New Owners & Investment Today, Gaudiy Inc. has announced that the previous shareholders of MyAnimeList have transferred their shares, making Gaudiy the sole owner of MAL. At the same time, Gaudiy has announced a third-party allotment of its shares, raising 10 billion JPY from Sony Group Corporation and Bandai Namco Holdings Inc. Who is Gaudiy? Gaudiy is a company with a vision of connecting fans to IP. With Gaudiy Fanlink, they explore using various new technologies such as AI and blockchain to bring new experiences to fans. Did you say AI/blockchain?!?! Technology is a tool. Tools can be used for good (mmm yummy lunchmeat) or bad (oh no not my arm!) ...Okay, that analogy is a bit morbid and we're still 5 months away from Halloween. I understand that much of the community feels one or more of the following: NFTs are scams, generative AI is killing artists' livelihoods, blockchain is killing the planet, web3 is a pipe dream! I'm not trying to say those opinions or concerns are invalid. What I'm trying to say is, just because a parent company explores using those technologies, doesn't mean those technologies are suddenly going to end up on MAL. Gaudiy's CEO, Mr. Ishikawa, has said it directly to me himself (shared with his permission): As you understand, what we're aiming to build is a space where fans can come together and enjoy content with one another. Using technology in a way that goes against that goal, or doing anything that would upset or disappoint fans, is not what we—or the Gaudiy team—ever intend. So then what happens to MAL now? Gaudiy is the fourth company to acquire MAL. What makes this acquisition unique is that we will not be losing the experience and knowledge gained previously. Hopefully, this means we should be able to escape some of the growing pains we've had to go through in past acquisitions. Very active MAL members may have noticed that our technical development slowed considerably over the last year. Many new features that were added in the last 2-4 years are still incomplete, and which we and many members still hope to see expanded (e.g. profile stats, interest stacks, fantasy anime league, our app, better mobile support, etc. etc.) With new owners and new investment, we hope to be able to get back to improving various features and your user experience. This is still the beginning of a new chapter in MAL's history, so it's too early to say definitively what will be tackled first. Still, I hope we can look forward together with cautious optimism. With that in mind: What's the #1 improvement you want to see? (You can only pick 1!)