Japanese-English Coalition Against Manga Sites

[Shanghai Alice]

Heh, well, I just love the feel of a book. :D

 

[Harmonie]

I really do not understand the obsession with having it printed at all.

But whatever, it can still be printed for people like you. But there needs to be an online alternative. That way we can have manga "Simulcasts" and so we can also have more obscure titles that would never get legally translated in the first place due to the cost of printing.

To be honest, the only joy I have in printed manga at this moment is that I've paid money for it and that it is legal. That is really all there is to it for me.

 

[twocows]

Umm... then what's the purpose of a kindle, if it's "Almost like reading a book?"

I know that you can store a lot of books. That's cool and all.

However, the joy of collecting a series, of keeping the cover clean, of arranging, and rearranging the books on the shelf... Even the joy of panicking when the edge gets slightly bent, the joys of being a bibliophile.

If new technology displaces that, then I believe that is when we'll become the ultimate crapsack sci-fi world.

That's not something that most people do, it's more of a hobbyist thing. This is related to what's happening with printed material: it's becoming a niche market. Everything is moving to digital, and trying to keep alive a failing business model is pointless. It's like when laws were written to keep the wagon wheel business alive after cars were invented. It may be sad to see old ways disappear, but different doesn't necessarily mean bad, it just means different. I, for one, would buy a lot more manga if it was offered in a format that I could download and read offline.

 

[Kotowari]

I'm 1/2 pro and 1/2 contra. =/

This coalition is good that way that illegal stuff is being countered. No artist likes their work being stolen, in one way or another. But no profit is made of those scans, at least not as a far as I know, concerning the read-manga-online sites like Mangafox.
It's the fan in me that yells out "WHAT?", but there's nothing I can do about it, no?

I don't read that much manga, I'm more of an anime watcher, but if I really like an anime, I will -eventually- start reading the manga. If I really like an author, I will read everything of that author. If I find a series that appeals to me, I will most likely buy it. =/ Reading online manga is for me a way to prevent me from spending too much money on things I don't like.
It is also a way to read series as many series haven't been licensed where I live. :0 Most of my manga are import. :<

And I agree with Shanghai Alice, nothing beats collecting the actual book and caring for it. The hunt for a series exciting, and when you finally get that last book, it's like a weight drops from your shoulders. :3 I love arranging, rearranging and being careful with my manga (any book btw).
The joy of having the actual book is that you can take them everywhere. Digital copies can't do that, unless your planning on dragging your laptop (or any other device) with you everywhere you go. :<
There are so many advantages that the actual copy has compared to the digital one.

 

[SilverStilletto]

i support the whole "piracy bad" thing and all, but... i cant get why they blame it all on scanlations. i mean... do they even consider that part of the reason people turn to online repositories of manga is because maybe, just maybe, the actual, legal, printed version is too expensive for them? im not a rich girl, i feel like im rolling in money coz iu just got $40 as birthday cash in the mail!! $10 a voulume is too much for me to buy all the series i like! ive turned to the library (which has a pretty good selection) for help, but im running out of options, and i cant ever get everything im behind on when i go to the store. i read scanlations not because i dont feel like paying, but because i just dont have the money. sure, the bookstore near me house sells the usually-$10 volumes for $3, but... im usually too broke to buy a $1.25 ice cream cone from the truck that comes down me street. and their selection is the worst ive ever seen. i mean, i might have the money in a bank somewhere, but... me parents dont give it to me and they dont even tell me how much i have. i dont get an allowance and its iffy whether or not i actually have a reliable job this summer. i have too much homework to work during the schoolyear. if they would just put manga up for fairly cheap downloads online, id glady pay for it (as long as i could convince mommy and daddy to let me but manga regularly online). but, as it is... i just read it online because its too expensive to read it legally, mosy of Pokesupe isnt published yet in America (i think?) and is really difficult for me to find anywho.

as for anime, same thing goes. i dont have cable or sattelite or anything (we get a measely 4? 5 channels?), so me options for watching anime are null. what do i get? daytime TV, soap operas, a couple cop shows, babyish cartoons in the morning on saturdays ONLY, church on sundays on EVERY CHANNEL, news, and informercials.

so id love it if theyd make a cheap, legal alternative online. until then, im stuck with piracy.

