While in Japan, I did manage to acquire quite a decent selection of titles; however, I did not really search nor purchase any since last summer.
I was actually copying the discs and making images of them, so that the DVD menu navigation (etc.) of the originals is included, rather than just copying the video files. I also have many copies which for some reason I have trouble playing, even though some worked the first time. Odd.
In any case, you may all be interested in one Taiwanese site ( ho-av.com ) that has almost every main juukan DVD title that was released for sale, including compilations.
At a meagre 1$ each at that. Several of them are also more difficult to find than the average juukan title.
I recently tried - without success - to order all 180+ DVDs (even with the extra printed disc cover option) from this site and ship them to Japan.
While I did not inquire further as to the lack of new information about the order status, I also did not get any message from the site owner - I just assumed it was cancelled due to my location. (There is the possibility to view the order status within the website)
Needless to say, I was pissed, but I was not expecting the order to be successful anyway.
This was despite the site using Kuroneko/Yamato Transport COD (cash on delivery) to ship it within Taiwan. (It is a Japanese shipping company.)
I checked really fast for shipping forwarder services in Taiwan, and found one called Taiwan EZ Star.
However, I only sent a message to the site on its Line app page, and got no reply.
The site also has an email address and Facebook page I did not bother to use for communicating yet.
Basically, I did not really try my best and make extreme efforts to figure out a way to purchase them yet, to be honest.
If anyone of you knows someone in Taiwan, or has Chinese friends, or knows of a way to ship outside Taiwan with EZ Star/another shipping forwarder, or some other method, that'd be probably be the most difficult part. Keep in mind that it must first ship via COD to a Taiwanese address, unless one of you can manage to communicate with the site owner in Chinese to make an exception.
I was also thinking about communicating with the website owner of Dream-Av.com instead (similar concept DVD purchasing website, but with English version), who's ok with shipping internationally using COD, to see if he would accept a generous payment just to be the middleman/forwarder between that other website and myself. Maybe one of you can try that?
There also seems to be mirror versions of the same website with different names. (perhaps if one of them gets DCMA'd)
I highly suggest to those that are interested to try finding a way asap to purchase them, as the site might soon get taken down/abandoned.
Even the juukan titles might suddenly disappear from the inventory list. (The juukan titles available on Dream-AV decreased last year from around 30 to like 12 now, for no apparent reason.)
I don't mind compensating - or try crowdfunding - whoever can get them all and make copies or image files of them to share.
Now, I could also make tremendous efforts myself to find a way to purchase them all for you guys, but I would probably be more motivated only if compensated properly, so... anyone have a game plan?
