A New Year & New Opportunities

Happy New Year, everybody!

I hope 2018 was great for you all, and I wish every one of you a wonderful 2019.

Much like the other State of the Herald pieces, I'll be dropping the "presidential" tone from this, since, well... I like being more candid with you folks. 😊

Exactly one year ago today, we launched the Anime Herald Patreon campaign. In what felt like a mere instant, our fates entered your hands, as we vowed to make you our core consumers. We adopted the mantle of “you deserve better,” and began to do our utmost to live up to that ideal.

We did away with all of our ads, and we vowed to remain that way, so long as we could keep talking nerdy to all of you without going into the red. We vowed to bring you Patrons new and original content, special patron-only goodies, and shout-outs in the AniWeekly column. At the same time, we vowed to begin broadening our content, and really diving deeper with our content on the whole.

And, for the most part, we’ve been doing okay! The first months were a bit shaky, as we expected, as we were basically finding our footing in the middle of a huge change in the way we do things. There was a bit of uncertainty overall, as we tried to do what we could to make our Patreon the best that we could for everybody involved.

What We Delivered

Our first month saw possibly our biggest piece to date, as we published a major investigative article on a legal battle between fashion vlogger Tyler (ScarfingScarves) and Anime Matsuri showrunner John Leigh.

In April, we shone a light on the crisis that is animator pay in Japanese studios, as we discussed criminally low wages in their newest openings. This was followed up in June, with a massive piece that delved into the impact that Steam’s rapid and capricious content policy changes had on niche game developers.

It was about this point that we rolled out our newest site redesign, our first in nearly five years. With a new framework and a more modern branding, we were ready to define our newest direction in regards to how we’d treat content.

A month later, we were off to Anime Expo, where we published more than twenty articles over the course of the con, including a full travelogue feature detailing my first-ever trip to the biggest anime con in America. At the same time, we busily tracked the events of a burgeoning white supremacist rally that threatened to encroach upon Otakon, adding more than thirteen updates, and fourteen sources over the course of two weeks.

In August, we saw our first foray into actual activism. The current presidential administration  began to bear down upon journalists once more. Harsh rhetoric became a day of sadness, as five members of the Capital Gazette lost their lives in a mass shooting. This prompted an open letter - our very first - that stated where we stand: we are journalists; we are your neighbors, family, and friends… and we’re not your enemies.

In September, we welcomed Ashley as a guest contributor with her quirky, touching, and thoroughly entertaining “Anime Made Me Gay! Let’s Go With Hot-Blooded Yaoi,” as we blew the lid off of a story involving subscription box provider Anime Bento.

In October, we raised the alarm on another issue that began to circulate in the world outside of anime. It was at this point that the New York Times unearthed a letter from the office of Health and Human Services, which would legally define “transgender” out of existence. As I am transgender, I spoke out on the matter, in a plea for solidarity and alliance at a time when we need it most. A few months later, this would echoed once more, as a prominent foe to the trans community began to accuse anime of causing people to become transgender.

In November, Lydia poured her heart out with Sincerely, Orange, a touching piece that examined suicide, the aftermath, and survivor’s guilt through the lens of popular anime Orange. 

In December, we launched our first deep look at the Fall 2018 anime season’s treatment of trans characters, and L.B. explained why you should be watching Chihayafuru before its grand return to Japanese TV in April.

What Went Right

On the Herald:

On the main Anime Herald site, we were able to really start branching out, as we explored new frontiers, and topics that normally wouldn’t be approached on the pages of Anime Herald previously. Pieces like our John Leigh/ScarfingScarves piece, the Otakon rally coverage, and our Anime Bento expose allowed us to show what we can do when we knuckle down with a real investigation. Meanwhile, articles like Sincerely, Orange and Anime Made Me Gay! Allowed us to really begin elevating voices that normally aren’t heard within the anime fan community.

At the same time, we continued to show a devotion to our news desk team, as we provided updates on every single day, outside of our scheduled days off. More than 2,000 articles were posted through the calendar year, which amounted to tens of thousands of words, and countless opinions and facts conveyed to all of you.

On Patreon:

We promised you folks exclusive content, and we did our very best to deliver! With more than 100 Patreon posts published through 2018, we offered a mix of behind-the-scenes articles, remixed classics, and more. 

At the same time, I began to embark on what will be my most ambitious (dare I say crazy) project in the history of my own career, with That 2007 Feeling: A Chronicle of the Western Anime Bubble, a book that will examine the events leading up to, and throughout the great anime industry bubble, as well as the immediate aftermath that followed. The first chapter went up last week, and I do hope to have the second up by February. 

After that point, though, things get a little… “floaty” as it will depend on the research at the time, and the people I’ve had the chance to talk with over specific matters.The end goal, regardless, will always be to have the first draft of the book done and ready for you to read by December. I think we can do this.

What Could've Gone Better

On the Herald:

Oof…  well, this is always a stinger. But, by April, I was sort of running myself ragged at the news desk, publishing between six and ten articles per day. By June, I had pretty much worked myself to a breakdown, and vowed to scale things back for the time being. And, well… that’s a hard habit to kick. I fell back in by mid-August, chasing the highs that come from those big Anime Expo reveals.

And, sadly, this led content to suffer quite a bit. Editorials were backlogged, and editing work was put to the back burner as the news feed effectively consumed everything else. This includes the AniWeekly columns, which became too much to manage along with the unending churn. 

Due to an injury sustained in my transition, the Nerdy Talk podcast was mothballed again - we’ll be back with this in 2019. 

On Patreon:

I quickly found myself running out of stories to tell, to be honest! The behind-the-scenes pieces we had told were among the most interesting, entertaining, and generally evocative works. At the same time, we hit a wall with our Anime Dream legacy content, as Matt and I made up but a small part of the site… and many of the articles that we published were, well, pretty rough at points, to say lightly. 

I’m not too sure, here, but I don’t think I’d be doing any of you a service by making you read a 16-year-old review of Geneshaft or Magical Meow Meow Taruto at this point.

Because of this, we were at somewhat of a loss on what to publish for you all. I feel genuinely awful about this, and offer my sincere apologies.

What’s Next

At this point, we're building the foundation for an all-new Anime Herald. With a renewed focus on content, we’ll be having a few discussions behind the scenes on where we want to take things next.

Over the next week, we’ll be rewriting our Patreon page, to make things a bit more concise and to tighten our message a bit better. And, in general, we’ll be working to spread the word of the Herald far and wide, by bringing you amazing content every single day, as we have in the past!

I want to thank each and every one of you for your support, and for putting your faith in us over the past year. I hope that, by 2020, we’ll be able to come back to you in another letter, to say that we’re proud of everything we’ve done once again.

So, until we meet again in 2019, have a great night, and a Happy New Year.

All the best,

Samantha Ferreira

editor-in-chief, Anime Herald