Scanlation Crackdown!!

[redeker]

Source

An international coalition of Japanese and American-based manga publishers have joined together to combat what they call the "rampant and growing problem" of scanlations, the practice of posting scanned and translated editions of Japanese comics online without permission of the copyright holders. The group is threatening legal action against 30 scanlation sites.

...

A spokesperson for the coalition said the effort shows that Japanese publishers—who license the majority of manga sold in the U.S.—are taking an aggressive interest in combating manga piracy outside of Japan as well as inside the country. The group charges that the former fan-driven practice of scanlating—begun in the 1970s, fans later began to scan, translate and post manga online at a time when it was difficult to find manga outside of Japan—has been transformed by "scanlation aggregators," heavily trafficked, for-profit Web sites that host thousands of pirated manga editions and offer them for free to readers.
According to a spokesperson, these sites are among the most heavily trafficked sites on the web attracting millions of visits each month while earning advertising revenues and even soliciting donations and sometimes charging for memberships. The group also charges that pirated manga is now beginning to turn up on smartphones and other wireless devices through the use of apps developed "solely to link to and republish the content of scanlations sites."
A spokesperson said that "we are left with no other alternative but to take aggressive action. It is our sincere hope that offending sites will take it upon themselves to immediately cease their activities. Where this is not the case, however, we will seek injunctive relief and statutory damages." The group is also aggressively reporting violations to the "federal authorities, including the anti-piracy units of the Justice Department, local law enforcement agencies and FBI." While the group has yet to file any lawsuits and has declined to name specific scanlators, sites such as MangaFox and OneManga have long been identified as major scanlation aggregators.
After several years of booming manga sales in the U.S. that drove the popularity of comics and graphic novels in the traditional book market, sales of manga in the U.S. have declined more than 30% from a high of $210 million in 2007 to $140 million in sales in 2009, according to pop culture news site ICv2.com. Many manga publishers and retailers who used to believe that scanlations actually attracted new readers, now blame the sales decline on the rise of giant for-profit scanlation sites that have allowed a new generation of fans to grow up reading manga for free online.
"Go back 2 years and track these sites and you'll find an inverse relationship between the rise of traffic on these scanlation sites and the decline in U.S. manga sales," said Kurt Hassler, publishing director of Yen Press and a former graphic novel and manga buyer for Borders Books and Music. Hassler points out that early fan-driven scanlation sites were aimed at making manga available overseas at a time when English translations of manga were rare. Indeed these fan scanlators would remove their online translations when the books were licensed for the English-language market.
That's no longer the case, said Hassler. "These sites are run as businesses and include direct scans of licensed English-language manga editions. Some even include our copyright notices. We don't want to have to do this but publishers are now focused on this problem."

mangafox.com and mangatoshokan.com have recently announced that they are removing manga:

[spoiler]

It pains me to announce that this is the last week of manga reading on One Manga (!!). Manga publishers have recently changed their stance on manga scanlations and made it clear that they no longer approve of it. We have decided to abide by their wishes, and remove all manga content (regardless of licensing status) from the site. The removal of content will happen gradually (so you can at least finish some of the outstanding reading you have), but we expect all content to be gone by early next week (RIP OM July '10).

So what next? We're not really sure at this point, but we have some ideas we would like to try out. Until then, the One Manga forums will remain active and we encourage all of you to continue using them. OMF has developed into a great community and it would be a shame to see that disappear.

Regardless of whether you stay with us or not, on behalf of the One Manga team, I would like to thank you all for your unwavering support over the years. Through the ups and downs you have stuck with us, and that is what kept us going.

As a certain Porky was fond of saying... That's all folks!

Time for me to go lay down and let this all sink in.

- Zabi

Source

We hoped it wouldn't come to this, but due to mounting legal pressure, we have been advised to remove all series serialized by the publishers in the coalition. This was a very difficult decision to make, and one we did not take lightly. Unfortunately this means we have had to remove the majority of our library, however we have been able to retain some manga, as well as most of our manhua and manhwa. We will be shifting the focus of the site more to manhwa and manhua (Korean and Chinese manga). For some of you, this may be your last visit to MangaToshokan, but before you leave we would appreciate it if you could fill out a short six question survey that we are going to share the results to the publishers. If nothing else, we hope it will make them aware of the consequences of their actions. Also if you could pass this survey on to other people we would appreciate it. Again, we apologize for this, but we don't have any other options at this point.

