I am a hobby light novelist, who likes to scan the web looking for people like myself who has some great ideas and loves to throw them down on paper for others to read and critique. But their isn't much of a community for us. Or for the people who create manga, or even anime outside of japan besides for a few scattered sites here and there. And those sites are not even their for the posting of such things. A few examples of this are 2g5eh

Baka-Tsuki-is for hosting Japanese light novels and other asian manga style literary works.
Dievantart- Although allows the posting of literarture is mostly an artisan website.

To my knowledge I have not found a website that hosts ameture manga or anime made out side of japan.

So...

What I am proposing, is a dedicated website to people around the world who make their own light novels, mangas, anime, or even visual novels. To be able to meet, communicate ideas and even work on projects together. I am in the process of building this website. But I want feed back on what anyone might think about this radical idea.

Has it been done before?
Is it too ambitious?
Is it just too crazy to be feaseble?
Should I just stop and wait for someone else to do it?
Please tell me what you think about this idea

Do it if you want, I suspect no one else will bother, though there have been a number of failed light novel projects over the years. There's a reason that you don't see anything like what you're describing, though- it's not creating amateur manga or anime, it's creating comics and cartoons, and the distinction is important.

Marketing is everything. The English speaking world has light novels, we just use the young adult label instead. Only hardcore self-style western otaku will even be vaguely interested otherwise. Even then, though, I think it's worth noting that a large number will revile you. Every online discussion that ensues after a person outside of Japan wants to call something they made "manga" inevitably ends badly. Anyone outside of Japan, producing something that isn't for Japanese consumers, is really a "cartoonist," and labeling yourself as anything else tends to cause large numbers of people to write you off entirely as some sort of weeaboo. I'm being a bit vaguer than I'd like here, forgive me, but I think the central point is rather clear.

So, if you do this, expect to be trolled heavily.

If I were you, I'd just a writer's group that specializes in young adult works or a group of cartoonists that happen to enjoy manga. It's a better use of time.

[img]http://i604.photobucket.com/albums/tt122/Wthuh/CrenshiSig.jpg[/img]
Reviews of my Work:
You are kind of boring - Blackorion
Congratulations! Ur an asshole! - tokyo_homi
**Your awesome!!! **- Cherelle_Ashley
NightSwan also said that she wanted to peg me, once, but I'm not sure whether to take that as a compliment or a threat...

I dunno...Baka-Tsuki does host one original light novel, don't they? Maybe more. I haven't checked there in a while.

Aside from that, tons of amateur fiction writers use sites like fictionpress.net. As you said, deviantart also allows writing, and other people use sites like livejournal as well. I can't claim to know all the websites, or even name the most popular one, but there are quite a few. Some authors manage ways to accompany their writing with pictures, as well.

As for manga, when it's ed on the web it usually takes the name of webcomic. There are some great host sites for webcomics, like smackjeeves.com and drunkduck.com. There are also sites that host their own comics, like Drow Tales (they even refer to their comic as manga).

As for anime, I wasn't aware there was any sizable base of amateur anime makers. I know a lot of unprofessional (and even professional!) animators put their stuff on newgrounds.com, or YouTube. But if you can locate a large enough group of people aspiring specifically to make anime-style cartoon series...then I think that would be a site you'd have to create. The others sort of already exist.

And since they're all such different media, I don't really see a need to combine them all into one website. Writers at a place like Fictionpress have a solid community to work with, with lots of readers and betas. Smackjeeves also has a strong community, though I don't know the ins and outs of it. The idea of combining aspects of those two sites is nice, but being a baby website it would lack the community, which is the entire point of making it. The people you'd want using your site have likely already ed communities that were built elsewhere. It'd be tough to get people to use your site, especially if you're doing it on your own. Those sites have multiple people managing them, and can better cater to their s.

I have checked into the sites you have mentioned and they all do have a small portion of their site dedicated toward manga and light novel lovers like myself. But unlike the idea I have, that is not the focus of their website. In a way its like a subsection rather than an actual section of their site with the majority of the their site catering toward western style novels.

The over all plan for my site is to be exclusively for the creation, developing, and production of manga, anime,etc rather than just incorporate it as just a section.

The reason I'm combining all of the medias together is because anime is usually derived from manga, light novels, and visual novels. So for an aspiring anime producer, It might be intresting to turn an ametuer manga, or light novel into an anime to host onto youtube or such. And having them on one site would make for easier flow of information rather than jumping from site to site to share ideas and info.

