ICv2.com has a little more on the abrupt closing on Friday of AnimeOnline, tying it to staff cutbacks at sister company FUNimation, the anime producer and distributor. Both are owned by Minnesota-based Navarre Corporation.
According to ICv2.com, FUNimation has cut its staff by about 10 percent.
AnimeOnline launched in February as a source for anime and manga news, and as a networking site for fans.
On Friday afternoon, editor-in-chief Rob Bricken posted an announcement that Navarre and FUNimation had decided to “pull the plug” on the site. By 6 p.m., AnimeOnline had been taken off-line, and its content replaced with a message that points to technical issues discovered during beta testing as the reason for the abrupt closing.
A spokesperson for FUNimation told ICv2, “We’ve gained tremendous knowledge from this beta test and look forward to integrating this knowledge in future endeavors.”
