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Manga Aggregator Sites and a Possible Solution - A Proposal

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Member

10:34 am, Oct 4 2011
Posts: 24


This is a letter I'm addressing to all of the community. If you're interested in helping out, please send me an e-mail or respond to this topic. I will try to respond as quickly as possible.

----------------------

Good Day,

Firstly, I want to introduce myself as Aoi from Nanbaa Scans and Sense-Scans. I work as a translator/QCer/typesetter for Nanbaa Scans and a translator for Sense-Scans. I’ve been scanlating for about a year now and ever since I went from being a general fan to actually helping and providing the community, I’ve noticed and learned quite a few things about the community itself. The reason I am contacting you today is because of the current problematic situation of aggravator manga hosting sites and the scanlators who provide the scanlations directly or indirectly to these sites.

As I’m sure you’re aware, many of these sites seem to disregard scanlators’ wishes in regards to credit pages (and credit in general), watermarks, delay periods and often they gain money off the community’s hard work. Lately, I’ve been noticing many scanlators have been creating their own readers and some scanlators have even decided to disband because of this problem. Yet, despite this, these aggravator sites are still doing well and haven’t seem to been affected at all. Moreover, even though some scanlators have been uploading strictly to their own readers, their scans still end up on these sites by people making screenshots or other such methods.

The reason for their undying popularity is simple: these aggravator sites are an archive of manga. It’s easy for people to get into new series, to read them and to never bother to go to the scanlators’ sites to thank them. As well, many people prefer to read a series in one shot than find the scanlators and download from them.

The readers have been, I feel, an improvement from before; simply because they provide the ability to read the manga in one shot in high quality from the scanlators. But, for many people, they don’t even know where on the Internet the scanlators exist. For myself, until I happened across MangaUpdates and started searching out series, I had never gone to scanlators’ sites.

The point I am getting at is that these aggravator sites don’t have competition. There is no other site with such an archive as large as theirs that can satisfy the needs of the community that follows the wishes of the scanlators.

The reason I am contacting you is to ask you to help participate in this project: to create a manga hosting site made by scanlators for fans and scanlators.

I only ask one simple thing if you were to participate: to provide scans.

I do not require any funds from you and you do not have to provide everything you scan. I only ask you provide a series – any series – or a group of chapters to help me in testing out the system and provide feedback to improve the system.

The proposed system is similar to MangaFox’s system: there are accounts that provide the chapters. However, different from that is that these accounts will only be provided to groups. That is, a single scanlation group will have an account and they can upload the zip file to the system when they so choose. The rest of the system will be automatic. In other words, the system will trust you to upload a proper version of that chapter in question. As well, similar to MangaUpdates, there will be a section on information about the scanlation group.

The system will be automatic. The only exception is creating accounts which will be private and will only be conducted by myself where groups may contact me for an account. As well, only scanlators that are listed in MangaUpdates and have uploaded at least one release will be able to get an account.

I should also stress this project is completely separate from MangaUpdates. MangaUpdates is a good database of this information and is typically kept up to date. Thus it will be acting as a reference for much of the information unless otherwise provided by any given group.

As for cost, the entire site will be provided through my own funds at the beginning, following which it will be provided through advertisements. Any extra money from the advertisements will be donated to charity. These charities in question can be recommended by the community but at the moment the only charity being considered is Red Cross. If necessary, I will sign a document stating the intentions of the site and what will happen to all money gained through it.

In conclusion, I am proposing a manga hosting site that can compete with – and hopefully – overtake MangaFox and other such aggregator sites. All I require is for you to test out the system and, most importantly, to support it. You need not provide anything other than a single series or a group of chapters to use as test data. Moreover, any money gained through the site will go to paying for server fees and any extra money will be equally split up between charities.

If you could support this site, I would appreciate it.

Sincerely,

-Aoi
(neo_music_rock14@hotmail.com)


Member

2:46 pm, Oct 4 2011
Posts: 19


I think you arrived a bit late: there is Batoto.com that should satisfy all your needs.
It is managed by scanlators.
Bye.

