Scanlations

[Winslow]

What are your thoughts on scanlations?

Good idea?

Bad idea?

An idea that had it's place when manga was hard to find in the U.S., but has now run its course?

Should be illegal?

Should not be illegal because it paves the way for the artists to find an audience in the U.S.?

I've downloaded a few scanlations - but to be honest - I don't make it a habit for two reasons - I haven't found a manga title that grips me, and my conscience says this may not be ethical.

[Sheldon]

As long as they do it for free, then I don't have a problem. It gets shady when other sites start offering their work for a fee....I don't agree with that.

I'll point this out, that once you get addicted a particular title, the scanlation folks become your personal pusher.....you become dependant on them, and withdrawl symptoms hit hard if you can't get your fix!

[Slayven]

As long as they do it for free, then I don't have a problem. It gets shady when other sites start offering their work for a fee....I don't agree with that.

I'll point this out, that once you get addicted a particular title, the scanlation folks become your personal pusher.....you become dependant on them, and withdrawl symptoms hit hard if you can't get your fix!
Chris Rock:"Get them on the comeback"

[Slayven]

only time i have a problem si when they get full of themselves

[Hiromi]

I love them, and as such prefer not to think about their legality, and on a side note I would love it if someone would inform me on where to find One Piece scanslations, picked up Volume's 1 and 2 last night after being influened by Slay, Jack, Kraah, and others and am enjoying it mightily.

[Alex Scott]

Most ethical scanslators would have taken One Piece offline already. There are, however, places that have later chapters, but I have no idea where they are. I tend to think it's kinda scummy to do that after the series has been licensed.

[Endless]

Most ethical scanslators would have taken One Piece offline already. There are, however, places that have later chapters, but I have no idea where they are. I tend to think it's kinda scummy to do that after the series has been licensed.

I think it's weird that the entire Naruto manga scans can be found so easily, and yet the series has been licensed for a while. If you type it in google, a number up sites will come up immediately. Do the publishers even care?

[Daemon]

I think it has to do with the fact that after almost two years of being released Naruto is still only upto Volume 5 in the american release.

One Piece is only upto 6 I think.

do you know how many fanboi's would be pissed if they couldn't get their latest fix on a weekly basis?

I need to go back and regularly re-read OP cause its released irregularly.

Also unlike scanlated manga its profitibility is in all likelyhood significanly lower than anime.

VCD = 2 eps for $2-5, vs 1 DvD for 2-3 for $20-30.

1 VCD can hold an entire manga series, so the scum of the earth don't sell it, and manga is only like $7-10 per volume.

Its why I support alot more manga than I do anime cause its so much easier on the wallet.

[DrewTheXenocide]

I think it has to do with the fact that after almost two years of being released Naruto is still only upto Volume 5 in the american release.

One Piece is only upto 6 I think.

do you know how many fanboi's would be pissed if they couldn't get their latest fix on a weekly basis?

I need to go back and regularly re-read OP cause its released irregularly.

Also unlike scanlated manga its profitibility is in all likelyhood significanly lower than anime.

VCD = 2 eps for $2-5, vs 1 DvD for 2-3 for $20-30.

1 VCD can hold an entire manga series, so the scum of the earth don't sell it, and manga is only like $7-10 per volume.

Its why I support alot more manga than I do anime cause its so much easier on the wallet.
Yeah, but not everyone has access to VCD eps or whatnot. They might not have a local Chinatown or whatever, that they can head to for stuff like that.

Anyhoo, I think the "moral" system most scanslators or working by works. If it isn't liscenced then go for it, but pull out the second it is.

[Daemon]

Yeah, but not everyone has access to VCD eps or whatnot. They might not have a local Chinatown or whatever, that they can head to for stuff like that.

Anyhoo, I think the "moral" system most scanslators or working by works. If it isn't liscenced then go for it, but pull out the second it is.


See I have a problem with that, because if I'm reading a manga thats currently at 30+ volumes and then it gets liscensed, if scanlaters really pulled the plug on it, by the time the american market catches upto where I Was at I'll probably have children by then.

