Been a while, ne? Since I tend to be long winded (check below for proof! ^_~), I'll try to write something about doujinshi once a week or so ... but no promises!! Laziness is the nemesis of obsession!
Ahem. Anywho. So this week's topic is disparities in the doujinshi world. Let me tell you right now, there are a LOT of disparities going on!!
First off, the inspiration for this topic came about quite randomly. I was on the doujin box website using their pre-made links (most of which really aren't very good - it's better to learn to navigate YJ yourself, then you find the REAL treasure troves! Also, the copy/paste command and Altavista's translator are a YJ navigators best friends!!! But that's another story entirely). So I was checking out some random series that I'd heard of but didn't know much about, clicking on the links and seeing what came up.
By chance, earlier that week I had seen a manga cd for Slam Dunk on sale for $1 on ebay. I'd considered buying it, but I changed my mind because I'm not really into sports (not that I've ever actually even read a sports manga that I can recall). So I was looking at the links and happened to click on Slam Dunk, just to see what was there (my guess: mostly yaoi). And I got a shock that totally blew me away!
THERE WERE OVER 900 SLAM DUNK DOUJINSHI. I stared in amazement at my computer screen. "You've got to be kidding me!" I exclaimed. I mean, I'd barely even heard of this series! The largest number of dj's I'd seen in a single group before this was Final Fantasy, a category that typically has about 2-400 doujinshi for auction on YJ on any given day. But here we're talking almost 1,000 doujinshi up for auction at the same time. That's a LOT!!
Immediately I hopped on over to ebay to see what the deal was there. I don't remember the exact number I found then, but let me just say that right now, as I type this (on a Saturday night so it may not be completely accurate), there are 2, count 'em, TWO Slam Dunk doujinshi on ebay.
I had encountered this same phenomenon before with one of my favorite video game series, Angelique. Angelique is hugely popular in Japan - it started out as a video game and spawned several sequels, OVAs, a manga series, and tons and tons of merchandise. Not to mention doujinshi! The Angelique doujinshi section on YJ tends to have at least 200+ dj's up for auction at any given time. Finding a cheap Arios/AngeCollet dj or Clavis/Julious dj is no problem at all. On ebay, however, you can hardly ever find even one good one. Right now as I type this there are 3 up for grabs on ebay, and all of them are labeled in the title 'hard yaoi.' Not much selection at all! And if your an Arios/Collet fan? Fuhgedaboudit!
I'd never really thought much of that disparity before my encounter with the Slam Dunk dj's, though, mostly because Angelique, although hugely popular in Japan, has not even been translated into English or anything. The English speaking Angelique fanbase is small (but growing!), and most people have never even heard of it! I myself only managed to get into the series by playing a ROM version of the original SNES video game (which, btw, is an amazingly fun game even if you can't understand a word of Japanese!) Which reminds me ~ Please sign the Angelique Translation Petition!! There's a link to the left. LESS THAN 100 SIGNATURES NEEDED!! ^_^ But, as I've said before, I digress.
Anywho, so I wondered, how is it that something so popular in Japan can be a total flop on ebay's international soil? Then, browsing through the doujinshi categories, I received further shocks. Prince of Tennis (which I've heard of and is pretty popular among english-speaking anime fans) had a wopping 2000+ dj's up for auction. My jaw dropped. That's more than twice as much as Slam Dunk! And meanwhile, Prince of Tennis only has about 10 dj's up for auction on ebay at the moment! I mean, the disparities in both number and selection are HUGE - and this isn't just a problem with a handful of doujinshi. It's common all across the board!
Series with tons of dj's on YJ have practically none on ebay; and the scary part is that it works vice versa, too! With the series Fushigi Yuugi, for example, last week there were about 4-5 dj's up on ebay. I searched almost daily for FY dj's on YJ, and came up empty every single time.
Nor do the disparities end there! There can also be huge disparities in the popularity of a series and the number of doujinshi. Dragonball Z, for example, which is one of the most popular series worldwide ('dragonball' is consistently one of the top search terms on the internet), only has about 100 dj's on an average day, up to 200 on a really good day, and can sometimes even dip below 50! This is nothing compared to the aforementioned series such as Prince of Tenis and Slam Dunk.
