We no longer require users to pass an approval process for joining the site. (this means if you tried joining and were rejected before, you can try registering again!) Originally this was meant to be a scanlator only system, where only group members updated their information. Now, we've decided to open it up more to the public so that anyone can join and help the community. We're sorry if your account was not accepted in the past because of this reason, but you can register now with no strings attatched.

Relatedly, we've changed the user account system to add user groups. Members joining the site (or some members, based on whether you've ever edited a series or author before) are added to the "Members" group. This user group can add groups or releases via their User CP. You can however request to be in the higher level "Updaters" group, by trying to edit a series, author, or adding a series or author. This will let you edit series/author information. The approval process is very easy and requires you to give a short reason why you want the upgrade. (This is explained on the request page).

These changes are precursors to further changes that we are going to implement in the future. We also hope that now no one gets angry enough to send us all the hate mail we used to get for rejected accounts. (Believe me, we get lots... somehow)

Either way, the changes are mostly superficial. Because there are new possible features we will be adding in the future, we encourage everyone to sign up! Who knows what lies down the road.

Special Note: To any user that has already been active on our site and contributed in some way, your account is already in the "Updaters" group, so you shouldn't be affected by this.

Thank you,

The Manga Updates staff

PS: If anyone experiences any weird problems, please post them here! Thanks!

Okay, i changed a bit how the associated names work in series, so if you search using the "Quick Search" box at the bottom of the series section (or click one of the letters at the top), alternate (or associated titles) will come up as results italicized. This is probably a bit buggy, so if you see any problems please report them here.

Update I also changed the way comments work for news articles. So, if you click on the "View" button, you won't see a threaded list of the items anymore, the comments will just be shown after you click the "View" button. This should help reduce the amount of clicks you have to make to see comments.

Sorry about the weird stuff and slow downs happening on the site today for those who noticed. I've been debugging a new caching system. Please disregard all odd ... occurances just for today ;-)

We have a new review today thanks to Mephisto2k!

Check it out here: Zero no Tsukaima

At the bottom of group pages you can see a "Series" table that shows the number of series in our database that have releases from this group and also a list of the series. More to come.

Update Many people had requested in the past the ability to update an authors birthday without a year or day. This has just been implemented as well.

We have a new review out today thanks to The Dystopian!

Check it out: REAL

Here at B-U, we recently were able to include some new features, one of which will help with updating the site with old releases. It used to be that any release before July 17th of 2004 would be classified as having an "unknown" date. This has now changed. We are now able to use any date. As of now, the oldest manga release we have in our database is the Angel Heart volume 1 chapter 1 release by MangaProject which was made around October 12th, 2001. (Date could be off a little)

Now, we need YOUR help. We would like to take off as many of our "unknown" dates as possible and put in real dates. We currently have about 700 releases with "unknown" dates. Please use either the "Request Change" in your control panel or the "Comment" option in the "Add Release" option to add the date of release.

Also, you can also help update our database by adding older releases/series. We would like to be the most complete manga database on the net for unlicensed AND licensed titles.

Due to the license of Kashimashi Girl Meets Girl by Seven Seas Entertainment during AnimeExpo (July 1 - July 4), Dynasty Scans will be dropping this project.

We, the people at Dynasty, are still getting questions about this at our forum. Yes, it is true. Nothing you do will change our minds.

I added a few more things. For one, if you look at a series that is rated, you can see a distribution of the ratings (i.e., how many people gave it 10 vs. 9 vs. 8 etc.).

Also, I have added something called a "sub letter", so when you are on the releases page or the series page or the authors page, you can click on one of the letters at the top of the page, and then a "sub-letter" set will appear, and you can pick up to three letters helping you find what you're looking for.

More to come.

I added a new feature and hopefully it will come in handy for specific anime/manga. I like to watch anime as well as read manga, so when i start a series and find that it actually continues in the manga after the anime ends (or goes off on a different path), I want to read on. A few examples of animes that do this are Berserk and Inuyasha.

Anyway, to help out with finding the chapter at which the manga continues, I have added a new feature called "Anime Start/End Chapter". See the series listing for Inuyasha for an example of the new feature.

Hopefully in the future it becomes easier looking for the right chapter to start reading at when you finish an anime.

BU-Staff