Disclaimer: This Column represents my opinions, personal and professional. If your opinion is different, fine. If your facts are different I am interested in hearing them. Otherwise just enjoy the column.
To Sub (Subtitle) or to Dub (Dub into English)? Yeah, right. Today the true question becomes "Do I bother subtitling?" This may come as a shock to everyone who prefers subtitles, but this is the reality of the crossroads where corporate American Anime currently finds itself.
Now, before you fire off that flaming e-mail, allow me to present my own humble opinions about dubs:

Personal (consumer) Opinion
I only spend my hard earned cash on watchable product - even if I am only renting. Unfortunately, very few dubs even qualify as watchable.

Professional Opinion
The American dubbing industry lacks quality control and shows few signs of improvement. More on dubs.

My opinion as a businessman
Strictly counting the beans, dubs cost about ten times the money, but are not significantly more difficult to produce with the exception of the actual recording. Therefore if I am trying to push out product, the only reasons to produce subtitles are for personal or public relations reasons.

Explanation: If the production is done in-house (by employees), the difficulty is relative to the employee's experience with sound and only takes 2-4 times as much time and effort. If the production is done by a contracted studio (as are most of the dubs produced in America), the cost in man-hours is nearly the same as subtitles.
Now, as you may or may not know, in addition to being a partner in Running Ink Animation Productions and Organizational Consultant to EX, I also collect a paycheck from Books Nippan for managing their Animation Division (which covers imports, licensing, advertising, and production for the Books Nippan labels: US Renditions, Dark Image Entertainment, Ultra Action Video, and JNA Animation Soundtracks). This gives me an uncomfortably close look at the Anime industry, and whether or not anyone else will admit this, the current Anime industry is approaching a major crossroads - one which may claim a few of the current companies.
Anime is no longer fans for fans. That ended several years ago when Anime started to air regularly on the Sci-Fi channel, and when the general market began to realize that Anime sells. Today, Anime is for profit, and for the companies that sell the most Anime: Blockbuster, Tower Records, and Musicland. These three companies probably sell at least 40% (possibly as high as 60%) of the Anime in the US and Canada, and since the rest of the market is made of smaller customers, no other opinions are heard quite so well as from the big three. And what do they say?
These companies declare such fan favorites as M.D. GEIST, The GUYVER, and FIST OF THE NORTH STAR to be stellar examples of fine Anime - simply because these titles sell throughout the country.
Substandard Anime, or titles that only sell regionally or very little at all, are titles such as PLEASE SAVE MY EARTH, NADIA (The Secret of Blue Water), TOKYO BABYLON, or even TENCHI MUYO. I am, of course, referring to the dubbed versions. Subtitles fall into and even less loved third class of product that is considered fare for collectors or specialty shops. In fact, Musicland (AKA: Suncoast, Sam Goody, On Cue, Media Play) officially discourages their stores from carrying subtitled videos if the dubbed version for the same title is also available.
So who carries subtitles? Independent comic, video, and specialty shops that cater to more selective Anime fans (especially in areas with colleges), and mail order companies. What this boils down to is that subtitled version of videos typically can only sell more than 5,000 tapes if there is no dubbed version (or if it is pornographic in nature...but that is a different story altogether!).
Therefore, since subtitles are only capable of providing a very limited revenue for roughly the same effort, it is no longer a question of dollar and cents business to produce subtitled videos. Instead the main reason companies produce subtitled videos is for good public relations with the fans, or because executives making the decisions personally wish to produce subtitles.
So where is this crossroads I have been hinting about? With business as it stands today, subtitles in general are not threatened. However, the success of Anime has had some rather unfortunate repercussions.
First, the perceived value of Anime titles has skyrocketed both in the US and most importantly in Japan. This condition has only intensified due to the bidding wars for the hot new titles. Now, even if the American company thinks a show is a 'B' or 'C' grade title, the Japanese company expects, and frequently can get, top dollar. Titles are becoming so expensive that each and every video, regardless of quality, has to be successful so that the company cash flow will pay for the production and acquisition of new titles.
