Tuesday, November 15, 2005

Hope for Akadot

After a trip to my local law library, and consulting with a helpful relative who studied law, I've got some good news as far as Akadot is concerned. Funimation bears the burden of proof in this matter. They need to produce the actual Exclusive License Agreement they signed with Aniplex because its language is critical to their claim of "exclusive rights to distribute" those FMA CDs in question. If the agreement specifies the nature of the property being "translations of the orginal works" Akadot can sell to their hearts content (provided Aniplex is aware of them doing it of course). It's not much to go on, but now that Funi is claiming "Exclusive rights" they're going to have to prove it with the document they signed.

Points of Contact

Comments (1) | Permalink

Monday, November 14, 2005

Funimation: Morals or Law?

DISCLAIMER: I am neither an attorney nor the agent of one, so the findings posted herein are subjective, and opinion only. Though based on factual legal information provided from various subparts and chapters of Title 17 of the United States Code, what I present is in no way a binding legal argument. While disagreements are expected, please do not address your arguments toward me, I can not be held liable for an openly disclosed opinion statement. I have paraphrased and reworded the complex legal language also, to make it easier to understand. Okay everyone, here's what I found after going over Title 17 with regard to Funimation Versus Akadot. Now, I don't like this any more than many of you, indeed it bothers me quite a bit, but legally, Funimation is right. Importing "sound recordings or phonorecords" for distribution is infringing on the exclusive distribution rights. Now, it is not illegal to import "sound recordings or phonorecords" for private use by the importer, but distributors can not import said items for "commercial gain." With that in mind, Funimation has the moral obligation to back up their claim of "exercising exclusive distribution rights" by targeting all retailers selling those imports (personal auctions do not count, an individual has the right to dispose of their copy of a sound recording or phonorecord by sale of said item without the permission of the copyright holder, or any distribution rights holder) as well as those retailers engaged in the practice of marketing and selling known illegal, pirated materials. Going after one retailer is not a smart business move, nor is it responsible legal practice, considering they've driven more people to purchasing illegal bootlegs of the legally produced albums they forced Akadot to remove from their web site. Since Funimation has made no indication of ever offering those soundtracks independantly of the box sets, I will have to find a way to purchase legit copies for my own use (As is allowed in Chapter 6 of Title 17) from a reputable overseas vendor. Like I said before, I don't like it, but it is what I found. I'll keep looking to see if I may have missed something, but I'd advise no one to get their hopes up. Anime Dreams

Points of Contact

Comments (1) | Permalink

Sunday, November 13, 2005

Title 17

US Code, Title 17, all 200+ pages of it. Not an easy thing to go through, considering there are amendments and everything else to keep track of. I'm still trying to find the "legal" logic to Funimation's antics, but that may take a while. It also doesn't explain why one retailer is being targeted when other retailers are still selling the legal CDs in question, or illegal copies. I noticed both Funimation and Navarre have gone out of their way to not make a statement on the issue (while that is common during pending litigation), in this case they do themselves more damage by not explaining why they target one legit vendor over illegit ones if the claim is "protecting their distribution rights." My issue is why did Funimation change their accusation from distribution right to "Copyright infringement" when they went after Akadot's Web host? Probably because they thought they'd get more leverage crying "wolf" by claiming "unauthorised and/or pirated" products were being distributed by Akadot (It should be illegal to make false claims like that against a company in my opinion). Now, I've never shopped online, but Akadot looks to me like it's trying to do things right by the law, and the fans. I also have an issue with the "Official" US Fullmetal Alchemist web site. It lists the L'Arc~en~Ciel album "Smile", and little else, under "Soundtrack" section. I guess we anime fans are supposed to be completely stupid. Anyway, I'm still going over the Title 17 of US Code. It's a good read, the Copyright Office web site has the whole Title and the amendments (You have to read the amandments too, because they change the language of parts of the basic Title). Take a look at it, just to see how complicated US copyright law has become. By the time this is done, I'll be pitching legal drama based anime to studios, you know, it just might go. . . Anime Dreams

Points of Contact

Comments (0) | Permalink

Saturday, November 12, 2005

Operation: Crackdown?

After seeing Funimation's antics, I have begun to compile the entirity of the Title 17 United States Code. For the layman, that's Copyright law, I'm collecting all 13 chapters and however many amendments there are to it so I can decide for myself once and for all who is in the right by laws standpoint. I have to say I don't really like what Funimation is doing, it's hard enough to find domestic release CDs for anime series where I am, and I think the novelty of having the cover and insert materials in Japanese would be interesting. I buy legal imports for that reason alone if I had the money. Right now I strongly disagree with Funimation's antice, and at last check, they had their message boards down so no one could ask them to explain themselves directly. Neither Funimation, nor Navarre(DO NOT CORRECT ME ON SPELLING. I DO NOT GIVE A XXXX HOW TO SPELL THE NAME OF A COMPANY I DO NOT RESPECT), have posted any information as of this afternoon, but I'll keep checking on that too. When I've fully read Title 17 of the United States Code, I will evaluate what information I have available and determine who's right by law anyway. Wish me luck, Anime Dreams.

