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JAPAN NEWS-YOMIURI
People offer prayers at a memorial July 29 for those killed in a fire at the Kyoto Animation Co., in Kyoto, Japan.
TOKYO >> More than 1 billion yen (about $9.2 million) has been donated to Kyoto Animation Co., whose No. 1 studio was devastated in an arson attack July 18 that killed 35 people.
A network of support for the popular animation production company is growing both at home and abroad.
As of July 29, about 965 million yen from about 48,000 donors had been deposited into a bank account the company set up.
Outside Japan, Sentai Filmworks, a U.S. company that distributes Japanese anime, launched a crowdfunding donation campaign for Kyoto Animation on July 18, the day of the attack, raising some $2.3 million.
The company said it will use the donations to help families of deceased victims and those injured in the attack, as well as for reconstructing the company. It plans to keep a report of how donations are used.
While the fire almost completely burned down the studio and destroyed most of its physical data, digitized data stored on servers at the studio, including key animation frames, were undamaged. Servers were completely enclosed by concrete, keeping them protected from the fire and water used to put out the blaze. The content of the data has not been disclosed in detail, but it may include frames from works in progress.
The company called the data “the accomplishment of the deceased.”
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