anime Industry?

I think its killing and helping the anime industry, but I don't even wanna explain this cuz I'm pretty sure yall know the points I would make.

No idea, but i bought BD if i love the series (after pirate it). But so far i only bought 2 titles because it's expensive and only some titles have english BD.

Piracy is helping more people to get into anime, but I don't think the industry is still financially stable. We all know the amount of hard work the animators go through and how underpaid their work actually is.

But it's not like everyone loves to pirate. As you said, I cannot wait a whole week for an AOT episode so I'll obviously watch it on a pirated site. Another major problem that piracy solves is we can watch any anime from anywhere in the world.

Let's say I want to pay to watch Attack on Titan. What are my options? Funimation isn't available in my country, neither is Hulu. Crunchyroll doesn't have it. So my only option is to wait for the blu ray version to release and then order it from a global e-commerce website.

I am not in favor of piracy but sometimes it does help.

As for your question, it is doing both. Piracy is the reason animators are underpaid, but it also the reason many of us are anime fans in the first place.

Obviously I won't say piracy it's a good thing, but it clearly attract lot of people into animation.

Now, if those who start off watching anime piracing, after realizing all the effords put into it, start to buy stuff related to anime, and watch exclusively using legal paths (streaming platforms, cds, etc), this might help the industry more than just shutting down all piracy stuff and hunting those who share it.

I think it's both (as someone else said, it helps people get into anime, but it also means the industry isn't getting as much money), but it also shows issues with the industry, such as availability, licensing restrictions by region, quality of subtitles, and other things. Gabe Newell says piracy is almost always a problem with service rather than price. Until some of these industry problems are solved, piracy will remain as wide spread as it is because people see it as a better service to get what they want. People will be more willing to pay when the industry can solve these issues and provide a better service.

Your argument would be correct only if litterally anyone who watched an anime on a site would actually buy something after using it. But differently from manga, people don't have any reason to actually spend money on something they have already seen (except in case they want to have in their colleton the Blu-Ray or similar, but it's very rare). Sites like Crunchyroll helps the anime industry 'cause a part of their earnings goes to the producers of those shows. Then there's even the fact that usually who uses sites is already into anime, or is a casual watcher who would never ever spend one euro on it. Think about this: how much money have you spent in your life for the anime you watched? Probably it's less than the time you dedicated to this medium, and not even enough to "match" the actual amount you would have paid normally. Sites doesn't help the industry neither marketing, 'cause usually when you go in a site you already know what you wanna see, and even in the possiblity that you discover something new, there's no reason for you to spend even a single euro on it, exept for gadgets or similar, but they are things that you would have bought in any case if interested.
Said so, I use sites.

Anime piracy got me into anime and because of that, I have bought a lot of anime goods. Legal streaming services aren't helping the industry as much as they should so the best solution is for Japan to make its own service so that people can directly support the industry. I don't know about other people but if there is a legitimate way to help the industry besides merchandise I'll take it in a heartbeat.

Piracy is always damaging, it only depends on how much it damages and how much it benefits.
To understand issues, one must understand where anime companies profit

Profit examples:

• Some animes are for promotion. Some for on-going manga, some to increase sales of books, some to promote video games etc.
  In my opinion for those types aim isn't to get ads to profit, but increase the sales or increase the fresh blood.
• Goods. I don't know where I read it, but the cream of profit comes from DVDs & Blu-Rays, Figurines, Cloths etc. Merchandises. Also allowing the anime to be aired out of japan, they need some airing rights or such.
• Then there are ones that are green lighted by comitee and how they do depends on views, ads and merchs.

Regarding exposure...
Marketing and exposure can be done via advertisement, promotional events in popular gacha games and through news, live-streams, free first episode youtube kind of actions.
From another thing I've read (sorry for not citing, I'm lazy), piracy either comes from lack of funds, financial independence (being not able to spare a coin or being a kid who needs to use parents card) or due to being convenient (the one I relate most).

