SuggestionBox – Customer Feedback

I stumbled upon this neat website called SuggestionBox.com, which is for customer feedback, which can really help one company *coughodexcough* that comes immediately to mind when someone speaks of Customer relationship management.

As the name shows, it’s for people to write down their suggestions for companies/products/events and other such things that can be improved upon through feedback. The website serves as a middleman, by passing on the suggestion to the company or people in charge, but you have to have the company’s e-mail address before you can suggest your ideas. There is also a limit of just 140 characters for each suggestion, which is not an easy task if you have quite a lot to say to the company. The website also allows for anonymous suggesting.

Since this is a beta stage, I’m looking forward to more features like actually seeing proof of suggestions being implemented. As it stands, any implemented suggestions are just marked with a green tick and not really supported with concrete proof like press releases or replies from the companies. I would also like to see all suggestions being listed fully out on the page instead of just a tally of the amount of suggestions a company currently has.

For more on Customer relationship marketing that is actually interactive and allows your suggestion to be heard instead of being lost in Customer Service, just head over to SuggestionBox and suggest to your heart’s content.

Ps. Odex’s box.

Crunchyroll – No longer safe?

After the Odex fiasco, most people have stopped downloading and instead turned to video websites like Youtube, Veoh and Crunchyroll for their anime fix.

Crunchyroll has been in recent news, for its $4M received in private corporate funding as well as talk of a possible tie-up with Gonzo Inc.

People have also been lamenting that since news of Gonzo affiliation, Crunchyroll has been removing licensed media like Bleach – Rather hypocritical in the first place – and Maria-sama ga Miteru.(Yes, it’s been licensed by Right Stuf and available for pre-ordering)

I don’t mind that.

Now, what I’m more worried about is this News announcement on the CR website.

but it requires a little work on your side by installing a new Bittorrent client (its pretty easy and i know many of you already use it). cuz its p2p, it should be faster for you guys to stream and it will cut back on the bandwidth cost a lot!

Am I the only one thinking that it could be a program that tracks down what the users watches? And it being a p2p client, people could technically be counted as downloading the anime episodes and be prosecuted under those charges by any anime companies that decides to go after Crunchyroll?

Odex-ed Anime in Malaysia

If you think Odex doesn’t have its feelers in Malaysia, think again.

TECHNOGRAM SDN. BHD only releases Odex’s VCDs and DVDs.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but since Technogram is registered as a Malaysian company, it could do what Odex has done in Singapore, except with Malaysian downloaders.

Additionally, Malaysia has also announced that it will enforce a law legislated more than ten years ago, which will have downloaders(if caught) paying fines of at least RM$250,000.

Some examples of the products here.

It’s the exact same boxset, but at a much lower price, less than half the retail price in local stores.
(USD$7.10 = RM$23.55 = SGD$10.20)

Odex splits all its anime into 2 boxsets when they are longer running with around 26 episodes, with Box 1 containing Episodes 1-12 and Box 2 containing Episodes 13-26.

Each boxset is SGD$29.90, and two of them would make (almost) SGD$60 compared to the Malaysia price of $SGD 20.40.

So it’s definitely much cheaper over the Causeway when you want Odex products, but why would you want them?
Animedia Entertainment, Lambaian Film, Vscape Entertainment and Video Star(all Malaysian companies) all license tons of anime, niche or mainstream.

They might not do a better job(butt ugly yellow font with black outline for animedia), but it’s way cheaper to buy their releases.

Plus, they even release stuff like Lucky Star(Full), Doujin Work(Full), Simoune(Full) and Yuri to Boushi to Hon no Tabibito(Full) in complete box sets and don’t split them up to milk more money off consumers.

Hell if I’m ever going to support Odex again. >:(

But, BOOYEAH for being able to marathon Lucky Star!

EDIT: Nothing is sacred.

All the firms listed above, especially Lambaian Film, should be bootleg sellers. The subtitles are obviously from fansubs, evidence here. That’s to say nothing of the amazing speed the “DVDs” are released with. From Philo’s comment and link on this post, Tower of Druaga has already been released on Sensasian.com since 2 Jul 2008 at a dirt cheap price of USD$8.99. From the price, not to mention the full release in one disc, it’s probably safe to say that it’s a bootleg, ripped directly either from TV or downloads.

Odex on WeHateThem.com

Thanks to rexit at vr-zone who first posted it up.

Someone has created an Odex subpage to show his/her discontent at Odex’s action, and to show that paying customers aren’t to be taken lightly.

_{WeHateThem.com} is a place for people to come together and share their opinions on organizations around the world. People who disapprove of organizations post their reasons while others vote on whether the reasons are valid or not. We provide an array of tools for people to share, rate and discuss about organizations around the world.

In my opinion, this is like a better version of the Odexsucks petition page, even if it is in beta.
Show your disapproval of Odex, and tell people of the amount you would have spent on the beloved anime series of your choice if not for Odex’s actions.

Before I give the link to the Odex page, please take note of some essential points.

Odex is aiming for overseas anime downloaders.

The earlier incident of an United States citizen getting an e-mail from Odex wasn’t a coincidence.

Warning E-mails to downloaders in the U.S from Odex

Odex is now sending warning e-mails to people in the U.S, from this thread on AnimeonDVD.

Paranoia is not unwarranted?

The e-mails are sent from a [company]@copyright-compliance.com domain, which, from the Whois Information(publicly accessible information), is a domain registered by BayTSP Inc.

If you reply, you’re probably an idiot, because Odex just wants your information. Sending e-mails through your ISP without knowing infringer details sounds good and all, but when you reply to the e-mail and NRIC you’ve already fallen into the trap.

It should be a rather enjoyable week for the anti-Odex crowd, because Singapore laws don’t stick in the US, and this just proves to be one more shot to the foot, from another continent.

Odex Website, again

I know I really should be getting to work on the Character Introduction for zenime, but I find myself helplessly attracted to the train crash that is the Odex website.

They updated with a few things, and their idea of the “community” being nothing more than a show for the Japanese representative is further reinforced.

Odex Saga on Get Real – Channel News Asia Programme

In my earlier post, I pushed out a request for Odexed people, as a TV director had contacted Xedo Defense to get some Odexed people to be interviewed on the Odex Saga.

The interview has already gotten the amount of needed Odexed people, so the recruitment(of sorts) is over.

At the same time, Zer0 also got an invitation e-mail to participate in a Get Real! interview on the Odex saga,

More shots of Odex’s Haruhi Part Two.

I don’t know, but Haruhi is someone that definitely has something to do with Odex.

Again, image-centric post with more comparison of Odex vs. A.F.K subs. You know the drill, Odex on top, A.F.K at the bottom. Or you could say, bad quality pics of Odex on top and and high quality screencaps of subs below.

Odex’s eNets payment apparently doesn’t exist!

Another bullet to Odex’s foot from its own staff that shows how utterly clueless even in their meagre office space Odex is.

It is very sad.