Forum - View topicNEWS: Swedish Fansub Site Closed By Copyright Enforcement Agency
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Kikaioh
 Posts: 1205 Location: Antarctica |
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Yes, it's copyright infringement, and has been for a long time. The words may be in a different language but the content is the same, which is the important legal point. As Spotlesseden said, it's not very different from translating a book into multiple languages and providing them free to the world. Plagiarism is a whole different discussion, as it's more of an ethical issue of academic/journalistic dishonesty, and isn't always necessarily a criminal copyright offense. |
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bradc
 Posts: 152 |
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They are very much abusing it the same way since fans (consumers) are often using subtitles as academia use where nerds and geeks are often stereotyped. There is nothing wrong with the fanmade subtitles; fans been doing since forever... Fans the very consumers buy them. Some books aren't translated in your language, how do you get them? There is no way of obtaining such material. |
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Kikaioh
Posts: 1205 Location: Antarctica |
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Personally, I think piracy establishes a problematic feedback loop that makes it more difficult for content to disseminate legally worldwide in a context that's profitable for content creators, largely because it culturally devalues content and elevates expectations that content should be enjoyed before it's paid for. When I compare consumer cultures for console video games (which have low piracy penetration and a broad cultural expectation that you have to pay in order to play) against anime/manga (which has high piracy penetration and an established culture that you should be able to enjoy a work before having to pay for it), it would seem to follow that at least one reason why anime has struggled as a business model in the US is because the cultural expectations established by piracy have increased the financial risk factors for domestic publishing (obviously there are other non-piracy related reasons, I'm just mentioning it as one of them). |
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Hagaren Viper
 Posts: 764 |
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I'm not seeing why people are so surprised about this, since the anime fandom should be more than familiar with fansubs and scanslations... which are, you know, illegal.
Of course I'm not familiar with this site at all though. I've heard there are sites that offer subtitle scripts for the hard of hearing where there are none, so if this was that kind of site that would be kind of lame. But how are the subtitles supposed to be applied? Re-burned onto a dvd? Slapped on a video file? It sounds like there is room for illegal activity in how the subtitles are used, so that could be why they went for it. Frankly it would be better to go after the video sources if that is the case though. |
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TsukasaHiiragi
 Posts: 179 |
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Piracy has nothing to do with it - Piracy has been around for decades, with little impact and has been proven many times again. But what people don't tell you is that since the days of piracy, the global markets was a much better place -
You throw in a global recession into the pot, and various idiotic laws and obviously, piracy will become the scapegoat for losses. Look at the 80s, you could copy a vcr tape, or a cassette tape extremely easy. Even game cartridges eventually became copyable - no one really cared so much because the bottomlines of companies was almost always being met so piracy was always chalked off as acceptable losses - then comes along intellectual property laws which are honesty, poorly worded and very construed which immediately gives way to much power to companies and organizations - then came along the huge recession a few years ago, and look what happened? Look at all the major sites which was targetted, and are still targetted today, all because companies could no longer easily make the bottom line targets - so obviously, something has to happen and in many cases, piracy becomes the obvious #1 target - it doesn't matter what it is, where its located etc - these days, if its infringing on someones property - chances are; someones going to come after you. Look at the recent case in Japan regarding R4 NDS carts - they was sold 'legally' in Japan for years before being declared illegal, and now Nintendo are filing for a huge sum of money - *oh and sorry if I made spelling/grammar mistakes ~ I'm suffering from a summer cold atm >.< I even shouldn't be at my computer lol |
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Kikaioh
Posts: 1205 Location: Antarctica |
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@TsukasaHiiragi: Well, you have to look at piracy in the context of the internet. The scale of piracy back in the 80's was several powers of magnitude smaller than it is today, simply because the VHS format was nowhere near as pervasive and instantly accessible as the internet is. I also think you might be underestimating the controversy self-recording media formats caused when they started appearing on the market, as there were lawsuits brought by the media industry to try and restrict VCRs from being able to record content (the one that jumps to mind is the landmark Sony vs. Universal Studios case). Even in the late 90's we started seeing the early signs of media concern over the Internet with the passing of the DMCA, so I think the industry has been concerned with piracy for quite a long while. I also think that your example of console video games isn't necessarily a good one, since they actually experience a very low degree of piracy compared to other media formats (largely because their entire technological model is based in copyright protection, which some suggest has actually been a financial boon for the game industry, which has surpassed the film and music industries combined in annual revenues for some years now).
