There is nothing wrong with fansubs. It's great to be able to sample a show before investing a lot of time or money into it, and it's great to be able to keep up with what's going on in Japan. I also don't see anything wrong with downloading a show that's already aired on Cartoon Network, which is a large chunk of what most "otaku" watch. It's already available for free, why not have it on demand?

If these companies were that concerned about people buying shows on DVD, they might want to consider making it a little more affordable. Most anime are released with as little as four, sometimes three episodes a disc, all selling for close to thirty dollars. Collecting entire series can be unreasonable, especially with long running shows such as Naruto, Inu Yasha, or Full Metal Alchemist. I wish more series would be released as Funimation did with Fruit's Basket, a mere four disc set.

Granted, the industry may have changed since my hayday, but I doubt it's much better. Not everyone has Cartoon Network, and not everyone has excess money to blow on overpriced DVDs.

What do you care, anyway? It's clearly not stunting the growth of the culture, and I doubt you work in the business.

And by the way, I own well over two thousand dollars worth of authentic anime DVDs.