Forum - View topicNEWS: Weekly Shonen Jump Editors Discuss Unauthorized Copies
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Paploo
Posts: 1875 |
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That's exactly the problem. The continuation of fansubs by fansubbing groups after streaming became the new shift in the industry this year is proof of that- even with a free, legal offering, most fans don't care. There'll always be new things to nitpick, delude and whinge about. Howabout you guys stop give us reason to villify you, by not doing and defending villanous things? If you do something immoral/illegal that has such a harsh impact on the real industry, you sort of have to expect people having issues with it. $10 is about the price of most paperbacks. So, to me, paying $10 for a manga is pretty reasonable. It's about the same as 3 comic book issues [w/twice the content], and a little cheaper then the price of a 100 pg. b+w OGN [straight to TPB comics, that aren't serialized beforhand] from a domestic publish, which tend to be around 12 to 15 bucks. In the terms of the rest of the book/comic market, manga prices are very reasonable. Comparing them to free, illegal, immoral editions on the internet that don't pay the publisher, artist or respectable retailer is an unfair practice that only shows more poor behaviour on the part of fans. This is all stuff that's also a problem for domestic comic publishers like Marvel and DC, with people posting scans of comics that are available at any comic shop, mailorder site, mailed subscription from publisher or newsstand across North America on the same day that only cost $3.00. They have the same sort of strange delusions anime/manga fans have, and the creators of comics have pretty consistently told them they don't appreciate it. But they just sort of come up with new and stranger reasons for doing it, and we keep seeing more and more legal battles, even as Marvel's made a lot of moves to making digital content available. Even with their extremely large subscription-based online service, there's still a lot of people arguing why it's okay to pirate. I think manga publishers money would be better spent offering a few online products where possible to see if the market really exists for digital content, and taking legal action against pirates offering material illegally, than launching a large, expensive free-for-all site that some fans seem to be asking for. Even that wouldn't the problem, and even then, there'd be many artist who don't want to have certain works online. |
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vashfanatic
Posts: 3490 Location: Back stateside |
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And I'm saying that, so long as the manga is 1) unlicensed and 2) the raws are never posted online, the damage from groups actually purchasing the manga themselves to scanlate is negligible to Japanese companies; if the manga is licensed in, say, English, then it's the responsibility of companies like Viz, TokyoPop, Del Rey, etc. to go after them. And indeed they should. Unfortunately the best solution to all these problems would be responsibility on the part of fans: to only get scanlations (and fansubs for that matter) on unlicensed and unavailable manga (or anime), and to purchase things that they like as soon as they are available, to learn patience and to support the industry. And unfortunately again I don't see that happening without sweeping legal action that may cost companies as much as they're losing to illegal copies. So I guess I'll keep preaching my message of responsibility on any forum I can until it batters through the armor of entitlement that fans wrap around themselves. I mean, I may like being able to read chapters as they come out in Japan as well as reading them in volume form when they come out in America, but I can give up this luxury if it helps the industry. Last edited by vashfanatic on Sat Apr 17, 2010 2:01 pm; edited 2 times in total |
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Mirri
Posts: 313 |
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Shueisha owns the publishing rights. They have the right to stop raw distribution ANY TIME. They are asking now. You are saying you're impatient and you want another culture to adjust their entertainment mediums to your language when you're a foreigner. Foreign sales are not where major profits come from on something that's not a behemoth like Pokemon, Naruto, or Dragon Ball Z, and to a lesser extent Bleach. What about One Piece? I hate to tell you, but you're not in Japan. One Piece tanked on US Television TWICE with two different dubs, even with nearly no edits the latter time for broadcast (if any, I was not looking for them.) All downloads may not be lost purchases, but that does not mean that downloads do not cause lost purchases at all. Saying it's okay to give out a successful title for free because it's successful isn't reasonable. Saying it's okay to give out an unsuccessful title because it won't be licensed in the US isn't reasonable. If you want to show your appreciation, import it from Japan. Bound Volumes often cost A THIRD OF WHAT DEL REY CHARGES IN THE US if you buy in Japanese. If you like it enough to steal it, you should like it enough to buy it. For everyone who says "But it's so slooooow to wait!", what would you think if you were producing entertainment for Americans, and people from a foreign country began to release full copies of your entertainment in your release's native language for the sake of translating that could make it out to the people of the country of the native release. Even if the intention is not to deal damage, it in all likelihood will. |
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sdhd
Posts: 169 |
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The manga publishers need to meet the needs of the customers which has not been in many cases. The "fans" comes in two forms. The ones that will not buy because they are too cheap. The other fans that will buy because they love the product.
