Major problems coming for scanlation sites

[cutiebunny]

The problem is when people ONLY download.

Watching fansubs streamed on non-authorized websites is a form of theft as well. You're watching an episode for little, if any, cost. You didn't pay the cable fees that many Japanese pay to watch anime. The creators do not see a penny of that revenue.

You know full well THAT is what's being discussed and it seems you would rather dodge that or make lame excuses for why it's okay to steal, rather than stand up and admit wrong.

Actually, I was referring to streaming. I assume that, for every person that chooses to download the series, there's a handful more that choose to simply watch it on streaming sites. I don't know about you, but unless its a series that I like or I feel the need to rewatch an episode for whatever reason, I don't like reruns. I won't watch the same anime episode similiar to how I won't watch the same sitcom.

US distributors are also targetting people who choose to watch anime and do not download it. I haven't seen any information regarding companies desiring solely to eliminate downloading, not streaming.

Plus, I like to play Devil's Advocate.

So it's now the company's fault that you're stealing? Let's think of the list of things that have been blamed or that make it okay.... The economy being bad means it's okay to steal. Wanting something but not wanting to pay for it means it's okay to steal. Something not bearing a price tag you like means it's okay to steal. The fact that society has encouraged you to have feelings of entitlement means it's okay to steal. If you buy something else completely different from manga, but still related to the given series, then it's okay to steal the manga. You don't intend to read the manga twice, so it's okay to steal. Lastly, these mangaka don't work hard enough! The mangaka should be facilitating your stealing by making their money some OTHER way after they're done writing, instead of expecting money for the books they wrote.

Did I miss any excuses?

These are all arguements that, if applied to a case of theft in court would get you laughed out of the building. But because you didn't actually break a window to get in somewhere to take it, you aren't connecting that you're doing essentially the same thing.

Depends on how good your lawyer is

Here's the bottom line. When someone works to create a manga, they deserve to be paid for successful work. I am paying people for their work. People who only download are not. It's that simple. For every person that downloads a manga without buying it or borrowing it from a source that IS paying the creator, that means the people making the anime and manga are putting money in to create something, while getting nothing back.... Money in.... No money out. How much free money do you think they have to put in? Eventually, they will no longer put money into it and then you have no manga. It won't happen tomorrow or next month, it will be slow, but it WILL dry up and die for lack of funding. Unless something changes.

Or, it will go back to being a niche market as it was in the 1980s and 1990s. Companies will license certain properties that they think are profitable.

As for anime fans, if you go to any anime convention, there's a large amount of young, under 18 fans out there. I'm sure that some of these conventions keep stats on this, seeing how several of these applications require you to put your date of birth and/or age. And let's not forget all the Pokemon/Beyblade/Yu-gi-oh "under 12" fans as well who may or may not be aware that they are watching 'anime' instead of 'Saturday Morning Cartoons'. Therefore, I would say that the majority of fans are minors. However, on this site, I would say that the opposite is true.

Iceman - my comment on Wikipedia is quite valid because anyone, regardless of whether they donated or not, can still access Wikipedia. Until Wiki places a requirement that you HAVE to pay in order to access their site, people will continue to use it.

But don't worry...I won't be selling any of my Con shikishi on E-bay anytime soon.



EDIT - Found this article on AnimeNewsNetwork today.

http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/20 ... rfect-dark

It's interesting to see Japan cracking down on this problem. I bet that this guy either bragged about it or someone reported him.

[duotrouble]

I hate to pick on you, cutiebunny, but you have some of your "facts" incorrect.

Look at TV programs in the US. Within 24 hours of any show being aired, I can either head to the website of the station that aired it, or go to some other 'legal' site and watch the show, within maybe a few commercials, for free. That's because US companies realize that, if they don't do this, people will create sites that feature these shows. Then the revenue that the 3 ads/episode generate will go to these websites and not the parent company of these programs.

This isn't accurate. Any US program you find on a website MUST HAVE PAID distribution fees to place it on their website. The "limited" commercials that you see on some of those sites are there in order to pay for the distribution fees the website HAD TO pay. It's NOT free for the website. ANY website found streaming programming without distribution rights WILL BE fined and/or have their website shutdown. I personally know people who their job is to surf the web looking for such sites. This is why a lot of networks are adding their own programming to their own sites. It's so they can benefit from the money generated from the commercials instead of a 3rd party website reaping those extra benefits.

Also, there are animation companies that are charging small fees for people to view anime online. The only problem I have with this is simply that I don't like watching streamed video. My internet connection isn't always the greatest. But if that's all I have, I would adapt.

