So what comics are you reading?

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #775 on: Jul 22, 2010, 07:53 AM »
Why are they going down?!

Because reading fan scanned and translated manga online for free is apparently illegal. Who knew?

Well put me in a dress and call me sally, I never thought about it that way FFFF 8D

On a serious note: its not that I didn't buy manga but it was a good way to find buy worthy manga.

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #776 on: Jul 22, 2010, 10:04 AM »
I'm also eagerly awaiting the release of the last Scott Pilgrim volume this month. It's this month, right?

It came out on Tuesday, and it's pretty badass.

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #777 on: Jul 22, 2010, 11:18 AM »
Sad times about One Manga and other such sites, i'll have to get my fixes via torrents etc now.

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #778 on: Jul 22, 2010, 12:46 PM »
Feels like I'll have to regress to other methods of manga hunting.

But basically US manga companies are crying and blaming online sites for their poor sales.  As one publisher put it, it was all fine and dandy until people started putting up licensed manga and not taking down manga that was licensed and charging people for it.  Which sounds like baloney but oh well.
« Last Edit: Jul 22, 2010, 12:48 PM by William_Duel »

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #779 on: Jul 22, 2010, 05:41 PM »
So it's illegal... but why they closing the sites? I don't see the connection XD

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #780 on: Jul 23, 2010, 02:36 AM »
The manga companies have never really gone out of their way to do anything about it until now, is the way i am understanding it.

Apparently the majority of major manga companies have now contacted the major sites and told them to stop.

My beef is that it takes so long for translations to hit our shores, what are we supposed to do now? wait a year and a half for the stories etc to catch up?

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #781 on: Jul 23, 2010, 02:43 AM »
Well, without the internet I won't see any manga (maybe some crappy ones for girls or old Naruto), so that's unfair. Ban the scannlations in countries when this part of francise selling branch matters.

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #782 on: Jul 23, 2010, 05:28 AM »
The manga companies have never really gone out of their way to do anything about it until now, is the way i am understanding it.

Apparently the majority of major manga companies have now contacted the major sites and told them to stop.

My beef is that it takes so long for translations to hit our shores, what are we supposed to do now? wait a year and a half for the stories etc to catch up?

Yes.  Look, for a long time I read as much manga online as the next guy, but I think the perspective of the manga publishers has much more merit than most of you guys seem to think (I'm not trying to pick on you in particular, Enef).  The manga market has been in decline for some time, and the publishers were bound to address scanlations at some point.  I first got into comics through scanlations, and I really am sorry to see them go, but good on the publishers for taking this united, uniform initiative rather than the haphazard address-one-site-every-once-in-a-while approach that Marvel and DC have been taking to address the same problem.  It was going to happen eventually, and it really bugs me when people act like they are entitled the right to read illegal scanlations.  Maybe some of the Naruto scanlators will take this opportunity to instead translate some of the great manga that still isn't available in English, for which I don't see as big of a problem with online distribution.

Wolcik, I'm more sympathetic to your complaint, because I was in the same situation for a while (living in a country where I couldn't get much manga in print) but the vast majority of English speaking manga readers are in countries where they could purchase manga if they chose to do so, and you can't really blame the publishers for not really taking the small minority that you are a part of in account.  It might be expensive, but for stuff that you really want to buy there's always the Internet.

On a related point, I think that now would be a great time for publishers like Viz and Tokyopop to cut the prices on their manga volumes by lowering production values.  Unlike, say, some of the more literary manga published by places like Vertical, Naruto, One Piece and the like are mass market products, and they should be treated as such in terms of presentation.  If American publishers followed the format of the Japanese tankoubons more closely (chiefly with smaller sizes and lower paper quality), I would imagine their books would be a couple dollars cheaper, and annoucning such a change now would go a long way towards appeasing the hardcore fans that will be angriest about this anti-scanlation initiative.

Anyways, sorry to derail this thread.  That was much longer than I planned it to be.  I recently finished Dylan Horrocks' Hicksville and I highly recommend it.

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #783 on: Jul 23, 2010, 05:43 AM »
My point is that the manga we do get in english speaking countries is too far behind and only available in volumes.

If they were to keep up to date with the latest releases and have them available in a weekly chapter format i wouldn't have any issue paying for it. In fact, i would gladly do so (and make sure i get a subscription to it) because i'm always forgetting to check manga websites for the newest releases.

My issue isn't that i think i'm entitled to read illegally scanlated manga, it's that i shouldn't be restricted to manga thats only available in volume form and that's sometimes up to a year behind actual storylines, if it's even released in english at all.