Company like VIZ should be thinking ahead when they license a manga title in how fast they want to sell the title and keep the attention of the readers. The great example would be Naruto, Bleach, and Death Note. These manga should be released every month instead of every other month or every 3 months. Keep the product coming even if the licensee have to charge more so they can pay the translators and the print jobs and make profits at the same time. Charge people more for faster publications and quality. From a customer point of view the manga titles have been already been finished in Japan, so why can't the licensee release them in a timely manner to keep the customer attention? Last edited by sdhd on Sun Apr 18, 2010 6:00 pm; edited 2 times in total |
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domino
Posts: 373 |
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Fans will always find a way to distribute illegally when legal methods fail them.
I know a lot of Japanese people living in the United States that rely on digital scans just because they can't get weekly jump here. They have money and would gladly pay for the comics if they could read them on the same day as people in Japan. They do not want to read manga in English. Ordering Weekly Jump from Japan is silly because you are basically shipping a phone book to your house from the other side of the world on a weekly basis for an outrageous shipping price that is bad for both the consumer and the environment. Then it will likely get delayed, ruining the purpose of subscribing in the first place. The internet has been a great tool for digital book distribution for a decade, so why haven't they taken the issue into their own hands to distribute their works internationally for a fee instead of wait for frustrated fans to do it for them for free? Give us options and we will take them. |
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littlegreenwolf
Posts: 4796 Location: Seattle, WA |
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I don't think comparing a book/comic format to a digital video format is a very good comparison. With fansubs you can easily burn it to a DVD and have in some cases a quality DVD that rivals that of an official DVD release. Scanlations are different. The quality various across the spectrum. For example I know for a fact there are at least two different groups that release Skip Beat's bi-weekly/monthly chapters. One goes for speed, the other for quality (the same can be said for any Shonen Jump release). I think fellow forum goer Emerje stated it best with the following:
You can't just print out scanlations and have a copy of a volume to rival the official release. The very idea of doing such a thing, and how it'd look on my book shelf has me cringing my nose in disgust. To stop scanlations you need to address WHY there are scanlations. Some fans are looking for a free fix of manga, yes, but not everyone. I believe it's mainly conveninece and, with popular series, having the latest chapter. Yes, you can critisize us fans who read scanlations for being impatient, and you'd be right. I know I'm impatient. For example, It'd be like telling the biggest Doctor Who fan in North America that no (I'm a Doctor Who fan obviously), you can't watch the Doctor Who Christmas special the day it airs in England because you're American. You have to wait 6 months before it shows on SyFy. IT'S NOT GOING TO WORK. If a fan finds a link online, they're going to download it because waiting 6 months to watch that special when everyone else online has, meaning they're possibly going to spoil it for you etc, it's just too much of an overload that fan urges can't control. The results? Millions of people watch the Doctor Who specials in America (according to some of the numbers, it's rumored to be one of THE most downloaded shows ever) way before it ever airs in America, meaning ratings are rather dismal if the fans bother to watch the American broadcast at all. BBC is trying to fix this issue much like anime-companies are doing now with simulcasts, but there's still problems. Fans no longer have to wait 6 months, but there's still about a 2-3 week period in between a UK broadcast and a US. More patient fans can wait no problem, some of the die hards not so much. Still, I know BBC-America saw a major boost in their viewership with a shorter wait on the recent Doctor Who specials they aired, be it because it was David Tennant's final episodes, or the lack of wait in between, only the airing of the new Doctor Who season will tell. But that aside (I think I may have gone off topic a bit with that point) manga is a different format, and its release is different here in the US than Japan. In Japan most manga are released chapter by chapter, weekly or bi-weekly (sometimes monthly). Fans there buy a bunch of random manga chapters at once in magazine format, and then they buy that chapter again in book format. This wasn't a problem a few years ago for US companies, but through digital copies fans are getting chapters days after their Japanese counterparts, and they like it. This has created a demand that no company here in America has addressed or attempted to address, and until they do they'll continue loosing money on it. Give fans a legal alternative to reading the latest chapter, and some will pay for it, as well as continuing to buy their favorite title's in book format. Not everyone will be willing to pay, but I believe they'd get enough interest in it that they'd make some sort of profit off it it. Then once they give us fans a legal alternative of the product that is in demand, then they will probably have more luck in getting rid of these scanlation sites like onemanga. Publishers already have to translate the chapters and do some editing for a volume release, why not give us a rough draft of the final version weeks, if not months ahead of time, for a cheap by chapter price? |
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Arisato-kun
Posts: 17 |
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I honestly hope nothing comes to pass because of this. I understand that these copies are wrong and can lose money for the industry but think about the money they have most likely gained because of it. What about those that support authors like myself? I honestly would not have learned about or purchased the vast majority of manga series I own if it weren't for online translated copies.
