Blogger Generation, Weeaboo Sensation, A.D. Vision
It’s okay to write a catchy headline, or embellish it to get people’s attention. It may or may not be okay to write “1/3 of men are rapists” when you’re an English-language blog reporting on Japanese tabloids when you’re regurgitating an Associated Press article on rape in Africa, just because in the original write-up it quoted a study with a 30% figure in a select sample of men who confessed to the act. It is probably unethical, however.
But is it okay to write “ADV shuts down” in your headline when, in reality, it is only in a technical sense, while their operation continues as usual? I think it would be ethical to do so if the article furnishes an explanation. I mean one thing that immediately comes to mind is a kind of cover-up. I am sure (unless my trust is betrayed) the proper debtors against ADV are still going to get their fair shake, pending appropriate legal proceedings. Ditching the ADV name can only mean that there are some nasty lawyers after them, for whatever the reason? And it would be in ANN’s interest to write a misleading headline to shield ADV’s operators and their subsequent puppet companies? That would clearly be unethical. I also couldn’t think of another reason why ADV’s press release is as cryptic as it is, besides that whoever wrote it is secretly my twin, separated at birth. Yet, on a close read, the press release itself says as much–that their operation will continue as usual. Looking up at the equally-cryptic names of the shell LLCs, you can find that it’s the same gimmick behind Sentai Filmworks. That’s that.
The second thing that comes to mind is, wait, did Anime News Network just got it wrong? I hope that is the case, and whoever wrote it was just a sensationalist bastard. It would be “lol ANN” if not for the fact that dozens of other blogs out there parrot ANN’s major news posts, and then they get it wrong because most of them suck even more at reporting this kind of news.
Anyways, this nod nod wink wink thing … I don’t like it. But it also lead to some serious funnies in the various reactions, and some interesting thoughts.
1. Viz. As said, some people get ahead of themselves and take a list of casulties and make a status report of sorts. “oh we have just Funi, Bandai and MB left” or some such. It’s utterly incomplete, and it expresses a sentiment more so than any fact, but I find it amusing that companies like Viz totally disappears from the picture. Not to mention that ADV is technically still around. It’s a strong brand, after all.
2. ADV may lose its name in the company, but their trademarks are still fair game. It may very well be something we see in all of new-ADV’s releases. There’s no reason why they can’t brand them…unless see: wink wink thing.
3. The IP lawyer in me, as a reaction, immediately look up their trademarks. LOL. As expected, ADV Music and ADV Manga are still live, and I wonder what kind of a pretty penny they’d trade them with. Perhaps they can keep on using it. It would make sense!
It’s bad enough that this happens every single season with the previews and people parroting bad or mistranslated information from Japanese websites or press releases, but it’s an entirely extra level of pathetic when it’s directly from an English source. Hell, you can even read between the lines of the original release to figure things out. “ADV shutting down, everything now owned by brand new companies run by the same people a couple blocks away.”
I totally agree that ADV should write better PRs. But I also get the feeling that this PR is primarily done for legal/due diligence purposes and they … made it as cryptic as they could WINK WINK NOD NOD? Anyways, being a corporate drone, I understand all too well that the quality of PR is determined by resources available and less so by English fluency. I’m sure whoever was banging it out for ADV didn’t really give much thought about it, nor really had the time to worry much about it either. Or, FWIW, have all that much to lose.
I also forgot to point out–what’s up with the funny LLC names? A normal company would use names like “ADV Corp LLC” or “AD Ventures LLC” or something that makes more sense. I’m not a corporate lawyer so I don’t know why that wasn’t the case.
http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/editorial/2009-09-01/what-happening-with-adv-films
hivemind? lol.
More like cleaning up after themselves, or attempting to. And contrary to the editorial column, the moment they allowed that headline to slip they’ve ventured into “editorialize” land! It was just a bad move, but it’s good they’ve came around and said something about it.
I think in general people don’t understand business shenanigans, although it’s not like they’re exposed to them on a regular basis. They tend not to make the news, unless it’s something like Old GM selling its assets to New GM and giving creditors the middle finger in the process.
Company names are just for marketing purposes, and if you don’t want to draw any attention to yourself you’d pick something bland or obtuse. If it’s available in the jurisdiction, numbered corporations are also an option.
Yeah, the general public don’t understand it, but an organization like ANN should at least get it right. It’s not that difficult, honestly.
Are you perchance suggesting that ANN is a terrible site with extremely poor news reporting that’s barely above the level expected from an amateur blog site? Perish the thought!
Well, this is essentially old ADV into new ADV to screw creditors. Not all of them (it’s likely that the senior secured creditor from the PR is getting a good share), but everyone else is out in the cold. Of course, if ADV had been liquidated they’d be out in the cold too.