Points of Contact

Comments (0) | Permalink

Wednesday, November 9, 2005

Riding Spirits

I just finished watching Spirited Away, must be my ninth or tenth time this year. I fell in love with that film the first time I saw it, and it still reaches out to that one spot in my heart where hope still resides. I don't want to spoil anything about the plot for those who haven't seen it yet, but how the movie makes me feel, how it reminds me that my life is pretty good, how it affects the way I see things, I can easily discuss. There's a lot of energy in the subtext of this film, but subtext is something that can't really be described. It's there, and many people pick it up without knowing they're doing it. Since it's too hard to put what subtext is to words, I won't try. The energy drives the whole experience very well, hinting at the deeper, more raw emotion that lays hidden beneath the characters seemingly normal personalities. After getting in touch with that emotion, which is subtle at first, a person can easily lose themself in Spirited Away. My siter even said, after she watched the film; "It's easy to forget you're watching a movie, you could get lost in it." Which is how I get each and every time I watch. No better review have I seen or heard that those words. The emotion is still noticable without reading the subtext, but it's kind of deceptive in that it leads you one way, when the characters are going another. I'll leave that speak for itself. You'll notice one of my featured quiz results shows Haku, from Spirited Away, I take great pride in that result for personal reasons that I won't bore anyone with here right now, though I'm not hard to pursuade to talk about it. Oddly, the film quiets the unrest in my mind, it has a calming effect on me that's actually quite pleasant. A state of distemper is easily subdued when watching Spirited Away, at least for me anyway. Someone tell my family that so they'll know how to handle me when I get frustrated by something. There are a lot of subtleties to the film that, to put it the only way I can, push the right buttons of mine, in the right order. Call it the password code key to my mental state, and personal inner workings. While not granting full access on it's own, it does open me up a bit, well, more than a bit, but I won't say how much *^_^* To wrap this up into a coherent blog burrito of refried anime goodness, Sometimes what you least expect from anime is what you get, and though I know the stories are usually deep, I didn't really expect to find myself, no pun intended, spirited away by this one. The realms of imagination have been opened up, and I'm rather enjoying my visit there. Anime Dreams.

Points of Contact

Comments (1) | Permalink

Saturday, November 5, 2005

More Thoughts

In going back over my last few posts again (I've done that quite often lately), I was forced to recognize that I've been using this blog the wrong way. Sure it's necessary to vent a little frustration once in a while, but I went beyond that into the realms of the pitiful, whining about the least little things. It's funny to read some of the minute things I'd blow all out of proportion, talk about making mountains out of molehills. While I can't guarantee a complete change, I can promise that I will try to take this blog thing more seriously than I have, and not use it to rant over what amounts to trivial matters that I really need to resolve on my own, and not involve the internet community around me with them. Once in a while, I'll probably post something in anger, that's to be expected of all of us, but I will try my best to keep things under control. Since I don't have access to a lot of anime at the moment, I'll have to come up with other relevant topics to cover here until such time as I can acquire more of the anime I'm not getting to see. I'll take a look around the net this week, sit down to my few DVDs and see what kind of quality post I can have up here next time. I'll save my real rants for my other blog and my message board. Your continued tolerance of an ignorant fool is much appreciated, please don't stop now. Anime Dreams to all.

Points of Contact

Comments (1) | Permalink

Thursday, November 3, 2005

   The Worst Luck

Just found out this morning that another application I subbmitted through my local Job Service (State run employement office) was turned down, took almost two weeks for me to find out. I don't know why I bother with that sorry excuse of a waste of taxpayer money anymore, I really don't. That's right the Job Service is garbage.

Points of Contact

Comments (1) | Permalink

Tuesday, November 1, 2005

Thoughts

Once again, I was made to feel inferior to my peers. I'm not angry about it, I am annoyed, I am frustrated, and I am disappointed, but I'm not angry. The Beta launch invitations for the Art of Otaku went out this morning, to those of you who signed up, check your inboxes if you haven't all ready. Naturally I read through it to see just how to go about getting involved with the Beta launch. I didn't have to completely read the invite to know almost immediately I was automatically out, that I couldn't participate. I don't have a credit card, so I have to wait until the "official" launch to be able to get the guide, and I'll end up paying more for it because of that. I guess those of us who don't have credit cards are just second class citizens because we can't pay for everything with a sixteen digit number. People used to do that kind of thing to me in school. I was in Theatre in high school, the other students would get together and plan cast/crew parties then decide to invite me an hour before the thing was to start, knowing I needed more time than that to be sure my family knew I had plans. To tell the truth, I think they deliberately did that so I wouldn't be able to go. Here, I've been a proponent of the money order payment method since it was brought up, then the invitation goes and slaps those of us who can't pay by credit card in the face by saying to us: "you're not important enough to qualify for the discount because you can't put the money up right this very nanosecond." I want the project to do well, I really do. However, it's hardly fair to expect the people who want to particpate in the Beta launch but can't only because we don't have a [squeaky-squeaky!] credit card to lose out on that discount and be content about it. A lot of noise over a few dollars and cents, I know, why should I even bother, Right? Well, it's a matter of principle to me, that's why. I wish the Beta Launch of the Art of Otaku all the luck in the world, I'll give a [Honk!] when the rest of us can buy it. No, not this time, no anime dreams.