Yet ANOTHER disparity (oh, there are tons of them! Even more than I'm going to mention here, you can bet on that!) is price. Since, unless you live in Japan or can buy the doujinshi directly from the circle, you pretty much have to buy it at auction (or anime conventions, which can end up costing a hefty sum what with the transportation, hotel reservations, entrance fees, etc). The best places for these auctions tend to be online, on websites such as ebay or Yahoo Japan (or one of the other Japan-based websites that I'll mention at some point in the future). If you want to buy from Yahoo Japan, chances are that unless you're a seasoned veteran, you'll probably go through a deputy service - which tacks even MORE fees onto the price of the doujinshi!!
Pricing on a single item can vary greatly. I've dj's that would normally go for 3000+ yen slink away at under 1000. I myself have gotten complete steals (such as Hanky Panky on EBAY OF ALL PLACES for $9.99, and BVD Selection for a mere 3100 yen), and have also been incredibly, VERY, STUPIDLY foolish. My example: I paid 8000+ yen for a Kuri doujinshi that had a page falling out of the middle -_-;; ... and to add salt to my wounds, the same dj sold twice, in better condition, the next week for around 2000 yen each, and then on ebay it went for only $46 ... less than half of what I paid!! GRRR!!!
Learn from my mistakes, people! DO NOT bid more than you can comfortably afford and are WILLING to pay! And when you bid through a deputy service on YJ, make sure to calculate the FINAL PRICE (i.e. an estimate including your max bid and the various deputy fees) BEFORE YOU PLACE YOUR BID. I cannot stress this enough - if you don't, you'll get a SCARY SURPRISE in your email a few days after the end of the auction!! Buuuut ... well, that's off-topic here, isn't it?!! Don't worry, I'm planning to have a nice, LOOOONG rant about deputy services and buying 'straight from the source' (i.e. Japan) VERY soon!! ^_^
Anywho, back to disparities! As you can see, sometimes the most random series that you've never even heard of can have TONS AND TONS of doujinshi up for auction, a veritable gold mine ... while your favorite, most beloved series barely takes a breath on YJ or ebay (ahh, the story of my life! *SOB*).
Oooh, and that reminds me of yet another disparity (which is sort of related to price) ... the BIDDERS!! Sometimes, there have been times when NOBODY bids on a perfectly wonderful dj, and you can't understand WHY they're not! Then other times, it seems like EVERYONE wants it! Totally random!!
I encountered this phenomenon recently on both ebay and Yahoo Japan in my quest for Final Fantasy 4 doujinshi (preferably those starring Rydia/Edge) Back in the early days of my collecting, you couldn't find an FF4 dj on ebay to save your life. And even on YJ they were a rarity! But I kept at it, searching every day. And then I finally found them! And ... the first several YJ auctions, NO ONE ELSE bid! Those weren't for R/E dj's though, just plain ol' FF4. But then came a whole bunch of R/E doujinshi, they were GORGEOUS and there were 6 or so of them, and they all had low starting prices and were from the same seller!! I bid decently high maximums on them, but my dreams were crushed when suddenly LOTS of people started bidding in the last minutes, driving the prices up so high I could barely even see them!
What happened? I asked myself. Why are these people suddenly bidding large amounts of money for similar dj's that they would have scorned a month earlier?
More recently, the selection of FF4 dj's on YJ has gotten somewhat better (although there are still hardly any compared to FF7 and FF10), but there are still times when the bids go far higher than what I'm willing to pay - plus I have the added disadvantage of those nasty deputy fees, too!
And then, to make matters worse ... I recently encountered this phenomenon ONCE AGAIN on ebay! Just a few weeks ago!
On ebay, FF4 doujinshi were few and far between. then I finally found some! Two gorgeous Rydia/Edge dj's (hentai, of course!). That was the one and only time I have ever had to pay for an auction with an IPMO (because the seller didn't accept Paypal). It's not an experience that I'd like to have again, I'll say that much! ^^;; But anywho, no one else bid on the dj's, so I got them for a pretty decent price (although add in the shipping cost, IPMO cost, cost of MAILING the IPMO to Japan, and the savings just melt away).
