Jun Seba, better known in the West as Nujabes has passed away as a result of injuries sustained from an automobile accident which occured on February 26th in Tokyo, the official hydeout productions page reports in an update posted earlier today.

Seiba made his professional debut in 2003 on the hydeout productions compilation first collection and his first solo album, Metaphorical Music. He is best known internationally for composing the score in the Samurai Champloo television anime series including its “Battlecry” opening theme song. True to form for a hip-hop producer, Seba left behind unreleased tracks in the studio. His label plans to release those tracks in the future.

The e22 portal for vocalist and frequent collaborator Shing02 is also hosting a page for fans to leave their condolences as well as a letter written informing people of the news.

[via e22, Natalie]

Amazon has quietly launched its Kindle Reader desktop application for Mac OS X, without so much as any advance notice or a press release. This follows last month’s launch of the reader application for RIM’s BlackBerry lineup.

The desktop Kindle Reader application allows users to purchase books from Amazon as well as easing sync between the application and the Kindle hardware and displays bookmarks/highlights from Kindle reading sessions, although without allowing for new highlight creation.

The download is free and is compatible with Leopard, but is not compatible with PowerPC-based hardware or Tiger.

Formula D competitor Tanner Foust and his race prepared Scion tC Coupe powered by a 600 horsepower NASCAR V8 recently scorched through California’s Mulholland Highway. and laid rubber down through the section known as The Snake.  Before anyone pipes up, the Scion has been converted to rear wheel drive as per Formula D rules and as such, is not street legal, nor is it feasible for 99% of you.

Nozomi Entertainment has announced that it has licensed the complete Dirty Pair TV series consisting of 25 episodes and two TV specials after a week-long contest.

The series produced by anime studio Sunrise is adapted from a series of light novels authored by Studio Nue co-founder Haruka Takachiho and foollows the misadventures of the Lovely Angels Kei and Yuri, two teenaged galactic private investigators who solve mysteries and often leave chaos and wanton destruction in their wake as a result.

This also marks the first time the TV series is being made available on DVD in the US after the reimagined Dirty Pair Flash TV series and feature films were previously released in the US. The 25 television episodes and two TV specials will come in two DVD collections and will retail for $49.99 each, with discounted pre-orders available now.

Pre-Order Dirty Pair TV Collection 1 from RightStuf
Pre-Order Dirty Pair TV Collection 2 from RightStuf

Like Hulu, but sometimes wish you could save stuff for offline viewing? Enter StreamTransport, a new Windows-only stream ripper that promises to allow for downloading videos off of the ever popular service along with other video portals.  When running, the application automatically captures the stream URL for downloading, with no interaction needed in its own integrated browser. The software works on sites using harder to capture streaming protocols such as RTMP, RTMPT, RTMPE and RTMPTE.

Just tested with Hulu itself and can confirm that it saves the complete stream with no commercial breaks, confirming that the ads are inserted server-side instead of being embedded in the video stream itself.

Sentai Filmworks has announced plans to dub one of its most popular titles in Clannad along with Blue Drop, Ghost Hound, Legends of the Dark King ~ A Fist of the North Star Story, and Tears to Tiara.

Production duties for all five series will be handled by Seraphim Digital Studios under the auspices of veteran ADR directors such as Steven Foster, who will oversee the English dub for Clannad.

In addition, Sentai Filmworks is developing an “Upgrade” program which will allow owners of the subtitled versions to upgrade their DVD’s for the new release containing the English dub. The dubbed versions of the aforementioned shows will also be available both through broadcast, streaming and retail outlets over the coming months, with further details as they are made available.

This announcement is sure to delight those devoted fans that held out hope for a dub, however miniscule the chances were.

Funimation has released a new statement regarding its newest acquisition in Dance in the Vampire Bund after its initial announcement caused a considerable uproar, stating that it would make edits to the show for content for both the the streaming and home video versions.

In the days since we announced the acquisition of the anime “Dance in the Vampire Bund,” we have been following the varied responses from within the anime community to our decision to edit specific scenes from its streaming and later home entertainment release.

First, out of concern for our distribution partners and advertisers, we will continue to make minor edits to the episodes which are available via free streaming and television broadcast due to the readily accessible nature of these platforms. We will be careful to keep such edits to a minimum.

However, FUNimation is – as always – committed to bringing the best anime content to the United States in its unedited form on home video. Therefore, we are evaluating the release of the series in unedited and uncensored form for home video. Since only 7 episodes have broadcast in Japan, final determination must be reserved until all episodes can be reviewed to ensure compliance with current U.S. law.

We would like to thank everyone in the anime community for the feedback provided to us on this matter–your opinions count.”

Funimation representative Jackie Smith further stated that “based on the episodes we’ve seen, Funimation expects to be able to release the unedited version on DVD and Blu-ray, but Funimation has not yet seen the unaired episodes and will reserve final judgment until after it has considered those episodes”.

Further explaining that Funimation has paid close attention to consumer feedback, Smith also stated that the distributor has decided to take a closer look at the edited scenes and has determined that the edited scenes cut so far will be acceptable for a DVD release in their unedited format.

Another level to the story concerns the possibility of a TV broadcast, which I brought up during the apex of the initial firestorm on Twitter, suggesting that it intends to air the series via its Funimation Anime Selects VOD/SVOD platform and linear channel on Verizon FiOS at some point in the near future, albeit in the currently available edited format.

Looks like Junko Mizuno’s expanding her talents to concert poster design as seen in the above image, as she has designed legendary rock band Faith No More’s concert poster for their appearance in Sydney, Australia.

The poster is available as a limited print from Secret Serpent for $50. As a fan of Faith No More and all of the associated projects by Mike Patton and Co. as well as Junko Mizuno, I so fucking want this poster.

[via Scott Green]

Crunchyroll has issued the following statement regarding its Download to Own Service:

“As Crunchyroll continues to evolve, we add new features and remove ones that don’t perform well. Recently we’ve made a decision to discontinue our Download-to-Own service, which lets users purchase DRM-free, downloadable videos of our popular shows. We believe online streaming video is the future will continue to focus on those efforts. Starting March 31, 2010, no new purchases of video downloads will be allowed. However, your existing downloads will continue to work until May 1, 2010. Please download and save your video files by May 1, 2010…”

While the service was offered, Crunchyroll made no serious effort to promote the key selling point in DRM free video files of some of its most popular shows, preferring instead to play up its Anime Membership program, while others, most notably Funimation offers download to own titles with rather restrictive Windows Media DRM.

Just got this in from MTV Iggy. Chiaki Kuriyama, best known for her role as GoGo Yubari from Kill Bill is debuting her new single from Gundam Unicorn Ryusei No Namida today in the US.

MTV Iggy is a new project from the venerable channel to showcase international music from around the world with in-depth profiles on rising artists that are making waves in their respective countries and are about to break in the US. The link above includes her profile, interviews and video footage.