In light of Tokyopop’s cutback news yesterday, including 39 layoffs (about 1/3 of the employees based on recent numbers), the effects of this news is already being felt. The forum reps for BLU manga responded to questions about if their parent company’s changes would affect them and it seems that’s already the case. One of the two site reps has been laid off (known on forums as Midorihebi) and Shonen-Ai-Samurai, one of BLU’s editors has this to say:
“This is a very unfortunate situation for us all and I’m close to tears right now just thinking about how I won’t have Midorihebi here to help me out any more. She’s done an awesome job the last 6 months or so checking the BLU emails and always being there to support BLU. She was so looking forward to representing us at Yaoi-Jam but those plans have been canceled now and Yaoi-con plans are also up in the air. Times are very tough right now and with problems in the bookstore industry, we’re facing a lot of challenges. I don’t know exactly how things will end up right now but I would expect some changes in the BLU release calender. Hopefully the changes will be minimal. We have had a lot of success selling our books on Amazon so I want to thank you all who support us even when you can’t find the books in stores.”
No doubt we’ll be hearing more news like this in the near future as the anxious wait to hear who’s cut: both employees and series.
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A Tpop employee actually commented on my blog to say that none of them were given any prior notice, either. It's all very SUCK. :/
That said, can I borrow the pic you used? It's way cleverer than anything I could put ogether right now. @_@ I'll be crediting you for the link either way.
[…] (Via Kuri.) […]
@gia: Sure, you can use the image. And it does indeed sound like a whole lot of suck. Very inconsiderate. You'd think with how long even the consumers felt something was up, that Tokyopop higher-ups would've known soon enough to warn their employees of layoffs.
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