Going Gonzo

Crunchyroll, Anime Streaming, and Unpaid Digital Labour

Authors

  • Jacqueline Ristola University of Bristol Auteur-e

Keywords:

streaming platforms, labour, anime, fans

Abstract

This essay examines how anime streaming platform Crunchyroll leveraged fan labour to become an industry leader in the anime distribution market. Before becoming a global leader in streaming anime, the site was known in the mid-2000s as an anime piracy site, largely functioning on fan labour for uploading its content. This essay combines Marxist political economy, discursive analysis, and fan studies methodologies to analyze how Crunchyroll capitalized on unpaid fan labour to transform itself from a popular piracy site into a legitimate streaming platform. 

Author Biography

  • Jacqueline Ristola, University of Bristol

    Dr. Jacqueline Ristola is a Lecturer in the Department of Film and Television at the University of Bristol. She received her PhD in Film and Moving Image Studies from Concordia University, Montreal. Her research areas include animation/anime studies, media industry studies, and queer representation. Her dissertation examines animation’s transformation from cable television to streaming platforms. She is currently the co-chair for SCMS’s Animated Media SIG. Her work is published in Synoptique, Con a de animación, and Animation Studies Online Journal, where she was awarded the inaugural Maureen Furniss Student Essay Award. She also co-edited a special issue on LGBTQ Animation for Synoptique: An Online Journal of Film and Moving Image Studies, and has a chapter in the edited collection Representation in Steven Universe (Palgrave 2020)

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Published

2024-02-05

Issue

Vol. 10 No. 1 (2024): Beyond Netflix: Studying the diversity of practices and platforms in the era of over-the-top television

Section

Articles

License

Copyright (c) 2025 Jacqueline Ristola (Auteur-e)

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.