The state of anime, are we doomed?

[Shyne]

There are so many posts toskim through so I am going to just add my 2 cents here. In the second half of the 1990's everything thought that rock music was dead/dieing. A lot of the same points raised about anime can be used for this point in rock music. Just hear me out. From about 1996-1998 rock pretty much failed big time. Popular styles of rock was no longer popular and people looked elsewhere in the music industry, but soon rock music became stronger and new styles came to the forefront. What I am trying to say is that everything goes through ups and downs. Something new is bound to come that will peak the interst. Not every series is for everyone. If everyone liked the same thing then this world would be pretty boring. I have seen and I am a fan of some series' that are on opposite ends on the spectrem. This was just a mini rant aimed at no one n.n

[SeijiSensei]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

So... that might be why some animes don't hit it big. Series length and production values.

While every distributor hopes to pick up the next Pokemon, Naruto, or DBZ and ride the franchise into the sunset, there are still many shows in the 12-26 episode category that get licensed each year. There are also many shows with excellent production values, Dennou Coil being one, that never get licensed.

I think the primary answer to my question is the expected audience for anime sales in R1. By and large sex and violence sells better than drama, especially when a large segment of the audience consists of 12-30 year-old males. (Women, I'd argue, are much better served by manga licensors than by anime licensors.) Breaking out of this niche has proven very difficult for years now as demonstrated by the consignment of anime to [adult swim] or SyFy. We can argue about why anime has failed to establish a wider foothold in the R1 entertainment industry, but I see no evidence that it will become more widely appreciated or more available here in the future. If anything, I expect anime will occupy an even smaller niche in the years ahead.

I would love to be able to point my adult friends to places where they could watch shows like Bartender legally. Crunchyroll has flirted with a more adult market with licenses like Ristorante Paradiso, Eve no Jikan or Durarara, and has carried a few family shows like Chi or Erin. Still they're much more likely to license a show like Chu-Bra than something like Aoi Bungaku or even Tokyo Magnitude 8.0.

[Kaioshin Sama]

Originally Posted by Vexx

I have a hard time taking *anything* that comes out of 2ch as referential or indicative of the overall population of fans. Its amazing how a vocal minority can horribly distort one's view of the larger group.

Yes, I think it's important to keep in mind that Type B probably includes a large part of the group that will buy multiple copies of the same product, which then get turned into generic quantative statistics so that it ends up looking like they make up the majority of anime fans.

Also am I the only one that is getting a stock market vibe from this whole trend of doing something like buying 30 tickets to a single movie all for personal use cause that's seriously what it's starting to feel like. The people don't necessarily need these extra items, but in purchasing multiple copies it's like they are purchasing a share in getting to decide trends in anime and ensuring that they get to see more of their favourite tropes in the future. That is their dividend.

[0utf0xZer0]

Originally Posted by DragoonKain3

I personally raise a few eyebrows at what I hear from 2ch (just like I do from stuff originating from 4ch), but I find 2ch's remakrs plausible enough. Sure, not everyone is on the extreme ends of the type A vs type B spectrum, just like few people are on the extreme ends of the gameplay vs story spectrum over at the games thread, but even in this thread I can see whether a particular poster leans more towards A or B. Even I personally don't neatly fit in type A or B, but I do admit I lean more towards B quite heavily if my Aboslute Moe Property is present, and type A if not (which usually isn't the case since my AMP is quite common).

But even as a theory, it does explains some things. For example, KimiKiss anime was a fail commercially because it catered to type A people, when the games (dating sims) pretty much catered to type B people. And in the process of turning it into a type A anime, it changes minor things in the characters that really irked the fans of the original game (again evidence apart from Kannagi and Good Ending that one shouldn't stray too far from the tropes), despite how masterful that story was weaved, alienating a good portion of the fanbase.

Like I said, the problem I have with the Kannagi example is that the first DVD came out shortly after the incident and proceeded to outsell every other TV anime release that year except Geass, Macross, Gundam, and Clannad. I'm sure it's possible they lost sales, but it's also clear to me a lot of people simply didn't care.

As for Kimikiss, one of the arguments I hear for why the anime flopped is that it went for a multithreaded rather than harem approach to the story. Which to me begs the question of why fans of EF: A Tale of Memories accepted that anime's multithreaded approach. After all, EF averaged more than twice as many units per volume. Is it just that in Kimikiss' case it was a change from the game, whereas EF's game was multithreaded to begin with?

