Doujin to go the way of the dodo?

[Lego]

Not sure if this belongs here, but I did find this interesting from ANS.

Doujinshi Could Be In Trouble
Recent sales of fan produced parody comic based on j-chara icon Doraemon have gotten so big that it may have created an uncomfortable situation with the original rights holders. Not at all uncommon in Japan, Doujinishi have enjoyed a long and healthy existance over the years in Japan in a mostly gray legal zone. "Doraemon Final Story" as it's titled, went on sale at Comiket 71 at the end of 2006. 400,000 people attended the event. The story collects elements from a chain mail of the same name that originated in the late 1990's. Mostly through word of mouth internet advertising, news that the unofficial manga would be published surfaced in late 2005. Over 2006 the planned title took on a buzz dynamic of huge proportions. The circle has sold 15,500 copies to date, huge numbers for a dojin. However, the authors didn't attain permission from official publisher Shogakukan, throwing the comic into a technically illegal "priacy" status. They contacted the group at the end of 2006 to cease circulation. J-Cast, our source for this news, asked Shogakukan for a comment. They were told the issue is unresolved, but gave the following statement: "Will severely deal with the piracy in the future." The situation is interesting becuase Comiket has been ongoing for 30 years and most of the fan-produced manga works you can buy there are based on existing copyrighted characters. What's more, many of today's mainstream, corporate backed manga artist stars got their start in dojin and at Comic Market. "Manga inc." underpins Japan's huge animation industry. The nation's exponentially growing soft power in the world is often tied to both of these pop culture corporate segments. If Doujinshi is agressively addressed in the future, could this have any effect on the entire system of contents creation that has existed in Japan in modern times? Where this situation will go from here is uncertain, but some believe this development could be precedent setting.

I was under the impression that doujin circles and license holders had this kind of non spoken agreement that they would be find if they only made their books available to a limited amount of people or printed a limited amount of copies. Obviously fan art is different as anyone can draw fan art and I'm sure that a license holder or even the author themselves wouldn't object to a standard fan art of one of their characters. But obviously the first thing one things of is doujin based off established series. It always came off as a tricky thing to me when you have a whole market which advertises and uses established characters mainly for hentai purposes.

I'm a fan of doujin in the sense that I like to collect stuff from series I like to watch. Obviously I'd be lying if I said that I didn't enjoy seeing the erotic side of it to. But still it brings up a interesting issue when you have a event like Comiket that attracts hundres of thousands of visitors.

[something]

Oh you and your silly subject lines =P Of course doujins aren't going away, I'd see this case as the exception that proves the rule, more or less. For a property with such a high profile as Totoro, I can see an exception perhaps being made.

Could this potentially be a "precedent"? Anything's possible, but you'd do well by your anatmy not to hold your breath for it, I say.

[Lego]

Oh you and your silly subject lines =P Of course doujins aren't going away, I'd see this case as the exception that proves the rule, more or less. For a property with such a high profile as Totoro, I can see an exception perhaps being made.

Could this potentially be a "precedent"? Anything's possible, but you'd do well by your anatmy not to hold your breath for it, I say.

I should be more like a news reporter when I make headlines. "Today in international news, doujin might be facing stiff opposition from blah blah blah blah". Yeah, I know that this doujin got singled out because it sold a insane amount of copies for a doujin. Still it's interesting to see if more companies will step up and go "hey wait a minute" when it comes to doujin. I'm still surprised by the vast amount of doujin for literally any series you can think of. Comiket seems to be getting more "corporate" these days anyway.

[populuxe]

Comiket seems to be getting more "corporate" these days anyway.
As a fan of doujinshi, I've been wondering about this, too. The line between a simple fanbook and a professional release making money off of someone else's copyrighted characters is blurring to the point where I'm not at all surprised a publisher is cracking down on it.

[Lego]

I've seen many examples of this from the most recent Comiket(71). I have no problem with fanbooks or hentai doujin, but you can see why some companies might come down hard on doujins that sell very well. That and the advert of doujin H games based off of established characters moving more and more towards the low end anime realm makes me wonder if we'll see anything during the next Comiket.

Maybe everyone wants to hit it big like Type Moon did, who knows. But you are starting to see doujin circles trend away from fan produced and try to break into the professional published market. It'll be interesting to see what happens.