Regarding lack of funds, I've pirated video games since I didn't have the money and they stopped making demo games for some reason. As soon as I gained financial independence, I purchased originals. This is a very common story in gaming, since piracy is not just watch and done kind of situation. But if you've enjoyed a show, there is a high chance you will want to purchase something relating to it that maybe a hoodie or DVD-set who knows which links to my previous profit related topic.

Regarding convenience, thanks to the licensing and geo-locks you as a fan are double shafted. When shows you want to watch are distributed between streaming services it makes a very hard bargain to pay full price for one show. Not to mention, even if you use your own countries streaming service some animes won't be licensed with them. Thus the traditional VPN.

Then you look at the seven seas, gentle breeze caressing your skin, nice tides that won't leave your ship stuck or stranded. It is tempting to be a pirate.

(Also as a final word, regarding not-torent piracy aka pirated content on a website.
It is very costly to maintain a website, even when you put ads. Thus some great sites go down due to money problems. Then there is taking of legal action, some companies out of anime industry are notorious for protecting their IP/Product/Whatever. But even taking legal action is costly soooo there is that.)

It depends. Do you think that people who pirate would use paid services if their regular avenues weren't available, or do you think they'd simply don't watch the series that'd otherwise force them into legal services that they don't want to use? Crunchyroll alone has a ton of notorious issues ranging from merely navigating their site to moral ones and I lean more towards that people just wouldn't use those legal ways to get at their seasonals.

Which means that there technically isn't any revenue lost and those people are more likely, due to exposure to buy merchandise or to import their series from japan. I personally know people who tend not to use Crunchyroll who read physical, imported manga, who've studied the language or collect figurines - pretty confident all of them simply wouldn't pay anything otherwise

There's also something to be said whether exposure to a bigger market is necessarily a good thing. While it does definitely generate more revenue stuff like this tends to cause a medium to become more streamlined in what content is to be deemed appropriate - given that you need to cater to each market simultaneously

TL;DR it's complicated but I reckon it does less harm than people like to claim

"Piracy is almost always a service problem, not a price problem" -Gabe Newell, Head of Steam/Valve etc.

I suspect most people would switch over from pirating to getting anime "legitimately" if streaming services didn't do the community dirty with exclusive licensing, poor user-interfaces, little innovation, region restriction, not simulpub'ing, etc. Hell, I know I would.

We shouldn't guilt trip consumers of anime to stop pirating with a weak moral argument. If services actually offered something of value, almost everyone would switch over.

I can only talk for myself, but I don't like to buy things blindly, so I pirate everything and (try to) buy it afterwards if I liked it.

I personally pay for subscriptions and still pirate anime. My experience with legal streaming is ass cough crunchyroll mobile app cough, so I prefer to just do my due diligence and get a better experience simultaneously (Plex/Jellyfin). I doubt many pirates are similar, though.

Hard to say if it's really doing anything to the Anime Industry, would have to have a look at Crunchyroll/Funimation/etc's business practice and where the transaction takes place to know for sure.

There would be no "anime community" outside of Japan if it wasn't for piracy, it just doesn't seem like Japanese anime producers care about the market outside of their country.

It is true that most people (including myself) started watching anime through illegal sites, but beyond introducing you to the world of anime, it does not give any benefit to the creators of anime. I know that a lot of people will say some people will buy some merchandise if they like anime, but that will probably do with 5 out of 200 animes that they consumed through an illegal site.
Clearly the most beneficial thing for the anime industry is for people to watch animes on legal streaming sites, as each of those companies has to pay a license or partner with the distributor in order to stream an anime, it is a more direct gain.
This is evidenced by the fact that more and more animes now depend on success in legal streaming services outside of Japan than on Blu-ray sales or merchandise, not to mention many of them (Crunchyroll, Funimation, and Netflix, etc) invest in producing anime.

I leave a related article:
https://www.ign.com/articles/why-anime-is-the-next-streaming-frontier-state-of-streaming

Well like it or not every anime fan has pirated a show at one point or another. While it is bad for the industry, it is undoubtedly also the reason most of us are anime fans.

Piracy steals blu-ray sales from the shows, but let's be real here, I don't even have a disk drive in my laptop anymore, so the future isn't very bright for those numbers.