I guess the other problem I have with the Type A/Type B distinction is that there's a question of who is making the distinction. I'm part of two anime clubs, and I've seen distinctions like this used to try and enforce a sort of social hierarchy within one of them. In my experience, it's certain Type As who seem to be the ones deciding who falls into which category, and the distinction usually seems to be whether you happen to like what they classify as "Type B" shows. Whether you also like "Type A" shows is irrelevant - most of those relegated to "Type B" on the hierarchy factor a lot more than just "I like/dislike the characters" into their opinions.

So yeah... basically, when I hear about a distinction like this, one of my questions is "who is trying to distinguish themselves with it?".

Originally Posted by Triple_R

To the uninitiated, over-the-top shots like that (and like the Bakemonogatari scene you reference) can come across as trying too hard. Or, like myself, it can disengage them from the story by hitting them over the head with the 4th-wall breaking realization that this is there to try to pander to the viewer.

One of the wonderful aspects of the Miyazaki films is that you can truly get completely immersed within their stories, just like you would from reading a good book or novel. Part of the reason is that there's nothing there that jarringly reminds you of anything outside of the story itself, like a sales pitch in the form of a pandering shot.

You and I might ultimately disagree on this, 0utf0xZer0, but surely you see where I'm coming from, don't you?

I'd be more inclined to agree if we weren't discussing a Shaft show. Making weird, jarring depictions of just about everything is pretty much the defining point of the Shaft brand.

I also hold the problem with the nosebleed gag is the exagerration, not the trope itself. The trope itself is just a Japanese old wives' tale about what happens when you get aroused.

Originally Posted by SeijiSensei

While every distributor hopes to pick up the next Pokemon, Naruto, or DBZ and ride the franchise into the sunset, there are still many shows in the 12-26 episode category that get licensed each year. There are also many shows with excellent production values, Dennou Coil being one, that never get licensed.

I think the primary answer to my question is the expected audience for anime sales in R1. By and large sex and violence sells better than drama, especially when a large segment of the audience consists of 12-30 year-old males. (Women, I'd argue, are much better served by manga licensors than by anime licensors.) Breaking out of this niche has proven very difficult for years now as demonstrated by the consignment of anime to [adult swim] or SyFy. We can argue about why anime has failed to establish a wider foothold in the R1 entertainment industry, but I see no evidence that it will become more widely appreciated or more available here in the future. If anything, I expect anime will occupy an even smaller niche in the years ahead.

This is more or less what I've been thinking for a while, actually: anime's problem isn't so much content as image. If there's one thing harder than marketing drama to your typical action junkie western anime fan, it's marketing drama anime to people who perceive anime as "sex, violence, and weirdness" and whom aren't fans. A few shows per year that fit non-otaku tastes doesn't mean much when the non-otaku audience doesn't even know they exist.

[bayoab]

Originally Posted by Ash Falls Town

But the one thing that's the same among all fansub watchers is that none of them are directly responsible for the content of any anime*. So since the OP thinks that anime is doomed because of the addition of
this isn't a fansub argument.

The argument I was making was variation of the first sentence of your quote here, not a fansub one.

Originally Posted by Ash Falls Town

My post wasn't anti-fansub at all. I'm just saying that whether people watch or don't watch fansubs isn't going to increase or decrease the amount of fanservice or otaku culture present in anime series.

Actually, if more people actually watched and/or paid for the legal streams, the west would actually have some say. If Japan saw that there was money to be made, they would do it. There have been a number of series which have been made because there was demand in the West for them. It won't change the amount of otaku-aimed titles though because that is where the money is right now in Japan.

Originally Posted by Triple_R

This can then determine if there's enough positive fan feedback out there to warrant exporting DVDs of the anime to foreign markets with a professional sub job.

Japan has no clue on how to read the foreign markets correctly. They have tried multiple times and failed. The one thing that they do understand is "This licensor wants more of this."

Note: American companies have learned that internet fan feedback is next to worthless. The number of titles that were popular on the net and respectively flopped sales wise is either surprising or unsurprising depending on your view of the market.

And let me tell you this right now too... if fansubbing had never existed for foreign language markets, anime DVD sales in those markets would have been much, much worse over the past 20 years.

