October 2006

At Anime News Network, simple news of Broccoli’s move from Diamond to PGW becomes far more interesting when the dicussion turns to Diamond’s shortcomings, and Ali Kokmen of Del Rey somewhat comes to its defense.  A few quotes:

That curiousity is natural, but whatever benefits Broccoli sees in their new book trade distributor are likely the kind of business decision that’s invisible and irrelevant to the individual fan or bookbuyer. And that’s kinda the way it should be.

(snip)

Complaints you may hear about one aspect of their business might not be relevant to the other–and, of course, may or may not be fair anyway.

Those complaints, mostly, are pointed at Diamond’s comics business.  Something pretty evident from the disproportionate amount of bile and snark generated by comics-related blogs and forums (for such a relatively small industry) is that comics, from fans to creators to retailers and everyone in between, is filled with loud, petty, bitter, obsessive whiners with no remorse.

Which isn’t a bad thing.

Passionate people complain.  Kvetching is a great American institution.  And nothing is more American and filled with more passionate people than comics.  In few other business will you find such close intermingling of the fan and professional sides… you have readers opening stores or becoming artists and writers, and creators taking shots at publishing.  Oftentimes, you’ll find people working out of their element, to put it kindly.  Bad things happen, and monolithic Diamond gets a lot of the blame not only because it’s easy, but because they’re the only target around.  There’s no other company of that size distributing comics.  There’s no other company of that size offering periodicals with non-returnable terms.  Fans are eager to eat it all up, because they have aspirations of breaking into the industry themselves.

Ali Kokmen is from a traditional book publishing background (originally Collins, I think), so he takes a very gentlemanly view of it.  But the decorum of the book world is a facade… it’s just as trecherous a business in its own unique way, we just don’t hear about it like we do with comics.

+++

Heisei Democracy notes that Keito Koume’s ero-manga tankoubon from Wani Magazine has shipped (which was previously discussed here.)  Keito Koume is drawing Kujibiki Unbalance, the spin-off from Genshiken.  This would make him a former doujin/eromanga artist illustrating a manga which previously only existed as the fictional subject of an ero-parody doujin by the protagonists of another manga about otaku.  Ehhhhhhhhhhhh?

And man, that guy can draw a mean orgy scene.

MangaNews has a translation of a JESTRO report entitled “Trend of Japanese Publication.”  Among the many items of interest include:

• Sales of manga magazines (anthologies) have decreased while sales of tankoubon (collected trade paperbacks) have increased, enough to push the entire manga market up for the first time in years.
• Manga magazine circulation has shrunk 70% compared to 10 years ago.
• The success of overseas markets, specifically mentioning both Viz Media and Tokyopop, was noted as having contributed to the expansion of the manga publishing business overall.

This may come as a surprise to some, but the manga magazine market has been suffering a “crash” similar to the American comics market, albiet a gradual one.  Some say the first signs of erosion came over 20 years ago… magazines were still doing great business in the 80s, but they were mainly buoyed by a few mega-hits.  While this article points to the emergence of second hand stores, ealier culprits included the rise of video games, which not only competed for the attention of youngsters, but also creative talent.

Conversely, what was bad news for manga in Japan was actually good news for us; the Japanese market slump may have been one of the catalysts for the manga explosion in the West.  The promise of new revenue streams pushed publishers to approach foreign licensing with more vigor.

The original report can be downloaded here.

+++

Journalista shares the same befuddlement I had earlier at the “amicable settlement” Top Shelf reached with Great Ormond Street Hospital.  From all appearances, the hospital which owns Peter Pan’s copyright in Europe made zero concessions… many had already speculated that Lost Girls wouldn’t be released in Europe until 2008, which is when the copyright expires.

Rethinking the original announcement, however, produces a couple positives.  The “amicable” part of this settlement could mean that when the book is finally released in 2008, the hospital would remain tacit in the media, avoiding some potentially damaging publicity.  (A children’s hospital versus a porn comic that bastardizes beloved characters with depictions of underage sex?  Guess who’s going to win that one in the court of public opinion.)  There’s also a slim possibility that the EU may decide to extend GOSH’s copyright beyond 2008, and that this agreement would preclude them from taking any future action against Top Shelf in that event.  Whatever the case may be, at the very least a release for Lost Girls in Europe seems guaranteed for the moment.

+++

I must have the Asian comic equivalent of Spidey sense… as pointed out by Gumugum in the comments section (and now on ComiPress,) Taiwanese cartoonist Ao Yu Hsiang is celebrating his 50th birthday with plans of a new Oolong Yuan cartoon to be produced in China (which has recently limited/banned Japanese anime and other foreign cartoons on TV to boost its own domestic animation industry.  See, there is an anime angle to this sotry after all.)  Again, any publisher looking for something different from standard Japanese fare should check out Oolong Yuan, especially the earlier long-form books that dealt with the characters’ origins.  They’re an absolute blast. 

+++ 

We’ve just lost the best darn brand manager at Diamond Comics.  Mr. D. Lange has decided to “move on to other things.”  This is the 3rd brand manager switch for us this year… does Diamond have an employee retention problem, or is dealing with comics publishers about as pleasant as rubbing hot wing sauce in your eyes?  Don’t answer that.

Anycase, all the best of luck to Mr. Lange.