Animexx is a German voluntary association

Voluntary association

A voluntary association or union is a group of individuals who enter into an agreement as volunteers to form a body to accomplish a purpose.Strictly speaking, in many jurisdictions no formalities are necessary to start an association...

 (Eingetragener Verein

Eingetragener Verein

Eingetragener Verein is a legal status for a registered voluntary association in Germany and Austria. While any group may be called a Verein, registration as eingetragener Verein holds many legal benefits because a registered association may legally function as a corporate body rather than just...

) for promotion of Japanese popular culture

Japanese popular culture

Japanese popular culture not only reflects the attitudes and concerns of the present but also provides a link to the past. Japanese cinema, cuisine, television programs, manga, and music all developed from older artistic and literary traditions, and many of their themes and styles of presentation...

, in particular anime

Anime

is the Japanese abbreviated pronunciation of "animation". The definition sometimes changes depending on the context. In English-speaking countries, the term most commonly refers to Japanese animated cartoons....

 and manga

Manga

Manga is the Japanese word for "comics" and consists of comics and print cartoons . In the West, the term "manga" has been appropriated to refer specifically to comics created in Japan, or by Japanese authors, in the Japanese language and conforming to the style developed in Japan in the late 19th...

. It was founded on 30 January 2000 in Munich

Munich

Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...

  when two other groups, 1. Sailor-Moon-Online-Fanclub and Animangai, merged. On 5 May 2008 Animexx became a member of Verband Deutsch-Japanischer Gesellschaften, a group of organizations and people interested the relations between Japan and Germany.

As of February 2010, the site claims to have over 126,000 members. Its site includes discussion forums, fanart galleries, and areas for publishing fanfiction and doujinshis. In association with Egmont Manga & Anime

Egmont Manga & Anime

Egmont Manga & Anime is one of the largest publishers of manga in Germany. It was founded in the year 2000 as a daughter company of Egmont Ehapa, after the manga boom in Germany became apparent around the turn of the millennium. Since 2003, EMA has been part of Egmont vgs in Cologne.- History :In...

, and online magazine AnimePro, they republish some doujinshi in anthologies. According to German magazine Spiegel Online

Der Spiegel

Der Spiegel is a German weekly news magazine published in Hamburg. It is one of Europe's largest publications of its kind, with a weekly circulation of more than one million.-Overview:...

, it is the largest web portal

Web portal

A web portal or links page is a web site that functions as a point of access to information in the World Wide Web. A portal presents information from diverse sources in a unified way....

 for Manga Artists in Germany.

There are over 10,000 dojinshi available on the site, which are quality controlled and checked for "legal acceptibility". Real-person slash

Real person fiction

Real person fiction is a type of fan fiction featuring celebrities or other real people. In the past, terms such as actorfic were used to distinguish such stories from those based on fictional characters from movies or television series....

 is not permitted, and there is a "complete ban" on shotacon

Shotacon

, sometimes shortened to , is a Japanese slang portmanteau of the phrase and describes an attraction to young boys, or an individual with such an attraction. Outside Japan, the term is used less often with this meaning. It refers to a genre of manga and anime wherein pre-pubescent or pubescent...

 and lolicon

Lolicon

, also romanised as lolikon or rorikon, is a Japanese portmanteau of the phrase "Lolita complex". In Japan, the term describes an attraction to underage girls or an individual with such an attraction...

. Schwarzer Turm, a small publisher that specialises in publishing German work, uses Animexx to find new artists to publish, and they publish manga anthologies together.

In May 2002, the group also began organizing the Connichi

Connichi

Connichi is an annual, 3-day anime convention in Germany and one of the largest of its kind in the German-speaking world with over 18,000 visitors in 2011. It is held by the German anime association Animexx e.V.-History:...

 fan convention

Fan convention

A fan convention, or con , is an event in which fans of a particular film, television series, comic book, actor, or an entire genre of entertainment such as science fiction or anime and manga, gather to participate and hold programs and other events, and to meet experts, famous personalities, and...

, as well four other smaller conventions: Hanami in Ludwigshafen, YukiCon in Zuffenhausen

Zuffenhausen

Zuffenhausen is an urban district in the northern suburbs of Stuttgart, the capital of the German state of Baden-Württemberg. It consists mainly of the formerly independent city of Zuffenhausen. The Zuffenhausen district has an area of 1,200 hectares and 35,568 inhabitants .The oldest surviving...

, J-Con in Merzig

Merzig

Merzig is the capital of the district Merzig-Wadern, in Saarland, Germany. It is situated on the river Saar, approx. 35 km south of Trier, and 35 km northwest of Saarbrücken.-Municipalities:...

 and Animuc in Fürstenfeldbruck

Fürstenfeldbruck

Fürstenfeldbruck is a town in Bavaria, Germany. It is the capital of the district of Fürstenfeldbruck. it has a population of 35,494. Since the 1930s, Fürstenfeldbruck has had an air force base....

.