Which has nothing to do with ~2008+ which is what my post was about.

[animeboy12]

Personally I've always been pessimetic about anime ever becoming mainstream for a foreign makert ala r1 region, it's certianly possibly but unlikely at this point because even if you were to say, whitewash anime of it's questionably sexual content, convience poeple that it's not all blood, violence, and sex, and convience people that animantion in general isn't just for kids, you'd still have to overcome that fact that anime is made for people of a different culture.

It's like wanting bollywood movies or Chinese movies to do well here as well. Oh sure there's going that one movie that gets right and is a huge financial success domestic and in the foreign market but for a huge portion of the stuff even if it does follow the formula of that big hit was just won't have the luck. So as long as it's made by the Japanese for the Japanese, this the position anime's going to take, international at least.

[npcomplete]

Originally Posted by SeijiSensei

While every distributor hopes to pick up the next Pokemon, Naruto, or DBZ and ride the franchise into the sunset, there are still many shows in the 12-26 episode category that get licensed each year. There are also many shows with excellent production values, Dennou Coil being one, that never get licensed.

I think the primary answer to my question is the expected audience for anime sales in R1. By and large sex and violence sells better than drama, especially when a large segment of the audience consists of 12-30 year-old males. (Women, I'd argue, are much better served by manga licensors than by anime licensors.) Breaking out of this niche has proven very difficult for years now as demonstrated by the consignment of anime to [adult swim] or SyFy. We can argue about why anime has failed to establish a wider foothold in the R1 entertainment industry, but I see no evidence that it will become more widely appreciated or more available here in the future. If anything, I expect anime will occupy an even smaller niche in the years ahead.

I would love to be able to point my adult friends to places where they could watch shows like Bartender legally. Crunchyroll has flirted with a more adult market with licenses like Ristorante Paradiso, Eve no Jikan or Durarara, and has carried a few family shows like Chi or Erin. Still they're much more likely to license a show like Chu-Bra than something like Aoi Bungaku or even Tokyo Magnitude 8.0.

They seem to have a pretty good size audience for shoujo though with neo-ADV picking up those titles for DVD recently. And judging from the variety of stuff they have (I didn't even know they have Cencoroll, Tortov Roddle, Moegaku5, etc), including older titles, it doesn't seem like they're that picky...

Have you seen this and this from Quarkboy btw? See the noitamA and Darker Than Black 2 discussion

Spoiler for *short* excerpt:

The industry’s opinion is split heavily. There are old school companies that basically refuse to sell streaming rights separately from DVD rights. There are people who think streaming is the future… But it takes a lot of people all agreeing to make it really happen (google “nemawashi”). Anime is made by production committees, and if only one member of the committee has a serious objection, simulcasts can be tricky to arrange. Crunchyroll has done everyone a great service whether you respect them or not. They have proven that a website that only streams anime can make Japan money. CR’s streaming of Naruto Shippuden has made Japan a serious chunk of money. A show like Time of Eve which normally would make absolutely nothing in the west has been extremely successful. This proven success record is immensely helpful in changing the mindsets of the Japanese companies. CR has proven the theory that making money is possible. Of course, then there’s the issue of profitability… But as long as the Japanese get their cut that can come later.


Lately it’s whatever they can get for cheap. DVD sales are so low it’s scary. Crunchyroll tries to get anything and everything that it thinks will not lose it money. Some things they get DO lose money. But that’s the way the game is played… Especially with simulcasts you have to predict how a show will be before episode 1 is even finished, and it might turn out to be a real dud. Here’s the sad truth: Anything too “otaku” will sell like a brick outside of a core group of fans that number in the low thousands. If the Japanese won’t sell it for cheap, then it’s not worth it to even license. I think Toradora is one of the best shows in a long time but I don’t think it’ll be licensed anytime soon. It just wouldn’t sell on DVD anymore. It’s a VERY difficult time for licensing anything. Risky, low margins, low sales, and low expectations. One can only hope this year will be the bottom of the market and things will pick up again later.


