Forum - View topicNEWS: U.S., Japanese Publishers Unite Against Manga Scan Sites
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Nexus124
Posts: 1 |
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Sort of weird because someone can sit in a books-a-million or barns and noble and read the same manga/comic chapters and still not buy them. They have very comfortable chairs for it. However, when someone does it online it's illegal.
I would totally agree with paying for latest chapters if they were around the same time they're released in Japan... |
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Aerfyn
Posts: 2 |
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I fully support shutting down sites that are making a profit off of this but attacking sites in general is going to do more harm than good.
I have spent close to $2k on manga series in just over the last year as I like to support the companies that are bringing me series I like. However most of these sales are a direct result of being able to read scanlated versions. What these companies seem to fail to recognize is that most people won't buy something unless they have a chance to really preview it. I live in a small town and our local bookstores manga selection is pretty weak so I have to order most titles I want. I likely will not order a book based on the cover alone, the price is simply too expensive since unless I order a few the shipping cost is way too much. Also there are a lot of series that are not being translated or have been started and stopped. Slow and inconsistent releases are the biggest problems that need to be addressed before going after piracy. If people do not have a legal option how is it really fair to blame piracy? As an example I purchased the first to Shakugan novels as soon as they came out and now Viz has pretty much shelved the light novel series. Same with Chibi Vampire. Getting burnt when you buy into a series to have it just stopped is frustrating and really doesn't make me want to support the company. Or the release times are rediculously delayed. Look at FMP, book 4 still hasn't come out yet in the novel series. Claymore manga releases are another really slow release. It's frustrating to have to wait 4-5 months between chapters. These companies need to come up with legal solutions to get the content out in reasonable and reliable channels. Has stamping down on mp3 sharing sites really done much to stop music piracy? No. But if you look at iTunes for example it has helped companies build revenue by providing an option for people to pay for stuff and get it easily. With Apple putting out iBooks that would be a great revenue market for these companies to target. There is also a huge fan base out there translating items. Yes some translation groups are better than others but why not work with the translation groups? Some would probably be willing to help translate content for just some free swag and stuff from the companies who can then turn around and sell the translated stuff online as down loadable items. The problem is too many of these companies are afraid of new technology and want to keep doing business the way they have always done it and so instead of putting resources towards exploiting new tech and really expanding they flail around like children and devote too much to trying to stop piracy. Piracy will never be stopped. Those who won't pay for something never will. Focus needs to be on delivering the content to those willing to pay, in a way that promotes people to pay for it. Getting it out there faster or at least as fast as the scanlation sites is key. If people have to wait 4 months between volumes they will loose interest in buying it if they can read them online monthly. I definitely agree the authors need to be compensated for their work. After all what we enjoy is their livelihood, they can't keep writing/drawing if they are not paid for it. But they need to start pushing their publishers to get their work out there, to recognize that Japan is not the only home to their fans and that their really is a vast market available looking to be tapped. But to really tap that market, to put a real dent in piracy they need to go forward with technology and really compete. Just looking at the price people in the US/Canada are willing to pay. The current volumes of Fairy Tail are 440 Yen on Amazon JP, which direct currency conversion is $5 Canadian but we spend $12 Canadian for. That's twice as expensive but we pay it because we like the series. Most fans are not looking for lower prices, just to be able to buy the series they want, with a reasonable delay for translating and a convenient way to purchase it. Digital downloads, selling it on sites that let you read a bit of it.... So many different ways to actually improve sales that are being ignored. In the end if the only move the publishers do is to try and crack down on piracy they deserve to loose. Focus really has to be on finding ways to provide the content to those that are willing to pay for it. There are a lot of series I would gladly buy if they were available in English, and somehow I don't think I am the minority. |
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GWOtaku
 Posts: 678 |
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I'm mulling over what this means but in general, I certainly can't deny that what they're doing is justified and probably well overdue. If this can be effective, this is the way--a focused effort instead of assorted & isolated actions. That said, the comics industry does need to try exploiting the digital arena much more than it has to date. Manga has been nearly absent so far with the notable exception of Rin-ne and assorted free first chapters for certain titles (I previewed Twin Spica, liked what I saw, and bought volume one. Nice). It'd have to be at least plausibly realistic financially, of course, but yeah. Consumers are drawn to choice and in general, it's in a business' interest to appease that.
