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INTEREST: RetroCrush's Magical Idol Pastel Yumi Stream Credits Unauthorized Fansub

At least they owned up to it. RetroCrush still the best legal streaming service we have.

Terrible decision, and RetroCrush is getting well deserved flak for it. But it’s kind of interesting to think that they probably were within their legal rights to do so: a fan translation is a derivative work, so Johnny English Subs and its members would have no legal recourse against RetroCrush, since they can’t claim copyright on a completely derivative work.

Of course, IANAL, etc.

A bunch of years ago, in germany we even had some cases where a licensor was openly working together with fansubbers, so they could make more obscure stuff available for streaming.

I also heard that Crunchy likes to hire german fansubbers to translate subs from english to german. I don't have a proper source for that but based on how terrible some german subs are (looking at you Wake Up Girls), I wouldn't be surprised if this is true.

We've also had at least one case of fansubbers being officially credited on a legal release, with AnimeNation's Risky/Safety attributing translations to VHS fansubbing group Sachi Gumi Distribution. Presumably those usage rights were duly requested from the group, and the scripts were approved by the Japanese side.

When Animation began to seriously consider licensing anime, we quickly narrowed our targets to a pair of short series from Pony Canyon. Having no prior experience in translation, video mastering, replication, or distribution, we wanted to cut our teeth on something of manageable length: a single series of 13-minute episodes. I suggested Omishi Mahou Gekijou Risky Safety and D4 Princess because they were both short series, and I’d watched the entirety of both: Risky Safety via VHS Sachi’s fansubs and D4 Princess via untranslated VHS copies of Japanese TV broadcasts. The AnimeNation staff collectively and distinctly preferred Risky Safety. As of today, D4 Princess remains unlicensed for American release.

I received permission from “Sachi” to use her fan translation of the series’ dialogue as the basis for our official script.

But it’s kind of interesting to think that they probably were within their legal rights to do so: a fan translation is a derivative work, so Johnny English Subs and its members would have no legal recourse against RetroCrush, since they can’t claim copyright on a completely derivative work.

f you want to use fansubs, you need to get permission both from the fansubber AND from the Japanese licensor and sign contracts to get the rights to the translations cleared up.