[Ialdaboth]

15,500 sold ? 400,000 at the event, so probably as many potential customers ?

If I was Shogakukan, I would think that the intelligent thing to do would be to offer to the circle to publish the doujinshi, in exchange with a modest fee per book sold.

Edit : Frankly, doujinshi going extinct would greatly surprise me. Doujinshi are great as a playground for both new talented artists (Tetsuya TSUTSUI, Takizaki Mamiya come to mind) and a lot of already known artists. Not to mention doujinshis with original content which are perfectly trouble-free (or maybe when they reach commercial status, like Higurashi ?). I think we will se a drawback at first and circles editing less copies of their doujinshis to avoid legal trouble, but mass extinction, no.

[Lego]

15,500 sold ? 400,000 at the event, so probably as many potential customers ?

If I was Shogakukan, I would think that the intelligent thing to do would be to offer to the circle to publish the doujinshi, in exchange with a modest fee per book sold.

Edit : Frankly, doujinshi going extinct would greatly surprise me. Doujinshi are great as a playground for both new talented artists (Tetsuya TSUTSUI, Takizaki Mamiya come to mind) and a lot of already known artists. Not to mention doujinshis with original content which are perfectly trouble-free (or maybe when they reach commercial status, like Higurashi ?). I think we will se a drawback at first and circles editing less copies of their doujinshis to avoid legal trouble, but mass extinction, no.

I wouldn't be surprised to see a cut back in production numbers. The main appeal for a lot of people isn't original doujin though but doujin based off of established characters. The same goes for hentai doujin which seem to fly off the shelf or table when showing popular series like Haruhi or ZnT.

[Jumbo]

While I can see where Shogakukan may be coming from, it seems a little too late now doesn't it? All this "after the fact" stuff seems pretty typical to me. Now if they actually ~do~ something about it at the next Comiket, if say the circle responsible ignores their threats, then they will have made headlines.

As others have mentioned the new talent that surfaces there is quite incredible and aside from popular artists doing fan type or original stuff, but the new trend of trying to create the next big original anime/manga etc. is really where Comiket shines for me anyway.

[something]

As others have mentioned the new talent that surfaces there is quite incredible and aside from popular artists doing fan type or original stuff, but the new trend of trying to create the next big original anime/manga etc. is really where Comiket shines for me anyway.
Indeed. We have people complaining all the time about (and I absolutely do not agree, but for the sake of argument...) how anime is becoming stagnant, and there's no new talent or fresh blood or blah blah blah blah. If that were the case, how suicidal would it be for the Japanese anime/manga industry to crush the culture of doujinshi? Pretty devastating, I'd think.

So I agree, doujin aren't going anywhere.

[Xenozohar]

This whole story is not really a surprise to me, in fact I was wondering why it don't happened more often. If I can figure why Gainax or Type-Moon may want the doujinshi of their licences to be drawn, I'm perplex to the fact that the creators of series targeted toward young audiences(like Oujamajou Doremi, Digimon or Hamutaro) let H-parody of their titles exist as it could only tarnish their images...
Still, I don't think doujinshi is in danger, some of the actors of the anime/manga/video game market need it badly (especially the pedo moelicious market), and the originals creations don't have to be worried.

[Fencedude]

Type-Moon

It'd be more than just a tad hypocritical for Type-Moon to object to doujin.

[something]

I'm perplex to the fact that the creators of series targeted toward young audiences(like Oujamajou Doremi, Digimon or Hamutaro) let H-parody of their titles exist as it could only tarnish their images...
Because most sane people over age three realize a Hamtaro h-doujin isn't an official creation. I don't buy the "tarnish the image!!" argument, and never have. If the doujin markets itself as an official product, that's another issue, but that's rarely if ever the case and should be easy enough to see through anyway.

[KShinjo]

Because most sane people over age three realize a Hamtaro h-doujin isn't an official creation. I don't buy the "tarnish the image!!" argument, and never have. If the doujin markets itself as an official product, that's another issue, but that's rarely if ever the case and should be easy enough to see through anyway.


I'd agree with disarm regarding the image tarnishing issue. Heck, considering that many professional mangaka have started out by creating doujins (and that some continue to make doujins on the side), I'd think they too don't believe in the "tarnishing the image" argument.

