The ODEX Saga

It’s been quite a while since ODEX extended its wrath into the heart of the anime community here in Singapore. It is unanimous that downloading animes as a whole is illegal, but there exists a thin, fine line between the downloading of licensed animes and non-licensed ones. An even fragile margin hangs in the balance between downloading fan-subbed animes and getting them by more conventional and legal ways e.g. by purchasing CDs. In fact, for years, fan-subbed animes have been the natural source of all the frenzy and excitement that has fueled the hunger of the evergreen local community.

As if the apocalypse were descending on us, ODEX began to transcend that line and vowed to hunt down illegal downloaders, by enlisting the services of a company called BayTSP to track down downloads via bit torrent. However, to do so, ODEX have to drag the ISPs to court to be granted the permission to track downloaders’ IP addresses – with the intention of tracking those who are going against copyright laws. And from there, ODEX clearly gained the upper hand, and has since issued the dreaded warning letters “indiscriminately”. With those letters came the statement asking the unlucky recipients to pay up a few thousands in settlement and compensation for various costs (in employing BayTSP and court fees primarily).

The manner ODEX fishes out offenders and slaps them with a “fine” has inadvertently met an uproar in the community. ODEX has since tried to lighten the situation by not issuing the letters to offenders according to backlogged illegal downloading activities, which means past downloaders are spared. However, ODEX still treads on with a serious and unrelenting stance.

Many fans are outraged by the amount of money they may be forced to pay up, or risk facing court action by ODEX. Considering that the number is in the thousands, many are also inclined to believe that ODEX are trying to make some profit and stem losses for the past few years, something which ODEX has denied. Perhaps, more leniency could have been employed, like posting warning letters to particular first-time offenders, and not just vague warnings on forum posts that have extensive but not a thorough reach to the community. Some has questioned their ISPs authority over protecting the customer’s privacy policy, which ODEX has demonstrated to be “assailable”. More importantly, the whole saga raised a common question : does a private company, whether it is part of an affiliation or not, even have the right to claim damages and bring forth infringement cases while acting on behalf of Japanese animation houses? Such is the discernment of some members of the community that ODEX’s recently opened online anime CD store was hacked and its page splashed with questions on its policies [ take a look at Dark Mirage's post ]. To tarnish the already affected reputation of ODEX, warning letters were mistakenly issued to downloaders abroad, resulting in even more uninvited backlash (though they were sent under BayTSP’s name).

My take on the issue? It’s quite simple, really. I see ODEX as becoming an “all-seeing big-brother entity that overlooks the workings of the anime world”, in Singapore that is. It’s pretty much like the Celestial Being in Gundam 00. Here’s how ODEX resembles Celestial Being in real life :

This is Gundam KyriOD. (BTW, that’s a deliberate typo). It travels at ridiculous speeds to deliver you-know-what to targets.

Meet Gundam EXia. The one with the all-seeing eyes. Blue glowing ones to be exact, lit by high-tech LEDs.

When Gundam KyriOD and EXia combines, I am Gundam ODEX!

Looks very high tech indeed.

Teeewww! Got that, you downloader? BTW, that’s not a laser. It’s those signals in cyberspace that only home in on bit torrent users. Those kind that can only be seen using high-tech infrared sensors. Really.

 

[ some of the pictures are taken from Dark Mirage ]

I firmly believe there are better ways to rejuvenate the anime business. ODEX’s approach can be easily dismissed by anyone as a form of “tyranny”, since they should understand that downloading of anime has become a norm in the whole world – it’s the big reason why there are so many non-Japanese followers – and acting “aggressibvely” will only result in the opposite effect. In fact, if you were to look at RIAA’s war against illegal downloading in the US, a war chest of cash and a lot of paperwork are absolute necessities. It’s really not easy to change something that has become somewhat a norm.

Instead, ODEX should look at providing alternatives that better what torrents are offering. Plus, they should listen to the fans’ complaints all this while. Provide CDs with better picture quality with better and spot-on subtitles. Add to that cheap and affordable pricing, deliberately spark off threads saying that newly ODEX-published CDs are so good in popular forums, and loyal fans will ensue.

ODEX’s new online store, which also offers Video On Demand (VOD), admittedly looks very promising, but only to be bogged down by the lack of choice of animes. Especially so for VOD, it’s a must for new animes and episodes to be constantly added to keep up with the pace of fan-subbers. This is to satisfy the hunger of fans who have already been addicted to the swift avaibility of fan-subs. No wonder some subbers ban those irritating fans who kept asking about release dates from their forums…..

To provide fast updates in the first place, an audacious and ambitious plan have to be hatched. I’m thinking of a “bidding system” where anime publishers bid for fan-subbers’ services, according to their subtitling speed and quality. At least fan-subbers need not worry about losing their status in the anime world. Anime publishers like ODEX will have a wealthy source of quality subbing.

To top it all, for any one of these ideas to become reality, both sides will inevitably have to make compromises. I’m fully aware that given the current situation, my suggestions may not even be taken into consideration, or probably meet considerable objection, let alone take off from the drawing table. There will be gains and losses, but ultimately, satisfaction and a peace of mind will slowly become a normal part of the ever-passionate and loyal anime fan base.