Cosafe and other local news
Tibits about Cosafe, legality of fansubs in Singapore and a brand new IRC channel.
Bj0rn reports and does a summary of what appears to be comments made by Julia in several local anime blogs.
because to me…for a point…it became hopeless (read ALL the comments posted above)….We strayed away from our main ideas…our main setup…our REAL meido cafe…
For the sake of Class, Floyd and Ferlyn rushed too fast into it…despite me warning them not to open too fast…and everything in there was , truthly not even half of what I had planned.
It’s actually quite an interesting read giving insight to the background of the cafe.
My Thoughts? I was indeed wondering where the 2nd half of the partnership disappeared to, since in blogs, all I kept hearing was Ferlyn.
Actually I take the comments as a pretty good sign. Why? Because somebody recognizes that what they are doing now is nothing special, and far from the concept of an actual maid cafe. What you have now seems to be a cafe/restaurant that somehow serves as a gathering point for cosplayers on special occasions.
Having a cafe/restaurant isn’t very helpful I think. You don’t specialize enough, so you don’t do well in either. And it’s good to be a meeting place for cosplayers, IF cosafe was at far east shopping center. At chjmes…. isn’t the cost a little too much, even if you have the crowd.
But like people always say, it’s a good learning experience. And Julia did make many good comments about the situation, with money being bankrolled by Ferlyn’s side alone. I wonder how their working relationship would work out.
Just to clear up a little on status of Fansubs in Singapore
Singapore’s Copyright Act was amended last year to make it a criminal offence for individuals to infringe copyright wilfully.
Nevermind whether things are licensed. With the Berne’s convention, downloading any anime is a criminal offence. (fansubs or raw) In other words, you don’t have to do it for commercial purpose, and you don’t have to wait till Odex sues you to be arrested, as popularly believed.
However, looking at previous reports on cases of MP3s, it seems that it was RIAS who “monitored p2p networks” and submitted IP addresses to the police, who then acted upon it.
Given so, I think we can assume that we can wait till Odex submits IP addresses to the police. Is it hard to do so? I don’t think so. I always assumed that Odex can connect to bittorrent themselves, and look at the list of connected peers themselves. Look! So many singaporeans, and then submit the list of IP addresses to the police. The police would then do a formal legal investigation (you know, get warrants to track and all)
But most people believe that there will just be one or two scapegoats and the matter will blow over. After all, you can’t really stop downloading, and I think Odex just wants to drastically reduce that number.
Even Tsubaki is now not downloading anime!
New IRC channel
There’s now a spanking new #SGanimebloggers at irc.rizon.net . You won’t see me there though. I’ve long grown too old for IRC 
January 6th, 2007 at 1:37 pm
I think it’s important to go back to the source and know our laws. Do check out our Copyright Act. Cap no. 63 at the Sg statutes page. You may also want to look through IPOS website. So far I haven’t found anything that says or imply “wilful infringement = criminal” It has to be 1) commercial related, 2) significant extent.
Do let us know if you confirm otherwise.
Cheers.
January 6th, 2007 at 5:45 pm
If the day ever comes … I still wun buy from ODEX … i’d buy from the auntie opposite KKnM
January 6th, 2007 at 6:04 pm
I heard the news… so ODEX goods = original copies or those bootleg?
January 7th, 2007 at 4:10 am
I hope that post doesnt cause an uproar.
January 7th, 2007 at 11:44 am
[...] Cosafe and other local news [...]
January 7th, 2007 at 12:00 pm
ted, i need ur email to send u the pic of EOY my friend just gave it to me..
January 7th, 2007 at 8:31 pm
Ok, so that’s how things go now…
*Readies up equipment for future resistance campaigns*
Lol, joking. ODEX sure are going hardcore now eh? Dammit, not like I don’t buy from them right? Hao xin mei hao bao. Help them out and they do this to me…sigh…
January 8th, 2007 at 2:33 pm
With regard to the maid cafe issue, I still think its ridiculous to expect Japan-style maid cafes, or something closely resembling that type/kind of service.
On the other hand, as I’ve mentioned a few times on sgcafe, where it all started, it all depends on the direction/crowd type the maid cafe wants to attract.
Personally speaking though, I’d rather stay out of this.
July 15th, 2007 at 12:48 am
From what I believe, I think Odex also has a problem of having very very slow releasing. One of the biggest issues I think. In addition, they DO NOT sell alot animes,
eg. Busou Renkin, Utawarerumono, Rozen Maiden, D.grayman, Code Geass.
Our only practical resource would be the net. Its is rather ridiculus to burn a large hole in one’s pocket just to get them direct from the states.