JOURNAL: Castor Troy (Ryan Molina)

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  • NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!11 2006-06-22 01:47:16 "maybe u can make a cross over of naruto and yu-gi-oh!" 
  • Ah yeeeeaaah... 2006-06-21 22:30:51 I feel GREEEEAAAT! :D 
  • Breaking the silence... 2006-06-14 01:52:05 There's one major thing that's been bugging me, and probably quite alot of you in the past year. This has been one of the worst, if not the worst year for AMV legality. The "hobby" we love so much is now being compromised by paranoid record labels who are afraid of losing money for every video we make.

    This all started last year with the Creed, Evanasence, and Seether (sp?) record label thing that ended up removing any videos with those bands from the site. This has shown we are no longer a hidden, ignored, or silent presence in the eyes of the public. The .org has been featured on TV, magazines, websites, radio, etc... The anime companies and record labels have been aware of us for quite some time, but now they're taking action.

    No matter how hard we try to justify it, our hobby is illegal. I hate this fact more than anything, but that's the truth. Editing a video in the privacy of your own home is ok, but the second you begin distributing the video on cds, the internet, etc, that becomes a gray area. However, the anime companies have always turned the other way and have grown to accept our work. But if the worst happens, I guarantee the anime companies will not lift a finger to save us. We scratch their back (promoting their shows with our videos), they scratch ours (by not doing anything).

    So how do videos play at cons? First of all, the conventions spend a hefty amount of money acquiring a license to play music whether it be for the elevators, the hotel rooms, and for the amv contests. They get permission to play the videos simply by having the anime companies look the other way. The anime companies have always been cool with us (most of the time), but we don't how long that will last and it hasn't always been the case.

    Back in Anime Expo 1999, Kevin Caldwell's Engel was played during the closing ceremonies and one of the producers of Evangelion was watching it. That producer ended up getting really pissed off and that caused the amv contest to be removed from the schedule until 2003. AX still had AMV contests, but they were never mentioned on the schedule.

    So after the Creed, Evanasence, and Seether (sp?) debacle, we hoped all of this would die down, but we were wrong. Just recently, Pie Row Maniac recieved a cease and desist from Immediate Music. The NES and RVG Projects recieved a complaint from JD Harding. To finally put the icing on the cake, Anime Expo is buying into all the paranoia and cancelled all fan related AMV activites. While AX will still have the AMV contest, that's the ONLY amv related thing it's going to have. AX will have no amv panel, no amv workshop, and no VG3 showing. So all in the course of 2 weeks, ALL 3 of the VG projects and one editor have been fucked over.

    I'm disappointed that AX will not get to see the finale of the VG projects after I've successfully shown the other 2 at the past two AX's. AMV creators are getting the shaft and I feel that it's only going to get worse.

    The #1 defense we always pull is that we do this for non-profit reasons. Sadly even that did not save the Creed, Evanasence, and Seether (sp?) videos from being deleted off the site. If this doesn't work, then I don't know what we can do the next time we're in trouble.

    This is probably the moment where I would saw we stand up and fight for our rights and bs like that. The best thing to do right now would be to continue what we're doing and have fun. But we should also be aware that we're now being watched closely by the record companies and just as long as we don't do anything to compromise our presence furthur, we should be ok.

    If anyone has any corrections to make regarding anything I said, please feel free to do so. I'm just tired of all these headaches, especially regarding AX and the VG projects that were all thrown upon us in the short course of one week.

    :( 
  • Niotex 2006-06-13 13:36:40 Congrats man, your first year coming to AWA, and you already get a panel :)

    Sadly I won't be there to see it :( 
  • Akon 2006-06-11 23:53:30 I hope everyone had a great time at akon. Congrats to all the winners and contestants. Big thanks to jubjub for being my proxy and for winning best of show at the experts amv contest. ;)

    I still have some sentimental feelings towards Akon because it was the first out-of-state con I went to in 2003 after seeing Machine's Akon 13 documentary. It was the first time I met MJ, the Hypeo crew, and many of the TX based editors. Despite some of the con drama that happened, I still had a great time.

    Naruto Ball Z ended up winning an Honorable Mention for best Action in the experts amv contest. I decided to enter this year because Rubyeye was taking control of the amv contest and I knew it would be in good hands. Big thanks to everyone who voted and an even bigger thanks to Rubyeye and Chris for improving things this year. I wish I was there to see the contest.

    Things have been pretty stressful for me this year, but hearing how well Akon went definitely cheered me up alot. :) 
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