Source

[/spoiler]

As a relatively long-time frequenter of scanlation sites, this turn of events disappoints me very much. Much of the manga I read on scanlation sites (Akumetsu, Berserk, Drifters, etc.) hasn't been released in its entirety in the US. Admittedly, I did stop buying manga after going on scanlation sites (because this was the time I also got a Xbox 360. Imo, I simply used scanlation sites because buying the manga couldn't be justified, especially with the rate of releases from bookstores vs. scanlation sites, and the time I spent on manga vs. gaming.) However, I do have a (relatively) large collection of manga, because, as someone still of the 20th century, I do prefer having hardcopy to digital.

I've heard an argument on digital piracy that people who pirated digital content shouldn't be counted as "lost sales/revenue" because these are people who never intended to, or even possibly couldn't, buy that content in the first place. This definitely applies to manga, specifically because of the near-exclusive production and release of manga in Japan.

[FallenStar]

I would be most upset at this, not because I couldn't afford to buy manga... but because the "official" translations of manga can often be most heavily censored compared to the original Japanese versions.  Without the ability to download scanned translations more accurate to the originals, I'd like to think this would force dubbers to be more accurate... but somehow, I get the feeling this is only going to *hurt* the manga industry instead of helping it.

[Serika]

Anime and manga fans are no strangers to legal threats. For every website this "coalition" takes down another site will come and replace it. I find it pathetic that so many businesses these days resort to legal threats whenever their profits are lower than expected.

but because the "official" translations of manga can often be most heavily censored compared to the original Japanese versions.

Companies here would make a lot more profit if they would stop shitting up the series they license. 4kids, Funi, and the rest have only themselves to blame whenever they make stupid edits to cover up nudity or change the script in any way. This "everything has to be clean" attitude is why the more perverted stuff from Japan has become popular over here.

[Neil]

This is one of the saddest news I've ever heard this year..

Most of the mangas that I've read in onemanga and mangafox aren't available in my place, and some series are left untranslated, so how the heck am I supposed to buy them in the first place?!!

Seriously, I used to buy mangas, but ever since some of them are being left untranslated halfway, I stopped buying them. Heck, the only Mizuki Kawashita manga available in my place is Ichigo 100%, and they still haven't finished translating it yet. And when will you released Ecole Du ciel vol 9??!!

I don't have any grudge against the mangakas, but I do have a grudge against the publishers.

[Mighty Oracle]

For now, there's still mangastream.com.

[CidHighwind]

There will always be BitTorrent.

[Ashitaka]

It's certainly a big blow, but I'm sure that most of the scanlators will be able to carry on releasing either via torrents, their own sites or on IRC. It'll take a bit more work to find new chapters, but they'll still be out there.
If mangaupdates.com was to be taken down, however, then I'd be really worried...

[TiaMaria]

Well, I know what the next few days of mine are getting blown on. Thank you publishers! Your dick moves once again hurt the consumer most!

For anyone interested in reading a heck of a long article on the subject of video game piracy, with arguments that mirror quite nicely the situation here, enjoy. http://insomnia.ac/commentary/pc_game_piracy/

[Newp]

This has been happening for a while, now. The threats started back in April, IIRC. Until they shut down 4chan, though, scans will magically appear, someone will host them on some random site, and it will go on. It may take longer to get scans and get them translated, but this isn't going to stop anything.

It's 100% on the publishers, here. I'm sure the artists are just glad that so many people would want to read their manga.

Do the US manga publishers honestly think that people are going to buy their product when they turn out crappy and slow work? Not to mention that very, very, very few manga actually make it overseas.

[NotPeepingTom]

There are always going to be sites with Scanlations. I thought OneManga was the best, but I found out better sites that makes OM seem silly in comparison.

[tenck5k]

There are always going to be sites with Scanlations. I thought OneManga was the best, but I found out better sites that makes OM seem silly in comparison.

Reveal your secrets to me!
...please?

[NotPeepingTom]

There are always going to be sites with Scanlations. I thought OneManga was the best, but I found out better sites that makes OM seem silly in comparison.

Reveal your secrets to me!
...please?

I can, but you gotta make sure not to blurt the sites out to anyone. If you are a Ned Flanders than I can't give em out.

[tenck5k]

There are always going to be sites with Scanlations. I thought OneManga was the best, but I found out better sites that makes OM seem silly in comparison.

Reveal your secrets to me!
...please?

I can, but you gotta make sure not to blurt the sites out to anyone. If you are a Ned Flanders than I can't give em out.

Keep it secret, keep it safe, huh? I can handle that XD