This is especially true with the longer running series'.

[Inkthinker]

See I have a problem with that, because if I'm reading a manga thats currently at 30+ volumes and then it gets liscensed, if scanlaters really pulled the plug on it, by the time the american market catches upto where I Was at I'll probably have children by then.

This is especially true with the longer running series'.


Which is where the whole aspect of only pulling the scans for currently available issues comes in... in my opinion, it pushes the line of the whole grey-market aspect of scanslations, but it's up to the publishers to crack down on that (and some do).

There's also the issue of when the licensor releases a shitty version of the product. For instance, I was up to vol. 11 of Tenjho Tenge when the CMX license was announced, and the scans I was reading stopped production... and I was cool with that, willing to wait, and accepted that it would take a couple years for them to catch up... and then CMX released their butchered, craptacularly edited book, and now I have no intention of purchasing that swill.

So, does that mean I can never (short of learning to read Japanese) read TJTG again (assuming CMX doesn't step back, get a clue and re-release without edits)?

[Cephus]

Personally, and I think this is a pretty unpopular view, I think the scanilators and fan-subbers do a much better job overall than the legal licensors and I would almost ALWAYS turn to them before I'd go out and buy a legal copy. Price has nothing to do with it, quality does.

Case in point, my wife picked up the first issue of the Yu-Gi-Oh manga (hell, I don't know why, but she did). I read through the first couple pages and VIZ completely blew chunks on the translation in just the first 5 pages!

Now going from memory, there was a competition on television and one kid tells the other "oh, you said ATTACK and therefore triggered my special card... blah blah blah." That's all well and good, but the other guy NEVER SAID ATTACK! I went back and looked, he NEVER UTTERED THAT WORD!

Anyone with two brain cells to rub together would have caught it. VIZ didn't.

Now I have hundreds of original Japanese manga, so obviously I don't mind paying for things, but if the US imports are going to blow translations so ridiculously, change names, redo things for an American audience, etc. then count me out. I'm not watching this stuff because I want it Americanized, I'm watching it because I WANT ANIME!

So until these American companies pull their heads out of their ass and just bring it over 100% intact, I have no problem with scanilations or fan-subbers.

[Sambo253]

Personally, and I think this is a pretty unpopular view, I think the scanilators and fan-subbers do a much better job overall than the legal licensors and I would almost ALWAYS turn to them before I'd go out and buy a legal copy. Price has nothing to do with it, quality does.

Case in point, my wife picked up the first issue of the Yu-Gi-Oh manga (hell, I don't know why, but she did). I read through the first couple pages and VIZ completely blew chunks on the translation in just the first 5 pages!

Now going from memory, there was a competition on television and one kid tells the other "oh, you said ATTACK and therefore triggered my special card... blah blah blah." That's all well and good, but the other guy NEVER SAID ATTACK! I went back and looked, he NEVER UTTERED THAT WORD!

Anyone with two brain cells to rub together would have caught it. VIZ didn't.

Now I have hundreds of original Japanese manga, so obviously I don't mind paying for things, but if the US imports are going to blow translations so ridiculously, change names, redo things for an American audience, etc. then count me out. I'm not watching this stuff because I want it Americanized, I'm watching it because I WANT ANIME!

So until these American companies pull their heads out of their ass and just bring it over 100% intact, I have no problem with scanilations or fan-subbers.

This reminds me, on this board I had heard that VIZ did a hatchet job on the Naruto translations. Can someone give me some details? What other stuff has VIZ done horribly? I was about to try to buy every PULP imprint comic they have. You'd think for being in the business for so long they'd be better at this.

Scanslations are a truly grey area, they are illegal because the Japanese companies have asked many sites to take their work down. But some of the best manga I've read is scanslated and I know I won't have much of a chance to read it here since publishers are so focused on shonen and shoju stuff. Or if they do publish it we'll get CMX's Tenjo Tenge.

