The Belfast Telegraph is reporting that Amazon UK had available for sale (and since pulled) a Japanese PC eroge called RapeLay, which supposedly simulates the rape of a woman and her two daughters, though I think it’s the forced abortion segment that truly makes this game “special”. One parliament member angrily vowed to make a stink at the next parliament session, despite there being no evidence that the game was actually imported into the UK. (Britain recently enacted a law that criminalizes production and distribution of fictional depictions of violent sex, excluding film, curiously.)
One point that may be intentionally overlooked by Belfast Telegraph for the sake of sensationalism is that the item does not appear to have been made available by Amazon UK directly, but rather a third party using Amazon USA’s independent seller program that is more notorious in the states as a source of “professionally” pirated anime DVDs. If the Belfast Telegraph article’s claim that the game was available to UK buyers is correct (I doubt it), and the Japanese developer’s site specifically states their games are not for sale outside of the US, there is a small possibility that what was offered was an unauthorized counterfit, or even warez someone burned onto DVD-R in their basement.
You know, I think Western media loves stories that portray Japan as crazy sex world, especially when it comes to manga and anime, but in my experience (ahem) hardcore bondage/S&M is just as prevalent, if not a more popular theme in European porno comics. They just don’t seem to have the kind of online visibility that manga does.
+++
Ooh, I have not seen this anywhere else… author Tina Anderson reveals that Viz’s original content program, which was first brought to light after calls for submissions/portfolio reviews at several anime and comic conventions, has been put on hold. The decision may be related to the departure of Marc Weidenbaum, who was VP of Original Publishing.
A mere delay, or a signal that the publisher is adopting a back-to-basics approach? It would have been interesting to see what Viz could do with original content, considering the goal was not to replicate the ”oel” lines of other manga publishers, but to start a truly domestic graphic novel imprint. Hopefully, this is a protracted schedule, not a total abandonment.
+++
A showdown is brewing between the Authors Guild of America and Amazon over the Kindle 2.0′s ability to read text aloud, which the guild maintains is a circumvention of author’s audio rights and may damage the audio book market. The guild recommends that authors and publishers withhold books from the Kindle program unless Amazon also pays for audio rights. On the other end, Amazon argues that a machine reading is far different from a recorded performance, although given the speed of technical advances in the field of voice synthesis (Hatsune Miku, anyone?), it isn’t inconceivable that one day machine readings will approach near-human quality.
The legal strength of the arguments notwithstanding, at this stage I think the text to speech function will be used most extensively by the visually impaired, so it would be a shame to take that functionality away. Perhaps a new, cheaper licensing structure, one that covers exclusively this emerging technology, is in order.
+++
First, Futari H. Now it’s Tantric Stripfighter Trina. I think the evidence is piling up… Tokyopop is going to become an ero publisher! Oh crap!
+++
ComiXpress, another POD specifically serving the comics market, has announced their intention to enter the distribution game as well. Excerpt from their front page message:
ComiXpress is proud to announce that our Retail Distribution Service will be launching shortly. By offering the highest quality Print On Demand comics and trade paperbacks to retailers, the always important brick-and-mortar stores will have access to a catalog of some of the most amazing new comics coming out today.
Head on over to their website for more.
Now that there may be competition between POD printers, perhaps we might start seeing those discounts that so flustered many retailers start going up, eh?
-
About the KINDLE thing – isn’t the audio reader the same version that Microsoft Reader used – where it sounds like a “bot-reader” reading the work.
Isn’t part of the appeal of audiobooks the celebrity reader? What the Author’s Guild is saying makes no sense…they’re asking for royalties for something that’s programmed in for those who might have trouble reading [dyslexic or paralyzed] but still want to enjoy a book. KINDLE isn’t try to attach a celebrity voice to KINDLE programming or make eBooks available to those who want to hear a story while driving in the car.
An audio function is not the same as ‘an audio book presentation’. Perhaps someone should remind the guild of that.
-
@uk ero thing wouldnt the eroge game gibo (stepmother’s sin) also fall under this ban as well, along with other manga I’ve asked about simon lmao ^.^;
Any idea what stripfight is about simon since the cover doesnt seem to tell much? -
About ComiXpress:
I was interested when Ka-Blam announced its plans, but am less than enthusiastic about ComiXpress. Having had delays of several months getting comics I ordered from their online catalog sent to me, hearing horror stories of how much of a backlog and delay the company commonly has, I fear that unless they’re on the cusp of some major overhaul, ComiXpress isn’t going to be much of a factor in any developing POD-to-direct market distribution system.
Not that I wish them ill, of course, and I’d love to see some healthy competition energize POD publishing, but past performance leaves me wary.
-
Here here– also, if you’re a manga maker [or graphic novel creator] POD is just not cost affective. :( Amazon’s own POD program can’t handle the pre-press, and places like KaBlam, LuLu, and ComixPress charge too high a base price to make it worth the hassle– you’d have to set your retail price far above the competition in order to meet most distributors asking take.
Until a POD company comes along that can offer plans in ‘print runs’ of 50-100-500, and get that base price down to even a reasonable [but still pricey] $2-3 per book–creators will need to rely on printers and pay for their stock up front. :(
-
11 comments
Comments feed for this article
Trackback link: http://www.icaruscomics.com/wp_web/wp-trackback.php?p=2565