Forum - View topicNEWS: Manga Reading Site JManga to End Service in May
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mangastudent
Posts: 10 |
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Emphasis on copies, it's really easy to copy them to sites in the cloud designed for this sort of thing. In the consumer arena, I've been an Amazon.com customer for long time and use their Cloud Drive, 5GB free, then 20GB $10/year, on up through 5 levels to 1,000GB for $500/year, which are pretty good prices. Use two of these services as I do and you're very unlikely to lose your stuff. Much less likely that physical copies.
This is too expensive for DVDs/Blu-ray, but normal insurance will cover physical copies, albeit with the pain of filing a claim and fighting with your insurance company to get it right. |
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ZeetherKID77
 Posts: 981 |
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What we need is something like Steam for manga.
So then everyone can start freaking out when sales happen then look at their "library" and go "wait, when did I buy that?" |
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Brand
 Posts: 1028 |
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You do realize Jmanga was basically Steam for manga? Steam in DRM and if you lose your account some how, you no longer have access to those games. Users don't actually own the games they have through Steam. |
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Daizo
Posts: 139 |
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Just because they're both digital distribution platforms with DRM elements in them doesn't make JManga the "Steam for manga". |
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agila61
 Posts: 3213 Location: NE Ohio |
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Much of their catalog were titles that wouldn't sell enough to cover print manga costs. And if what someone (Vertical Ed?) has said about ebook royalty rates being twice print royalty rates is correct, then the only feasible opening for those titles would be for reading online. Of course, they SHOULD have started with something like JManga7 with new content coming out on a "all you can read" subscription over a certain period from introduction, and then something like JManga with cheap 1 week rental for back chapters, with volumes moving into your permanent library if you reread them a certain number of times. From the premium member forum, Crunchyroll actually pitched something like JManga7 when JManga was first launched, but it wasn't started until after JManga had moved on from hiring technical support from Crunchyroll. And even so, JManga7 copied part of Crunchyroll's upsell page from free to paid members almost word for word, except for changing "Anime" to "Manga" and "Watch" to "Read". From personal experience, the Android reading app was fine on devices that it happened to work on, but was real finicky about which Android devices it did work on. |
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tuxedocat
 Posts: 2183 |
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An "all you can read" business model is ideal for me as a consumer. I see an awful lot of other consumers saying the same thing.
There is something wrong here, when there is a consumer demand that businesses ignore. (except Viz, to whom I have to give props for trying - even though I'm not so interested in Shonen Jump titles.) That being said, I am depressed today over JManga. I had pretty much made up my mind to support them on a monthly basis, mainly because I want to see more manga localized rather than less. They even seemed to be evolving with the JManga7 thing.... too sad now. |
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Suena
Posts: 289 |
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I was hoping to finally read new releases for Your & My Secret! And hoping the price would go down for Kentauros... Well, I'm not sad at how I spent my money. If they're going broke, it's not because of me. Hopefully someone else will learn lessons from this, and be willing to get a modified model like this going (like all the stuff you geniuses are discussing).
And learn how important a good impression is from the get-go. A lot of people got turned off from the site at the beginning because...it was pretty bad. And they never wanted to come back, and never did. |
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Ryan227
Posts: 43 |
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I have such mixed feelings about this. It first I was kind of upset but then I thought there could be some positive things about this too. I decided to join jmanga because they had one series I really loved and I figured I should support the series and show them people were interested in it. I didn't like the reader and I didn't like the point system but I hoped that if they saw enough people buying certain series they would consider printing it (or license it to an American company). But in the end they only released two volumes of it, less than one every six months even though the series is already 6 volumes long in Japan. I was sad when I saw that jmanga titles were pretty much considered off limits for American licencors too and I started thinking I'd never see any more of this series. Now that JManga is gone though I guess I can only hope someone licenses it now or the scanlators pick it back up.
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jsc315
 Posts: 925 |
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27million streaming subscribers and 8 million DVD subscribers is far from struggling. And Netflix plan for original content has nothing to do with that what so ever. But i do completely agree with you on what you said about Jmanga |
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Myaow
 Posts: 1068 |
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This is such a giant bummer. JManga had a lot of neat titles that you'll never ever see anywhere else and I appreciated that a lot. I would have loved to see it have a lot of success and keep doing its thing for years and years. Super sorry to see it go.
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ZeetherKID77
Posts: 981 |
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Steam is an example of GOOD DRM. People will try to poke holes in it by mentioning the account loss stuff but that's only if you're stupid enough to be VAC banned for hacking. Steam lets you download games to own. JManga did not. |
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Vertical_Ed
Company Representative
Posts: 278 Location: New York, NY |
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http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110818/04304815584/author-says-ebooks-will-hurt-authors-because-royalty-rates.shtml Currently the standard is around 45% for eBook. While approx 15% for paper. And manga eBooks also have advance costs. These costs have dropped, if bundled with the print version. |
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agila61
Posts: 3213 Location: NE Ohio |
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Against what base? List? Gross? (And not just so I can write percentage problems in royalty rates for Basic Math) List for Saturn Apts paper is $12, 15% of which would be $1.80, List for the Saturn Apts Nook Comic is $6, 45% of which would be $2.70. Of course if its list, and if the ebook distributor were to take a 30% cut, with the ebook that would only leave $1.50 for everything else.
If this is in addition to the overheads that can be pooled between print and ebook, its yet more inducement to refrain from ebook-only distribution. |
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reanimator
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Being a regular J-Manga subscriber, I'm really shocked by the announcement. I have purchased 41 volumes of various manga for an average of 500 points or $5 each. Pulling the plug like that is not fair, especially I've spent average of $5 for each volume. $5 is about the price for a print manga in Japan. I don't mind DRM, but people spent way too much for each manga volume in digital format. Download would be nice. If not, transfer to other e-book sellers like Amazon is also a great option.
I don't want to speculate too much about the business side like other fans, but J-Manga should state why they're pulling the plug. Is it because western fans are too cheap? Is it because some of them trying to pirate? Or is J-Manga has been losing money since the beginning? Whatever the reason, they should make a valid statement. Dear ANN, please set up an interview with that J-Manga translator. |
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ConanSan
Posts: 1818 |
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Could just be that Japan Japan'd like it is want to Japan when faced with the opotunity to not be a gaggle of chucklenuts.
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