You thought your anime was safe?

With Sony absorbing the ire of gamers worldwide by announcing that they would no longer produce physical media for video games, it slipped past most that Sony’s Crunchyroll revealed they would pull their anime store behind a subscription paywall.

Beginning in August, only Crunchyroll subscribers will be able to buy exclusives, premiums, Anime, toys, Manga, clothing and apparel, games and accessories through Crunchyroll. Basically, users are paying for the privilege of spending more money when the store was open to the public before the announcement.

There is an important aspect to point out in Cruncyroll’s announcement, emphasis mine:

This August, we are transitioning the Crunchyroll Store to a brand-new shopping experience that will be available exclusively for Mega and Ultimate Fans.

You may be wondering why this distinction is important, and that is because Crunchyroll has three subscription tiers as seen below.

Yes, this means that those subscribers paying for the Fan tier are now blocked from accessing items on the Cruncyroll store. Those subscribers would have to upgrade to the Mega or Ultimate tiers to gain access. From a consumer’s perspective, this is an unprecedented level of greed, and it was all by Sony’s design.

The Plan

It was only in 2017 when Sony bought a controlling stake in anime distributor Funimation, gaining access to popular titles like Dragon Ball Z, Cowboy Bebop, One Piece, My Hero Academia and Attack on Titan.

Then, just four years later, Sony acquired Crunchyroll from AT&T Inc., which was a direct-to-consumer anime streaming provider with a 5 million subscriber base at the time. This allowed Sony to merge their Funimation library with the Crunchyroll streaming service, combining two large fanbases under one umbrella. However, the plan was not yet complete.

Just a year later, Crunchyroll bought the online anime retailer Right Stuf Anime.

At the time, Right Stuf Anime was a leading anime and pop culture media site, providing physical Blu-Rays, Manga, Anime, figures, clothing and collectibles. When the acquisition was announced, customers were assured Right Stuf Anime’s products would remain available on the Crunchyroll store, which has turned out to be a lie of omission. Yes, the products do exist on Crunchyroll’s online store, but only for those who can afford their premium subscription service.

And this is not the first time fans and customers have suffered from Sony growing anime monopoly. When Crunchyroll announced the merger with Funimation, Funimation users were notified that they would lose access to their digital Funimation content.

But do not despair, Crunchyroll does allow you to buy the content you already bought from Funimation again!

As much as many of us revere the Sony brand that we grew up with, spending countless hours enjoying their consoles, Walkman’s, and other products that were always customer focused, it’s time to realize that this is not the same corporation. Greed is good is the new Sony motto while they push for subscription paywalls, the destruction of physical media and an all digital future.

A digital future that guarantees no consumer protection for the products that they purchase. Not only did those Funimation customers lose their digital anime purchases with no restitution, PlayStation recently announced that customers in the UK would lose all access to their digital movie purchases after losing their licensing agreement with Studio Canal. That is over 500+ movies lost with no refund.

While many, especially investors, applaud these moves by Sony and feel that an all-digital future is inevitable, it’s becoming obvious that Sony should not be the leader of the revolution. Nintendo has always been shrewd and litigious when it comes to their products, but the greed Sony has displayed recently is unparalleled. There is no way customers can trust this company with an all-digital future or with their digital library. It’s time to treat Sony as the Evil Empire it has become.

Originally Published Here

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