 

[twocows]

This coalition is good that way that illegal stuff is being countered. No artist likes their work being stolen, in one way or another. But no profit is made of those scans, at least not as a far as I know, concerning the read-manga-online sites like Mangafox.
It's the fan in me that yells out "WHAT?", but there's nothing I can do about it, no?

Piracy isn't stealing. Stealing takes something away. Piracy makes a copy. Stealing actually hurts real world profits because money was spent producing something that was taken away and thus cannot be sold. With piracy, no item is taken away; the product is still available, ready to be sold. A lot of these anti-piracy groups are making the imaginary sales argument, but again, the broken window fallacy is at work. People have to spend money on other things, and it is quite likely that if the work was not available for free download that they would not be getting it at all. The RIAA, especially, takes this argument to an absurd extreme, claiming that one downloaded song equals one lost sale and one uploaded song on a file sharing client equals as many as a thousand lost sales.

As was almost acknowledged in the article itself, piracy has actually broadened the audience for anime/manga. It used to be an extremely niche market that made almost no sales, but these days a lot of series are getting localized because of how popular it has become thanks to online scans. This is especially true with people that actually like to have series in print (I'm not one of those people): many may hear about a series that has become popular online and end up purchasing it on recommendation from others who have read the series online. It is the same effect that has been seen time and time again in the past with music and software piracy, and unfortunately, the response from the rights holders looks like it will be the same misinformed drivel.

Piracy is not the disease, it is merely a symptom. It is the end result of a failure to have a good business model. Attacking it rather than its causes is a dangerous road that can lead to severe consequences for the consumer, and it is something we need to fight. It is not hard to imagine a world where your favorite series is not available anywhere except online behind a pay-site and on a per-viewing subscription fee (not to mention what would happen if the site ever went down, either temporarily or permanently). This is the kind of anti-consumer lockdown that causes piracy to begin with. If content producers upgraded their business model to make their works more accessible, they would not only make more money but would find that estimates for "lost sales to piracy" have gone down drastically. Steam is a perfect example of doing it right; I have more games owned on Steam than on any other platform, and it's because it's very accessible. I pay for my game, I download it, and I play it. When I'm on a good connection, it takes a few minutes at most; I don't even need to drive to the store. Piracy for Valve's games is almost non-existent, and piracy for popular games sold on Steam is lower than for those not sold on the platform. If a system like that was popularized for the anime/manga localization industry, I can almost guarantee sales would go up and consumers would be happier.

 

[Cherrim]

"Stealing" or not, I still think piracy should be every bit as illegal. If you aren't paying for the content like a proper consumer, why should you get access to it? Just because you can download it for free without paying doesn't mean you should. Making a copy or stealing a copy, you're still getting something you know you shouldn't be.

But I digress. :( I'd like more official venues like online manga reading much like the anime streaming sites that are successful (think crunchyroll or Funi's streaming, I guess). A profit is (presumably) made, guests get the content they want for free or a small subscription fee, and less issues all around. I think it's a step in the right direction, especially since society as a whole is moving away from printed media.

 

[digi-kun]

I like having a book to read personally :p I don't buy series that last forever though lol

Also, am I the only one that thinks that this Japanese-English coalition is mostly the English side pushing the Japanese side into helping them for the status that "the Japanese agree with us, so you should to"?

Eh, overall I'm against this. Like many other have said before, manga reader sites have generally broadened the anime/manga audience. In addition, most of the manga that's released in America is quite a bit behind, I'll estimate 5-6 volumes. Assuming the best case scenario (Shonen Jump Weekly American schedule) that's at least half a year before the manga catches up, with a year and a half with most other releases (3 month release). Also, I swear these last two years where sales have dropped is people realizing Naruto and Bleach actually aren't that good, and stopping purchases of it on a monthly basis, moving to other (better) manga that have that 3-month release time per volume, hence dropping sales.

