Pat Payne

THAT'S the piece of crap I saw being sold in a San Pedro flea market! Those things looked so flimsy that just by staring at them you could shake them apart...way overpriced at $10...

That's a lot of it. You have to remember that when the Macross was blasted out to the ass edge of the Solar System, there was only roughly 75,000 people on board, and zero access to the 6,000,000,000 people on that third rock from the sun. They were under constant attack by the Zents, and had no time for the niceties of full training, and so went with "just enough so you don't kill yourselves." That sort of sink-or-swim environment could explain why there seem to be only two types of pilots: the damn-near-Newtypes (like Max, Hikaru and Roy) and the pitifully mediocre (everyone in a tan VF). But also, nobody IIRC had done fighter-to-fighter dogfighting in space up to that point, or at least precious little, and there were no organized tactics for VF fighting at all, as the craft had only been invented a couple of years earlier and the first generation of VF pilots were still flying them -- and consequently making up the rules as they went along. Think of WW1 fighter pilots like Oswald Boelke who had to make up all aircraft combat strategy (which is still in use today) on the fly while still overcoming a natural tendency to think of strategy in 2 1/2 dimensions. Experimentation like that is necessarily costly in lives until you finally hit on getting it right.

LOL!

Thanks, MSW, I'd forgotten about Miller's provision that the acts depicted must be otherwise mentioned by law. I don't think it'd be thrown out though, only since his crime was apparently violating a court injunction against viewing any porn at all (legal, illegal, or extra-crispy) as part of the terms of his parole (which is also harsh, but I don't know the facts of the case). IMHO, they won't give him life. They'll just send him back to prison and have him serve out the rest of his term for the original offense of recieving and trafficking in child porn (perhaps with another shot at parole a few years down the line if he's been a good little pervert)

Not sure what Minmay's Panties is suppose'ta mean -- strike that...I don't wanna know, do I?

Never mind...I just reread the previous post... go ahead and delete this one

When I had read that article I was surprised to hear that ADV was that deeply involved in anime production in Japan... Although it makes sense from a business standpoint for both sides -- Japanese comapnies get funding and a guaranteed foreign audience, while ADV gets a guaranteed license to sell in the States.

Is this the same "Lonely Soldier Boy" that was the theme song for Mospeada, just with a crappy English dub?

I'm sorry, Lurker, but that argument doesn't hold water. Porn is porn, no matter if it is done with real live models or by moving drawings. It is the depiction of a sexual act for the tittilation or arousal of the viewer. That's one reason they went so hard on him. HE VIOLATED HIS PAROLE AFTER HAVING BEEN CONVICTED WITH A SIMILAR OFFENSE. Life may be a bit harsh, granted, for his offense (although for molesters [a different matter in a sense] death is even too good for them), but as I said, and I still stand by it, depicting child sex has been found by the US government and the courts to be obscene and therefore undeserving of 1st Amendment protections. That being said, nobody's saying that we all should go to jail because Minmay's nude for a few seconds in DYRL. Now, you do have a valid argument if you twist my premise a bit: Another reason for restrictions on child pornography is that a crime (and a heinous crime) is committed when the porn is produced -- the molestation or rape of a child. It is true that that crime does not happen when it is depicted through ink and paint -- then it is merely a matter of the artist's imagination. Yet, as I mentioned in my earlier post, another use that pedophiles have for kiddie porn is "grooming" -- sexualizing their young victims to make it easier to molest them. Let me answer your hypothetical with a question: If we allow animated child porn, what then? Where do we stop? Where is the line to be drawn? (pardon the pun ) I agree that adult porn and adult hentai (even the "wink, wink, nudge, nudge we known she's really 16, but for the purposes of the US release, she's a college co-ed" genre like La Blue Girl) should be allowed. But I cannot agree that patent child porn, even if no actual children were harmed is permissible only because no children were harmed. It is such an abhorrent act -- even by proxy -- that we have put it, almost by itself, beyond all pales of civilization, humanity, decency and tolerance. It's interesting that you used the word "fantasy." That's one of the problems I see with with it. It seduces some into thinking that having sex with young children is just another fantasy, and sooner or later they attempt to carry that fantasy to reality. I only need point you to the examples of David Westerberg here in the U.S. and Tsutomu Miyazaki in Japan. Granted, you could argue that the same case has been made against violent video games. However, we know of more people who have played Doom, Quake, GTA or other games and not shot up a school than we have of people who have viewed child porn and not had urges to go and have sex with a child. That, by itself, is not illegal. There are naked pictures of kids all the time in National Geographic, and nobody has seriously considered pulling NG off of the stands. Context has a lot to do with how the nudity is viewed. A good case in point is the bath scene in Totoro (a more family-friendly anime cannot be found): Both father and daughter are obviously naked, yet there is no sexual subtext either in the movie itself or as "fanservice" -- they're merely doing as many Japanese do, enjoying a hot bath. As I mentioend before, there is a three-part test used by the courts to determine obscenity: 1) Does the material, when taken by prevailing community standards, tend to be viewed as offensive? 2) Does the material serve a prurient interest? 3) Does the material have any redeeming literary, scientific, political, social or cultural merit? You lost me here, Lurker. Sorry. That one is harder to justify. I would gamely take a crack at it by saying that unlike works where at least one of the participants is patently underage (such as Kite), a rationalization could be made that since the characters look full grown (and since Japan has a different age of consent than we do -- IIRC, it's 16 as opposed to our 18) that the characters are meant to be viewed as full-grown adults. And even with Fast Times at Ridgemont High -- society has acknoledged that teenagers are sexual creatures. Parents would rather they not be, and if you get into bed with a 16-year-old, and you're 18 or older, you're gonna go to the juzgado, yet there is nothing wrong society-wise with having adult actors play older teenagers (15-16 up), because that is what we kind of expect. It is a double standard, I agree, but it's there. Apples and oranges. In an S&M video, all participants are willing and old enough. In child pornography, at least one participant is not of legal age. In live-action kiddie porn, a crime is being committed. In animated kiddie porn, there is no crime behind the scenes, granted, yet, it still serves a purpose as a tool for pedophiles both through "grooming" as well as spurring them to move from fantasy to action.