I just hope they look at the other side of the issue and realize that money could be made by utilizing these copies. People just need to realize that as long as you read these copies you should most likely be buying copies when they become available to support these great authors and artists. I don't think there's anything to be ashamed of in that. |
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LordRedhand
Posts: 1472 Location: Middle of Nowhere, Indiana |
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Nice theory Arisato-kun, unfortunately it doesn't happen. It is hard to know exactly what positive effects are but it is easier to see negative effects (Comics/Manga are losing money and series are getting canceled due to low sales.) This is part of the reason I can't get behind scanlations/fansubs is that even if I bought everything that I read/watched through these means (and in fact would feel obligated to regardless of whether I really liked it or not, buy all that you took means buy all, no exceptions.) I still would not have given back everything that I took. For that to happen I'd have to stop immediately the use of scanlations and fansubs and even then I can't really give it back on what I already took, but preventing myself from doing so in the future.
Besides anticipatory excitement makes your fandom burn longer than being an impatient I want it nowz! mindset, and now is a good a time as any to practice, I recommend breathing. |
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Paploo
Posts: 1875 |
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littlegreenwolf, a lot of what you're talking about is stuff Jake Forbes pointed out in a recent guest editorial @ mangablog I linked to on the manga forums here last month
http://www.mangablog.net/?p=7492 Jake writes a very good, thoughtful piece that is worth reading. He takes a very balanced view in that he goes after everyone[fans/japanese companies/domestic publishers], brings up lots of questions, and asks everyone to do their part to try to fix things. Basically, japanese manga companies do need to make changes, but fans have to keep lots of things in mind too, and a big part of it (and what you overlook a little) is that fans have to move away from scanlations and being so pro-piracy before any meaningful changes can happen. It's a two way street, and fans haven't been holding up their part of the bargain- the fact that anime piracy hasn't been affected at all by the swicth to legal streams shows whose foot the shoe is on. |
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littlegreenwolf
Posts: 4796 Location: Seattle, WA |
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There are always exceptions and fans on different sides of this. Some fans just take what's offered for free, and they probably always will do so. Other fans go up and beyond buying the manga when it's released in English, even going so far as to importing the Japanese edition when no English version is ever released, as well as purchasing other licensed merchandise. I know the negatives of scanlations probably do outweigh the positives, but that doesn't seem to stop Ameircan publishers from using the scanlation community as a sort of testing ground for titles they're interested in licensing in concerns to lesser known manga-ka. It seems lately that it's rare for a month to go by where a manga that jumped to popularity in the scanlation community is suddenly licensed my a publisher here.
