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"Crunchyroll, an on-demand streaming service for Japanese anime and television shows broadcast across Asia, is rolling out a new e-commerce platform today that offers viewers merchandise while they're watching their favorite shows.\r\n\r\nAs with Western comic books and sci-fi television shows, fans of popular anime such as Naruto Shippuden and Bleach often like to buy merchandise to show their support for the franchise. This can be additional DVDs or graphic novels, called manga in Japan, but also figurines, dress-up props and clothes.\r\n\r\nThe market for these goods is incredibly lucrative - Crunchyroll estimates that over 70 percent of the anime ecosystem is monetized by merchandise related to the big anime brands - so it should come as no surprise that the streaming service wants a slice of the action.\r\n\r\nUsers that access the service from the browser will now be able to purchase merchandise as the video is playing. This is often from the right-hand side of the webpage, as a small pop-out box which shows the name of the product, price, a thumbnail image and \u2019Shop Now\u2019 button.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\nCrunchyroll also serves up a series of video advertisements for users who are watching an episode for free, so there\u2019s a chance that the company might utilize this space down the line.\r\n\r\n&amp;quot;We are innovating around content streaming and delivering e-commerce capabilities to immediately connect viewers with merchandise relevant to the video content that they are viewing, and we're only at the beginning stage of where we want to go with the combined experience,&amp;quot; said Brady McCollum, COO of Crunchyroll.\r\n\r\nIt\u2019s important to note that the merchandise will always be relevant to the show that the user is watching. Although adverts are rarely welcomed by Internet users, the fact that they\u2019re specialized and targeted based on a users\u2019 tastes should mean that they\u2019re a little less irritating.\r\n\r\nCrunchyroll already has a dedicated store accessible from the menu bar, but will be expanding its relationships with partners throughout Asia in order to sell exclusive merchandise previously not available outside of these markets.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\nCrunchyroll is unique because it\u2019s one of the few dedicated services offering a legal means of streaming anime in a timely manner. DVD sales, which often require large amounts of translation work and voice acting for \u201Cdubbed\u201D audio tracks, have slowed in recent times because of the delay in release dates.\r\n\r\nFans want to watch anime as soon as it is broadcast in Japan, which has triggered a ground swell of online piracy and subtitles contributed by fans and amateur translation teams.\r\n\r\nCrunchyroll offers users a free, legal way of accessing a whole host of popular shows including Total Eclipse, Nyarko-san: Another Crawling Chaos. Some of these shows are uploaded with a small delay, up to a week in some cases, which users can choose to bypass by paying \u20AC4.99 per month for a premium subscription.\r\n\r\nRelated:\u00A0Crunchyroll launches its on-demand anime and Asian media streaming service in Spain and Portugal\r\n\r\nImage Credit:\u00A0OLIVIER MORIN/AFP/Getty Images"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://thenextweb.com/insider/2013/05/21/crunchyroll-launches-e-commerce-platform-to-offer-viewers-merchandise-alongside-their-favorite-anime/>