Daniel Roth has an interesting piece in the current issue of Fortune about the lessons Hollywood might learn from Mangawood. He tells Boing Boing, "The story analyzes how the niche worlds of anime and manga manage to pull off something increasingly rare in showbiz: they court their customers instead of alienating them, encouraging fansubbers (explained in detail in the piece), showing up at all fan shows, and pursuing whatever cutting edge technology their viewers are buying."
Snip from the piece:
Anime and manga firms have taken on forms very different from Hollywood studios or publishing houses. They more closely resemble the constantly updating startups of Silicon Valley. Their ethos is to get the product out to the right people — whether it's on a DVD or over a mobile phone or downloadable — and see what happens. If it succeeds, milk it; if not, try something different. And if the fans are into file sharing (which they are), keep the lawyers leashed and find a way to make piracy work for you.
(…)Female fans now make up about half the attendees at the conferences. Responding to the interest, CosmoGirl last summer began running its own manga strip on the back page of every issue. 'We started hearing girls say their favorite books and favorite things to read were manga,' says Ann Shoket, the magazine's executive editor. 'The girls have drawn their own manga for us. Not just one weird girl — a lot of girls.')