I'm with Gonzai in that I like to sample things before buying. I love that Amazon will give you a few pages to read. I wish more places would do that. Maybe that's coming. I read the first volume of Vampire Knight online and discovered I loved it. So I've been patiently waiting for them to come out in the US as I have been buying them. I also witnessed a lot of people reading manga in the stores in Japan. It's one of the main reasons I don't buy books from bookstores anymore. When buying a new copy of a manga, I want to make sure it's actually new and not preread by some cheapskate in the bookstore.

I do the same thing with anime. I dl, watch and then purge. The only anime I've kept are those that I want to buy. Once it's released in the US, I purge it and buy the DVDs. I pay for my cable internet and view doing this much the same as DVRing a program off my cable and watching it when I have time and then purging it.

Zero, it's not you against anime-beta. I see several people on several sides. I'm on the side that allows us to read manga and watch anime without taking from the artists. I supports the arts regardless of the country.

[iceman57]

Okay, I've read the article but I'll admit I haven't read this entire thread yet. I stopped at this quote because I'm curious where this mysterious stat came from as the research I have done states completely the opposite.

The majority of anime fans are still in school and do not have a job.

This site, while it's collectors that need jobs for money, is mostly fans over the age of 18. Another site I frequent had these stats: 3428 over 18 vs 1390 under 18. Sounds to me like more anime fans are over the legal age. Plus, most of the underage fans I personally know are watching it with their parent, who got them involved to begin with. If I'm wrong, please direct me to where this info came from. I hate spreading incorrect theories. Thanks!

Confirmed.
Here are Beta board collectors statistics (result appear in a classic normal curve way) based on a sample of 471 users :
- Almost 40% of users on the main segment (born 1980-1984).
- 99,5% of users are over 18.
- 97,4% of users are over 21.

Concerning professionnal life to pay the mangas, hide behind the false argument of gratuity and income issue whereas even following university school and working at the age of 25, this represent 87% of users able to pay.
So I'm okay for the 13% not working and not having an income, but they ain't a majority at all and can't be consider as the rule for "free"dom of access to media content.

[zerospace]

Thanks duo . I realize that now, since more people have posted since the start of this thread. At the very least, this discussion has been interesting to read!

[cutiebunny]

Confirmed.
Here are Beta board collectors statistics (result appear in a classic normal curve way) based on a sample of 471 users :
- Almost 40% of users on the main segment (born 1980-1984).
- 99,5% of users are over 18.
- 97,4% of users are over 21.

As anyone who has ever studied statistics, the great thing about them is that you can align them to whatever cause you want them to be.

The problem with your examples is that you're just basing it on the sites that *you* visit. As an adult, the liklihood of you visiting websites where tweens/teens talk about their relevant issues(ie. First Crush, Homework, Prom, etc.) is small. You're not heading off to the plethora of Disney-esque 'child safe' sites that cater to children/tweens/teens. Considering that Disney airs Naruto & Dragonball Kai now, I'm sure there's probably a forum on their website catering to these shows, chock full of juvenile "Who's Stronger"-type posts.

So, let's take a site like Serebii.net, which has its own forum, serebiiforums.com and caters to children/tween/teens. After all, it is a Pokemon website. According to this website, there are over 107,000 users in their forum. Unfortunately, there isn't a filter where one can arrange the data per user. But looking at the posts, one can see that the bulk of its members act/type/post topics that would normally be interesting to tweens/teens. I would venture a rough estimate that no more than 10% of all users on this site are over the age of 17.

So, for the same of simple math, let's assume that 10% of Serebii's members are 18+. That's 10,700 members. But, that also means that there are 96,300 members that are under the age of 18.

So, once again, it sounds to me that the majority of anime fans are under 18.

So I'm okay for the 13% not working and not having an income, but they ain't a majority at all and can't be consider as the rule for "free"dom of access to media content.

What if the 13% of people are the ones who are abusing it most?

When you attend cons, you see people who are overly obsessed with anime to the point that they 'know' every episode. They're the ones that have downloaded EVERYTHING simply because it exists, and they can. For example, there was one teen attendee at Fanime 2010 that, upon being told that Daikon III/IV would never be legitimately released, protested by saying that he already had burned a copy of it. I would venture a guess that this young fan probably has burned copies of many anime in their entirety and has no desire to buy legitimate copies. The only difference is that this person spoke up about it. There are many others that do not.

The question then becomes, where and how, do anime companies draw the line? Are companies ok with fans solely watching/reading their product on streaming/scanlation sites even though, by doing so, that is a form of theft? Or do they put a blanket ban on everything? And if they choose the latter, not only is there the issue and cost of enforcement but deterring fans from new anime, and potential new sources of revenue.

