Sony in talks to buy Kadokawa
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Since Kadokawa also owns J-Novel Club, I assume this means JNC will be part of the Sony umbrella if this goes through. Not exactly a pleasant thought given Sony's reputation in the anime community, and their outright hostility towards many of the consumer friendly policies that we enjoy here at JNC. If they do as they've done at other media companies they've acquired, I can forsee the end of DRM-free EPUBs, and the end of the forums. :-(
I don't expect any JNC staff to be able to make any comment on this for legal reasons, but I was curious what kind of thoughts people might have on the topic.
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I don't think any of us are happy about the idea, for pretty much the reasons you list.
Sony has earned a bad rep in this market. -
Cannot say I'd be happy about it. I've lost a supplier to Sony in the past, and cut back on my purchases of anime since then. I used to buy several thousand dollars a year; I don't think I've gone over a couple of hundred in the past year.
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When Sony bought Crunchyroll the result was that I became able to access Funimation titles that weren't previously available in Italy, so I can't say it was a negative. Of course, considering in the gaming world they are now more prone to censorship than Nintendo, I'm worried we might hear the dreaded sentence "adapted to the sensitivity of the modern audience" more often. I don't think that would directly interfere in how JNC handles translations, but who knows if we mightvsee some sude effects from an eventual acquisition.
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@Lex said in Sony in talks to buy Kadokawa:
When Sony bought Crunchyroll the result was that I became able to access Funimation titles that weren't previously available in Italy, so I can't say it was a negative. Of course, considering in the gaming world they are now more prone to censorship than Nintendo, I'm worried we might hear the dreaded sentence "adapted to the sensitivity of the modern audience" more often. I don't think that would directly interfere in how JNC handles translations, but who knows if we might've seen some side effects from an eventual acquisition.
my experience (in the USA) was that titles on FUNIMATION (which Sony owned) vs titles on Crunchyroll (prior to Sony's acquisition of them) had LESS censorship- legacy titles that had adult imagery/nudity/themes/language were more likely to be found in the funimation archives. After the 'merger' it seems the 'lowest common denominator' / most conservative library was adopted (or if a racy anime was aired- the editing rendered it unwatchable )
since the buyout - I've literally had nothing to compare - Sony owns 90+ % of all the (new) titles available in the USA in 2024I'd prefer that whatever media that I consume (translated/subtitled etc.) is as close to the author's intent/how delivered in original market (Japan) as possible -if that is evolving to be more 'sanitized' well, it is what it is, however competition is good for the market, and monopolies are bad for creativity/art ...so I hope that SONY doesn't go thru with this
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@Jon-Mitchell I remember watching some anime on Crunchy were in some scenes 90% of the frame was censored, but I don't know if they edited the show of was already that way in Japan. But yeah, it was terrible, only way I was able to watch was because I previously ready the manga and knew what was happening.
I wholeheartidly agree that less censorship there is, the better. I want to be the one in change to decide if the content is suitable for me, not someone else. -
I'm not particularly hopeful. Already planning on picking up anything I feel like I'm missing and getting out depending on how things go.
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Honestly, I got the chills reading this thread… But I’ve heard that Kadokawa literally asked Sony to save them from Kakao who wants to buy them, too. Well, what will be the lesser evil in the end, I wonder?
Anyway, I wouldn‘t get this worked up yet if I were you. We haven‘t yet seen the end of the matter. Maybe it won‘t be as bad as you think afterwards. Just don’t think too much over it and simply enjoy life. Otherwise it is way too stressful. Let’s just hope J-Novel Club can keep their DRM-free policy etc., more specifically Sony won’t interfere too much with J-Novel Club’s management. That said I can’t really believe that they would crush everything J-Novel Club stands for, especially if this is what makes them highly successful.
End of the discussion!!!
I‘m off to reading the newest prepub part of Mercedes and the Waning Moon. I‘ve been looking forward to this all week!