[Ialdaboth]

ANS has a follow-up about this subject :


Criminal Charges Loom For "Doraemon Final Story" Doujinshi Creators

Following up a report ANS made last week, fan authors of the 15,500 selling smash hit "Doraemon Final Story" doujinshi manga could could be in big trouble. Doraemon copyright holders Shogakukan have deemed the work as "malignant piracy" and ordered a sales discontinuance of the comic late last year. Bringing a compensation of damages claim is bsing discussed now. Criminal Charges could be applied as well.

[The Great Bear]

ANS has a follow-up about this subject :


Criminal Charges Loom For "Doraemon Final Story" Doujinshi Creators

Following up a report ANS made last week, fan authors of the 15,500 selling smash hit "Doraemon Final Story" doujinshi manga could could be in big trouble. Doraemon copyright holders Shogakukan have deemed the work as "malignant piracy" and ordered a sales discontinuance of the comic late last year. Bringing a compensation of damages claim is bsing discussed now. Criminal Charges could be applied as well.



And this should be the end of it. The doujin circles will know that while being popular is nice, there's a point at which they're going to raise the ire of the copyright holder who will make an effort to protect their rights.

The lesson: be popular, but don't print up and sell 15,000 copies of your doujin. At that point, it's not some little fan comic, but a mass selling item.

[KShinjo]

And this should be the end of it. The doujin circles will know that while being popular is nice, there's a point at which they're going to raise the ire of the copyright holder who will make an effort to protect their rights.

The lesson: be popular, but don't print up and sell 15,000 copies of your doujin. At that point, it's not some little fan comic, but a mass selling item.

Make sense but I think there's more to this story (that we haven't heard yet or haven't got all the details to) than just the number of copies sold.

[Lego]

Doraemon is massively popular in Japan and has been for ages. I can see why the license holder took notice when that many copies of a doujin were sold. The reason I posted this story in the beginning was due to what some people are saying in this thread. Obviously this is just one case as it was based on a high popular show but you have the license holder going in and saying "hey guys, stop that". Whats to stop others from going in and doing the same?

Still though I don't see doujin dieing anytime soon but I do think that some circles will be a little more cautious when it comes to things like this. Most of the up and comers if you will seem to gravitate towards their own characters and their own doujin games rather then drawing Haruhi 50000 times then selling it at Comiket.

[DrMM]

I doubt it will have much impact on the doujinshi industry as a whole. Anyone remember the story of the arrest of a doujinshi artist for drawing a Pokemon hentai doujinshi that happened a few years ago (5?) when Pokemon was at its most popular in the U.S.? I know there were quite a few paranoid people out there, fearing that doujinshi was doomed. However, as a whole, the doujinshi industry continued on as normal.

This seems like a similar situation, where a single artist goes just a bit too far and is made an example of. However, it's doubtful that it will have a long-lasting impact.

[Lego]

There was also a hentai mangaka that was actually arrested and imprisoned because his works were pretty much uncensored and they deemed it "to graphic". I wish I could remember the name of the artist or the hentai mangaka but both names escape me at the moment.

[Murdock]

The hentai manga-ka went by the name Beauty Hair.

[Lego]

The hentai manga-ka went by the name Beauty Hair.

Ah, thanks for that. Say hi to Face, B. A. and Hannibal for me.

[Talyn]

The hentai manga-ka went by the name Beauty Hair.

Ah, thanks for that. Say hi to Face, B. A. and Hannibal for me.

I love it when a plan comes together!

[DrMM]

The hentai manga-ka went by the name Beauty Hair.

Ah, thanks for that. Say hi to Face, B. A. and Hannibal for me.

I love it when a plan comes together!

I pity the fool with a name like that?

[Murdock]

The hentai manga-ka went by the name Beauty Hair.

Ah, thanks for that. Say hi to Face, B. A. and Hannibal for me.

I love it when a plan comes together!

I pity the fool with a name like that?


At least I'm not on the jazz.

[DrMM]

The hentai manga-ka went by the name Beauty Hair.

Ah, thanks for that. Say hi to Face, B. A. and Hannibal for me.

I love it when a plan comes together!

I pity the fool with a name like that?


At least I'm not on the jazz.

But you are howling mad.