My guess is that it will be similiar to the music industry's approach - Not to punish the small infractors who download a handful of songs for their personal use, but instead to target those that have a massive 10,000+ song index & routinely upload/burn/sell/trade them.

[iceman57]

The problem with your examples is that you're just basing it on the sites that *you* visit. As an adult...

Yeah, yummy adult sites too
(woops quoted out of context)

According to this website, there are over 107,000 users in their forum.

Please be kind to find a better source to cross with the data that I listed previously wich were simply refering to this cel/sketch collection board as a sample vision. Samples are in use to set statistics without having to study a complete population, US census does the same with triennal statistics publishing. Note that kids that are part of the 107,000 users use massive download, and for this I have interesting curves.

So, for the same of simple math, let's assume that 10% of Serebii's members are 18+. That's 10,700 members. But, that also means that there are 96,300 members that are under the age of 18.

Before to repeat/inspire my percentage data :
1. Do the stats on your own 107,000 sample (good luck !)
2. Publish a book or any retaliable document (a hundred of pages please not a bunch lines on a forum), additionnaly note that reference to Wikipedia are NOT accepted in University works.
3. Come back to show up stats.

I studied anime cel collection for years, not the whole world of Mangas over the US because there already are official institute monitoring it. Fact is that there are similarties and tendancies with data I monitored for years, especially with the increase of downloads on a young generation. But categorise that manga readers are under 18 is reducing, like saying that every people over 50 got Parkinson illness.
The stats I gave previously were all self made, based on a collector population of 471 people. If you don't accept them, build other stats but please don't say they are wrong until you have something else to purpose.
If you say "mangas readers are under 18", be kind to use retaliable source.

What if the 13% of people are the ones who are abusing it most?

Please don't reuse my own exact stats to argue if you consider them as non valid. I apologies but what you wrote down is unfortunaly nothing based on a valid source or data, just feelings and rumors. If the listed users are under legal age, their money firepower is Daddy/Mummy/Grandma extra cash is low and attached to periodic income (Xmas + Birthday). So your conclusions even not statistic based are not valid.

The question then becomes, where and how, do anime companies draw the line? Are companies ok with fans solely watching/reading their product on streaming/scanlation sites even though, by doing so, that is a form of theft?

Ask Youtube why there are channel closed for "copyright infringment".
Sorry I'm not a fan of polemics, but once again, and as Zerospace wrote several time, there are easy property rule to understand that authors have right and to respect them...
Why trying to necociate about "free" question, rules and laws offer to live in community and not turn to beasts by preserving human being. This is selfish to think the opposite.

[cutiebunny]

Please be kind to find a better source to cross with the data that I listed previously wich were simply refering to this cel/sketch collection board as a sample vision. Samples are in use to set statistics without having to study a complete population, US census does the same with triennal statistics publishing. Note that kids that are part of the 107,000 users use massive download, and for this I have interesting curves.

Show me where I said your data is wrong.

What I said is that any statician can manipulate any data to convey any point they want. This means that they can select what they want to report from sites/studies that fit the message they want to say. So in this case, by solely reporting data from this website and ignoring data from a website, like Serebii, that is geared more towards children, you're skewing the results.

This does not mean that your data is wrong. What it means is that, for the sources that you looked at, it's correct, but, in regards to the larger picture, it is not. But to state that there are more older anime fans than younger ones based on data generated from a website that caters to anime collectors with income is flawed.

Before to repeat/inspire my percentage data :
1. Do the stats on your own 107,000 sample (good luck !)
2. Publish a book or any retaliable document (a hundred of pages please not a bunch lines on a forum), additionnaly note that reference to Wikipedia are NOT accepted in University works.
3. Come back to show up stats.

You realize that the point of mentioning the Serebii site was to demonstrate that there is a very large fanbase under 18, right? Because it appears as if you're trying to debate your ability to keep statistics. I could care less.

I studied anime cel collection for years, not the whole world of Mangas over the US because there already are official institute monitoring it.

Eh

Fact is that there are similarties and tendancies with data I monitored for years, especially with the increase of downloads on a young generation.

As would be expected.

But categorise that manga readers are under 18 is reducing, like saying that every people over 50 got Parkinson illness.
The stats I gave previously were all self made, based on a collector population of 471 people. If you don't accept them, build other stats but please don't say they are wrong until you have something else to purpose.
If you say "mangas readers are under 18", be kind to use retaliable source.

If the point of the study is to show that there are more anime fans under 18 rather than over 18, then, it would make sense to catagorize people by age rather than something more exclusive like race, religion, gender, or collection habits?

