Well, I definitely agree with you on the morality of the whole thing, and I won’t make excuses to justify my continuing to DL anime off torrent. My cousin is struggling to start out as a recording artist and understands how much work goes into putting anything out in the entertainment industry, and how piracy makes most of that work go to waste, and the same goes for anime and the people who sweat and bleed to get it out.

However, I have one major problem with buying anime legally, especially in my country, the Philippines. You just can’t. At least not the recent, teen-oriented ones. Most of the anime I’ve seen in stores are either movies (such as Spirited Away, and even seeing Miyazaki films in stores are pretty rare), or shows intended for children (Pokemon, Bakugan, etc.). The only other mainstream anime you see distributed legally are those who’ve had incarnations in the local TV channels (such as Yuu Yuu Hakushou or Ragnarok the Animation), and a lot of those shows are at least half a decade old. Long story short, none of the shows I’ve downloaded can even be seen in the shelf of a video store.

One possible reason has been stated ad nauseum in the comments: the pricing. The Philippines is a developing country, so mass importing would put a heavy strain on distributors. In addition, most of my countrymen can barely eat three times a day, let alone trot over to a mall to buy an original DVD (or even a VCD). The lack of a target market for anime, coupled with the price, would naturally dissuade most distributors in the Philippines.

Granted, we do have dubs, and some of them are pretty decent. But if you flip on over to the channels that provide dubbed anime, you will notice that there are only around 6 voice actors for 6 different shows. That’s the same set of voices for each show. Not exactly pleasant to listen to.

In sum, it’s easy for anyone to say that piracy is a crime, or that the anime industry is dying because people are acquiring their anime illegally, especially if you live in a highly industrialized and economically well-off (by developing standards) country. But try living in our country, and you’ll see precisely why people choose to download or buy pirated DVDs.