Streaming sites like Crunchyroll provide a solution to this problem but they don't stream anything in a lot of places. I've considered getting a subscription multiple times, but they literally have nothing in India's library.

Many fans, including ones who pirate it, buy anime merch, figurines, and manga. Manga and figurine sales probably help and contribute to the industry much more than whatever Crunchyroll does.

Now, I'm not saying piracy is the way to go, or streaming sites are bad. Both have their merits and demerits.

The best solution to this problem would be if all the animation studios in Japan came together and launched a new anime streaming platform that has every show and simulcasts for western audiences within 12-24 hours. I am pretty sure most fans would love that, cause they'll finally be able to watch their shows legally, without ads, and be able to make an active contribution to the industry they love.

The majority of people who pirate don't pay for streaming service/DVDs, because why would they? I do, but I'm both a weirdo and dissatisfied with my streaming service's selection.

The only way piracy is going to be helping put money back into anime is if pirates are getting invested in the shows and characters then going out and buying official merch. Couldn't tell ya if it evens out with the lost money they would make in streaming fees and disc sales, because I haven't done the research. Thinking probably not.

If pirates are killing the anime industry, it's only because stupid streaming services like Crunchy handed them the gun.

Free exposure is a bunch of crap to be fair, most of the times at least, if you watch anime you're... most likely already into anime, and you won't be coming across the sites you're talking about unless you search for them yourself. People are much more likely to get the exposure you're talking about from Youtube clips or things such as that.

The industry isn't dying at all though, otherwise reckless studios such as MAPPA wouldn't exist.

I agree that piracy made it more accessible to watch anime for lots of people. But I don't think they are the main reason for their popularity. Most people like me discovered anime through Youtube clips/reviews/top 10s or through the occasional edgy anime shown on tv

one piece earns billions for the anime industry

In the current situation: Legal sites are dogshit. Because of that noone is really willing to instantly pay for a service unlike something like netflix or spotify which people don't even think twice about subscribing to cuz they're actually good services. So rn it's helping anime become more popular -> more income for the industry. Unfortunately even if we all switched to legal services they'd still suck, so it's not like pirating is really taking away from the industry, it's only taking away from some rich fatass' account balance, and rightfully so.

"Piracy is almost always a service problem, not a price problem"

To prove this, I can just say I have spotify cuz it's a good service and it's convenient for me, it's worth it.

If the services were good, and people decided not to pay for them, that would hurt the industry more, but since the services would be good, the majority would pay for them -> more money for the industry.

So I think: Piracy's effect on the industry ranges from neutral to somewhat positive depending on the situation the service providers themselves create.

what is dead may never die, it just needs someone to dig its grave.

revive

piracy only exists because crunchyroll is ass
stop geolocking everything and make your platform coherent then maybe ill start paying

Let me just share the famous quote from Gabe Newell:

"We think there is a fundamental misconception about piracy. Piracy is almost always a service problem and not a pricing problem," he said. "If a pirate offers a product anywhere in the world, 24 x 7, purchasable from the convenience of your personal computer, and the legal provider says the product is region-locked, will come to your country 3 months after the US release, and can only be purchased at a brick and mortar store, then the pirate's service is more valuable."

This applies to anime as well. As long as region blocking and platform exclusive licenses are a thing, pirating will stay popular.

So if anything, it's the anime industry killing itself, not pirates.

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i just find it weird, im not gonna throttle you if you do it, but like crunchyroll is 10 bucks?

I am a pirate but if there is website which has every anime available on it and I can access it without any need of VPN then I would gladly pay for its subscription else I am happy being a pirate :-)

I would never pirate anime, as I am an ethical anime fan who loves to support the industry. I encourage everyone to do the same and not support the illegal anime streaming black market. Glory to all legal anime streaming sites!

Please let me see my family.

i do believe you should use crunchy, funi, hulu, netflix aka any legal site

but

i understand that in alot of countries certain shows are not accesible unless you fork over alot of money for a dvd or something

The thread "Do you think piracy is killing or helping the anime industry?" and its comments have been merged into this thread.

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