That's exactly it, Soulscud. Free speech law is a very tricky thing. In my perfect world, the KKK'd be shut down, but so long as they're not inciting (and that's basically putting a gun in someone's hand and saying "kill that person") they can;t be touched for their filth. First, while the Constitution says that Congress shall make no laws abridging free speech, assembly, press or religion, the courts have ruled often that at times a compelling national or social interest can allow them to bend those restrictions. The interest has to be weighed as being considerably higher than the risk to freedoms, though to be kosher. For instance,the famed Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes made the famous argument in Schenk v. US, 1919[?] that the government could not condone, and would be within its rights to pass a law banning the shouting of "fire!" in a crowded theater that was likely to cause a fatal stampede (the case in Schenk hinged on a man who was trying to incite draft-dodging during WW1) In the same way, the courts and government can ban what it calls obscenity, or at least not extend to it the full 1st Amendment guarantees of other speech. Child porn fails all measures of the obscenity test curently in use: a) It is seen as outrageously offensive by nearly any community standard anywhere in the country; b) It caters not just to a prurient but indeed a deviant interest; (although the test looks at merely prurient interests) c) In large measure, it has no redeeming social, political, scientific, literary or artistic value (that's why coffee-table books of non-sexual nude minors as well as old paintings and sculpture that depict nude minors are usually cleared). The compelling interest, often, is that pedophiles not only use child porn to get off themselves (which is icky enough) but also can use it to "groom" children: socializing them into believing that relationships like that are normal and proper. The Federal Government (with the exception of the FCC) has largely taken itself out of the game of attempting to ban normal pornography (although there are some disconcerting rumblings from certain sides of the aisle recently), although as recently as the 1960s the Post Office was stopping and confiscating copies of "Lady Chatterly's Lover" and "Ulyssees" on the grounds of obscenity (given the test cited above, both of them are blatently not obscenity as the gummint defines it!) Even earlier after a spate of vety racy and violent movies ("Extase" with Hedy Lamarr [1932(?)] which featured full nudity of the star and "Scarface" with Paul Muni [also 1932(?)] which was about as bloody as many action movies today) the Government mulled a censorship board of its own based on ones then working non-stop in Boston and elsewhere. The movie industry, to forestall that, put a man named Will Hayes in charge of the industry's own censorship board, one that lasted until the '60s and the advent of the ratings system. Further, once we take the Federales (and gladly, kiddie porn) out of it, things become more dicy. The Federal government and most (perhaps all) states have free-speech guarantees in their constitutions, ones that say that they will not restrict free speech. There are, more often than not, no such guarantees in local charters. And some localities (counties, municipalities, cities, hamlets, villiages, etc.) are death on anything that they consider obscene -- and they don't always use the Supreme Court's test. "Night Shift Nurses" is an example. That one, so I've heard, was cut for ... let's just say some unhygenic scenes that ran counter to three localities' laws (I do not know the three, the CPM Rep who mentioned it to ANN refused to say) CPM had to cut those twenty minutes for a reason: Hypothetically, if you sell something legally pornographic in San Francisco to a buyer in New York, and it passes through certain towns in Tennessee (or Utah, or Kansas, or Nebraska, or Georgia, or Mississippi...), if the postal inspector there inspects the package and sees it, he can (and most likely will) prosecute -- EVEN THOUGH THE PACKAGE WAS NEVER MEANT TO REMAIN THERE MORE THAN A COUPLE OF HOURS. Just the mere fact that it reached that place by the whim of the Postal Service en route to its final destination is enough to violate the law of that town. And they can ask Governor Ahnold to extradite you and your company for obscenity proceedings -- even though the wider community may not have been aware of its existence within the city limits. That's happened a number of times with internet porn companies as well as with videos and magazines. Now, of course, you yell "Freedom of speech! Slippery slope!" I don't think by restricting the animated kiddie porn of the type mentioned, Kitty Media or Critical Mass are going to be put out of business. That kind of stuff would never be sold legally in this country anyway, not only because it's against the law, but because the market for it is in negative numbers. No retailer would dare put that on their shelf, and no company would risk the slings and arrows for selling it openly here. And, as I said, the government has to meet a high bar for legal pornography before they can ban it, so I'm not losing sleep over this, since it won't affect your right to watch Jenna Ja,meson or Mido Miko. I am, though, concerned that in some news articles, they've lumped all anime in with that lolicon garbage.

