Manga Xanadu

Libraries are a major source of manga for many fans, especially teens who may not have the means of getting their favorite titles, so having a major publisher like Kodansha release their two biggest hits among other, on the most popular eBook library platform is a big win! At least it is for readers in areas where Overdrive has a wide selection. That is, unfortunately not my area, which I find surprising, since I live in the Southern California area. Hopefully some day soon that will change. If you have access to these titles through your library, give them a try!

In this week’s post: News from Kumoricon, free manga online, manga by subsciption online, manga in libraries, respect for shojo, or the lack thereof, New York Times Best Seller list, second opinions, podcasts, and the Manga Village weekly roundup.

Too Much Good Stuff! Deb Aoki of Manga.About.com continues posting her coverage of panels from SDCC. This week she adds an entry for the Best and Worst Manga panel including comments from the panelists. There are more Best and Worst and a whole page dedicated to Most Anticipated. It’s interesting that Twilight made the Best list, but Maximum Ride got put in the Worst. Both make tons of money for Yen Press, so yah there. And the cat manga Chi’s Sweet Home and Cat Paradise both definitely deserve to be in the Best list. I don’t know what I would add to this list. I have hard time saying something is the Best or Worst. Except One Piece. That’s definitely a Best! Also added to her coverage is a complete transcript of the Online Piracy Panel. It’s NINE PAGES. The front page to it give the topics covered in the discussion, but getting the full transcript is almost the same as being there! Definitely thank Deb for her hard work in getting this up for everyone to read. This is a very relevant topic right now as fans and publishers bash heads over the best way to get comics and…

You know, I am really getting tired of these parents “outraged” by things they find in their kids’ rooms and feel the need to blame someone else for it.  The latest is, of course, the man in Oregon who found his 12 year old son had checked out some mature rated manga from a public library. My question about all this, as a parent myself, is this; why is he blaming the library and not his son?  In the news report, he said he went to the library to find answers and demanded that the library “enforce” the adult section.  Why didn’t he ask his son why he checked them out?  Just like he said, it plainly says on the cover “Mature 18+“.  Surely if the kid can read the manga, he can read the age rating. This kid knew full well what he was getting, and this father is just pathetic for taking out on the library.  It is not the library’s job to police the books it checks out.  The library did exactly what it was supposed to; it put mature rated books in the adult section.  That the kid was smart enough to either ask or look…

At the recent “State of the Manga Industry” panel at NYCC, representatives from manga publishers from Del Rey, Viz. and Tokyopop talked about the health of manga sales and fielded questions and concerns. As a whole, they agreed that the industry was “strong and healthy”, with titles shaking out into one of three categories; the “definitely will sell” or A list titles, the “probably will sell”or B list titles, and the “must compete to sell” or C list titles, which is where the majority of titles fall. The big issue is of course with the last category; how to get these books into the right hands. Promoting awareness of titles was mentioned as a problem for all publishers. Why? Even if most of the sales of titles come from brick and mortar retail, getting the word out about titles shouldn’t be such an issue in the internet age. If manga publishers would make better use of their online resources, C list titles would have a better chance. Here are some things I think they should consider.