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the anime companies may never admit it, but fansubbers do serve a purpose in the whole scheme of things.

Fansubs serve two roles in regards to the american anime/manga industry:

1. The promotion of said product. More people watching it means more people will promote it. Social network advertising is cheap and effective, as many big non-anime related companies are realizing this.

Unlike in Japan, there is no TV airing for many of these programs. Not one iota. Instead, the only way for us to watch this stuff is through recorded media. So we get our free viewing and tell other people to watch it, and then we like to buy hard copies of said stuff. It's like water. We can all get water for free, but many people like bottled water because of the perceived (monetary/emotional/personal) value.

2. Through this promotion, companies can decide what to focus their dollar on. Nowadays, they won't just buy every show under the sun (which means fansubbed anime STILL serves a purpose- There's no way we'll ever see a commercial release of Monster here in the states) but will go after the ones that generate the most interest.

There where two rules that came up with fansubs- 1. If the show was licensed, you stopped distribution and 2. if you liked the program, buy the damn thing. We get more episodes per disc and more box sets at reasonable prices nowadays than ever before, a far cry than the anime fans in japan who have to plunk down 50-60 bucks a disc for two/three episodes and yet we have a generation or two of fans who thinks they're entitled to free stuff.

I make a point to buy any series I saw a fansub of and enjoyed. That's the purpose of fansubs once the series is available- so you vote with your dollar, saying that you want to see more of it.
I wouldn't exactly call it stealing but no one really thinks highly of the person who goes to a Baskin Robbins for ice cream and just gets nothing but samples either.

That's right, anime is just like water rofl

Anyway, a lot of the points you're repeating make it obvious that you haven't read all of the posts in this thread. Fansubs may promote series and their distribution is also intended to be haulted once series become licenced in whatever country the fansubbers are from. However, watching unlicenced anime is perfectly legal, and therefore not part of the argument in hand. In fact, if I recall correctly, nobody was knocking unlicenced fansubs in the first place, but whatever. The point is that when people DO continue to distribute licenced series, they're breaking the law. Again, as I said before, when people do this with no intention of buying said series, their actions are completely immoral.

The water analogy makes sense for the musician, but I don't think it can be applied to anime.

That was a very interesting article, and it raised a lot of fair points. The one reason I can give to support fansubs is their loyalty to the original product. As much as I want to support the industry, it almost seems like complete waste of money when anime is badly translated (I'm thinking back to the Nodame Live action I watched most recently, which contained horrific translation). Fansubbers tend to translate anime more precisely and with very little/no editing, due to their desire to provide fans with the best.

In the past, I've watched both DVD versions and fansubbed versions of the same anime, and found the differences and mistakes cringe worthy. It almost makes me wish the fansubbers were hired for official releases :/

Unlike water, anime isn't free, so I can't agree that the analogy works.

It's an insult to the fans who actually WANT to support the industry when subtitles are that bad. I despise the fact that I can often get a more accurate translation for free, or at least not waste my money on an equally poor translation.

Also, as is often the case with dubbed releases with Japanese audio options, subtitles are sometimes composed of dubbing scripts, rather than an original translation. For example, the subtitles to the Serial Experiments Lain DVDs released by MVM are exactly the same as the edited English audio.

Don't get me started...(-___-) I think it's perfectly fine to become obsessed with something for a little while. Fangirls and fanboys want to share a passion for something they genuinely love or enjoy, so nobody has the right to knock their enthusiasm. Obviously, one comes across the odd fangirl/boy who's both illiterate and argumentative. A sensible person would ignore this. That's why I can't stand stupid elitists for leaping on their high horses and starting fights with people who just want to have a bit of fun. They aren't hurting anyone, until an elitist provokes them. What's wrong with these people? Don't they have any better to do than start fights over the Internet?

I agree, here. The fact is, musicians don't make the bulk of their money on CD sales, like the record labels and other forms of media like to say they do. The labels get the money from the sales, and so do the managers.

The bulk of the money is made with tours and merchandise, like shirts, hats, hoodies, etc., in that order.

Unfortunately, anime series can't exactly do world tours, otherwise this wouldn't be a problem. The industry almost solely relies on the sales of DVDs and Manga.