You can argue that the medium is meant to be read one chapter at a time, and is designed to leave the reader in serious anticipation in waiting for the next chapter more so than waiting for the next volume, and this creates a constant buzz in the word of mouth popularity. Other graphic novels released here in the US with a common book story format (not talking about the monthly superhero comics). Manga are designed to pull a reader in with only twenty pages and to make them want and look forward to the next chapter, versus a volume of chapters all at once. Paploo: I've read it before, and I think via a link you posted too. He brings up many good points on both sides like you've said. The problem is I don't see myself stopping with the scanlations unless I'm offered a legal alternative. The best I can do as a fan is just continue buying the volumes as they're released here. |
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ZiharkXVI
Posts: 364 |
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You are right. Whilst the rest of this board messes around playing the minister giving a sermon, you see the harsh reality. These companies will not crack down on sites like Onemanga because its for all the money they could dump into legal proceedings, they know three things. 1) They can't afford it. 2) There is a great chance others will replace them. 3) There is no guarantee of even success depending on how the litigation goes. I really find all this talk about the moral depravity of reading scanlations to be unhelpful. You see, change does not come from the fans. No matter how "morally correct" you are, you don't expect them to change. You might punish them - but the problem is obviously beyond the limits of what the law encompasses. Meaning, you can't do that effectively. I have an analogy for this situation that fits fairly well. Imagine if you will a small, one horse town in the old west. You're the proprietor of the local saloon. You're business is entertainment and good times. It used to be good for you. People come, have a few drinks, enjoy a show or two, and then head off to whatever they do to survive. You have a sheriff in town in case things get a little too out of hand, but he's not the greatest sheriff. He's corrupt. You have to pay him bribes to get him to actually do anything. But its okay, since your uses for him are few and far between. You even have a local preacher - but lets face it, your uses for HIM are even fewer. You're in the entertainment business, not God's word. Your business is a good one. You've been a little lax though in a few areas. You maybe don't clean the glasses very often. You stock up on a selection of alcohol, but you're selective about which people you'll sell certain kinds to. Saving the best for your personal friends - cause after all, they're your friends! The shows are nice, but because you're kind of cheap, you only show them on Tuesday of every week now. So for those people who can't make it, too bad. Overall though, who cares? You're the only saloon in town. Your business is still good. THEN, Scanner Jack came to town - and it all fell apart. Scanner Jack sets up his own saloon on the other side of town. Now, Jack is not a very moral fellow. He frequently robs the shipment of whiskey coming in off the coach just outside of town - picking out some of the best for his own bar. He books your showgirls for every night of the week. He cuts his prices to nothing, because in reality Jack just uses the saloon as a front. He's already made it rich because of his past scams and doesn't need the money. What do you do? The companies from which you buy your supply of alcohol tell you that they won't be able to ship any more to you. They're not getting paid ala Jack's theft and its not worth it for them to even bother anymore. People are flocking to Scanner Jack's saloon because obviously they can enjoy good drink and good entertainment there at low prices. Its no secret that Jack is a criminal, he even brags about it some times. But now he has friends. People who think and act like him. You see, you never bothered to talk to the sheriff early on. And now of course you know it would take a bribe of epic proportions to get the lazy lawman to crack down on Jack and all his supporters. You know you should've nipped it early on, but now its pointless since you can't afford the sheriff's services. You turn to the preacher - but lol, nobody listens to him. You try and tell the townsfolk to stop going to Jack's, but although many nod and listen to you, its ineffective. You still haven't stopped any of your old business practices, and they point this out to you. And although you still see faithful patrons gather to your business - enough that you're surviving on - you see the numbers dwindle every week. What do you do?!?! Or in other words, what do the manga companies do? Only idiots blame the fans alone. Its just as much a business problem of not adapting to the changing circumstances. Its like if you were selling something by handing it out to people and hoping they come back and pay you later. Do you really expect that to be an efficient business model? Really? |
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LordRedhand
Posts: 1472 Location: Middle of Nowhere, Indiana |
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I buy comics (like actual issues, unless my periods of not having enough money make me miss the single issues than it's to the TPB.)