Whether piracy is responsible for financial losses is debatable, since it's virtually impossible and overly complex to estimate the financial and cultural effects of a largely guesstimated theoretical absence (though as I mentioned before, some vague comparisons can be made between the relatively successful and heavily copyrighted-protected console gaming industry vs. the relatively struggling, copyright-weakened domestic anime industry). The speculative nature of piracy economics is usually why I avoid discussing it, and instead focus on the moral/ethical/legal nature of rights infringements, which is a bit ways easier to reasonably discuss. |
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Sheleigha
 Posts: 1671 |
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The difference here, is that they did NOT provide the videos to their work, only the text... Scans and fansubs of course provide both. It would be like getting hauled to jail for making an .ass/.srt file for some anime. |
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Hagaren Viper
Posts: 764 |
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Not always the case though. I've seen fansub groups that offer the subtitle files, though it is pretty darn rare for them to offer them exclusively it does happen. For most fansubs, you're obviously going to have use a TV rip if you are going to use that sub file as soon as possible. If you wait to import the DVD or whatever, then hey, more power to you, use that file. If the whole site was based around the latter option, then I can definitely see the problem. |
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Kikusui
Posts: 5 |
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What exactly happens in such a case? Do they simply cease the server and end it, or do they use the server to try to track down downloaders?
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Hawkwing
 Posts: 317 Location: Sweden |
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I'm ashamed to be born in this shithole. It's been proven that Sweden is unable to do one good deed in our generation.
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Sceleris
Posts: 43 Location: Sweden |
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I have a hard time getting agitated about this.
First of all, it's clearly illegal. Subtitles just simply do not reach the threshold of originality to make them "works" independent of the original films' copyrights (although the translator may have a copyright himself). They also hosted the files themselves, so there's no possible grey area like in the Pirate Bay case. Another thing is that the site was quite obviously made to facilitate film piracy. Most of the subtitles were for American or Swedish (we have awful dialogue mixing...) films and television series, with clear information about which pirated release they were timed for. There were of course some obscure flicks, but mostly the big budget kind that has or will come out legally subtitled sooner or later. It wouldn't surprise me if a substantial part of the subtitles were straight-up rips of commercially available DVDs or Blu-ray discs. Thirdly, the subtitles were often low quality, with spelling errors, grammatical errors and mistranslations, so "nothing of value was lost." (On the other hand, at least there weren't as many issues with readability as there are with English language anime fansubs, whose authors, besides using crappy fonts and colours, often seem to disregard even such basics as line length or duration.) Also, that they would have had "several anime series"... Well, consider me a sceptic. I've never seen any anime on the site. Quick research on the Web Archive cache from April this year does indeed show that Bleach and Higurashi seemed to be on the site, but that's about it, and probably just a handful of episodes at that. There is no Swedish anime fansubbing scene to speak of. (Everyone watches English fansubs anyways; many fools even say they prefer it.) No, good riddance. Those morons at Undertexter.se should be grateful for getting away with it for more than nine years. |
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Gilles Poitras
Posts: 476 Location: Oakland California |
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One study shows that shutting down a major piracy site does have an effect. http://idea.heinz.cmu.edu/2013/03/07/megaupload/ |
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jr240483
 Posts: 4374 Location: New York City,New York,USA |
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Unfortunately , its still copyrighted , and its still illegal. and companies have been cracking down on fansub websites and fan streaming websites. Companies like Viz Media have placed all of their copyright handling to Remove Your Media LLC to get their licensed materials off of illegal sites cause it costing them and the licensors revenue. Its also why companies like them as well as the MPAA wanted SOPA and PIPA to pass. Though i am kinda surprised that there is no world copyright enforcement agency to combat fansubbing. not to mentioned that for some reason they go after fansubs of anime seires from time to time but only when it cost the money , but when a hentai OVA goes up the law brings down the hammer hard and their licensors start sending out " cease and desist " letters . kind of a double standard if you ask me. |
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Shiroi Hane
Encyclopedia Editor
 Posts: 7580 Location: Wales |
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See this article, particularly with regards to "derivative works": animenewsnetwork.com/feature/the-law-of-anime/2013-02-15/2 |
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Aethix
Posts: 36 |
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The way I see it, just redistributing the subtitles is like performing a cover of a song. Speaking as somebody who has actually done a little translating, I believe that there's enough rewriting and original creativity involved in the process to argue that the translated writing is different enough from the original that it does not constitute a copyright violation.
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