Otaku Consumerism and Investing in Media

or "The Otaku Voting Process"

Background

Let me first by giving some background on the otaku consumer base.

Within Japan, Otaku markets are supported by a small group with deep

pockets. The ideal scenario for a new "product" is that fans preorder the

Blurays, collect all the figures, go see all the movies, you get the idea.

This is nothing new, a production company wants to see good returns on an

investment in creating something like a TV anime. However, the novel part

of this market comes in the mindset of the consumers themselves. They find

it to be their obligation to support creations they like, with the idea

that by buying in to and throwing money at something they are directly

supporting the chances of more things like it to be created.

The first one's free

This reality can most easily be seen in how BD sales work. A typical

TV anime will have around 12 episodes, with the BD set usually

splitting that up in to 3 releases, each containing 4 episodes. When a

show starts airing on TV, the preorders open for the first BD release,

with the later ones opening up as the show airs more. This has lead to

BD preorder numbers acting as a way to gauge "hype" and the fact they

open up at different parts can be charted out to see change in "hype"

as the season plays out. I should also mention that the general going for

one of these BD is roughly 60-70 USD, a full season set usually running

around 200 USD. These prices are inflated because of the idea that

they represent, which is an endorsement of the product in a language

that production companies understand. This is amplified by the practice

for otaku to buy 3 copies of something, they saying going something like

"One to keep mint, one to loan, one to use", showing again that the amount

of money being spent is just as important as the physical item.

In this regard, the "responsiblity" of an Otaku becomes to watch new

things that come out, then find something they like and vote with their

wallet to endorse it such that more like it is created. Otaku culture is one of "active" consumerism.

Do not shop locally

With that said, the question becomes: if a huge part of Otaku culture is

this consumerism, how does one outside of Japan participate? To get at

this, we must understand how licensing of Otaku media works for the

international market. A licensing company (Funimation, Crunchyroll, etc)

will pay a blanket price for the rights to redistribute media abroad.

Somtimes this is split up, in where seperate countries have seperate

production companies. This blanket payment becomes a problem, meaning that

if you(the consumer) purchase a licensed re-release of a show, your

additional sale is not resulting is more cash ending up in the right

hands. Nor is your sale included in the preorder metrics generally used to

gauge commercial success. One could argue that you are working through

a proxy, and showing the production company that they should license more

shows like that, but that's not voting for "more production" its voting for

"more re-releases". Things have a changed a bit now that crunchyroll has

started acting as a production company for some series, but again this

extra layer of indirection is not ideal.

So what's a international fan supposed to do? The answer is importing,

purchase Otaku goods within the primary market. This puts your vote

in the right place while still giving you that tangibile reprsentation of

your support. This process can be a bit tricky, but their are some

great services that make it fairly easy. Ordering directly from the site

yourself is usually more of a pain then it's worth, having to find a

proxy shipping service, dealing with issues in paying using a foreign

credit card, etc. For people just starting out I would reccomend

something like White Rabbit Express. For use there you simply paste in a

url from a Japanese store front page, and they take care of the rest.

There of of course a bit of a mark up for the ease of something like this

but in my experience it is more then worth it.

Otaku, regardless of their location, have an obligation to participate

in the consumerism. It is a satisfying purchase when you know that you

are participating and putting something on the table in support of things

you like. I encourage other international fans like myself to give it a try.