It's also really difficult to find some of the stuff i enjoy in the UK, even comics wise, without paying over the odds on Amazon or some such, which you pointed out yourself as an issue, Viz are especially bad for this.

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #784 on: Jul 23, 2010, 08:39 AM »
Well no one, absolutely no one can justify reading scanlations because no matter how you slice it, it's illegal and you are stealing from the creators. I read scanlations all the time but like with downloading music, I'm fully aware it is wrong. A lot of the manga I read is unlicensed or extremely behind the US releases but I still have no right to be reading the scanlations.

I think trying to justify it is just silly. We're all stealing, that's the cut and dry version of it. The creators and publishers don't owe us shit. They especially don't owe us filthy pirates. They're not trying to be mean jerks and piss in your Cheerios. The anime and manga industry is doing awful right now, every single year another company dies off. If all the leeches that downloaded their anime and manga off the internet actually bought some anime and manga the industry would be in much better shape right now. This is why the companies are going after fansubbers and scanlators. If the industry was flourishing maybe they wouldn't have realized oh hey a huge % of anime fans are stealing from us and we're losing a fuck ton of money, we need to do something about it!

Even if they offered more legal alternatives like simultaneous releases and an actual online manga site (which 2 legal ones are coming out it seems) people would still read scanlations. Even Naruto which is only a few volumes behind the Japanese releases in America gets pirated a fuck ton. You can also look at Funimation, Crunchyroll, Hulu, etc. all of them have simulcasts of select anime and pirates still whine and bitch that they can't download the episodes to keep forever, bitch that the quality isn't as good as the fansubs, bitch that the fansubbers are better translators despite the complainer not knowing Japanese. I'm pretty confident the same thing would happen with legal online manga sites, people will still torrent the crap out of releases and complain the official release isn't as good as the scanlator's.

Sadly, if the legal online manga sites charge I have a feeling a ton of people still aren't going to pay for it and the industry isn't going to get in much better shape. Why pay for it if you can get it for free on random manga browser website?
Kittens wearins mittens

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #785 on: Jul 23, 2010, 09:49 AM »
All the reasons are fine and what not, but I just think the official reasons they're giving are just kinda crap though.  Because from the news and interviews I've read online so far, a lot of these publishers are claiming that what they're attacking is the fact that already translated and licensed books are being scanned online (I know mangafox had this practice and that was definitely in poor taste) and that websites are charging for access to some scans (the people paying for these must be stupid), so that's cash that should go to them that's going to random people with no permission.  Though these are all really obviously excuses to deal with scanlations as a whole which I'm sure they'd like to snip in the bud.  But the truth is, while these websites will go down, traditional methods of acquiring scanlations will probably still continue.  People are pretty resistant when it comes to what they think they're entitled to do.

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #786 on: Jul 23, 2010, 09:57 AM »
They don't really care as much about the scanlators. I mean a lot of pros started as fansubbers/scanlators. But you have to consider OneManga was on Google's list of 1000 most visited sites. When clearly a ginormous chunk of people are viewing manga illegally easily on one big site it's an issue. It looks like they're just going after sites like OneManga, the companies normally don't care about the scanlators themselves. They don't have the time/resources to track people down on bit torrent or IRC or sites that give a download links. So it's not like scanlations are going away, they're just making it harder for you. A lot of people are going to be too lazy to track down downloads and manually download them or learn how to use IRC so that is a small victory for the companies.
Kittens wearins mittens

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #787 on: Jul 23, 2010, 11:13 AM »
Yeah, I agree with Angie.  The idea is just to get rid of the big hubs like OneManga and force people to make more of an active effort to seek out scanlations, which I really do think will decrease the number of people that do it; searching bittorrent or always looking for new sites is too time consuming for a casual reader.  Legal manga sites aren't a great alternative, at least in my opinion; I would much rather pay $10 for a 200 page book than $1 for 200 pages online.  The issue of getting people to pay for things online once they've become used to getting them for free is much larger than manga publishing, however -- newspapers, for instance, are facing the same problems.  Still, publishers should be able address this question on their own terms and not have their hand forced by scanlators; it's entirely within their moral and legal rights to force sites like OneManga to close.

