Why manga books are declining in U.S ?

            Manga is an art form of Japanese comic. It is very amusing and eye-catching to readers. But recently, there have been many problems with manga include dropping in sales, manga companies start producing bad quality manga book with cheap materials, and less manga advertisement on U.S media.

by Brian Hibbs at ComicBookResources.com.

            The chart above describes that a number of sales of manga books has been dropping since 2007. The main reason of the decline in sales includes the illegal posting of materials over the Internet.  Currently, there are hundreds of manga websites that posted free manga without permission from those manga’s companies. Because people now can read free manga online, they do not want to spend money to pay for manga, which has lead to the declining of manga markets.

             The second problem that manga is having is that companies have started to produce bad quality manga books with cheap materials. These companies want more profit than they should have; they started to print manga using cheap ink and paper. Using cheap materials can lead to hard to read prints and thin pages to flip.

             The last problem is that less manga advertisement in U.S media in order to introduce manga to people. According to Erica Friedman (2013), manga advertisements could be found in everywhere in Japan. Many stores in Japan are full of manga characters goods, toys and clothes. However, in U.S, manga is totally out on television or DVD. There is no movie releases in theater and no manga bookstores remained. In addition, publishing companies are not paying author the right wages. They only get paid 2% of each manga that they made, and the rest go to the publishers.

           Based on the chart described, I believe that there are a few things need to be solved to help manga industry back up stronger.To support manga’s market, we should purchase manga and not read on illegal manga websites. But we need not to buy manga that used cheap materials to produce, so that these companies can publish better quality for readers to be paying for. Providing readers with promotion and marketing can solve the problem of advertising manga book. Lastly, readers need to notice manga authors and encourage them to stand against their publisher to get what they deserve. 

            In conclusion, the amusement of manga can also have many negative sides. To prevent these problems, readers can stand up and choose to do what is right.

Citation:

Thompson, Jason. "Why Manga Publishing Is Dying."Http://io9.com/5874951/why-manga-publishing-is-dying-and-how-it-could-get-better. 23 Jan. 2012. Web. 23 Oct. 2015.

Friedman, E. (2013, Nov 8). “Is manga publishing declining? If so? Why?”