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Hey, hi, yoohoo whistles. Everyone gather 'round and reread this part: Lacking proper training and a viable salary, many young animators don’t feel they can

Hey, hi, yoohoo whistles. Everyone gather 'round and reread this part: Lacking proper training and a viable salary, many young animators don’t feel they can keep going. The Japan Research Institute estimated that a quarter of them quit the industry within four years, and two-thirds in eight years. This retention problem has often been viewed as a form of natural selection. “I think this way of thinking is misguided,” said Sudo Tadashi, the author of two books about the anime industry. “Truly brilliant” animators are needed for roles like director and character designer, but without enough “adequately good” animators—particularly in-betweeners—the industry wouldn’t be able to function. “I don’t think a field where only top-level talent could stay on is a good place,” Sudo said. The question, then, is how to create an environment that helps more people become “adequately good”. You might think that this article is just about Japanese animators, but it's also about the state of the job economy and the careers of several generations of workers in the developed world, globally. The obsession with per-worker productivity - of only ever hiring the 10xer - is how you get here. The grunt work still has to be done, of course. As ever, if you want to know where much of the expertise has gone, look to China (and South Korea). This is not a new phenomenon; I don't think the article mentioned it, but a large part of the growth of the expertise of Japanese animators in the 20th century was the work that they got that was outsourced from the US. Go ahead and look through the staff/production lists of your favorite childhood cartoons - particularly holiday specials - from the 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s. You'll be surprised what you find (or not).

bilbo0s 3mo ago
>As ever, if you want to know where much of the expertise has gone, look to China (and South Korea) Good news! You don't need to worry about that anymore! I can guarantee you, as the article implies, money from big tech is being funneled to people perfecting models for in-betweeners as we speak. /s I think we may be entering an era where we really have to start thinking about how to organize work at a fundamental level. Because if you think the present where the "1%" refers to the group of people to whom the lion's share of resources in society accrue is bad; imagine a future where the "1%" refers to a group that are the only people any given government and steward class need to keep everything running.
- coldtea 3mo ago
  >we really have to start thinking about how to organize work at a fundamental level Who is this "we"? As if society at large gets a say? Do people owning land and houses ask the homeless of how to organize home ownership?
  - jimmydorry 3mo ago
    All it takes is a populist with a good message to make a political group. All functional Western nations have voting mechanisms that allow for radical government change, if there is enough public support for it. It might take a decade to fully manifest, but if we're entering an age of such extreme, then I would expect people to eventually vote for such change.
    - coldtea 3mo ago
      >All functional Western nations have voting mechanisms that allow for radical government change Voters never get what they vote for.
      - gruez 3mo ago
        The RNC tried to stop Trump from winning the candidacy but he won regardless. The fact that MAGA movement is seemingly enthralled to him means at least some people are getting who they voted for, and therefore your statement can't possibly be true.
        pdimitar 3mo ago
        I doubt they voted for increased fuel prices.
        coldtea 3mo ago
        >The RNC tried to stop Trump from winning the candidacy but he won regardless. That's not an example of people getting what they voted for though. It's RNC trying to prevent people prevented get the alternative to what they decidedly didn't what. RNC just wanted the same old politics and career players (that people didn't want), and tried to prevent Trump for that reason (same as Dems did to Bernie). Not that Trump wining changed anything. After he won, he negated on his promises, and just gave same old neoliberal/neocon RNC shit combined with some theatrics for the gullible. So people prevented from electing who they wanted, and when they finally elected him anyways, they got the same shit they voted him as the alternative to.
DanielHB 3mo ago
I worked with CNC machining shops in Sweden and the people working there made the exact same points. CNC is not exactly an art form, but programming the machines definitely has some craftsmanship aspects to it. Even considering that after a part is programmed it can then be mass produced. - Very hard to get young people in because entry level pays very poorly AND requires non-trivial amounts of training. - Razor-thin margins so shops can't afford to pay well - Overall not great work conditions compared to an office job - Retiring experienced older workforce with no one to replace them - Having a shop in China machine the parts for you can be quite acceptable, especially in higher volumes However I disagree with your argument of "obsession with [...] only ever hiring the 10xer". It is not so much that, but rather that if you hire average people with average skills or people that require training *you go out of business* because the shop next door won't. Basically it drains the expertise completely dry until is just completely moves to another country having a demographic boom. And this is happening to software engineering right now. People who complain about immigration don't seem to realize that non-developed countries are seeing massive population growth reductions too. Eventually the world is going to run out of countries having demographic booms, then society will have a massive lack of people to maintain existing infrastructure and corporations. The only upside is that wealth inequality should drastically reduce in this scenario (unless some governments manage to push caste systems back into fashion).
- ItsYan 3mo ago
  >It is not so much that, but rather that if you hire average people with average skills or people that require training you go out of business because the shop next door won't. If only workers would form some kind of a community, which would take monthly contributions and that would then be used to upskill. It would unite most, if not all people in the same industry.
  - bell-cot 3mo ago
    > - Razor-thin margins so shops can't afford to pay well > - Having a shop in China machine the parts for you can be quite acceptable, especially in higher volumes Yes, in some circumstances, your idea can work. To a degree. But there are plenty of trades and whole industries where domestic employment has fallen by 100X or more, because global capitalism found plenty of cheap workers in distant countries. Where 10X (or more) lower pay didn't seem so bad, compared to their local alternatives.
motbus3 3mo ago
Investing funds don't want to know about 10 years in the future. Next quarter is fine and damn with the rest
stuaxo 3mo ago
Yep, the current systems incentives are not aligned with it's continued existence.
casey2 3mo ago
Why would Japanese studios outsource when Japanese artists are paid less than Chinese ones?