Sam: CR’s business model is a hybrid subscription/ad-based revenue share. Let’s take the subscriber part first. All that money goes into a pot. The total number of minutes spent watching each show by subscribers is calculated. So “Naruto 312 has a total of 123456 subscriber minutes in Q2″ or whatever and the pot of money is split up to the various different Japanese companies in proportion. Then CR takes it’s cut (which varies with each contract, obviously) and the Japanese get the rest. The ad-based model is more usual: Total ad revenue is reported to CR by the ad-serving company for each video… It’s added up and split up based on the ad-based revenue split (which is often different than the subscriber one).
Jaka: I see.
Sam: The good news with this is that people who subscribe and like, JUST watch Naruto can be happy knowing that all their money ends up going to the people that make Naruto.


Jaka: I see. Back to noitaminA, do you think CR will ever get licenses for that slot?
Sam: CR could get Nodame 3, but it turns out animax owns worldwide rights to season 1 and won’t sell them cheap so Nodame is in licensing hell. Never gonna happen.
Jaka: Any future shows?
Sam: Always possible. The people who do noitaminA basically don’t want to sell their stuff unless it’s for a “worthwhile” price and so far the western market hasn’t reached that level for most of the noitaminA stuff.
Jaka: Yeah. Afaik, CR is made up of mainly casual anime viewers and the stuff that’s aired on noitaminA is way beyond the scope of “casual”. See: Trapeze.
Sam: Sure, but they’ll try and get anything that could grow their userbase.
Jaka: I see.
Sam: Here’s a tidbit for you: Baka to Test wasn’t simuled because of Vampire Bund.
Jaka: How come?
Sam: Someone expressed interest in the vampire show (shocking! I know) and MediaFactory thinks it could force them to bundle Baka with it so they don’t want to give it up to CR for cheap.


Jaka: So, just wondering, DTB S2 was a huge hit last season. Did CR try to acquire it?
Sam: Sure they did, and they were quoted a price that included DVD rights and told, “Well this is what funi will pay us for it. Can you do better?” And the answer is of course, no.
Jaka: So this comes all the way back to the bundle-talk.
Sam: Oh sure, Crunchyroll could make them a lot more money _from streaming_ than funi could, but splitting up the license is not in the cards.


Sam: To make matters even more complicated, sometimes it’s different companies that control the Asian rights than the Europeans ones. In fact, it’s most of the time. Some TV stations like TV Tokyo have whole divisions like Medianet designed to deal with international licensing. Fuji TV too. But TV Asahi or Tokyo MX do not. You want to license anime, be prepared to study the landscape. It’s complicated. Actually that would be awesome, “gg licenses upcoming K-on season 2″.


Sam: Well, I can speak in general terms. Most licensing contracts of any sort have 2 components. A “minimum guarantee” which is the minimum amount of money the Japanese will get, usually paid in advance or in installments and then a revenue share percentage which is split up for anything over the MG that the show makes. Anyway listen to the ANN podcast with the ex-Geneon guy. He gives all kinds of numbers for MGs for back in the heydey of licensing.
Jaka: How many times more?
Sam: In today’s world MGs for streaming only are from 0-$1500 an episode for anything mid to low level. According go the Geneon guy, he was giving numbers like $10,000 an episode. Or more because they were even investing in the show. How much Funi pays for DVD licenses these days is a great question I’d like to know some numbers for myself.

Originally Posted by animeboy12

Personally I've always been pessimetic about anime ever becoming mainstream for a foreign makert ala r1 region, it's certianly possibly but unlikely at this point because even if you were to say, whitewash anime of it's questionably sexual content, convience poeple that it's not all blood, violence, and sex, and convience people that animantion in general isn't just for kids, you'd still have to overcome that fact that anime is made for people of a different culture.

It's like wanting bollywood movies or Chinese movies to do well here as well. Oh sure there's going that one movie that gets right and is a huge financial success domestic and in the foreign market but for a huge portion of the stuff even if it does follow the formula of that big hit was just won't have the luck. So as long as it's made by the Japanese for the Japanese, this the position anime's going to take, international at least.

Well.... there is this: Anime Culture Mentioned on 4 U.S. TV Shows This Week
...

I say it'll still grow, but over the generations as anime becomes more popular with young people worldwide. It may not ever become as mainstream as primetime TV but it's popular probably because it doesn't try to cater so much to the mainstream. I liken it to niche music: the kind you don't hear much on the radio--or more in some regions and less in others (e.g. dance/electronic music - almost none in most of the US, but more on EU radio), but still has a sizeable audience with a lot still being produced.