 

[Netto Azure]

Or one month release like FMA did? XD

 

[Masterge77]

This is the end of uncensored Manga, especially Pokemon Special, this is the same thing that Viacom is doing to Youtube, and what Square Enix did to the Chrono Compendium, these are DIEHARD FANS posting these scanlations, and they do not care,

Now we have to read Pokemon special either censored heavily by Viz, or in illegible moonspeak, I am not letting copyright and censorship take my Pokemon Special away!!!!! *protests*

 

[.Fenris]

"Stealing" or not, I still think piracy should be every bit as illegal. If you aren't paying for the content like a proper consumer, why should you get access to it? Just because you can download it for free without paying doesn't mean you should. Making a copy or stealing a copy, you're still getting something you know you shouldn't be.

Using this logic, on a broader level, would mean no promotions or discounts for you, because you aren't paying for said content in full.

 

[Vernikova]

Using this logic, on a broader level, would mean no promotions or discounts for you, because you aren't paying for said content in full.

How does it mean that? Promotions and discounts offered by either the company who produces the item or by a compnay that legally sells the item are perfectly fine since they can sell it at whatever price they deem fit. So they would be paying it like a proper consumer should pay it.

 

[parallelzero]

In the end, this coalition will never truly succeed, so I don't really see much of a reason to worry. Even if they shut the main sites down, there will always be ways to obtain it, much like subbed anime.

 

[Jorah]

I can't buy Pokespe anywhere around here. It's hard to find manga in this country, you can only find it in rather small sections in the more successful bookshops, or you have to go out your way and try to find specialist shops related to geeky things. You'd be *extremely* lucky just to find one volume of it here, let alone the whole of the one arc. I can find stuff like Yugioh easily, even though that finished years ago >_> I could buy online, but the only series I would want to buy at the moment is the RS arc, and they don'/t seem to sell that on Amazon at all >_>

Other than that, I don't really have enough space for 30/40 volumes of books, so having it on computer is ideal. If they really want to help stop piracy then they have to make it easier for the consumer to buy their products, by doing something like was already suggested by selling digital copies. Otherwise, I'm keeping my downloaded ones :(

 

[Eternal Nightmare]

I second what parallelzero said :3

Anyway, I'm one a stand still about this. Yes its illegal and if I were a mangaka or even head of a publishing company I would do the same this coalition is trying to do, but one the other hand I try to stay up to date with what's happening in Bleach and Naruto. Its not like because its taken down that's a stab in the heart, hell those two manga series are already dried out and overpopularized anyway, so I can live. Now if they take down Case Closed then I will have a major problem

 

[Ryoutarou]

Oh noes, now where will the spoiled fans of today get random moe manga #516?

I've always been a supporter of buying manga in physical form, so cutting down on illegal scanlations, or at least making an effort to do so is something I will always support. I do think there should be some sort of digital alternative for people who want to be able to pay for the stuff and have a digital copy, I can't quite remember which titles it was with, but I do remember Marvel making an attempt at something like this a couple of years ago. If people can make money off Crunchyroll, Hulu, and other sponsored anime streaming sites, I don't see why the same can't be done with manga.

The anime and manga industry outside of Japan have been in worse shape than ever precisely because of illegal digital viewings and the digital distribution buy official outlets is proving that there is a market for this sort of thing, so I can see digital distribution deals working out to a smaller extent here.

 

[Netto Azure]

Now if they take down Case Closed then I will have a major problem

You mentioned Detective Conan's Dub name therefore you do realize that if something as obscure as Pokemon Special is pulled off...;(

 

[Ryoutarou]

How is anything related to the Pokemon franchise obscure? Especially a series like Pokemon Special, one that's actually being reissued in proper format.

 

[Netto Azure]

How is anything related to the Pokemon franchise obscure? Especially a series like Pokemon Special, one that's actually being reissued in proper format.

The anime overshadows it too much. :U

 

[Ryoutarou]

That totally misses the point. It's all Pokemon, regardless of what medium it takes, that brand name alone will garner it attention.