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #788 on: Jul 23, 2010, 11:34 AM »
Yeah, I don't think I would pay to read manga online. I prefer to buy the books, I mean I have 3 bookcases full of manga alone haha I just prefer the feel of having the book instead of reading on a monitor. The only way I would pay to read manga online is if it were a monthly fee kind of deal that I believe Crunchyroll does with streaming anime. Like $8.99-$12.99 a month to read whatever manga that was available provided it was a massive selection I would totally do. But I would never pay per a chapter when I can just buy the book whenever it comes out. The $8.99 price came from Netflix.

I personally only follow a few series online so it wouldn't really be worth it for me to go more than $12.99 a month. Hell, Crunchyroll only charges $6.95 a month to watch anime and amazingly they're actually making a profit (that's what the company said recently anyways). I wouldn't mind paying the cost of one manga volume to get my monthly manga fix early, but paying per chapter would be way too costly.
Kittens wearins mittens

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #789 on: Jul 25, 2010, 06:51 PM »


After searching high and low for this, I discovered I could read it online... (seems like a good thing I found it now huh?) It was very good. Surreal and grotesque, and Maruo's art was lovely as usual.
« Last Edit: Jul 25, 2010, 06:53 PM by vanilla wafer »

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #790 on: Jul 25, 2010, 07:33 PM »
Haha a book so controversial that even the Japanese themselves banned it.   There's a movie too but I think amidst controversy or whatever only France has any version of it.  It goes by Midori.

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #791 on: Jul 25, 2010, 07:45 PM »
I feel like I picked a bad time to hop in on this topic. Like I walked in on a food fight. I can live with it if onemanga's getting closed. The only things I ever got around to reading on there were +Anima and 666 Satan, and I never finished either. I share Angie's opinion for the most part. So do you guys read American comics too or is it just manga these days?

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #792 on: Jul 25, 2010, 07:56 PM »
I just at this moment finished reading Ghost Riders: Heaven's On Fire and man this redeems all the shitty stories Ghost Rider has had in the last decade.  And Ghost Rider has always been a childhood fave of mine.  The pace is too fast in my opinion but it's a great Ghost Rider story and to me kinda bridges all the new storylines with Ghost Rider enemies from the 90's.

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #793 on: Jul 25, 2010, 07:57 PM »
I read American comics, just not as many since I wait for good word of mouth before I buy them since I tend to just grab up the graphic novels
Kittens wearins mittens

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #794 on: Jul 26, 2010, 04:25 AM »


Re-reading Eyeshield 21 just because.

My god this stuff is so good.

I never thought i would enjoy an american football Manga but i do, it's full of life and interesting storylines.

Definetely worth reading through.

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #795 on: Jul 26, 2010, 10:20 AM »
I somehow never got into Ghost Rider. He looked cool to me as a kid, but I never took the time to sit down and read any of them. I actually didn't know anything about him other than the fact that his skull is on fire and he has a motorcycle. That is, until the movie. Then I realized he was actually Nicholas Cage. I have a soft spot in my heart for all superheroes who are actually Nicholas Cage. Seriously though, I may have to check that out then. I read a lot of comics off and on, it's hard for me to find art I like and writing I like at the same time. All-Star Batman and Robin, for instance. I adored the art in that, but the writing was a little... Over the top for me. I liked Ultimate Spider-man up until issue 100 or so when they changed artists and stuff. Right now the only thing I read consistently is Invincible.

*
Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #796 on: Jul 26, 2010, 02:01 PM »
Just finished reading Scott Pilgrim, MBQ (again), and the first 2 volumes of VOID Pulpo (again).
Power and wealth to no avail, let only our drinking prevail, a sober man and the sages are both lost through the ages, but all our brave drinkers, never shall die..

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #797 on: Jul 27, 2010, 11:35 AM »
Finally got off my ass and grabbed




to get my learnin on.

Also grabbed Joe the Barbarian finally since I already watch Sean on DA



Kittens wearins mittens

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #798 on: Jul 27, 2010, 11:40 AM »
I have all three of McCloud's books- they're great reads, even Reinventing, which is more amusing in a retrospective manner. I've been watching Sean Murphy's DA for a solid year now, and I'm always floored by his inks. I want to purchase a Joe the Barbarian TPB when they come out- I can't find the issues in any of my comic shops.

Re: So what comics are you reading?
« Reply #799 on: Jul 27, 2010, 11:44 AM »
Yeah, I was bad and torrented Joe. I did however pre-order this sexy thang http://www.amazon.com/Joe-Barbarian-Deluxe-Grant-Morrison/dp/1401229719/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1280256155&sr=8-1 can't wait for that shit to come out! Makes me very sad that it doesn't come out until February
Kittens wearins mittens

 

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