The real issue is pretending that it matters. Come on, anything good about ADV has been gone for some time now. The fact that there’s still a zombie shuffling around doesn’t mean anything, without the people who actually did the work.
Good points all, but it’s worth noting here, I think, that Robert– of Robert’s Corner Anime Store –talked directly to Mike Bailiff, formerly of ADV and now of SXION 23’s Section 23 (yeah, I know). Bailiff noted that most of ADV’s employees (the ones that “mattered”) are now with S23, but that ADV co-founder John Ledford is not.
Which addresses that there will be SOME differences, in response to omo’s overall thesis, which appears to be that there will be none…and also in response to Avatar’s statement that ADV Mach II if “the people who actually did the work” are involved, which they are.
Source link here: http://animecornerstore.blogspot.com/2009/09/adv-films-shuts-down.html
As for screwing creditors, I’d make sure I had *very* solid sources and specific evidence before spreading word like that. If I’m missing something, I’d appreciate the heads-up.
ADV had stopped using the ADV name for the release of new shows already (don’t know about the re-releases), instead releasing everything under the Sentai Filmworks brand, typically without a trace of the ADV logo. Methinks they’ve pretty clearly known that they were going to be doing this for a while.
Oh man, I love your tinfoils.
@gia: there’s a lot of information that has come out subsequent to the press release and I certainly did not write this post with that in mind. Obviously the change of address/phone numbers and abandoning of their URL seems to point to something more, but that info was not included in the original ANN article.
At any rate, a lot of that info could be included in a PR, too. Again, it’s all this winking.
Also, if the so-called organization “ADV” has been slowly dropping that name, maybe their ADV trademarks are part of some settlement/bankruptcy process.
@Miha: I appreciate it ;)
And I buy Avatar’s creditor theory, only because I don’t see any other plausible scenario that rhymes with my own experience.
Gia, my point is that the people who did the work have been gone for years; the vast majority of the company was laid off in 2008. What’s left is a skeleton crew. Sure, it’s still the same skeleton crew, but anything that was good about the company has been gone for a long time.
im so disappointed. I hate ADV. I remember when they had faggots spying in IRC channels to make sure fansubbers werent subbing their animus. I also remember one of those fansubber faggots sold his soul to them in the end anyway. So good, glad they’re having troubles, I really wish they had gone down for good though.
P.S. Worse than ADV, ANN sucks balls too. They should learn to write news stories after properly pulling their head out of their ass.
In the end, it’s a question of reality vs. illusion. You’re right about the reality — it’s the same wolf with a new sheepskin cover. The illusion is that we’ve lost another one — but only people with a lot of skill/understanding in the business world are going to see that while racing to break the story.
Most people don’t have the expertiese to parse that PR and come up with the answer. That’s not a knock on fans, it’s just the truth. As for sensationalism by ANN, I’m just as guilty. Neither I nor ANN (despite their name) are professional news organizations, and it’s not _that_ wrong.
For all intents and purposes, the ADV brand name is history. Legally speaking, there’s an empty shell and two other virtually meaningless entities left, but there’s no ADV.
I disagree to the extent that it doesn’t take someone who is savvy about business stuff to decode that poorly-written press release. It only takes someone who has to read legalese and press releases (as whoever works that function at ANN has to do daily). Actually the only real mistake ANN made was using the phrase “shut down” yet that language is suspiciously missing from the press release itself. I prodded in the ANN forums for a bit and I think somebody has used those words to describe something in this news bite, and whoever was covering that news just ran with it without thinking about it twice.
So in that sense, ANN probably understood that PR just fine, that the operation that used to be owned by ADV will continue on under a different name. They only decided to use a phrase that severely misimplied the reality of the situation…because I believe it sounded more drastic than it really was. It’s not a purposeful choice of words, and whoever wrote that piece may not understood the whole story before writing about it (that, well, regardless if you are pro or not, it is not a good thing to do).
As to “it’s not THAT wrong”… I don’t really care. Just because someone lit a torch in a movie theater doesn’t mean it’s okay to yell fire. But I don’t want to belabor that point–yes, everybody makes mistakes and it pleases no one. ANN certainly doesn’t like it any more than I do. What I do want to say, though, is that ADV brand name is NOT history. Their trademarks are live. There are no reasons why they could not use it unless it is part of their settlement agreement, or something along those lines. It is possible that you are right that it is gone forever, or someone else might pick them up for some other uses, or Sentai/Section23 will go back to using it.
Practically speaking, the legal status of a corporation/llc is not particularly important in identification. The operation is what makes a company a company, and some piece of paper doesn’t mean anything in a court of law if someone can show that it’s just a facade.
Hinano, er, that was me, you know. (Except I wasn’t ever a fansubber, so maybe you’re thinking about someone else?)
