Not too long ago, I needed to check Digital Manga, Inc.’s website for information on some manga or another. So I did what was obvious: I typed digitalmanga.com into Firefox, and I waited… and waited… and finally got nothing. I thought maybe I had misremembered their address, so I Googled it. Clicking on the link to the homepage did nothing, but clicking on the link to the About Us page worked, and I could browse the site from there. I am not the only one who had trouble with their homepage or their related sites, but access to the homepage was later restored. I chalked it up to a weird issue with Digital Manga, Inc.’s website coding.
But March 1st brought us this interesting tweet:
I hate to break this news, but I have it on good authority that all work at Digital Manga has effectively stopped. The chances of the current Tezuka KS being fulfilled at this point is practically zero. Hardly surprising, but still disappointing to say the least.
— Tezuka In English (@TezukaInEnglish) March 1, 2018
Of course, such news quickly made the rounds. Kickstarter pages filled with comments from worried backers that they wouldn’t get any rewards. Elsewhere, though, reactions were more blunt:
So the buzz on DMP, custodians of much of the remaining Tezuka manga catalog, is not good.
who could have seen this coming, besides pretty much everybody
— Mike Toole (@MichaelToole) March 1, 2018
So, was Digital Manga, Inc.’s downfall inevitable? What went wrong?
The History of Digital Manga, Inc.
Started in 1996, Digital Manga, Inc. (DMI) operated several manga brands including Digital Manga Publishing for general manga, June for boys’ love titles, Project-H for hentai manga, and more. They also operated ebook store Emanga.com, online store Akadot, and sponsored YaoiCon, which they announced in December 2017 that the convention would skip 2018 and return in 2019.
For the last few years, they have relied heavily on crowdfunding. According to their page, they have created 20 Kickstarter projects alone. Their last campaign was in April 2017. For some Kickstarters, they are still shipping out rewards as of Valentine’s Day at least, and they have been posting jobs in February.
The publisher also had a moving sale in late 2017 and early 2018, which they say is one of the reasons they’ve been too busy to fulfill rewards and respond to requests for updates.
The Status of Their Crowdfunding Campaigns
Let’s take a look at their successful Kickstarters since mid 2016:
Kimagure Orange Road – funded May 2016
- Original estimated delivery date: October 2016
- Last update: October 2017
- No rewards have been sent.
- Backers who were expecting signed rewards are instead being offered a 10% refund or “an item of equivalent or greater value will be substituted”.
- Digital copies finished.
- Supposedly, the first four omnibuses have been printed and are ready, but the last two omnibuses were lost in transit.
Kodomo no Jikan – funded July 2016
- Original estimated delivery date: October 2016
- Last update: October 2017
- Fan translator was hired for the official translation but may have left.
- According to updates, 0 progress in quality checking, translating, etc. between May and October.
- No rewards have been sent.
Under the Air – funded November 2016
- Original estimated delivery date: April 2017
- Last update: October 2017
- Books and ebooks started shipping in August 2017
- Rewards still being delivered as of Valentine’s 2018
- Covers for The Crater may be missing in some shipments.
Wonder 3 – funded April 2017
- Original estimated delivery date: August 2017
- Last update: October 2017
- Supposedly, all but one volume ready for printers.
- No rewards have been sent.
Psyche Delico titles – funded May 2017
- Original estimated delivery date: June-October 2017
- Last update: January 2018*
- Delayed to Q2 2018.
Um, yeah, not a great record. Lots of issues, and not a lot of updates. And as of this writing, Digital Manga themselves logged into Kickstarter on March 2nd, 2018, so they definitely had the ability to post comments to reassure backers. One backer for the Psyche Delico campaign says that she did receive a response recently… only to be told they were passing it along.
*EDIT: Two days after this article was originally posted, an update was added saying that some of the manga in this campaign were ready to print, others still incomplete. Add-on title Ai no Kusabi, which was supposed to be a reprint, was not mentioned.
Inevitable or Evitable Decline?
Unfortunately, by the time the Wonder 3 Kickstarter launched, red flags were everywhere. I’ve discussed the subject of crowdfunding before, but here’s a basic tip: maybe do one at a time? Even two is pushing it. Especially, in DMI’s case, Kodomo no Jikan and Kimagure Orange Road are both rather long series at 13 and 18 volumes respectively. Yes, they are in omnibus format, but they still require the full series’ length worth of translating, lettering, etc. Even hiring outside freelancers, that’s a lot of work for a small publisher to be releasing in a relatively short period of time. And that’s before the additional manga campaigns DMI launched!