So I can get drawn in easier than with a manga (have not really explored manga, my tastes are more to Alex Ross or the art found in The Red Star by Christian Gossett than to say Gosho Aoyama, even though I like Case Closed. Another series I'm looking at is Mouse Guard http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Oq2kNZRKShg/StT9u_LVHaI/AAAAAAAABWA/RYiv-y04Qdk/s1600-h/legends.jpg So it's not that I have a problem with wanting to buy a TPB or a manga and can understand the mindset, it's just that you know they need money both in the short and long terms to be successful and if everyone waits for it to get collected or cheaper then well we all lose. |
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ABCBTom
Posts: 183 |
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I don't think it's any of our intent to blame the fans alone. I currently don't work in the industry, so I can't make any meaningful changes there. But I can convince fellow friends to do the right thing. No anti-piracy person is against changes in the industry. If I had my guess, since Viz is doing a speed-up release of One Piece, and introducing chapters in Shonen Jump, that One Piece would be the manga that will have the first "simulcast" experiments. Keep this in mind: 1) Probably due to obligations to advertisers, publishers, subscribers and the like, any "simulcasted" chapter will have to be delayed a day or more, so that people will still buy the magazine in Japan. I know that the entire magazine needs to move to a digital format, but that is an evolutionary process. 2) Region locking would likely be required, since Shueisha deals with a lot of different licensees, and they would not want their sales affected. This would also be an evolutionary process. 3) Advertising would be required. Banner ads, or maybe click-through ads. Maybe a small subscriber fee would allow you to read the latest One Piece ad-free. If the manga was provided for no money, how can the publisher stay in business? A publisher would never undertake any act that would knowingly destroy their profitability. 4) A translator would probably have to work with Oda, his staff, and the publisher in order to provide a ready, quality checked, accurate translation in time for a very close release. This takes money and effort. Those of us on the anti-piracy side are simply saying that this wouldn't matter. Someone would log in, download all of the images, put them on their site, with THEIR ADS, and make money from content they didn't even bother to scan in and translate. Maybe they'd even try and hack into Viz's servers and pull the translations before the Shonen Jump issue even hit newsstands in Japan. ANN would post something about how Viz's Shonen Jump site was hacked and the content was spread for free about the internet. We'd be on a comment thread like this, and this is how the comments would go: "It's Viz's fault. They should have known someone wanted to hack in and steal the manga before even the Japanese could read it." "Viz needs to get with the times! You can't expect people who want to read manga would want to view ads. Viz just needs to give it away for free." "Why should I have to wait three days to read something I can scanlate now! Information wants to be free, Viz. You're using the old time business model, and that no longer works in this digital age." "I can't support Viz because they region lock. Until everyone in the world can read it for free, I'm going to scanlate in protest." "Viz uses a stupid font. They also call Zoro "Zolo". I'm going to keep reading my favorite scanlation that uses comic sans." And the excuses and justifications would fly about how this just isn't good enough, and I would be there, once again saying that the bar keeps shifting and fans are playing a con game. I will even link back to this thread when it happens. At that time, will some of you admit that some of this is just shameless theft? What will it take? |
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ZiharkXVI
Posts: 364 |
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I'm not suggesting there's anything we can do about it. But I am wondering what will happen. And btw, I don't take sides here. I'm definitely not pro-piracy. Its illegal. I'll admit to having read scanlations before, however I do have the manga for those. But as you might guess, I"m certainly not impressed with the businesses. They are single-handedly going to kill the manga industry with their foolishness. I do like some of your points to "Keep in mind". That's the type of stuff we need to start hearing from companies. My personal view is this. They missed the boat. Like so many media companies, they didn't even bother to address the digital medium. And now they're suffering for it. Digital has a whole host of advantages over print media. Free cost aside, if I had my choice of buying a manga book or downloading an entire manga onto a reading device - I'm going to go digital every time. The companies rolled the dice, and they lost. So what do they do now? They better start scrambling. It may be possible to come up with a fallout plan still. What they just told me in this news story though is that they've got nothing. They're just waiting around till the industry folds. I've seen the anime side of the industry at least try. Its true - their effectiveness is muted by the already prevalent use of fansubs. They missed the boat too early on to beat this stuff. They too have consequences. If the manga industry can't address these issues, then expect less manga. Expect a sort of black hole to appear sucking all creativity into it and that only those sold for a cheap buck survive. At that point, the industry will either die and be remembered fondly or will transform through the help of new businesses. I mean, mangaka aren't going to just die I suppose. They just might not use a company like WSJ to get their stories out there. |
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sdhd
Posts: 169 |
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The Japanese companies are always slow to react to problems instead of being proactive. They blame the readers, and fans for their own short comings. If Shueisha want the readers to change their behavior then Shueisha needs to meet the needs of the fans. By threatening people who upload raws onto the internet is stupid. This makes Shueisha looks like a bully. Shueisha have a lot of money so they can take people to court. Last edited by sdhd on Sun Apr 18, 2010 6:01 pm; edited 4 times in total |
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