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Comics and Digital Piracy

Apparnetly the girl with the Hetalia question stormed out in a huff when she didn't like the answer.

Aoki noted that this was becoming less and less common, although it does happen with some titles, so it was unfair to trot out Conan and Initial D, which operated under different rules.

Aoki brought up that the recent closure of some scanlation sites has led some fans to complain about "greedy publishers," but that these same fans don't seem concerned about the scanlation aggregators making money from the unpaid scanlators' work.

Quote:

Aoki noted that this was becoming less and less common, although it does happen with some titles, so it was unfair to trot out Conan and Initial D, which operated under different rules.

I kinda didn't understand what they meant by Conan. Can anyone inform me on what they mean by Conan? It's kinda a stupid question to ask, but, I kinda want to know... :S When I think of "Conan", I think of Detective Conan English Translation that Viz currently is doing.

Quote:

Aoki brought up that the recent closure of some scanlation sites has led some fans to complain about "greedy publishers," but that these same fans don't seem concerned about the scanlation aggregators making money from the unpaid scanlators' work.

Exactly.

Anime Remix wrote:

Quote: Aoki noted that this was becoming less and less common, although it does happen with some titles, so it was unfair to trot out Conan and Initial D, which operated under different rules. I kinda didn't understand what they meant by Conan. Can anyone inform me on what they mean by Conan? It's kinda a stupid question to ask, but, I kinda want to know... :S When I think of "Conan", I think of Detective Conan English Translation that Viz currently is doing. Quote: Aoki brought up that the recent closure of some scanlation sites has led some fans to complain about "greedy publishers," but that these same fans don't seem concerned about the scanlation aggregators making money from the unpaid scanlators' work. Exactly.

I'm assuming they mean Detective Conan, whose translation operates under the same company-enforced-issues as the anime does w/some name changes and such, hence the Case Closed name. People like to complain about that, though it seems pretty minor in the grand scheme of things.

Paploo wrote:

Apparnetly the girl with the Hetalia question stormed out in a huff when she didn't like the answer.

Despite what the panelist said, I really doubt that there were plans to bring over the series before they saw how popular it was here and in other places outside of Japan. Hetalia is sort of different too, in that the initial fandom was focused more on translating the webcomics (that can be seen for free on Hidekaz's site) as opposed to the published material.

With the advent of fandom becoming so enormous, I'm sure that's changed and scans can be found of the printed volumes too. But that doesn't negate the fact that the fandom formed around the core of translating a webcomic for other fans.

Maybe one day instead of just having the publishers doing the panel, some of the mangakas should join too. I've read WAY too many posts on how "evil" the publishers are, and apparently are spokesmen that people rather disslike... So maybe having a mangaka there, whom fans obssess and idolize, telling them their feelings on the whole thing, may get some people to think about the situation a little bit more?

I still don't get why they won't admit that they use the fansub world to gauge what is popular enough to license and what isn't.

matrixdude wrote:

I still don't get why they won't admit that they use the fansub world to gauge what is popular enough to license and what isn't.

When I asked someone who actually worked for ADV (I don't remember who) some years ago he denied this, and pointed to the fact that they were often pre-licensing or even funding the creation of anime. Admittedly there seems to be less of that going on these days.

Shiroi Hane wrote:

matrixdude wrote: I still don't get why they won't admit that they use the fansub world to gauge what is popular enough to license and what isn't. When I asked someone who actually worked for ADV (I don't remember who) some years ago he denied this, and pointed to the fact that they were often pre-licensing or even funding the creation of anime. Admittedly there seems to be less of that going on these days.

I don't often call people outright liars, but anyone who claims that the industry does not look at fansub popularity as marketing data is simply not being honest. I can't imagine any industry where data on a potential market, being freely available, would be ignored.

Of course, it is unlikely that the industry would ever admit that, since it might be seen as a chink in the armour of its uncompromising stand on fansubs as piracy.

Not that it is germane to a discussion of the morality or legality of fansubbing, but the process of "piracy" is not always one-way. I am aware of a case where the published edition of a manga was directly derivative of a fansub, word for word in (many) places, to such a degree where there was no question what had occurred. Such cases, while not immediately obvious to the general public, also constitute a weakness in the industry's moral/legal position. If you're going to throw stones (or have your lawyers do it for you), you had best check whether your house is built of glass, first.

- abunai