[muimi]

I used to be very anti-scanlation for the longest. The thing is, I tend to buy all manga (and comics, for that matter) that I like as it comes out and read it on my own since I've taken enough Japanese to do this for most things I read. For things that are more difficult, well, it's a learning experience. But I've relaxed lately -- not everyone can read Japanese and there are some things that I like that are so old and obscure that you can't find the original Japanese, let alone find translated.

So now I figure if it's distributed like fansubs -- done by fans, for fans, freely -- and taken off the market as soon as a license is announced, it's fine. I'll agree that SOME fansubs and scanlations are done quite well. This isn't true of all sub/scanlation groups but there are quite a few that I consider to be good quality, some of which are better than professional. Some professional company translations really make me angry because their translations are poor. X as published in Japanese and X/1999 as published in English by Viz is a great/poor example. Flipped art aside, the translations are horrible not so much because they're wrong as much as because they ended up losing a good part of the story by not understanding how important the speech patterns were. (Some notable dialog they changed all together!!) Part of the trick with translating manga dialogue into English is trying to keep the same "feeling" with the speech patterns, something that is difficult if not impossible to do at times. I have done fan translation work, pre-scanlation era and trust me, it's not always easy.

[Zun Liako]

This reminds me, on this board I had heard that VIZ did a hatchet job on the Naruto translations

Ino's mind transfer technique became "Valentine Technique" when she possessed Sakura during the 1st Chuunin exam. The Byakugan became Evil Eyes (I mean, White Eyes would have been good, as thats a direct translation if I recall, but Evil Eyes, what the heck?)I wouldn't say a complete hatchet job, but there were alot of unneccessary attack name changes and so forth.

[Jack]

I'd do a breakdown of the changes made to Naruto, but unfortunately due to a special circumstance at the moment that is impossible. But it is terrible in more ways than just the name changes.

Re: One Piece. If you're happy reading the Viz translations then more power to you. I OTOH would rather not wait ten years (literally, ten years) to get to where Japan is right now. And then another twenty years to get to where Japan ia then (seriously, it may well still be going then).

Scanslations are a wonderful thing, and not just from the perspective of a consumer. They're free marketing. Popular scanslated series get licensed, which is good for the western and eastern producers, and good for the fans as well. Everyone wins.

[OverMaster]

For someone who lives in a country with no manga editorials of its own, and where getting imported manga is helluva tough (even making online buys is hard here. Too money consuming. Ever tried to make the change from bollivars to dollars?), they are life savers. People from the US often forgets that, and just say, "Oh, the manga is available here, so scanlations must be kicked off the net. Who cares if people from other countries get screwed by that".

Okay, I have never read something like that here, but in other boards, I have read things that come quite close...

[Winslow]

Thanks everybody for the well informed and well thoughout posts.

Very helpful.

I appreciate the various POVs.

[Daemon]

For someone who lives in a country with no manga editorials of its own, and where getting imported manga is helluva tough (even making online buys is hard here. Too money consuming. Ever tried to make the change from bollivars to dollars?), they are life savers. People from the US often forgets that, and just say, "Oh, the manga is available here, so scanlations must be kicked off the net. Who cares if people from other countries get screwed by that".

Okay, I have never read something like that here, but in other boards, I have read things that come quite close...

Well thats because the majority of translators are american fans, and the gentleman's agreement is such that you're supposed to stop distribution of the product once its liscensed in that area.

I bet if the Scum of the Earth didn't profit of fansubs and the like most companies probably wouldn't mind, as fans are going to buy the official product and those that wouldn't have bought it still wouldn't buy it and such.

[Cephus]

Scanslations are a truly grey area, they are illegal because the Japanese companies have asked many sites to take their work down. But some of the best manga I've read is scanslated and I know I won't have much of a chance to read it here since publishers are so focused on shonen and shoju stuff. Or if they do publish it we'll get CMX's Tenjo Tenge.

The only reason the Japanese companies care is because they're afraid it'll affect their ability to get the manga licensed in the US. Maybe the Japanese companies need to start putting requirements into their licenses that all manga will be released straight, uncut and unmutilated. That would certainly reduce the need for scanilations, wouldn't it?