JManga Fails.
http://www.jmanga.com/urgent-message
http://www.animenewsnetwork.co.uk/news/2013-03-14/manga-reading-site-jmanga-to-end-service-in-may
The Good: JManga was an honest attempt to bring manga into the digital medium, they offered different types of titles and genres, including yuri stories that otherwise would never saw the light of day.
The Bad: Trying to implement a bad/outmoded business model into the digital medium, the model may have worked if we still lived in an analog world, but this is the internet/digital age. Restrictions to digital content, not to mention unable to view such content unless it is from their site is not exactly logical, that would be like renting a video tape AND forced to use their in house VHS just to restrict pirating (also, paying for the rent of the VHS system, ridiculous).
The Ugly: When a publishing house goes out of business, are you legally obligated to return their books that you bought from them without any refunds? Of course not, but when a legal digital manga site that promises to give you access to manga by charging you a monthly subscription fee, on top of that the fee of BUYING the digital manga, you are expected at least to have a sense of ownership of the purchased good. Unfortunately, you couldnt download the digital manga, all you could do was have access to it as long as your monthly subscription was ok. Let me say it again, you are paying for the purchase of the manga, and a monthly subscription to have access to the site so you could view it. It wouldnt be so bad if it wasnt for the fact that once they go out of business all their digital content is just going to be erased. That's right, the manga you bought is not really yours, its deleted once its over. In fact, you werent buying anything at all, you were paying for the access of the content and the rental to view it. You were buying the privilege of being able to read manga from their site, but you were not really allowed to own it. But the problem doesnt end just there, they were selling manga at the price of the equivalent of physical mangas made from dead trees. Publishers and printers need to charge the sale of their goods to keep overhead, but this is digital, the cost should be different! Anyone who bought music from iTunes would know the songs are not sold to the equivalent of manufacturing and distribution of physical music CDs. Their business model was doomed to fail. The real problem would be that in the future if someone decides to bring legal digital manga into the market, there will be challenges. First, they will have to deal with a better business model, second, because of what JManga did to the consumer, there is going to be skeptics from a consumers' point of view regarding the ownership of digital content, cost of purchase, and a guarantee that the content wont just get deleted once you buy it from them no matter the reasons.
http://www.animenewsnetwork.co.uk/news/2013-03-14/manga-reading-site-jmanga-to-end-service-in-may
The Good: JManga was an honest attempt to bring manga into the digital medium, they offered different types of titles and genres, including yuri stories that otherwise would never saw the light of day.
The Bad: Trying to implement a bad/outmoded business model into the digital medium, the model may have worked if we still lived in an analog world, but this is the internet/digital age. Restrictions to digital content, not to mention unable to view such content unless it is from their site is not exactly logical, that would be like renting a video tape AND forced to use their in house VHS just to restrict pirating (also, paying for the rent of the VHS system, ridiculous).
The Ugly: When a publishing house goes out of business, are you legally obligated to return their books that you bought from them without any refunds? Of course not, but when a legal digital manga site that promises to give you access to manga by charging you a monthly subscription fee, on top of that the fee of BUYING the digital manga, you are expected at least to have a sense of ownership of the purchased good. Unfortunately, you couldnt download the digital manga, all you could do was have access to it as long as your monthly subscription was ok. Let me say it again, you are paying for the purchase of the manga, and a monthly subscription to have access to the site so you could view it. It wouldnt be so bad if it wasnt for the fact that once they go out of business all their digital content is just going to be erased. That's right, the manga you bought is not really yours, its deleted once its over. In fact, you werent buying anything at all, you were paying for the access of the content and the rental to view it. You were buying the privilege of being able to read manga from their site, but you were not really allowed to own it. But the problem doesnt end just there, they were selling manga at the price of the equivalent of physical mangas made from dead trees. Publishers and printers need to charge the sale of their goods to keep overhead, but this is digital, the cost should be different! Anyone who bought music from iTunes would know the songs are not sold to the equivalent of manufacturing and distribution of physical music CDs. Their business model was doomed to fail. The real problem would be that in the future if someone decides to bring legal digital manga into the market, there will be challenges. First, they will have to deal with a better business model, second, because of what JManga did to the consumer, there is going to be skeptics from a consumers' point of view regarding the ownership of digital content, cost of purchase, and a guarantee that the content wont just get deleted once you buy it from them no matter the reasons.