@SpikeDurden I have a similar story and felt the same way when I discovered Funi's streaming.
I watched many of the mainstream anime on TV growing up in the early to mid 2000s and collected a few manga series. I never hopped on board the streaming train during college years and was simply unaware of how abundant and accessible anime had become.
One thing that I remember from the olden days was that anime was EXPENSIVE. Those of us from around that time could recall the classic 3-episode tapes/DVDs that individually sold for a high price, and I had to fight with my parents to even let me order these weird suspicious-looking foreign cartoons online. I didn't look into modern anime all those years because I retained the preconception that it was still expensive and basically a luxury market. I was also dirt poor in college and as a young adult so buying entertainment in general was never a priority.
When I discovered this site I actually thought I was missing something. At first I found you could watch things for free, which I thought must be a mistake. Then I found you could watch hundreds of series for only $6 a month, and I still thought it was a joke, or a limited time sale, or a low introductory rate. I was dumbfounded.
Since then Funi has basically opened up the door of the anime world to me again. From a time when I wasn't watching/buying/consuming anything I then became an avid collector (for better or worse).
At first I didn't understand their business model, but the fact is I would never have begun spending money in this market without their introduction. Having the opportunity to discover and get invested into different series is the best way (in my experience) to encourage people to support them financially, and even if all you do is stream they're at least making a few bucks rather than none. With broader experience comes a certain trust and expectation of quality too. I would never have considered something like buying a series blind or preordering without being I influenced by their model. Now I do it fairly often. Some of my favorite shows have even been blind buys.
And yeah, when I first signed up I too was digging into new stuff nonstop. There's so much available to a newcomer it's overwhelming.
There's also plenty of other anime on Crunchyroll and Hidive too to check out. It's amazing to compare the olden days to now. It's like we used to only have the kiddie pool but now we have the ocean.
