Forum - View topic
NEWS: Manga Artists File Lawsuit Against Manga Download Site

Why pay for a series when you can get it for free? Why is it necessary for anyone outside Japan to support the industry? They seem to more or less be fine without selling the license. Shows, eps like haruhi suzumiya and code geass, are gonna sell/be popular enough regardless what happens outside Japan. Anime has survived years before it penetrated the American market, While it might be profitable to the point it MIGHT spawn a few extra series here and there, it's not a necessity for the market to stay afloat.

Though i say that, i tend to avoid obviously gonna-be-licensed tiitles, and try go for the more obscure titles. I never download manga... even if it's free. I DO support the industry by buying domestic DVDs. But like Shirotensaki said, i don't know how long i can wait for domestic DVDs after seeing it subbed already. Me, for example, i've see all of the 1st season of School Rumble. i've decided to wait until Funi releases the ova and 2nd season. Now, if for some reason, i get compelled to watch the ova and/or the 2nd season, i will do so, and Funi loses the money i would have spent on buying the domestic vers. Why wait another 2 years to buy something i can get for free right now?

Now i do understand that creators should get paid for their work. If i was in their shoes, i wouldn't want anyone to do that to me, but this country was built on stealing, on many different levels, but that's another topic.

Bottom line for me: I always buy my manga, some anime series i dl for free, and some i decide to buy domestically. If dl'ing hurts the industry, that's too bad for them, because as long as fansubs exist, i will take advantage of them if i feel it's necessary.

Last edited by Faceman on Wed Mar 14, 2007 7:56 pm; edited 1 time in total

Well, for everyone who always complains that they cost too much and they can't afford to buy them I can only say: Get a job, you bums!

Really, anything and everything in life costs money. If you want something bad enough, you can get a job. Either a part-time one, or mowing lawns, shoveling snow, babysitting, even maybe parental allowance. Welcome to the real world.

I'm not saying I don't download manga, but the series I like I download, and the ones I download I buy as soon as it comes out in the US. Besides supporting the series, there's something to be said for having a physical copy. Also impresses friends when they see your manga collection.

And if you're too young to get a job, and you don't get an allowance, or you're just too damn lazy, a lot of public libraries (Gasp!! Not the Library!) have begun having a manga and graphic novel section in the Young Adults area. Check your local one if they do.

Edit: And you just don't seem to get it. Fansubbing and scanlations do hurt the industry if people who would normally buy them don't because they got it for free. And there won't be fansubs/scanlations of titles if it keeps on happening, because producing anime is a business, and who wants to spend money on a product people will get for free?

Hmm... Is this site hosting raw manga scans and is a japanese site? Otherwise, it would strange that they would be convicted in Fukuoka....

If so, then it makes more sense to me. If the Japanese are the ones reading it, it shouldn't be that hard to find manga or buy it (since japanese manga is pretty cheap), thus the japanese manga market would be losing its customers.

I don't mind buying manga or borrowing it from the library, but I know no japanese, so I have to resort to scanlations. Americans would only make a very small fraction of the Japanese manga market

Its a tricky tricky issue.

Who's to blame for this stuff? On one hand its tough to blame the people making this stuff available for download. Its not like they make money off this which is what seperates them from Pirates/Bootleggers. The thing to keep in mind, is wether theyre doing harm or not, theyre doing this as a free serivce to Anime fans. On the other hand, its tough to blame Anime fans for downloading. Its tough to justify spending a hundred or so bucks on a complete Anime series when you could just download it for free. Youre expecting them to spend all this money just beacuse what? Its the right thing to do? It helps the industry? Im sure people would like to do that, but what can ya say? 100-200 bucks buys you alot of stuff.

Then ofcourse theres the whole legal side. The problem is, the law rarely is enforced on the internet. If youre breaking copywright laws, yeah you could get in trouble, but keep in mind though these guys are in trouble, there are thousands of people who get away with it. As for downloaders, the odds of getting in trouble are even smaller. So its not like breaking a law IRL where theres a good chance you'll get caught. Thus theres not really much of an deterent there.

Like alot of fans, I'm guilty of downloading aLOT of scanlations, but, like alot of fans, I buy what I like in the end, usually in japanese.
I hope scanlating doesnt end, or, rather, I hope TRANSlating (ie text file 'scripts' of manga) becomes more popular, because my level of japanese isnt quite fluent enough to be able to read japanese manga on my own, so I read my japanese books with the scanlations as a translation aid. This also improves my japanese. Buying the japanese volumes as opposed to the english volumes is an advantage for me because 1) often almost half the price of the english volume 2) Some english versions I am really not happy with and don't want to spend money on 3) Some english volumes are released far too slowly. 4)My japanese gets better.

The only other reasons, like most fans, is:
1) Preview series: If I didn't do this, I wouldnt own half the manga I do now. It's very, very rarely that I've ever bought a new series without reading into it a little first to see if its worth it, most of the very few times I have, I've been disappointed.
2) Out of Print Series: Currently the only manga that I download as it is the ONLY way for me to read it is the Violinist of Hameln. This series was never released in english, and the Japanese volumes are now apparently out of print, so scanlations actually ARE the only way I can read this great series.

