Although FUNimation has had a presence on YouTube for quite a while now, the North American anime distributor and the video-sharing site have reached an agreement for FUNimation to have a "branded channel" on the site. In the announcement on its "Latest News" webpage, the company says that it and YouTube have "established a content and advertising relationship," which they call a "Strike Content Agreement," in order for its titles to acquire greater visibility.

The plan is to post video content from past series, episodes from upcoming shows, extended previews, and additional content that will be specific only to the YouTube site. New episodes will be posted weekly, remaining on the site for a specified period of time before being taken down. For July 2008, from previously enjoyed FUNimation series, people can expect to see episodes of Blue Gender, Slayers, Peach Girl, Mushishi, and Kiddy Grade.

Fans in some of the forums discussing the distributor's latest move are unclear exactly what a "branded channel" is, and how this will differ from what FUNimation has been doing on its YouTube channel all along. Many are of the opinion that it really means one thing: advertising. Among other things, they suspect that FUNimation sees this agreement as a way to re-advertise series whose sales have dropped as new shows were released and captured fans' immediate attention.

Another clue to the rationale for this agreement may lie in a comment made by Gen Fukanaga, president and CEO of FUNimation Entertainment: "We look forward to connecting existing fans with their favorite programming from Japan, faster than ever before." Anime companies have been trying for several months to find an answer to fans' frustration at having to wait months to see shows in North America after they've been aired in Japan. This often prompts illegal downloading, which the distributors are trying to stamp out. GDH/Gonzo has already set up several places online (including its own YouTube channel) where fans are able to watch episodes of new series directly after they have screened on Japanese TV. It could be that FUNimation is hoping to develop a similar strategy.

As to the "branded channel," FUNimation is the first North American anime distributor to make this arrangement. A few Japanese companies have already set up something similar, the most notable being Kodakawa Digix Inc. Their arrangement with YouTube is especially interesting because they developed software for YouTube that would allow Kodakawa to go through all fan-generated videos based on anime they license, and get rid of the ones that don't suit their promotional purposes. When they announced their own partnership with YouTube, they said that this software would be usable on the video site by any company that wanted to police its material the same way. So one wonders if that's a part of this new FUNimation/YouTube agreement as well. (It is never explained in the announcement what is meant by "Strike Content," but one possibility could be that it refers precisely to Kodakawa's site-patrolling software.)

YouTube strategic partner development manager, Cliff Samaniego, acknowledges that there is a lot of FUNimation-related content on the site already. But his interest and excitement in this deal with the anime distributor suggest that what comes next may be quite different from what's gone before.