Frankly, I'd probably buy many more comics and I'd invest in a Kindle if I had the option to carry my comics around with me everywhere. Even if I made the budget to collect lots of manga, well, in the short term shelf space is an issue in my apartment these days. But man, so far we're lucky to have newspaper comic strips digitized. I'm just waiting and hoping for some publisher to take the big plunge. Oh, and yeah--I'd definitely pay some money for a professional & legal translation of the latest Naruto or One Piece chapters. Last edited by GWOtaku on Tue Jun 08, 2010 1:37 pm; edited 4 times in total |
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SaharaFrost
 Posts: 95 |
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Personally, I have no problem with the companies cracking down on these websites. It's certainly in their right to do so, and these websites ARE breaking the law...so I really feel like I have no room to complain.
On the flip side though, I do think that publishing companies in America and Japan need to take the necessary steps to make material more available to their customers if they do this. Unfortunately, with the way the economy is, right now is probably not an ideal time for them to be taking financial risks (which is part of why they're wanting to get rid of these sites in the first place). One thing that several people have suggested is that these companies make chapters of comics legally available online...I think this would definitely be nice. Another thing that I would really like to see companies try to do though is to sell more manga for less money. In Japan, the average manga sells for about half of what it costs in America. And companies like Viz have definitely been moving more towards that price, especially with their Shonen Jump and Shojo Beat titles. But the biggest problem companies are going to need to work on is licensing more manga. And this is not just America's problem...it's Japan's as well. They need to take a good hard look at what is being read on these sites and start trying to license those titles. This of course, is more my wishful thinking than anything else. It will definitely be a shame to not have access to those scans when the books aren't even available in America yet (and that's if they ever will be). |
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yuricon
 Posts: 145 |
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I have been thinking about this issue to the point of obsession recently. I've posted about it a lot on Okazu and Twitter - not because I have the solution, but because I have got a grip on the problem caused by the old solution to the problem and a basic idea of what the new solution needs to look like.
At then end of the month, I'll be participating in a roundtable on the topic over on TCJ's Hooded Utilitarian and I really hope you'll all read the article. I've written at length about why I can't support scanlation - this new article is me writing at length about why I think scanlation is actually the core of the solution. The companies can't do more than they are doing - going after the 20%, the criminal scanlation sites that are blatantly making money distributing IP they have no right to distribute and doing the best they can with the material they own and can legally distribute. This may be nothing, it may be my life work. At least I'll get the ball rolling. It will likely be up to you all to make it work. Cheers, Erica Friedman |
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prime_pm
 Posts: 2338 Location: Your Mother's Bedroom |
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Ignore what I just said. I've got something better:
EMULATE DRUG DEALERS "Drug Dealers get it right Drug Dealers are astute businesspeople. They know their product is so good they're willing to give a little away for free upfront. They know you'll be back for more--with money. Emulate drug dealers. Make your product so good, so addictive, so "can't miss" that giving customers a small, free taste makes them come back with cash in hand. This will force you to make something about your product bite-size. You want an easily digestible introduction to what you sell. This gives people a way to try it without investing money or a lot of time. Bakeries, restaurants, and ice cream shops have done this successfully for years. Car dealers let you test-drive cars before buying them. Software firms are also getting on board, with free trials or limited-use versions. How many other industries could benefit from the drug-dealer model? Don't be afraid to give a little away for free--as long as you've got something else to sell. Be confident in what you're offering. You should know that people will come back for more. If you're not confident about that, you haven't created a strong enough product." That was pg 191 of Rework by Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson. Get it now at your local library and/or bookstore! It's a must-have! I guarantee! No, I'm neither Jason nor David. Just getting it out there. |
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Mahzes
 Posts: 18 |
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Personally, I read scans AND buy volumes for series I like- I only use scans as a means of staying up to date, since the English volumes of Naruto are a year or so behind.
I agree with what other people are saying, though. If they want to stop scanlations, they need to come up with a way for fans to read the new chapters online at the same speed that scanlations provide. Because I don't want to be a year behind with Naruto plotwise because I'm forced to rely on the official English releases. Like I said, I buy the volumes anyway, but I'd be annoyed if I didn't have a means of staying up to date. |
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Hyperone
 Posts: 20 |
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I'm no economist, nor am I much for manga. That said, the problem hits me as one of companies refusing to take any new steps, opting for a status quo setup.