Even the way they run their Kickstarters should have been improved. Kimagure Orange Road, for instance, should have just been all-or-nothing for the entire series instead of stretch goals for additional volumes. Make the base goal digital, stretch goal unlocked physical, and then upgrades on covers, paper quality, color inserts, etc. Perhaps even later Kickstarters like Kodomo no Jikan could have raised more money if DMI wasn’t asking for $140 upfront for the entire physical version just two months after asking for $170 upfront for a previous complete manga campaign. Yes, they had already completed some campaigns successfully, but I’m sure I’m not the only one who raised their eyebrows at immediately running back to the fans for their next release.
Plus, another big issue was that DMI wasn’t pushing their books to other outlets. Why not rack up some additional money through Right Stuf, Amazon, and other stores? With their sporadic updates on their social media accounts, it is easy to forget what they are releasing while the other companies are constantly pushing new and old titles. Some people may have missed the crowdfunding campaign, others can’t afford huge sums upfront, and still others may just be tempted later by a sale after sampling it at their local bookstore. For even the ones that made it to other outlets, print runs were small, and some manga seem to vanish overnight. I mean, look at Digital Manga Publishing’s list of titles on Right Stuf, starting with their newest volumes:
That’s a lot of titles already unavailable to be ordered. DMI is really limiting their audiences. Sure, I doubt any of their manga can compete with the likes of Tokyo Ghoul or Attack on Titan, but people have to at least have the opportunity to discover them!
Are Fans SOL if Worst Comes to Worst?
Let’s take the best-case scenario. Now that they’ve moved offices and had a moving sale, they send out all the Kickstarter rewards in the next few months. After all, people are reporting responses, and some are still getting their rewards. And at least one person doesn’t have a problem waiting:
So, while the rewards are late, let’s say no one is out money. Even so, DMI has most likely burned a lot of bridges on Kickstarter with their infrequent updates and lack of information. People shouldn’t be waiting months to get a response to their private messages. Backers in general should know how far along a company is with their project. From the time rewards are being sent out, people shouldn’t be waiting six months after others have received their items. Dedicated fans may still believe in DMI, but the publisher is going to have to wade through tons of comments on all their social media about how they felt wronged in other Kickstarters.
What about the worst-case scenario, as this alleged former employee on Glassdoor claims is going to happen?
No matter if DMI as a whole goes bankrupt or they just announce that all their back Kickstarters have fallen through, backers are most likely out of luck. Kickstarter themselves remind users that they are essentially gambling with their money. Some people may be successful in filing a credit card chargeback, but that’s up to the card and may deny refunds by saying it’s a donation.
Kickstarter’s Terms of Use say that creators “must complete the project and fulfill each reward” and, if they can’t, to “make every reasonable effort to find another way of bringing the project to the best possible conclusion for backers”. If DMI has some rewards at their warehouse as they have claimed in some updates, then they should be able to partially fulfill rewards. But if, say, Kimagure Orange Road‘s $160,000 never produces a single physical volume, how much will DMI say it took to make the digital copies? Would the eBooks be enough of an acceptable alternative that they wouldn’t have to refund considering they cost $9.99 each?
If they file for bankruptcy, creditors will likely have first dibs — or at least the legal power to get first dibs — on any cash and merchandise. As a reminder: don’t spend money on Kickstarter that you aren’t afraid of losing. Whether you may lose $1 or $10,000 in these campaigns, yes, it’s sickening, but it’s a steep uphill battle as to any kind of recourse.
Final Thoughts
Whether the rumor about Digital Manga, Inc. closing is true or not, even if they’re not technically in financial trouble, they are probably still in trouble with fans. For problems like Matsumoto’s sickness preventing him from signing Kimagure Orange Road merchandise, yes, it would be hard to figure out how much value there is in that and to try to satisfy those backers. A 10% refund may be disappointing and anger some fans, but it wouldn’t turn a lot of people away from the company as a whole.
However, going months without an update would be troubling for any Kickstarter, but no communication for months on multiple campaigns is just egregious. Plus, we all know they’ve been logging in for whatever reason, and it doesn’t take that long to say, “Sorry, we’re delayed, we’re doing this and this right now.”
Do I think DMI will continue into the rest of 2018 and beyond? I think there is a good chance… but in vastly limited form. After their big Kickstarter blitz, they’ve gone mostly silent, and the YaoiCon announcement was confirmation to me that the DMI of the future may be limited to, say, their Juné line to give Viz Media’s SubLime line some competition. They better get their current Kickstarters fulfilled though if they want to stay in the game. After that, Digital Manga, Inc. needs to either concentrate on just a couple of series at a time and/or stop running to Kickstarter for every release.