Lordy-loo, I could swear I saw this exact same craptacular specimine in San Pedro just days ago going for less than $10... http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewI...5965170357&rd=1 Also, did HG actually put those DYRL Superposeables on the market? http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewI...5964712469&rd=1

Oh, yeah...that's gonna take their health department rating down a couple of notches...

NASM sells Anime? Cool!

DON'T YOU DARE!

Hey, everybody, I was looking around my local drugstore a couple of days ago, and heard, that in honor of Episode III, the California Lottery is going to be issuing "scratcher" games based on the Star Wars saga. If I get any, I'll scan to show y'all.

(After hearing admission of joking, puts 2x4 of Learning away )

Very widespread. I'd never do it (If a series is too much *coughcoughFLCL$30for2-episodediskcoughcough* I just live without) but there are a lot of people who think that it's owed them, or that they should be able to get it without compensating the artists. Now, that being said, I don't like the movie/video/music/entertainment industry's attitude in general towards IP (the US Constitution and the Berne Convention prescribe ONLY a limited period of copyright, not the cash-cow in perpetuity that the studios want -- they'd like to abolish the concept of "public domain" if it were feasable) and their constant attempts to stop people from doing legal things with their discs such as making one backup copy or Tivoing shows from broadcast is irritating, but two wrongs don't make a right.

I see shades in this of the 1983 video-game crash. After the success of Pac-Man and the Atari 2600 (I remember that system well-my family had one back in the day, as a little four-year-old nipper, I used to play Pac-Man and Air-Sea Battle), everybody was making video games. The problem was, most of them didn't sell and weren't any bloody good. (Anyone remember Ralston-Purina's "Catch the Chuck Wagon"? Anyone?) Rather than focus on a few good licences, the idea was to flood the market with product, as well as overdevelop some killer licenses (ET, for instance -- the game that drove Atari to the brink of bankruptcy by making a sh!tty game and then making twice as many cartridges as there were A2600 consoles in existence). The end result was a lot of product went unsold, a lot of companies went out of business, and soon vidoe games were on the remainder bin circuit. Until Nintendo came along in '84-'85. A similar thing is happening in Anime. Like with video games, comapnies are looking for quantity, not quality. They're trying to flood the zone with more titles than anyone could possibly afford, and quite a few that nobody'd want. I certainly don't begrudge them trying to market to new audiences (Face it, the era of anime fandom being a closed society is long since gone) and I'm pleased at the almost zero lag time now between when some shows air in Japan and when they come to DVD in the US -- it used to be a recent series was one that aired five years ago -- but they're pushing it too far too soon. Really, the companies should cut back a little. Just because it aired in Nippon does not mean that the masses will watch it in Beikoku. If the anime/manga industry in the US does collapse, will there be a Nintendo to save it? (The ramble endeth. I'm going back to sleep.)

I agree. Maybe, in the context of the OAV it has a place, but I'm pretty sure that when the whole shebang started in 1979, Kawamori's thoughts ran more to: "OK, now what kind of gimmick can we use to sell this series and out-Gundam Gundam?"

Walmart and Target have been undercutting their prices for quite some time now, especially during the holiday shopping season. "Wal-Mart: We abuse our employees and act like hypocrites, and pass the savings on to you!"

BW also had a hand in, IIRC, Captain Tylor. That doesn't mitigate the fact that they should be pumping Macross more, especially after expending all that energy and treasure defending their rights to it in court.

Maybe it's just me, but I will not buy another Voyager DVD. I bought the original SBY movie, and haven't been able to watch it all the way through. Either my players won't read it, or they'll play it about halfway through and then begin to break up.

He said "Never again!" after DYRL, "Never Again!" after Flashback, "Never again!" after Plus and 7...If he does do another one, he might as well call the bloody thing "Macross: Never Say Never Again"

Yes, its called 'Super Dimension Fortress Macross". Perhaps you've seen it. Ouch, you sniping devil, you

At least he's honest about their provenance.