THEN, last week, there were once again two separate FF4 dj's up for grabs! I was giddy, hoping to add to my collection. Much to my shock, surprise, and chagrin, both final prices ended up going over $25 ... which is just way too much to pay for a normal dj that doesn't even have a true R/E focus! And there were a whole ton of people bidding on them! So my question: WHAT GIVES?!
Why, all of a sudden, are all these people swooping down on the FF4 dj's? It totally boggled my mind! And on YJ, too, there are a ton of people bidding on them now. Once again, my question: WHAT THE HELL GIVES?!?!?
So far, we've covered disparities in quantity, popularity, selection, price and bidder interest (not necessarily in that order!) Since this thing's getting pretty long, I'll try and hurry it up with just one more thing.
The last disparity I'll mention is something that has to do with selection, but exists inside the bastion of a single series. It deals with the subject matter, and the availablity of certain characters/pairings.
I've got some great examples for this concept, which I can't quite label without it sounding funny, and which is sort of vague. The first example uses the well-known series Yu Yu Hakusho.
Now, Yu Yu Hakusho is a wonderful series for yaoi lovers of all kinds. I can honestly say that over 90% of the YYH dj's that I've seen have had at least SOME shonen-ai or yaoi content. MOST are focused on yaoi content, ESPECIALLY the kurama/hiei pairing, which DOMINATES the series.
This is exactly what I'm talking about. Within a series, certain characters, pairings, or plot conventions are widely available, while others are nowhere to be found. Personally, I'm not a big fan of yaoi (although I will admit to a weakness for Touya and Yue from Card Captor Sakura), and personally, I like the canon pairing of Yusuke and Keiko. But I'm just one of a handful! I have NEVER, EVER seen a Yusuke/Keiko dj. MOST of the dj's I've seen have been Kurama and Hiei. This is a HUGE disparity within the series as to the content of the doujinshi! Some series are like that; trying to find a het pairing in the midst of all the yaoi is honestly, and I mean this quite literally, just like trying to find a needle in a haystack. Meaning: You just can't do it!
I've had a similar problem with another of my favorite series, Tokimeki Memorial. My FAVORITE character from this series is Mira Kagami, who is very sexy and aloof and has the most gorgeous purple hair you've ever seen (and she likes to eat melon ^_~). Unfortunately, for some reason fans just HATE her!! Or at least, they don't love her nearly as much as I do! Because I have NEVER seen a dj focused on Mira, and I've been looking specifically for that for several months now! Oh, sure, there are plenty of dj's focusing on Shiori, Ayako, Saki, etc ... but no Mira! Even in doujinshi that are supposed to be 'group' oriented (i.e. an 'all character' kind of setup), they'll have every character EXCEPT my girlie! I mean, what's up with that?! PLUS, even Miharu, a character who HARDLY EVEN SHOWS UP IN THE GAME AT ALL, is much much more popular than my baby! How the hell did that happen?!
Sorry if I'm getting a little overemotional, but this is a very sore spot for me. I absolutely LOVE Mira Kagami, she's one of my top 5 favorite characters of ALL TIME, and yet I don't have a single dj starring her. It's a lonely yet painful road, my friends. Lonely yet painful.
Well, that's about it for disparities. I'm sure there are plenty more (and I'll probably think of them all after I post this up, too!) but that's all I have time for today. And it is a lot, too, just reread over this thing if you don't believe me (and if you can stomach reading all those jumbled, disorganized thoughts all over again! ^_~)
Anywho, I think the next topic I'm going to cover will be the basics of deputy services and using Japan-based websites to your advantage. That's going to be a FUN topic! I could go on and on all day about all the 'tricks of the trade' so to speak (i.e. the complexities of navigating through a website in a foreign language that you can't even read) and other stuff ... Oooh, I'm getting all tingly just THINKING about that topic!! ^_^
I'll also keep you updated on any cool auction wins I have. I hope today's little ranty thing has been at least somewhat informative for you! If you have any comments or questions or whatever you can always email me (my email addy's in my profile).
See ya soon and good luck with your doujinshi hunting! ^_~