Pirate Anime FAQ Updated

Joe Curzon writes "The Pirate Anime FAQ has finally been updated, after year of me being far to busy to do anything on the internet! The FAQ would have been released sooner, but my request on Slashdot.org produced some "interesting" feedback via e-mail. This update includes a new and improved Fansub section, which also covers Digisubs. Scanlations have been added as a point of interest. Additionally the Audio CD and DVD sections have been improved with more details on the Pirate Companies and how to spot their "products". I would also like to say that feedback from readers and the industry is critical for keeping the FAQ up to date, and without their previous and continuing support The Pirate Anime FAQ could not exist. Finally I would to remind people to be extremely cautious when buying from on-line auction sites such as eBay. The most common e-mail I get sent is from concerned fans who have just found out that they have bought some pirate goods off a seller who claimed what they were selling was legitimate."

Comments

The quality of HK DVD

[Sexy Commando]

It's worthy to note that 90% of Hong Kong Anime TV-show DVDs are from the inferior TV captured sources, not from the DVD releases. Of course you can find dedicated pirates who strive to get the same quality as the original, but it's not likely you can find them in Hong Kong made DVDs.

If the show is unlicensed in the US, it is likely that you can download from BT sites like here and here.

Re:Is this correct?

[kaltkalt]

Yes but some laws require a mental element, i.e. intent ("mens rea" in legal fancy-latin). That's different from ignorance of the law. If I jump out at you from behind a tree and yell "boo!" to scare you and cause you to have a heart attack and die, it is not murder because I did not have the intent to kill you (even though my act caused you to die and I knew killing someone is murder, which is illegal). If you buy it thinking it is real, it is still contraband and you can't bring it into the country (it will be confiscated by Customs if they find it) but you won't be charged with a crime. Now, bringing in 100,000 units of pirated stuff might get you in some trouble b/c it could imply an intent to sell/distribute the stuff (it's clearly not for your personal use).

Yes, this applies to drugs, too. For example, if someone sticks a bag of pot in your pocket and you had no idea they did it, you're technically not guilty of a crime, even though the stuff is in your possession. But, you'll have a hard time convincing the cops that someone stuck it in there (don't they have the burden of proof beyond a reasonable doubt? Sure... but these are drugs, and as we all know the Constitution doesn't apply to drug crimes).

Anyway, bottom line is you're not gonna get in criminal trouble for bringing a pirated anime doll or whatever into the US from abroad. It can be confiscated, though (ya won't get it back, no matter how innocent/ignorant you were).

Re:Really...how big of a deal?

[TomHandy]

Well, this is an especially big deal to the original Japanese companies. And it's not just a US issue, but the problem of Japanese anime DVD's being pirated and bootlegged throughout Asia. The Japanese companies have generally expressed an even greater concern about this. In terms of how much it affects the US companies, it's more a different issue. Fansubs generally aren't as much a concern as "import" shops that sell bootlegged anime DVD's, even bootlegged DVD's when the show is licensed and available commercially in the US. Same with eBay auctions, where some companies have been more active in trying to clamp down on bootlegs than others (AnimEigo in particular has tried very hard to deal with the bootlegs of some of the shows they have licensed and released commercially like Kimagure Orange Road and SDF Macross).

And you are right..... the US companies in particular do recognize the role fansubs play, and the general thing they ask for is to stop distributing fansubs of shows when they are licensed..... although the digisubs phenomenon makes this more difficult, because it isn't as easy to halt digisub distribution compared to the VHS fansub days, when a fansub distributor could stop distributing a fansub, and the extent of a fansub's spread after that was less, and the quality wasn't that good anyway compared to commercial releases. This is the big issue that is dealt with regarding digisubs, which can be copied and distributed easily to hundreds or thousands of people at a time, and each subsequent copy isn't degraded like when people copied fansubs for friends, etc.

But anyway, the focus, and the big deal is most definitely the actual bootleg anime DVD's, etc..... fansubs and digisubs aren't seen as quite the same kind of issue.

-Tom