Why not (after shutting the sites down), take a look at their traffic data? Use this to predict which IP's are most desired by the fan base, and then move to make them available? This would limit risk, as you already have a demand demonstrated, while also cutting down on the titles most sought after illegally. |
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nightjuan
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Well, for those who don't live in the U.S. or Europe plus a small number of additional countries...it's actually incredibly hard and sometimes even hilariously expensive to find manga. Which is one of the reasons why such blanket stances often lead absolutely nowhere. Of course, any reasonable person would accept that access to manga isn't a right...but there's a lot of unsatisfied or commercially untapped demand throughout the world and this is a fact that is rarely acknowledged when these discussions take place. As long as the international perspective is lost, there will be little to no real progress since manga scan sites aren't exclusively aimed at U.S. costumers, to say the least, who usually do have some sort of retail alternative. But the world at large doesn't. Or to put it another way...I hope that the industry will eventually adopt a digital distribution business model comparable to what either Steam or Good Old Games are able to offer, to use two notable examples from the gaming world, because that would go a long way towards making lasting changes in a positive direction. Steam in particular does have some stupid publisher-based regional restrictions, naturally, but many of the products they sell are actually available for download worldwide. Yes, DRM would be a concern at first, but that's precisely why I've mentioned GOG as well. If anything, no DRM is one of their selling points and I would even say it's earned them a rather faithful fanbase.. Last edited by nightjuan on Tue Jun 08, 2010 1:35 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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prime_pm
Posts: 2338 Location: Your Mother's Bedroom |
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So far, the only one that's even remotely got on with that model is Yoshitoshi Abe and Amazon. Granted the Nook software's a piece of shit, but I digress.
Anyone remember that? |
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GWOtaku
Posts: 678 |
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Here's an interesting fact via Twitter today:
So seemingly, this is an early success story for a company offering a legal, current digital release for a manga. Certainly hopeful to see in light of this news and what it may portend for the future. |
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vashfanatic
 Posts: 3490 Location: Back stateside |
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 HAHAHAHAHA!!
You think that the fly-by-night, get-it-done-ASAP scanlators make quality translations? Sorry, but your typical release of a Shounen Jump chapter is just retched. Even if the typesetting isn't amateurish, the translations are often filled with errors and frequently made "more adult" by filling them with curse words. I've found that the best scanlators are the ones working on unlicensed and unusual manga, who will often take a long time to release chapters or volumes. For them, it's not about the status of being the first to get their chapter posted online, it's about bringing a title to the eyes of fans - and they generally dislike their work being put in online readers, and will shut down a project if it's licensed. They often will purchase their volumes straight from Japan too, rather than relying on scans posted directly online for anyone (including people in Japan) to download. This is a good step. Obviously adding a few titles to preview online would be nice, too. But while I appreciate the convenience of some of these sites, in the end, I'd be willing to be more patient if it helps the industry in the long run. Period. |
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suika
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This is what happened a couple years back when certain manga companies (ADV, Tokyopop) licensed so much manga that they literally flooded the market. And guess what happened? ADV collapsed, Tokyopop had to drastically restructure and scale back... Unfortunately, manga (and comics for that matter) are a niche market, shelf space and wallets are limited and the less than stellar series that were licensed didn't help matters much. I think it'd be better for companies to make smarter licenses.
This is just like the webcomics model - put up your comic content on the web for free but make money off a printed version + tshirts + buttons + merchandise + etc. How many webcomic authors/artists are able to make a financially self-sustaining living off of this? Well... not very many. |
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HayateTokidoki
Posts: 37 |
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I buy every anime, manga, video game, and music CD that I like. With manga and anime, TONS of stuff is out there that will never legitimately be released in English. I buy the original Japanese releases in these cases, but it is very nice to have the ability to enjoy these things in my native language (subtitled in the case of anime).
Beyond that, series that are released here simply take WAY too long to actually come out. It's absolutely ridiculous how far behind some manga series are with US releases. Some people have already said it, but the fact is the reason these sites are big within the community that is willing to buy the stuff to begin with - because those that are not willing to buy are not going to start buying because you get rid of these sites - is because the US publishers simply haven't managed to get their act together and release things within a reasonable amount of time from the Japanese release. They need to figure out a way to recapture the market and attract the fanbase to legitimate and positive ways to enjoy the product. If they can't do anything but release individual volumes in really limited retail outlets a year, or sometimes significantly longer, after they were originally released, I don't have much sympathy at lost sales for the US publishers. Maybe the Japanese publishers should get together and offer a subscription service to a site like One Manga that posts translations as they are released in Japan. They can bypass the US publishers and make some more money that will go directly to the creators. |
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agila61
 Posts: 3213 Location: NE Ohio |
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Crunchyroll would like to, and has the infrastructure to do it, but so far none of the Japanese production committees uploading anime and subtitles to Crunchyroll have given permission to do so. |
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