That also reminds me a bit of the CLAMP Appreciation Fanbook, which was sent also to CLAMP. (physical book pics and free pdf here)
The responses from the ladies at CLAMP here and here seem to show how surprised they were at the popularity of their material worldwide.

[roriconfan]

Oh well, at least anime can brag how they still show a lot more nude, sex and violence than cartoons.
Or have a decent story, if they try.
Without throwing moral messages at your face.

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by bayoab

Which has nothing to do with ~2008+ which is what my post was about.

It certainly does have a lot to do with ~2008+

Like it or not, bayoab, fansubbing was a huge help in growing the foreign fanbase for anime. Anime would be in far worse shape right now if not for the impact of fansubs over the years. These fansubbers deserve loads of credit for what they've done to help anime.

And if all fansubbing was to cease tomorrow, the anime fandom would reduce quite a bit in size, I'd say.

Fansubs are still the only way to view many animes in many regions in a timely fashion (i.e. within a few days of their initial airing in Japan).

[Sorrow-K]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

It certainly does have a lot to do with ~2008+

Like it or not, bayoab, fansubbing was a huge help in growing the foreign fanbase for anime. Anime would be in far worse shape right now if not for the impact of fansubs over the years. These fansubbers deserve loads of credit for what they've done to help anime.

And if all fansubbing was to cease tomorrow, the anime fandom would reduce quite a bit in size, I'd say.

Fansubs are still the only way to view many animes in many regions in a timely fashion (i.e. within a few days of their initial airing in Japan).

Yes, and all we need to do now if figure out how to get people who watch fansubs to buy DVDs and watch legit streams. (And yes, I realize I'm being a gigantic hypocrite here, but I'm trying to reform my ways).

[Dextro]

Originally Posted by Sorrow-K

Yes, and all we need to do know if figure out how to get people who watch fansubs to buy DVDs and watch legit streams. (And yes, I realize I'm being a gigantic hypocrite here, but I'm trying to reform my ways).

Simple: get me quality subs in my streams.

Oh and right: drop the freakin region blocks that don't allow me to view most of the frakin streams!

[Xion Valkyrie]

Well, you have to remember a lot of markets are in recession right now. Not to mention a lot of companies are experimenting with the whole 'online' delivery approach.

[roriconfan]

Streaming kill sales. No reason to buy or dl a series if you can watch it any time you like on the net. Heck, it doesn't even take up space or memory (other than RAM).

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by Sorrow-K

Yes, and all we need to do know if figure out how to get people who watch fansubs to buy DVDs and watch legit streams. (And yes, I realize I'm being a gigantic hypocrite here, but I'm trying to reform my ways).

Many people watch fansubs and buy DVDs.


I know someone who watched english subbed Nanoha before it was dubbed, and then bought the Nanoha Season 1 English dub DVD after it was released as an English dub DVD.

He would not have bought the Nanoha Season 1 DVD if not for having come to like the series through watching it via fansubs.

What's wrong with watching fansubs if the people who do so go on to buy the animes that they like?


Honestly... expecting people to spend $50 or more blindly; just picking up a random anime DVD based on the DVD cover artwork and hope it turns out to be good... I mean, that's crazy. Only extremely well-to-do anime fans with money to burn are likely to do this to any significant degree.

People want to sample the product before putting significant money down on it. This is why there are free demo versions of many a PC game.


As for legit streams... there are issues with these too. Region coding being one in some places. And, IIRC, not all animes are covered by legit streams.

[Sorrow-K]

@Triple_R

Hell yeah, people watch fansubs. Nothing wrong with that of itself (well, other than the fact that it's stealing, but that's a triviality). The big challenge is then to get people who watch the fansub (and decide from that viewing that they like the anime) to then buy DVDs. You'll never get everyone to do that, and trying to do so is a ridiculous strategy (as is punishing the fanbase). But companies need to figure out how they can encourage more people to watch anime through legal means and then transform that into sales. Online streaming is a good start, although it has its own problems it needs to figure out (region blocking, lesser quality, etc).

I don't pretend to have the answers. Fansubs are still far and away that best "try before you buy" method for anime available by a long shot. It's up to companies to figure out how exactly to encourage people to buy a product in lieu of the existence of fansubs, which will never disappear completely. Attitudes like the one quoted in this article are not helpful.

