AstroBoy Online Forums

Manga Entertainment has ALL 104 episodes of the 1963 series up on Youtube now. They got the last few up late this afternoon. I hope they will also post episode #193. I don't know if they made a deal with the right stuff to post these, but Manga is a division of the Stars network according to their logo, so I assume the upload to Youtube is "Kosher"

I guess we'll see if it's legal or not. I hope it is then I can finally refer to people to certain episodes so they know what I am talking about.

Makes me a little nervous too though because it's very very easy to 'steal' from youtube with a simple online program, I'd hate to see people steal the entire series instead of buying it.

Unless Manga is making people pay to watch them... I heard that some uploaders are planning on making people to PAY to watch certain videos, like a subscription. I know Funimation is planning on or does this already.

Most of the episodes are on Youtube with several commercials each. So maybe that's their revenue stream. I can't believe that 'stars' would be involved with 'piracy' on youtube.

I have a feeling this is legit, too. NOW . . . WE NEED THOSE OTHER "89!!"

BTW my Japanese boxed set arrived today . . . allllll those cds, and none of my machines will play them. Anybody got any suggestions?

"Earthshine" wrote:I guess we'll see if it's legal or not. I hope it is then I can finally refer to people to certain episodes so they know what I am talking about.

Makes me a little nervous too though because it's very very easy to 'steal' from youtube with a simple online program, I'd hate to see people steal the entire series instead of buying it.

Unless Manga is making people pay to watch them... I heard that some uploaders are planning on making people to PAY to watch certain videos, like a subscription. I know Funimation is planning on or does this already.

It's legal. Manga Entertainment themselves are uploading the videos to YouTube. As Tetsuwan Penguin thought, Manga Entertainment gains revenue from the ads on the video. It's also free to watch, so you don't have to worry about subscriptions or anything like that.

Some sites do require subscriptions to watch certain content, but not all. I know on Crunchyroll you have to have a premium account to watch the episodes the day they come out. Otherwise, you can wait a week and then users can watch the episodes for free.

It depends from site to site, but I know most, if not all anime content on YouTube is free. I may be wrong, but I am pretty sure about that.

Also, piracy is always going to exist. No matter what medium of media, people will always find ways to pirate the shows. The best thing people can do is watch shows legally and buy the DVD/Blu-ray sets if they can.

"AprilSeven" wrote:I have a feeling this is legit, too. NOW . . . WE NEED THOSE OTHER "89!!"

BTW my Japanese boxed set arrived today . . . allllll those cds, and none of my machines will play them. Anybody got any suggestions?

Find an expendable computer and put Linux Mint on it! (I recommend the KDE version)
Most computer DVD rom drives can be software configured to ignore region codes, and most Linux machines that have DeCSS on them also will enable this feature.

Google for Oppovideo and region codes. Some of the dvd machines they made could be hacked by entering a secret code into the machine via the remote control. I hacked my Oppo dvd player to ignore region codes.

"The previously mentioned DVD region hack works on my region 1 OPPO DV-981HD (purchased April 1,2008). Turn the player on with no disc loaded and press setup on the remote. Once the menu is displayed, press in sequence: 9210. This will display version/region info. Then simply press 0 on the remote for region free! Turn the player off then on again and enjoy your multi-region player!"

This is the machine I have (It's a fantastic DVD machine!). Maybe you can find a used one on ebay.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Oppo-DV-981HD-DVD-Player-/121130786148?pt=DVD_Players_Recorders&hash=item1c33f51d64

Same hack works with this model:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/OPPO-DV-970HD-1080i-High-Definition-Up-Converting-Universal-DVD-Player-with-HDMI-/221244761835?pt=DVD_Players_Recorders&hash=item33833726eb

I'm glad it's legit, I just really get twitchy about piracy especially for such a wonderful series.

You can download & use free for 1 month ANYDVD (on a PC), I use it, even with r1 discs, & it allows instant access to menus; no more waiting for anoying ads to run.

Thanks for the suggestions! I just downloaded VLC - and it looks to work the same way -- It's so exciting to see all these episodes, and THANK YOU JEFFBERT for giving us a view into this whole other Astro universe!

Looking at them in their entirety, I can only reconfirm that Jeffbert has provided us with an incredibly valuable service -- as I'm watching I think, "Oh! I remember that from Jeff's synopsis!" He's done an amazing job for somebody who doesn't speak Japanese!

"AprilSeven" wrote:Thanks for the suggestions! I just downloaded VLC - and it looks to work the same way -- It's so exciting to see all these episodes, and THANK YOU JEFFBERT for giving us a view into this whole other Astro universe!

Looking at them in their entirety, I can only reconfirm that Jeffbert has provided us with an incredibly valuable service -- as I'm watching I think, "Oh! I remember that from Jeff's synopsis!" He's done an amazing job for somebody who doesn't speak Japanese!

I think Jeffbert said he had some help from Strangewings. Anyway I hope that someone eventually fansubs these. Let us know how well you comprehend what's going on.

BTW Jeffbert, how's the book coming?