> 1. Central Park Media has filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy -
> that's not reorganization of debt (chapter 11), but
> liquidation, which means they're dead.

Nobody ever listends to me...  CPM was dead (DVD wise) more than 2 years ago, as evidenced
by locked and abandone offices, a degenerating web-site and servers, lack of licensing...
distribution, and sales.  I think the only reason it took so long was
that the bankruptcy papers, stock consolidation/burn-off, and bookkeeping took nearly
that long to accomplish.  i.e., GET YOUR AFFAIRS IN ORDER!


> 2. ADV ... There were no ADV panels at AX. Which isn't too
> surprising, considering that I can't actually get ADV to
> return phone calls...

ADV has never returned any of my calls or e-mails for the last 5 years.  The only
time I could contact them was to continually call them until I got through and could
actually talk to a person... which was lest than a 1 in 20 chance during business

hours.  The fact that they cancelled over a dozen licensing attempts last year, was
a seriously BAD omen.

Sad to hear about more of the decline of the US industry, but a re-tooling of business
practices in the industry has been needed for nearly eight years.  The benefit...
like the suggested BD regions and Japanese companies getting involved in the US
market from the home shores, is good.  Pioneer started doing this back when the only
optical discs were Laserdiscs and the wonderfully new CD format ^_^  and then they
started f'n things up about 6 years ago (when the FY OVA DVDs were being released

was the date it became obvious to me). 

I still think the Japanese distibutors would do well to consider Dual-Market strategy
from the start, and then for the more popular projects, PRESS the discs here where
the quantity factor will also bring the Japanese retail prices down, even when
shipping back to Japan is considered.  It costs almost nothing (a little over a dime)
to press DVDs for most medium market quantities, and that will (at the current rate
of HD mania) soon be true of BD, which I'm guessing will come down to about 30
cents or so. 

Lets just hope that the current "crisis" will give a swift boot to the head ^_^ to
the industry and get them started on a new and more appropriate strategy for these
times (before things change enough that another reorganization will be in order...

about 5 years? from now). 

And I'm also glad to hear that licensing on the original Dragonball has returned...
I want to see them all remastered and properly translated, without the embarrassing
edits and dialogue alterations.