Looking at the data of Anime-Beta and then extrapolating that information in order to obtain an accurate picture of the anime fanbase is pointless. Anime-Beta is a cross-section geared to older fans with money to spend on artwork. Serebii is a cross-section geared towards tweens/teens who like Pokemon and play Pokemon card/video games. Neither cross-section will give you an accurate picture of the fanbase.

It's only when you take a sample from websites like Serebii, Anime-Beta, etc. that you can obtain an "as-accurate-as-possible" picture of the fanbase.

Please don't reuse my own exact stats to argue if you consider them as non valid. I apologies but what you wrote down is unfortunaly nothing based on a valid source or data, just feelings and rumors. If the listed users are under legal age, their money firepower is Daddy/Mummy/Grandma extra cash is low and attached to periodic income (Xmas + Birthday). So your conclusions even not statistic based are not valid.

Once again, I never said your figure was not valid.

US companies planing on suing non-licensed distributors is enough to know that the the industry is hurting, exact figures or not.

Ask Youtube why there are channel closed for "copyright infringment".

You do realize that what I wrote was a theorectical question geared more towards the industry's options, right? Perhaps I should make it more obvious next time.

[iceman57]

Manipulate stats is for politics, main theme was "thou shall not steal by downloading" on scanlations, anime and every other stuff. Please do not light a counterfire about "free", "stats" and other details to explain reasons of.

Do your comparison work on a 100,000 sample people and be kind to share age representation in another thread about stats. Just be kind not to use rumor or the feeling from personnal network to set incorrect conclusions. About stats, trade department and journalist unions already focus on mangas around the globe, just search a bit about (please do not on Wikipedia) and you'll get valid data to start your works.

Coming back on main theme, dowload scanlation nor media content is PIRACY, buying counterfeit too.
Please, please, please, don't hide behind an umbrella of free access to culture for people without income, culture is museum and paid by culture ministry, anime did not yet reach this level and is still consider as a recent business. Business industry with authors, distributors, that put their work on paper or discs and ask for fees.
If consumtion of anime ( quote : " Manga is life " ) is overpassing your budget, pushing you to go on an illegal way to get your daily dose or to sleep in a car during a convention to save hotel money to buy DVDs, tell relatives to help to go in an anime detox.

[JWR]

First reaction.

http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/20 ... ans-launch

[duotrouble]

I'm finding it very interesting too, zero.

The problem with your examples is that you're just basing it on the sites that *you* visit. As an adult, the liklihood of you visiting websites where tweens/teens talk about their relevant issues(ie. First Crush, Homework, Prom, etc.) is small. You're not heading off to the plethora of Disney-esque 'child safe' sites that cater to children/tweens/teens. Considering that Disney airs Naruto & Dragonball Kai now, I'm sure there's probably a forum on their website catering to these shows, chock full of juvenile "Who's Stronger"-type posts.

I'm not sure who the *you* is you're referring too. I very politely asked where you got your stats from. It's a pure fact of life that numbers can be spun any way to help any argument, which is why I'm not a big fan of them. If I'm the *you* you're referring to, then you're wrong. The sites I frequent as an adult are geared towards children.

I'm one of those weird people who really doesn't like surfing the web. I have particular sites I go to and then I'm done. I think it's mostly because I spend a lot of time at work on the web, specifically trolling children's websites. I'm constantly heading off to "child-safe" sites verifying their "safeness", etc.

Don't take this personally but you seem to be the most riled up about this. It just makes me curious.

[cutiebunny]

Don't take this personally but you seem to be the most riled up about this. It just makes me curious.

As I said before, I'm playing Devil's Advocate. And I'm having an enjoyable time doing so.

More, please.

[kathpatty]

All I know is my Manga trader site has been off-line since I read this article
I buy manga that I love but read a lot on the sites also...
Example:
Saver - out in US up to Volume 6 (bought all 6)
Reading Vol 15 on the sites....it takes so long for manga to come to the US. I will continue to buy it- when it appears as I love the story

[iceman57]

Don't take this personally but you seem to be the most riled up about this. It just makes me curious.

As I said before, I'm playing Devil's Advocate. And I'm having an enjoyable time doing so.

More, please.

You ain't playing at all, in another thread you wrote that buy fake luxury bag is nice because it is cheaper. As you're already a part of the "free" lobby and the "fake" lobby, you can't be their lawyer representative.

Pitiful...

[JWR]

Finally some better news.
http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/20 ... nga-online

[iceman57]

Translation deserve mother language professionnals and not the first year language student that people cross in the campus street. I'm not really thinking that this way of organisation will offer an efficient quality level of work.