KeepAnimeAlive.com

It's been a while since my last post, but I'm glad to say that it's because I've been really busy following the launch of my new website, Keep Anime Alive. The site launched on January 12th, with only a simple news feed for features. Since then we've updated the site with an RSS feed, as well as put in place a system for Sustain the Industry videos to be posted, along with a list of purchases. We still have many updates and improvements that we are working on, and will hopefully be updated soon.

Not long after we launched, we were featured on Anime News Network:

Anime fans Colin Harvie and Chris Perry have established a group called the Anime Defense Project whose primary project at this time is the newly created KeepAnimeAlive.com website. 

...  

Original Article at Anime News Network. 

Anime News Network (ANN) is one of the most popular sites for anime related news, so being featured as an Interest article there was a big help to us. We soon topped about 1000 unique visitors shortly after being featured on ANN. A great many supporters sprung up for us on the ANN forums, but along with supporters came opposers.

Anime piracy has always been one of the most controversial subjects regarding anime for the past few years, and no where is it more apparent than on forums on the internet. Arguments are traded back and forth, before degrading into a slur of name calling.  Because the internet removes the face to face interaction between people, they lose their inhibitions and the need to be polite and become increasingly irrational. Arguments very rarely come to a successful conclusion on internet forums, nor is anyone every convinced to switch sides. They just bunker down, and decide to hate everyone with an opposing point of view. Not very productive or helpful.

It's been said that one way to eliminate misunderstanding of tone or inflection is to communicate by written words or email. That is not necessarily true, especially when on forums. When reading the words another poster has written, the reader applies to it the tone or inflection that they associate with the poster, whether true, or not. In addition, when arguing over the internet, people seem more inclined to take things personally, whether or not it was intended as such. As soon as one person takes something personally, and resorts to name calling, retorts will fly back and forth, and the conversation falls apart.  There are very few people on forums who can, or will, separate the people from the problem.

Because of this, we have been  very hesitant on whether or not to include forums on our site. Even if they are arguing in our favor, it doesn't make us look good, and no one ends up being convinced of our point.

When I started Keep Anime Alive, the goal was to educate people about the dangers of piracy, provide evidence, and actually show people the harm that it's doing, in the hopes that they will come to the correct conclusion themselves and stop pirating anime. Unfortunately for the moment, the majority of our opponents seem to think that we're their to tar and feather anyone who doesn't hold the same view as we do. We're afraid that having a forum might contribute to this view, so whether or not we're going to have one is still up in the air.

In any successful negotiation, you need to be careful not to make the other party feel like they are being personally attacked. This is the reason why we chose to focus primarily on convincing people through education, keeping with objective criteria so that they don't feel like we are making an attack on their character or beliefs.

It's on uphill battle, but with the launch of the site, things are looking good!

Remember, don't be a parasite.