About the whole 'money' thing, I find that more an issue with anime rather than manga, but I try as hard as I can to buy stuff. I usually buy stuff at conventions where the prices are often cheaper. With anime its harder as its basically 3 times as expensive as manga, yet there's so many series I still want to see/buy.
I wont be one of the whiney kids who whinge about manga being 'too expensive', $8AU for a japanese book, or $4 at a second-hand shop, is pretty damn affordable.

Very ironic that they're going after manga download sites (I'll admit I've tried to do it) yet doujinshi is not really sued upon as much.

So does anyone know about the double jeopardy laws in Japan? If so, could you explain why didn't it apply here?

May this link (http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1571/is_16_15/ai_54543049) help?

Ah, it's the manga version of the fansub crap Very Happy

. I've been wondering when this'll come around and allow hell to break loose~

Personally, I both buy and download. Almost everthing I've downloaded has been bought unless I just lost interest or it isn't over here (yet?).

I can say for certain that I also have Japanese manga volumes and, yeah, they aren't expensive at all~ I bought half of CLAMP's X series for half as much as I would the crappy&flipped!ViZ versions.

Some of the manga I downloaded I never expect to be brought over here, I've been proved wrong on some (Angel Sanctuary Very Happy

, my favorite manga of all time~! & Loveless, and Earthian) Now the scans are on a disk somewhere in my closet....

...In all truth, the only reason I download manga now is the weekly up-to-date chapters while I wait for the volumes to come out over here (inuyasha, naruto, tsubasa:r.c., xxxholic) DelRay is slow (gimme my CLAMP manga! Evil or Very Mad

); ViZ, again, is annoying with their flips; ug...my Naruto stuff will wait till summer for a catch-up...

humorously, I've actually passed myself while BUYING manga than when I downloaded~ (I stop after a while out of boredom~) Death Note (though I HAVE read the end) is one of those~! HAhaha, I passed my downloads~! hahaha.

Companies are getting better at liscensing and releasing now days; and I don't promote people who logically scan Offical Translations (I've seen a place with scans of TokyoPop's releases scnaned :S) or scan something that's allready completely OUT and readily availble......MANGA, as well as ANIME, is NOT a neccessity for life~! haha

Why am I ranting? ...I've read too many doujinshi today................ (Yes, I BUY doujinshi! That goes along with manga~! Very Happy

)

Like everyone has been saying manga is not that much and just because you don't have the money is no excuse to download. Correct me if I am wrong but didn't The Big O get a second season because of how well it did in the US? I bet all the fan sub watching in the world wouldn't have even been enough for a second season if there was no legal version of it. I know anime dvd's can be a bit much some times but like someone else said things cost money in life, its the real world. If you think about it paying $24.99 for a dvd isn't all that bad. Your supporting the company that dubbed it and giving money to the creator and when going to the movies after ticket prices and food its almost the same price.

When people download just because they don't want to wait is still pretty stupid in my book. Its not going to kill anybody to wait a few months for a tankoban or a DVD. I mean we are like only 9 volumes behind in Bleach and with a new volume coming out every 2 months that is not that bad. Shows like Naruto air every week with marathons all the time, if the filler arc is skipped on tv then we will be on Shippuden in about a year. I know people want to know what happens so they go download the fan subs which I can't stop anyone from doing that and as long as they buy the legal dvd's and tankobans I guess it is not all that bad though. I thought about downloading manga and anime just to be to where they are in Japan since I buy all the tankobans and dvd's anyway but I decided not to because I was not going to do something illegal. I'd rather wait every week for a new episode on tv or a few months for a DVD or manga so I can relax on my bed watching it in english or reading the legal tankoban. Japanese people have to wait for our shows to come out there, when I was there in the summer Prison Break dvd 1 was just realesed and here we just ended season 1 a few weeks before, plus they only got 2 episodes.

I too though am guilty of downloading. I never download manga and the only anime I download is One Piece. I wasn't too happy about downloading One Piece but I only did it because I couldn't take 4kids version anyone. I know its illegal and I'll stop when a new company picks it up and I'll buy the Uncut DVD's. Another thing I really hate about downloading is that most of the people think everyone does it so they go around talking about stuff that has happened and don't care if they spoil anything. I remember back in Jan 06 when we went back to school after Christmas break my japanese teacher showed us what she bought in Hawai. She pulled out her Naruto poster with spoiler[ Sasuke] and then some kid is like "BOO!!" that character sucks" The he said spoiler[ "He sad some very mean things to Sakura and then just left everybody and has not come back"] Keep in mind the US anime was still only on Zabuza at this point. Then my neighbor who watches fan subs was like spoiler[ "Later on Sasuke leaves"] So I do the legal thing and suffer for it.

	Anime News Network Forum Index -> Site-related -> Talkback	All times are GMT - 5 Hours Goto page Previous 1, 2, 3 Next
Page 2 of 3

Forum - View topicNEWS: Manga Artists File Lawsuit Against Manga Download Site

Forum - View topic
NEWS: Manga Artists File Lawsuit Against Manga Download Site