Wouldn’t normally check in on this stuff but eh you only live once!
My problem is that people dismiss a lot of what he says out of hand because they do not like him, or they might perhaps deliberately obscure the full picture to make Jerome look bad. For example, when Jerome made the comment that CEs were only selling 300 units. He wasn't proven wrong as such, he was proven not to be looking at the full picture (his figure didn't include more specialist retailers like AOL or UP1 or sales at conventions), yet people are acting like he deliberately told an outright lie to make AL look bad. Given Manga tends to rely more heavily on traditional outlets and casual consumers, that information is probably more relevant to Manga than the full sales figures.
It could also have been a generalisation to make a point - it’s hardly like anyone on a quick Twitter rant is going to carefully go through the data and check it all out. I certainly don’t see that one as any kind of attempt to make AL look bad.
Even when Andrew agrees with him, his comments still get ignored. Jerome says streaming hurts standard editions -- people explode into shouts of "he's a liar!, he's a liar!" -- Andrew agrees with him, and people tone down their criticism, but they still refuse to believe it. Whereas if Andrew had said it first, it would probably be taken as gospel truth and used to push for more CEs.
This ties into generalisations again really. The easier it is to find significant exceptions, the more people will be disbelieving of a statement - for example for every title like Ben-To (off top of head, may not be a good example) there’s a healthy selection like Death Note that it won’t hurt on standard. The easier it is to find a Death Note, Attack on Titan, Fullmetal Alchemist or the ilk that is streamed AND does well on home video - the harder it can be for folks to generally swallow.
I would also note that Jerome genuinely believes he and Manga are working to increase access to anime, they just aren't doing it in the way you want. I'd argue the fact Death Note is available for pre-order on blu-ray at £25, their commitment to low prices even when AL seems hellbent on increasing them, and their commitment to standard editions, even when expensive full price collector's editions are available, are proof of that.
Not sure I follow this line of argument - the Death Note BDs sell for £59.99 SRP, which is still good value but nowhere near £25 and most retailers are selling for £39.99 - £49.99 range (which is still great value for money and you should definitely buy it, I’ve got it on pre-order anyway!)
Also we’re not “hellbent” on increasing the price - but if you want nice things in a set beyond the discs, there’s a cost attached to it all. Namely as I’ve broken down before:
- Access fees often for content
- Translation cost
- Graphic design costs (takes more time, more approvals)
- Production costs (booklets DO grow on trees, but also cost a chunk of leaves to print
)
This has to be included in the cost as we’re sadly not a charity, we need cash to keep the lights on and staff paid / able to cover their mortgages/rent and bills. You can replace that with art cards or as you will, there’s always some added cost attached. Result is either a lower end Collector’s with the discs + case in a better price point but nothing new, or a higher end collector’s that has stuff that is new and/or cool and it costs more. I will literally never make everyone happy no matter what I choose, neither will anyone else alas!
I'm sure Manga would argue that holding back Sakomoto from streaming was necessary to ensure a home video release took place. You can think they're right to make that assumption or you can not think that, but $150 an episode is such a low figure, that no sane businessperson would risk it. (Andrew Partridge might, but he probably doesn't fit the "sane businessperson" criteria.
He also doesn't have a parent company to answer to.)
Not sure what you’re getting at here on that frontier
. That said, Anime Ltd are seasoned in the world of digital so I’m afraid I’m all boring and definitely do fit into the “sane businessperson” category for digital. We do a lot especially on the SVOD and shortly the EST frontier (iTunes, PSN, Xbox etc etc) because simply put content has to still be accessible for folks especially when our prevalent physical release format is Collector’s.
(Side note too but a key thing being missed out is even if it were $150 / ep - that’s not a flat fee as you get royalties too. So if the show was even semi-popular AND for some reason that was the MG you got, you’d make way more on CR than that pretty quickly.)
AP