Points of Contact

Comments (0) | Permalink

Monday, October 31, 2005

A Haunting I Will Go?

With today being Halloween, I began to think about a few things, and a question came to me that I'd like to ask. How many of you have had what you believe to be a paranormal experience? Could be anything from sounds, seeing things, feeling things, scents that shouldn't have been there, anything. I ask, because as a hobby, I'm into paranormal investigation, and such accounts are very interesting to me. I have had my own experiences that science just can't explain, so I don't investigate with the preconceived idea that all hauntings are soundly disprovable. To get things started, I'll share one of my experiences. There's a local cemetary near my house that's got a lot of history to it, with graves going back beyond the Civil War. A couple months ago, my mother and sister (who are more into the paranormal stuff than I am) asked me to go along with them to that cemetary after they visited it once before and got some bizarre distortions in some digital photographs they had taken. They wanted me along to have another person with them and my specialty within investigations are audio anomalies called EVP (Electronic Voice Phenomenon - voices or sounds recorded that were not heard by the person making the recording at the time the recording was made). I took along my digital voice recorder and let it run while we paid our respects to the honored dead, not really following the protocal of asking a series of questions (I'll get to that in a moment). While we were there, we stopped at a grave of interest, and as I stood off to the side while my sister took a picture of the stone (It has some very ornate carving on it) I caught the slightest, faintest aroma of pipe tobacco for only a second. If you've ever smelled it you know what I mean, that minty sweet kind of thick lightly smokey smell. There was no one around, in the cemetary or out, smoking a pipe. We wrapped our visit and returned home, and I sat down to the DVR, listening to the recording. All told there were five sounds that defied explanation recorded that morning. Four of them were distinct voices speaking short phrases. My DVR isn't the best, so the mic couldn't have picked up stray sounds from the street, and there wasn't anyone out anyway. The voices can be heard right before or after one of the three of us spoke, except for one which tried to talk on top of my sister and I. Three days later, my sister was reading a book written by a local paranormal enthuiast and she learned and told me that the person who's grave I smelled the pipe tobacco near during our investigation was known in life to smoke a pipe. If I had followed normal protocal, I would have prepared a list of questions to ask the spirits, and walked around the cemetary asking the questions. The idea behind that is to determine if a spirit is "intelligent" that is to say it is aware of things around it (and may even know its deceased). The idea is to have the recorder's voice and an unexplainable one together on a recording, it's more easily proven that the recorder didn't just pick up a stray sound that way I guess. Common questions include asking the spirit to identify itself by name, if its trying to finish something it left undone, stuff like that. So, anyone else have an encounter they would like to share?

Points of Contact

Comments (1) | Permalink

Sunday, October 30, 2005

Making the Music, Dreaming the Dreams

As I was working on a drawing the other day, I came to realize that I had lost sight of why I draw in the first place. As I thought about it in depth, I figured out when it happened. Now it's no secret I've been vocal, not always positively, about the Art of Otaku project. When that was first announced, I was very much against it in fact. It was that project that first skewed my perception, and tainted the reasoning behind why I draw. I don't even know why I let not being good enough to volunteer for that poject get to me now, but the reason was probably a small one. When I figured all that out, I reminded myself that I draw because it makes me feel good. I don't draw for recognition, I don't draw for profit, I don't draw for this site, I don't draw for friends or family, though their encouragement does push me to continue, I draw because I enjoy it, and it makes me feel good. Because I'm a bit self conscious about my artwork, I rarely check my own portfolio. Recently though, I did take a look at it, and something very obvious hit me right away. My friends and family tell me that my art is good, however, the numbers here don't reflect that sentiment. Are my feelings too delicate that no one is willing to risk damaging them with the truth? Am I too fragile a person to be given honest reviews of my work? Am I too naive to handle even an ounce of constructive criticism? Have I really presented myself as that kind of person? One who needs constant assurances to keep going? No matter what the numbers say, I'm going to keep right on drawing anyway. I don't draw for the pleasure of others, I draw because I feel good doing it. Even the worst criticisms won't rattle me now. Anime Dreams!

Points of Contact

Comments (0) | Permalink