Hmm. Well in that case, I suppose I understand what you're trying to do. I just don't much see the difference between light novels and standard Western novels. Or for that matter, web-hosted manga and webcomics. For the latter, I guess it's a stylistic thing. But if art communities were segregated based on the style they use to draw...I just don't quite get the appeal. Besides, there are tons of different styles used by mangaka, which often overlap with those of Western cartoonists. Where would you draw the line?

I can't speak from personal experience, but I don't think an aspiring anime producer would limit themselves to manga-style comics, or novels that themselves with the word "light" in front of it. A good story's a good story no matter what it's called, yeah? For example, if I were an animator aspiring to make a series based on a webcomic, I'd probably be torn between doing Drow Tales (which calls itself manga) and Unsounded (which has a manga-ish look about it, but calls itself a comic).

I do think I'm getting what you mean though. But if that's the case, then Crenshinibon makes a good point. Usually if you make a firm distinction between Western comics and Western manga-influenced comics on the internet, you'll get called an otaku/weeaboo/Japanophile and you'll end up flamed or trolled, to ridiculous extents sometimes. Even more so if you distinguish light novels and not-light novels, because even I can't tell the difference, apart from the tendency to have longer running series with shorter individual volumes. But that's more of a formatting thing than it is a writing thing.

But I'm meandering, so I'll get to my point. I think you should make sure there's actually a real desire for what you're doing before you go and do it. I can't imagine there're many people that'd really go for this idea, but in my book research trumps conjecture. Go check out the forums on some of those sites you looked at, and if there aren't any discussions on this topic, start some! Evaluate your potential target market before you go and start up your business, to put it in a wonky economic metaphor.

Even though I don't think I'd personally be interested in what you're putting together, if there are in fact a bunch of people seeking exactly what you offer, I think it'd be great for you to build that community for them. So, good luck! 😀

Quote from imp4ever

I do think I'm getting what you mean though. But if that's the case, then Crenshinibon makes a good point. Usually if you make a firm distinction between Western comics and Western manga-influenced comics on the internet, you'll get called an otaku/weeaboo/Japanophile and you'll end up flamed or trolled, to ridiculous extents sometimes. Even more so if you distinguish light novels and not-light novels, because even I can't tell the difference, apart from the tendency to have longer running series with shorter individual volumes. But that's more of a formatting thing than it is a writing thing.

Just wanted to back this up- there isn't a difference between a light novel and a proper novel. Not really. Light novels are just "low" literature. They can be plenty of fun to read, but they're basically just shorter books with simple language. This leads to an obvious result: the only successful translations are consistently marketed as ordinary young adult novels. Titles like [m]Kino's Journey[/m] are the exception, but they've still been marketed the same way for obvious reasons. In the west, a light novel is just a young adult novel. Be influenced by and shoot for whatever similarities you want, but the market is called something else in English.

More directly at the original poster, and I don't mean to be too crass here, but I've never heard of an "aspiring anime producer" from the west being taken seriously. It's just not done; Japanese studios are run by Japanese-speakers, and though there are plenty of small examples of occidental companies being involved on some level, the production always remains distinctly Japanese. It honestly makes more sense to just say that you're an aspiring animator and use a pseudo-Japanese style. Say you want to write young adult novels (between Harry Potter, Twilight, and nonsense like The Hunger Games the medium is the most popular right now), or say that you want to be a cartoonist. People will take you seriously, respect you, and you'll be able to become better by diversifying your style when you move back to your original inspiration.

But, do whatever you want. Just let it be known that I offered a warning, though with some of your spelling and grammatical mistakes, I'd work on the basics before any of this.

[img]http://i604.photobucket.com/albums/tt122/Wthuh/CrenshiSig.jpg[/img]
Reviews of my Work:
You are kind of boring - Blackorion
Congratulations! Ur an asshole! - tokyo_homi
**Your awesome!!! **- Cherelle_Ashley
NightSwan also said that she wanted to peg me, once, but I'm not sure whether to take that as a compliment or a threat...

Quote from Crenshinibon

between Harry Potter, Twilight, and nonsense like The Hunger Games.

BLASPHEMY! How could you say that?! Though Twilight I understand... 😛

Quote from artt

Quote from Crenshinibon

between Harry Potter, Twilight, and nonsense like The Hunger Games.

BLASPHEMY! How could you say that?! Though Twilight I understand... 😛

Calling a young adult novel young adult is blasphemy? You should talk to the people who market them.

[img]http://i604.photobucket.com/albums/tt122/Wthuh/CrenshiSig.jpg[/img]
Reviews of my Work:
You are kind of boring - Blackorion
Congratulations! Ur an asshole! - tokyo_homi
**Your awesome!!! **- Cherelle_Ashley
NightSwan also said that she wanted to peg me, once, but I'm not sure whether to take that as a compliment or a threat...