Second, the success of Anime in general has attracted some very big companies with extremely deep pockets. SAILOR MOON, despite a very public cancellation, was the #1 children's show in Canada, and Saban has had great success with both live action (POWER RANGERS) and animation (TEKKAMAN BLADE). So now, Saban is looking at DRAGONBALL Z, and Disney has inked a deal with Tokuma Shoten for worldwide distribution of all Tokuma films, including Studio Ghibli/Miyazaki. [Editor's note: DRAGONBALL Z started airing in syndication on U.S. television the week of September 7.] But this is the tip of the iceberg. You can bet that if Disney is successful, every other Hollywood player will be running to Japan to get their share. Don't forget, relative small fries like Orion (with Streamline), Pioneer, and Polygram (with Manga Entertainment) have already entered the market and their companies dwarf the typical Anime company. Last, but definitely not least, Columbia/Tri-Star/Sony produces quite a bit of Anime in Japan and could suddenly decide to flood the US market with Anime. When and if the major Hollywood companies decide to get into Anime, the current Anime companies (with the probably exception of Pioneer) will be left fighting for scraps or pornography. Face it, Bandai would much rather release a chopped-to-shreds GUNDAM through Disney and sell 700,000 tapes than release a true-to-the-Japanese version through Manga Entertainment and only sell 50,000 tapes.
What does this mean for subtitles? Take a look at the last several major Anime releases from mainstream companies: TOTORO (Fox Home Video), SAILOR MOON (Buena Vista - currently available only at Toys R Us), DRAGONBALL (Vidmark), and STREET FIGHTER II (Sony). All of these titles are only available on video in dubbed format. Why? Well, I already mentioned the dollar and cents reason, and you can be fairly certain that no Anime fan controls the output for any of those companies above. However, an even more likely reason is the fact that these large companies still believe that Anime is for little kids and must be not only white washed for consumption, but must also only be released as an edited dub to prevent consumer confusion. That's right, even though boxes prominently say "Dubbed in English" or "Japanese with English Subtitles," the typical consumer is not considered smart enough to read the box and figure out the difference. When these big companies pick up Anime titles that are pretty safe like AKAZUKIN CHACHA or MACROSS 7, or even when they pick up a title that can't possibly be released as a kid's movie like X, I predict that all Japanese language, cultural references and music will be eliminated and no subtitled version will be released.
What can you do about this possibility? Well, the typical grass roots method is to start a letter campaign or a petition. This is fairly effective and occasionally produces results. However, to affect Disney, you might have to start the campaign now so that results may happen in time for the first Tokuma release, which will probably be sometime next year (A new Miyazaki feature, MONONOKE PRINCESS, is in production). However, to be truly effective, you should try to make sure your letters are going to the right place. The top is good, but just imagine how many letters are going to Michael Eisner on a daily basis versus how many the man actually has the time or the inclination to read. To get good visibility, the campaign should be well organized and not only hit Eisner, but also the head of, say, Buena Vista Home Video Distribution, so that there are more chances of finding a champion for the cause.
The other way, which is also highly effective, will influence the entire market. Vote with your money and get your friends to do the same. Don't settle for a dub if you want subtitled. If you know a subtitled version is available, ask the manager of your local store to order it for you (even Suncoast is supposed to have special order capabilities). To be extra helpful, have as much of the necessary information (Suggested Retail Price, Order Code, Correct title, etc.) as possible to not only make the order easy to place but to scare the shit out of the manager and make him/her realize that you want what you want and are perfectly capable of getting it anywhere that wants your business. However, do yourself another favor and make sure you don't demand titles or products that the manager can't hope to get like GUNDAM 0080 or subtitled CASTLE CAGLIOSTRIO. The poor manager can't do anything about getting these titles, and will only get a bad impression of Anime fans.
So, is there a future for subtitles? I hope so, and I will do whatever I can to ensure that subtitles continue to be available. What about you?

Part 2: Bad dubbing
Part 3: Caveat Emptor o Sailor Moon Fans!