Manga Publishers Form Anti-Piracy Coalition

[Sledgstone 8,672]

http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/17662.html

A group of Japanese and American manga publishers have formed a coalition to battle scanlations of manga titles, the group announced today, with thirty sites identified for action. The participants include the 36 members of Japan’s Digital Comic Association, Square Enix, Viz Media, Tokyopop, Vertical, the Tuttle-Mori Agency, and Yen Press.

“...[T]o protect the intellectual property rights of our creators and the overall health of our industry, we are left with no other alternative but to take aggressive action,” a spokesperson for the group said. Scanlation sites are urged to “take it upon themselves to immediately cease their activities,” with injunctive relief, statutory damages, and referral to law enforcement agencies promised for those sites that do not comply.

Sites featuring scanlations, which allow online reading of manga in fan-translated English versions almost immediately upon release in Japan, have reached mammoth proportions. Onemanga.com, the largest of these sites, is the only comic-related site in the top 1000 sites worldwide, according to Google’s list of top sites (see “Pirate Manga Site Makes Google’s Top 1000”).

Manga publishers have been slow both to take action against scanlation sites and to offer legal alternatives for fans that want to read manga in digital format. For years, publishers appeared to view the scanlation sites as free marketing that primed the market in the U.S. for future release of legitimate editions and quietly tolerated them. And although the digital comics business for mobile devices is huge in Japan, Japanese publishers have largely ignored the market here, leaving illegal options the only way to read manga on cellphones or desktops. We asked Viz Media’s Gonzalo Ferreyra why manga publishers were so slow to offer legal alternatives here, and he told us that sorting out the issues in Japan was taking a long time (see “Interview with Viz’s Gonzalo Ferreyra, Part 1”).

But with manga sales in the U.S. plummeting (see “A Second Bad Year in a Row for Manga”), and the number of titles licensed for the U.S. also dropping rapidly, the Japanese publishers appear to have finally decided that they need to take action. Shonen Jump editors recently asked for scanlation sites to voluntarily stop (see “Shonen Jump Takes on the Pirates”), a precursor to this industry-wide coalition.

A coalition of American comic publishers has already drawn blood, successfully getting the largest source of American comics on the Web shut down (see “FBI Shuts Down Scan Site”) and the ownership charged (see “DOJ Sues Pirate Site Operation”).

Whether the new anti-piracy coalition formed by manga publishers will be as successful remains to be seen. But comic store retailers that specialize in manga, who almost uniformly believe that scanlations are hurting their sales, will undoubtedly cheer the efforts and hope that the massive amount of pirated manga content available online begins to diminish.

It looks like OneManga.com will be their first target.

[Khellendross 1,260]

Haven't used Onemanga in awhile. Mangatoshokan loads better and usually has better versions.

[Kite 3,263]

lol

i just literally read bleach ans naruto from OneManga

[Eppy 3,446]

*cry*

[Ladywriter 7,783]

manga sales and # of titles "dropping rapidly"

gee, how did that happen?

I'm sure it has nothing to do with youtube's crusade against AMV's. I mean after all, people love to blow tons of money on shit they have no idea what its about or if its any good right? Right???

or maybe they were right the first time... "publishers appeared to view the scanlation sites as free marketing that primed the market in the U.S. for future release of legitimate editions"

Can't have any free advertizing. Can't let fanboys/girls spread their love for their series on the public internet oh no no.

yeah well... keep up the bad work greedy scumbags. Yer just digging yer own graves. Kick someone around enough and eventually they leave...

still not following any series on ScyFy after they jerked us BSG fans around; 4 seasons in 6 years? yeah fuck you I got it all on dvd. No commercials or 5 month "mid season break"s. No new scyfi series I just gotta watch on that piece of shit network. They kicked this bitch one too many times, I packed up my BSG dvd's and abandon the channel all together.

[Khellendross 1,260]

BSG is the next series im starting this weekend, just finished Dollhouse

[Pchan 5,162]

BSG is epic.

Yeah, this SUCKS. They'll pull OM for sure or MangaFox. They finally finished the FMA manga, epic chapter of 80-100 odd pages.

[Ladywriter 7,783]

BSG ruled over my existence like a god! *twitch* I gotta thing for military shows tho so...

[Pchan 5,162]

I need to pick up their DVD Box set ... maan, I watched the whole thing on 2-3 streaming websites and I went through an entire season all pixel~lated !

[Fallen Storm 100]

Hate to hear that. My buddies and I are gonna be hurtin' for a good read.

[Sledgstone 8,672]

After this coalition takes down the bigger sites, I wonder if they'll start hunting individual manga scanlation groups. \

[Ladywriter 7,783]

All of this bullshittery isn't about protecting the artists rights. They already sold those to whichever corporation. This is about corps wanting dictatorial control of "their products".

[Pchan 5,162]

I think it's fair to say that we all pick up/ buy Manga from time to time, slowly depending on the availability or what not. If they completely stop online reading, how's someone supposed to discover new series, try it, and then buy it without regretting they bought it? Today, things have evolved from the way things were in the 70's or 80's or early 90's. It's good that there's more awareness and availability and access to things you want than there maybe was back then, but clamping down has a double effect. 1. people will rely on buying stuff, BUT 2. people will not freely try/ discover new titles easily.

Edited June 14, 2010 by Godgrave