Fansubbing

Fansubbing is when a group of anime fans translate their own copies of an anime show to their native language and then share them to other anime watchers, usually over the internet. Software such as Bittorrent make this process fast and easy for both distributors and downloaders.

Ostensibly, fansubbing is a way for foreign audiences who do not have a method for watching anime shows to experience them and to expand the audience of anime. As such, many groups include messages in their fansub videos requesting to stop the distribution of the video file once the series is officially licensed in the international market. For English fansubs, this usually means an American company has bought the license. After a series has been licensed, some groups will stop subbing the show to show support for the official product. However, not all groups stop subbing even when their show becomes licensed due to various reasons.

Rationale for fansubs

Fansubbing groups continue their activities because of problems they see in various aspects of the current international anime distribution industry. Some of their rationale include:

• It's not licensed - Before a show becomes licensed, many fansub groups think that they are free to fansub shows since there is not a local license holder of the show in their region.
• Price of DVDs - Many anime viewers find that the cost of anime DVD's to be too high for the amount of content compared to the price. In Japan, anime DVDs sell for up to $50-60 for just two episodes, whereas the same price could get full seasons of TV shows in the US. In Japan, DVD's are similar to collectors' items, often with special features to make them more worthwhile. However, Japanese companies have not been successful at promoting this model of distribution in the US. Recently, the price for DVD's and the number of episodes per disc are cheaper and more palatable to international audiences, but they often lose the special features of the Japanese releases. (More companies are now releasing boxsets with up to 13 episodes).
• Lack of preview - Related to the price issue, many anime watchers complain about paying such a huge premium to just start watching a show they may end up disliking. Most anime in Japan gets aired on television first, so the audience can gauge their interest. Then, the anime fans will decide if they want to buy the DVD's or other merchandise. However, there are very few anime programs available on television internationally, especially for more recent series that are currently airing in Japan. Often, buying a DVD is the first legal opportunity for anime fans to watch a new anime show, and paying $20 for an episode to an unknown anime is unattractive to many international fans.
• Long time delays in releasing - Along with the internationalization process is what is widely considered the slow speed of international distribution. Anime shows first air on Japanese television, where it is talked about and shared and watched all over the internet minutes after. Then, an international company needs to find that show attractive enough to consider licensing, talk with the Japanese copyright holders and agree on the license terms, and then start the localization process. This involves translation, dubbing, and localization of foreign concepts, which has taken up to years for some anime series. Many anime fans around the world follow whatever is currently airing in Japan at the moment and the local DVD releases often come too late to consider buying.
• Bad Editing - For some shows, the international company decides that the original material is inappropriate for what they consider the target audience, and then edit the international releases before distributing them. For people who have already heard about the shows in Japan, they may dislike some of the editting choices of the licensors and find parts of the anime missing elements present in the original.
  Some complaints come from the differences between how comics and cartoons are viewed in society between Japan and other countries. In Japan, anime can be used to depict any story and target any audience, from kid-oriented action and comedy shows to more serious sci-fi or dramas for older audiences. On the otherhand, cartoons may carry different perceptions in other cultures, and the editting for some anime reflects that. For fans of the original work, this editting may render the anime unenjoyable anymore. When Miyazaki's anime film Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind was adapted for US audiences as Warriors of the Wind, it lost much of its environmental messages and the main heroine was replaced by male protagonists. It was heavily disliked by fans and Miyazaki himself, who later vowed to always mandate "no cuts" in all his movies. Wikipedia article.
• Dub quality - Some anime watchers feel that the international dubbing quality of anime shows are often inferior to their Japanese counterparts. If the internationally released DVD's do not have the original dubs, some fans do not consider watching them.
• Translation focus - As anime and other forms of Japanese culture become more widely known as anime increases in popularity, many fans become prefer less localized and more literal translations. This is just a matter of taste, but the many different fansub groups can offer different levels of translation based on the fans' interest. Licensed anime as of yet does not usually have multiple translation options.

Criticism of fansubs

Many company sources point to fansubs as the cause of a decline in the sales of anime DVD's over the past decade. In 2003, sales of anime related media amounted to $4.84 billion. But, by 2007, it fell to $2.829 billion. If revenues from physical media fall, then animation production companies will not be able to sustain themselves since they are producing anime at a net loss. They need the revenue from DVD's and other merchandise to pay for the animation costs.

Wikipedia article on Fansubbing