[Kaioshin Sama]

Originally Posted by Sorrow-K

@Triple_R

Hell yeah, people watch fansubs. Nothing wrong with that of itself (well, other than the fact that it's stealing, but that's a triviality). The big challenge is then to get people who watch the fansub (and decide from that viewing that they like the anime) to then buy DVDs. You'll never get everyone to do that, and trying to do so is a ridiculous strategy (as is punishing the fanbase). But companies need to figure out how they can encourage more people to watch anime through legal means and then transform that into sales. Online streaming is a good start, although it has its own problems it needs to figure out (region blocking, lesser quality, etc).

I don't pretend to have the answers. Fansubs are still far and away that best "try before you buy" method for anime available by a long shot. It's up to companies to figure out how exactly to encourage people to buy a product in lieu of the existence of fansubs, which will never disappear completely. Attitudes like the one quoted in this article are not helpful.

I don't think there is an answer. Technology and convenience has made it equally as convenient to download fansubs as it is to buy DVDs or Blu-Rays. Look at it this way, I can download a file right now off of this website in 10 minutes (far less time then it would take to go to the store and purchase a DVD or Blu-Ray), plug a wire into my router, move one room over, flip on my Xbox 360 and watch it on my TV just the same as if I had put a DVD or Blu-Ray into a player and flipped it on. The fact that we now have 1080p Blu-Ray rip files as well removes the quality issue from the equation as well so what else is there?

[Sorrow-K]

Originally Posted by Kaioshin Sama

I don't think there is an answer. Technology and convenience has made it equally as convenient to download fansubs as it is to buy DVDs or Blu-Rays. Look at it this way, I can download a file right now off of this website in 10 minutes (far less time then it would take to go to the store and purchase a DVD or Blu-Ray), plug a wire into my router, move one room over, flip on my Xbox 360 and watch it on my TV just the same as if I had put a DVD or Blu-Ray into a player and flipped it on. The fact that we now have 1080p Blu-Ray rip files as well removes the quality issue from the equation as well so what else is there?

*Shrug* Attitudes? People have these things in Japan too, but overall sales from disc media (especially BD) are up this last year over there. Otaku seem to get by with the "prove your love through what you spend" attitude. I guess fans just aren't fanatical enough in the west for the same attitude to take traction...

Don't know the answer. Wish I did...

BUY SPICE AND WOLF DVDS!

Did that work?

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by Kaioshin Sama

I don't think there is an answer. Technology and convenience has made it equally as convenient to download fansubs as it is to buy DVDs or Blu-Rays. Look at it this way, I can download a file right now off of this website in 10 minutes (far less time then it would take to go to the store and purchase a DVD or Blu-Ray), plug a wire into my router, move one room over, flip on my Xbox 360 and watch it on my TV just the same as if I had put a DVD or Blu-Ray into a player and flipped it on. The fact that we now have 1080p Blu-Ray rip files as well removes the quality issue from the equation as well so what else is there?

This is why the DVD extras are key, I think.

To get people to buy the DVDs, it has to feel like you're buying a valuable collectible, and that it's coming with some added value beyond episode content alone.

Some of the DVDs for 80s North American cartoons had extras like long commentary tracks and specialized art cards.

Maybe something like that could help? *Shrug*

[0utf0xZer0]

Originally Posted by Sorrow-K

*Shrug* Attitudes? People have these things in Japan too, but overall sales from disc media (especially BD) are up this last year over there. Otaku seem to get by with the "prove your love through what you spend" attitude. I guess fans just aren't fanatical enough in the west for the same attitude to take traction...

Don't know the answer. Wish I did...

BUY SPICE AND WOLF DVDS!

Did that work?

Already own it on R1 and buying stuff I like in R2 is prohibitively expensive. Which is kind of sad since a number of the shows I like aren't the kind of thing you tend to see in R1.

[Nosauz]

Originally Posted by roriconfan

Streaming kill sales. No reason to buy or dl a series if you can watch it any time you like on the net. Heck, it doesn't even take up space or memory (other than RAM).

It's called quality, and if most isps have it their way, i'll see how much of the hd video your gonna stream on a 30gb per month line, with a surcharge of 2 dollars per gig extra you go over.