Omo, I have to disagree. You’re splitting legal hairs on the “ADV is alive/dead” issue, but in the end, it doesn’t matter. ADV has to die _as an operating business_ in order to keep from clouding title to the intellectual properties that has been transferred to the new entities. Effectively, there is no ADV because there’s nothing left to operate. If you disagree, please tell me what assets and employees ADV(x)has left? If the answer is “none” then there’s no ADV in any practical sense. We have seen zero evidence of any remaining assets, employees, or operations. Furthermore, if ADV were going to continue with any business operations at all, they’d have said so.
(Edit: I don’t buy the “ADV in disguise” argument either. If the truth is being told and Ledford isn’t involved in one or more of the companies, that weakens the argument that it’s all really ADV. In the end, whether it’s a shell game or not depends on the terms of the deal. If ADV got something to distribute to its creditors, it will be hard to prove this deal isn’t completely legit.)
I also believe you’re seriously overestimating the average person’s understanding of business/legal issues. I don’t know exactly what you do for a living, but if you operate in a field where you’re always working with lawyers, CPA’s, and corporate types, your view may be skewed. I deal with laymen — people working blue-collar or service jobs. Most can understand what we’re talking about here, but it’s not in their experience, so it _has_ to be explained. I doubt ANN staff have dealt with bankruptcies and the UCC.
Finally, having dealt with reporters (professional ones) I can tell you that generally they don’t know jack about the field their reporting on anymore; that’s about #5 on the list of qualifications. So to complain that ANN recklessly screwed the pooch here is a bit harsh.
I am splitting hair, but in business nobody calls that “dying.” It’s called a “reorganization.”
Plenty of companies change and transfer all their assets from one “company” to “another” but it’s just a legal procedure and there is no ownership or operational change. And no press would report the company died or shut down. It would be outright misleading.
In this case, as I surmised, the PR is really the most misleading thing, but it may well be that ADV is trying to be misleading in the first place. I jumped on ANN because they were the ones that fanned the flame the most, but it’s mostly a segue into ADV’s transformation–in other words, what is going on? Why are they being cryptic?
Second, of course nobody knows everything, but is it so difficult to consult an actual lawyer? Any country bumpkin local newspaper does this. ANN has access to people with that knowledge. No reason to ask first! And I hardly think I’m being harsh to ANN. It’s just that they made one mistake (out of the many they have made on a regular basis) that really blew it up.
[…] word, and whether ANN should have been so sensationalistic as to say that ADV was shutting down. Check it out if discussions of business and law interest […]
I think you have a point there Omo, and I’ll concede this: At the very least the title should have had a “?” appended to it, and the article should have had a statement that they were trying to contact ADV to determine if “shut down” was correct. I think it had a watered-down version of the latter, saying that they were trying to get more information, but that was all.
Re: consulting a lawyer — not if you want to break the news anytime in the next couple of days. I think ADV was trying to be deliberately obtuse, and the PR sure leads the reader to think there isn’t anything left of ADV. Also, access doesn’t mean on pre-paid retainer, unless ANN has a volunteer. I wouldn’t want to pay for a lawyer to parse every weird PR that comes through.
I don’t think it’s worth that 30 minutes or whatever for being the “earliest” if it means posting a news piece you don’t understand fully. Look at AnimeVice, they posted the same news on the same day and is thorough about it in a way ANN isn’t, and isn’t really that much slower. As far as I know, the AoDVD thread poped up around noon eastern time, so ANN themselves wasn’t really so early. Getting an answer from your favorite business guru or lawyer isn’t going to take days. We have telephones! And mobile ones at that. Heck, you don’t even need to do that if you got all of web 2.0 at your fingertips. Wait an hour and some business-talk-literate forum reader will furnish an explanation.
Then again, like I said, sites like Sankaku Complex are doing fine for themselves and they could care less if they mislead people. ANN at least owns up to it. And obviously I have higher standards and more respect for ANN, to match. If they want to be the definitive source for anime-related news they need to act like it.
Of course ADV is trying to be deliberately obtuse. They can’t come out and say “we’re doing this to screw all the creditors we can get away with screwing,” after all.
But Omo’s right in that ADV, as a business entity, does need to die for it to work. (Considering that I had a non-disclosure agreement with ADV, and not any of these new companies, it’s a matter of some interest to me!)
More like fake their own death, if you want to use the word ;)
Toole spills the bean (by citing Texas commerce statutes! my favorite kind of bean spilling)
http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3194966&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=2#post365271400
I’ll have to take your (and his) word for it… I read it also, but came up with an entirely different meaning having to do with securities transactions, and the power of the state to block them. Unless this is a case of “permitting while sounding like prohibiting” I don’t get it.
I imagine there is some case law that goes with it which will make sense. Got a Lexis account?