New coalition of manga publishers going after US scanlation sites

[Lynxara]

It doesn't matter that some people download anyway. All that matters is the proportion of buyers to DLers and the profit margins the buyers can generate.

No matter how you price your product, there will always be some people who just won't buy it. So you take that into account in your business model.

 

[Miaka975]

I'd buy ebooks.

just as soon as papiresu or any other ebook distributor starts selling something other than jpn TL's of harlequins, and boy's love novels and starts putting up stuff i actually WANT to read.

http://www.papy.co.jp/

oh and also when jpn gets with the rest of the world and stops using .book and .xmdf formats. who the hell uses those?

although i juuuust might just buy shounen onmyouji already... it's one of the only books i've managed to find ebooks for.. that i actually wanted to read

i mean if u can't find books that are number one at the bestsellers lists.. u're really lost

 

[Aoiblue]

The idea that a professional company can't compete with pirates is plain old bullshit. Viz, etc, have access to the home company, all the original art, and professional translators. By comparison, Mangafox and OneManga translations are regularly complete and utter crap, done from poor scans of newsprint copy with Japanese 201 translators who can't even recognize basic idioms. Seriously, I've read my share of manga on those sites and it's almost unanimously fucking incomprehensible.

They...dont translate them XD
They just host them....which is probably what you meant.
Although I only read the weekly series so I havent read much besides those.

And hey...the manga community is quiet XD

 

[GVman@Guts]

^If it'll be like like that, then that would be fine. Because I don't want them to take away the unofficially released manga away from us, otherwise we won't be able to read them!

So far, that's all it's been. The only thing that's happened is that Viz had MangaFox take down all of the titles they've licensed. I heavily doubt the companies will go after titles they don't have licensed.

So expect your Kamen Rider Spirits to still be available, folks.

 

[Lynxara]

Hasn't Toei gotten Kamen Rider Spirits taken down periodically? I know there are cases where original Japanese publishers have taken action against scans for whatever goofy reason.

 

[KouAidou]

They...dont translate them XD
They just host them....which is probably what you meant.

I was referring to the translations hosted on them, of course. But since the hosts have no standard of quality in translation, and since manga is so easy to edit and so easy to fake understanding of, it invariably attracts the worst of the worst wannabe translators.

Most of what I've seen on those sites is really obviously either people translating from the French or Chinese versions of the manga, or JAPN 201/301-level students using it as translation practice and not realizing that at that level, their work is simply not fit for public consumption. It's really just a bad scene.

 

[Lynxara]

Bad manga scanslations are more crippling to the fandom, too, because in the process of editing you obliterate the original kanji. You have to go dig up raws if you suspect something is completely wrong and want to check on it.

In a bad fansub, you can still listen to the original dialog and go, "Wait, no, that translation was wrong, he was really saying something else..."

Or it becomes clear why a translation messed up, like when the TVN translation of Sailor Moon mixed up yarn (keito) and cake (keeki). Those sound somewhat alike, reasonable mistake.

 

[KingRanger]

Hasn't Toei gotten Kamen Rider Spirits taken down periodically? I know there are cases where original Japanese publishers have taken action against scans for whatever goofy reason.

Goofy reasons? If they own the rights to them, they can do what ever they want with them. I mean we may not agree with what they do, but they have every right to do it.

 

[Lynxara]

I don't dispute Toei's right to do whatever with its copyrights, but Toei's thing is it doesn't want Asian consumers reading the translations. So US fans can't translate things unofficially for other US fans because some guy in Hong Kong might read it? That's a pretty goofy level of paranoia about piracy.

 

[KingRanger]

I don't dispute Toei's right to do whatever with its copyrights, but Toei's thing is it doesn't want Asian consumers reading the translations. So US fans can't translate things unofficially for other US fans because some guy in Hong Kong might read it? That's a pretty goofy level of paranoia about piracy.

Wow.. I didn't know they took it that far.