bilbo0s 3mo ago

>As ever, if you want to know where much of the expertise has gone, look to China (and South Korea) Good news! You don't need to worry about that anymore! I can guarantee you, as the article implies, money from big tech is being funneled to people perfecting models for in-betweeners as we speak. /s I think we may be entering an era where we really have to start thinking about how to organize work at a fundamental level. Because if you think the present where the "1%" refers to the group of people to whom the lion's share of resources in society accrue is bad; imagine a future where the "1%" refers to a group that are the only people any given government and steward class need to keep everything running.

coldtea 3mo ago
>we really have to start thinking about how to organize work at a fundamental level Who is this "we"? As if society at large gets a say? Do people owning land and houses ask the homeless of how to organize home ownership?
- jimmydorry 3mo ago
  All it takes is a populist with a good message to make a political group. All functional Western nations have voting mechanisms that allow for radical government change, if there is enough public support for it. It might take a decade to fully manifest, but if we're entering an age of such extreme, then I would expect people to eventually vote for such change.
  - coldtea 3mo ago
    >All functional Western nations have voting mechanisms that allow for radical government change Voters never get what they vote for.
    - gruez 3mo ago
      The RNC tried to stop Trump from winning the candidacy but he won regardless. The fact that MAGA movement is seemingly enthralled to him means at least some people are getting who they voted for, and therefore your statement can't possibly be true.
      - pdimitar 3mo ago
        I doubt they voted for increased fuel prices.
      - coldtea 3mo ago
        >The RNC tried to stop Trump from winning the candidacy but he won regardless. That's not an example of people getting what they voted for though. It's RNC trying to prevent people prevented get the alternative to what they decidedly didn't what. RNC just wanted the same old politics and career players (that people didn't want), and tried to prevent Trump for that reason (same as Dems did to Bernie). Not that Trump wining changed anything. After he won, he negated on his promises, and just gave same old neoliberal/neocon RNC shit combined with some theatrics for the gullible. So people prevented from electing who they wanted, and when they finally elected him anyways, they got the same shit they voted him as the alternative to.

DanielHB 3mo ago

I worked with CNC machining shops in Sweden and the people working there made the exact same points. CNC is not exactly an art form, but programming the machines definitely has some craftsmanship aspects to it. Even considering that after a part is programmed it can then be mass produced. - Very hard to get young people in because entry level pays very poorly AND requires non-trivial amounts of training. - Razor-thin margins so shops can't afford to pay well - Overall not great work conditions compared to an office job - Retiring experienced older workforce with no one to replace them - Having a shop in China machine the parts for you can be quite acceptable, especially in higher volumes However I disagree with your argument of "obsession with [...] only ever hiring the 10xer". It is not so much that, but rather that if you hire average people with average skills or people that require training *you go out of business* because the shop next door won't. Basically it drains the expertise completely dry until is just completely moves to another country having a demographic boom. And this is happening to software engineering right now. People who complain about immigration don't seem to realize that non-developed countries are seeing massive population growth reductions too. Eventually the world is going to run out of countries having demographic booms, then society will have a massive lack of people to maintain existing infrastructure and corporations. The only upside is that wealth inequality should drastically reduce in this scenario (unless some governments manage to push caste systems back into fashion).

ItsYan 3mo ago
>It is not so much that, but rather that if you hire average people with average skills or people that require training you go out of business because the shop next door won't. If only workers would form some kind of a community, which would take monthly contributions and that would then be used to upskill. It would unite most, if not all people in the same industry.
- bell-cot 3mo ago
  > - Razor-thin margins so shops can't afford to pay well > - Having a shop in China machine the parts for you can be quite acceptable, especially in higher volumes Yes, in some circumstances, your idea can work. To a degree. But there are plenty of trades and whole industries where domestic employment has fallen by 100X or more, because global capitalism found plenty of cheap workers in distant countries. Where 10X (or more) lower pay didn't seem so bad, compared to their local alternatives.

motbus3 3mo ago

Investing funds don't want to know about 10 years in the future. Next quarter is fine and damn with the rest

stuaxo 3mo ago

Yep, the current systems incentives are not aligned with it's continued existence.

casey2 3mo ago

Why would Japanese studios outsource when Japanese artists are paid less than Chinese ones?