Bike riding robotto
A pretty cool video was recently posted on YouTube showing the advances the Japanese are making in regards to robot balance.
Note: Skip to 2:10 to see the robot moving.
Japanese Kurisumasu
Like many people of the world, the Japanese love to put up Christmas lights around this time of year. The difference however is that the Japanese do it on a totally different scale than most.
To stimulate your visual cortex a little, check out some spectacular videos of this phenomena below:
Further anti-fansub sentiment
It is not only Odex condemning fansubs as of late, the most recent attack comes from Arthur Smith, president of G.D.H. International (owners of Gonzo), during an interview carried out by ActiveAnime.
Smith, who has been working in the anime industry since 2000, describes fansubs as the ’single biggest global threat to the anime industry’.
In the remainder of the interview Smith goes on to say that fansubbers, and those who support in distributing fansubs, are the main factor contributing to a 30% decrease in the size of the US Anime market.
The interview does carry a few positive notes, namely the steps that Gonzo are taking to expand its distribution channels (by using iTunes and XBox Live) and how in the next 6-12 months we should see a decrease in time it takes to get anime released in the US.
Aramaki, Takeuchi to be on hand for Appleseed Premiere
It would seem that when Appleseed: Ex Machina makes its North American premiere this December 15th in Los Angeles at the Jules Verne Adventures Film Festival, the director, Shinji Aramaki (Appleseed, Madox-01, Megazone 23 Part III) will be on hand for the presentation. According to ANN, Kiyoto Takeuchi, the screenwriter for the film, will also be joining Mr. Aramaki at Ex Machina’s North American premiere.
As an aside, potential attendees can purchase two tickets for the price of one by entering the code “STARTREK” when purchasing tickets online. Ticket prices range from $15.00 (At the cheapest level) to $200.00.
Idol: Yuko Ogura (小倉優子)
The Idol section of the site has been neglected somewhat over the previous months, it is therefore with much delight that I present to you the latest addition, Yuko Ogura:
Appleseed: Ex Machina to Premiere in Los Angeles
According to ANN, Shinji Aramaki’s Appleseed: Ex Machina film will be premiering at The Jules Verne Adventures Film Festival in Los Angeles.
The film will be presented on December 15, 2007, the final day of the Los Angeles event. Traditionally, the film festival has been held in Paris, France for the past 15 years. However, organizers this year chose to extend their offerings to California as a separate North American event.
Directed by Shini Aramaki and Produced by John Woo, the film will be presented at the Los Angeles Theatre at 2:00 PM on December 15. It will be shown in High-Definition. The creators of the film will also be on hand. More information about the film after the jump. (more…)
Live-Action Initial D Movie Going Blu-Ray
Tai Seng Entertainment, an asian film distributor, will be re-releasing the Live-Action version of the Initial D Movie in high definition on Blu-Ray Disc.
The disc will feature full 1080p video, multiple audio soundtracks including: Mandarin, Cantonese, and an English dub as well as English and Chinese subtitles.
Expect it to hit retail on January 22, 2008 at an approximate retail value of $34.98 USD.
[ ANN ]
Please don’t attack the Cosplayers
“Adella,” a fashion design student and cosplayer, has a message to all people who visit cosplays and those who troll her on the internet: “IT’S JUST. A. HOBBY. PEOPLE.” Apparently (and this is by no means uncommon), “Adella” - whose real name is Sarah, has been the target of assailants at Cosplay Conventions, and other events. She also is attacked online repeatedly. Rather than get into the specifics on that, we’ll just leave that one to your imagination. Many people can’t seem to understand the difference between her and the characters she chooses to cosplay, especially Aeris Gainsborough. GameSetWatch has this interesting little tid-bit from her experiences as Aeris:
“I get a lot of rude comments from people,” she admits. “I’ve been pushed around a few times, and told stupid stuff like ‘you sucked and you died, bitch…’ stuff like that.”
It gets worse. “When I was at Anime Central, I think in 2004, maybe earlier… I was standing in the lobby of the hotel and talking to someone I had just met,” she remembers. “And some girl ran up behind me and grabbed my braid and just yanked, as hard as she could. My head was jerked back and my neck had this awful pain wrench through it. I whirled around and screamed, ‘don’t touch me!’ And she just goes ‘I… I just hate Aeris…’ and ran off. Like because she hates some fictitious character.. it’s okay to physically assault someone dressed up like that character?”
Fanboys and fangirls assaulting cosplayers is nothing new, but Otaku Times would now like to take this time to remind you that even if you don’t like a character, it is not right to attack the person cosplaying them verbally or physically. We’d also like to remind you that assault is a crime punishable by law. Please cosplay with care.
Odex’s international fansub crackdown
Update (21/11): Official news of BayTSP’s mistake given in Singaporean newspaper The New Paper. OtakuTimes even got referred to in the article ^_^. Source: DarkMirage
Update (20/11): DarkMirage reports that after speaking with an Odex employee this was all a mistake on BayTSP’s part.
It would appear that Odex, the Singaporean anime distributor that we have mentioned before, are now attempting to extend their fansub crackdown internationally!
In the past few days fansub downloaders from the USA (Comcast), Japan (Usen), and France (Club Internet), have received DMCA notices for downloading unlicensed anime episodes (using Bittorrent). In the latter two cases the notices explicitly mentioned that they were sent by BayTSP on behalf of Odex; it can be assumed that this is probably the case for the Comcast downloader also.
Here are some extracts from the letter sent to the Club Internet user:
BayTSP, Inc. (”BayTSP”) swears under penalty of perjury that it is authorized to act on behalf of ODEX Private Limited/Anti Video Piracy Association (Singapore) (collectively known as ODEX/AVPAS), the exclusive licensees and/or authorized agents of the owners of copyright materials and interests (the Copyright Owners) that is protected in Singapore under applicable copyright laws in force and enacted pursuant to various international treaties. BayTSP’s search of the protocol listed below has detected infringements of exclusive copyright interests on your IP addresses as detailed in the attached report.
Evidentiary Information:
Notice ID: 61192
Asset: Ouran High School Host Club
Protocol: BitTorrent
IP Address: 89.85.xx.xx
DNS: i07v-89-85-xx-xx.d4.club-internet.fr
File Name: [Nerae]_Ouran_High_School_Host_Club_22_[57603381].avi
File Size: 370843648
Timestamp: 11 Nov 2007 06:17:33 GMT
Last Seen Date: 11 Nov 2007 06:17:33 GMT
URL: http://bt.nerae.com:7072/announce
Username (if available):
Other series mentioned in DMCA notices so far include Gundam 00 and Shugo Chara!.
Loading …Hello Kitty Tombstone
The Hello Kitty Darth Vader costume was cool, but no die-hard Hello Kitty fan could be fully content without having one of these waiting for them:
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