Post #499437 - Reply to (#499410) by DarkPatamon
Member

5:35 pm, Oct 4 2011
Posts: 24


Quote from DarkPatamon
I think you arrived a bit late: there is Batoto.com that should satisfy all your needs.
It is managed by scanlators.
Bye.


Thank you for mentioning this site. I have looked it over and this decision/proposal was made because I don't agree with everything that Batoto does. Particularly in the ads and upload policy.

Post #499512 - Reply to (#499437) by irational
Member

4:08 am, Oct 5 2011
Posts: 19


Quote from irational
Thank you for mentioning this site. I have looked it over and this decision/proposal was made because I don't agree with everything that Batoto does. Particularly in the ads and upload policy.

I did not know and thought that you did not know it (you did not mention it in your post...).
I like your idea anyway and I hope it has more success than batoto: the idea that someone earns money with a copyrighted material without any regulation is the worst thing ever made.
For example, in batoto's rules, there is no mention to inactive groups: it means that even though a group closed, its "managers" can continue to earn money through it. no

Post #499530 - Reply to (#499512) by DarkPatamon
Member

7:31 am, Oct 5 2011
Posts: 24


Quote from DarkPatamon
Quote from irational
Thank you for mentioning this site. I have looked it over and this decision/proposal was made because I don't agree with everything that Batoto does. Particularly in the ads and upload policy.

I did not know and thought that you did not know it (you did not mention it in your post...).
I like your idea anyway and I hope it has more success than batoto: the idea that someone earns money with a copyrighted material without any regulation is the worst thing ever made.
For example, in batoto's rules, there is no mention to inactive groups: it means that even though a group closed, its "managers" can continue to earn money through it. no


Haha It's fine. I probably should have mentioned that in there.
And thanks for your support. I appreciate it. smile


user avatar
Member

5:46 pm, Oct 5 2011
Posts: 16


Quotes from an old Batoto thread regarding inactive groups and money:

Quote from Grumpy
As to the question of who gets money.
Quote
If the scanlator ad is not available, default ad will be shown which will be used to pay the expenses of the site, which is roughly 5x per view on average compared to mangafox as the images are not compressed for non-webtoons.

If the group is not participating or the group is inactive, default ads are shown (ours).

And to prevent misunderstanding about webtoons in quote above... I meant that the stat of 5x applies to non-webtoons. Not that webtoons are compressed; nothing is compressed.


Quote from Grumpy
Take mangatraders for example, their cost in servers alone is roughly $900/month according to MT. And frankly, MT isn't that popular compared to online readers. And I really think they need more servers b/c it's rather slow imo.
Scanlation is a fairly large community, and with such quantity comes an inevitable exchange of money. This very site too needs support to run.


Post #499635
user avatar
Member

7:02 pm, Oct 5 2011
Posts: 402


The suppositions about what manga readers spend their money on are pointless because no one sees the real figures. Take Mangafox, whose fan boys bring up the same defense all the time. Does it need to spend 3200 USD it's estimated to rake in every DAY to pay for its servers? Yeah riiiiight. Where does the rest of the money go?

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Completed translations list
Dropped translations
Member

4:46 am, Oct 6 2011
Posts: 24


Regarding costs, (I have to check this figure) I can get about 500GB -> 1TB of space for 4 bucks a month. This is also a server with almost no downtime. There is also the possibility of making servers eventually. Though I would prefer not to do that as it's generally a big pain. OTL (I have done it before.)

When you take into account the fact that (if the ads are CPM and it depends on the company) with 1000 views you will get $4 dollars, it won't be hard to pay for the server costs since there will be a fair amount of people viewing the site.

Mind you, I still have to do more research into advertising and what not, but that's the possible figures at the moment.

user avatar
MangaAddict.1+1=11
Member

6:22 am, Oct 6 2011
Posts: 846


Well, good luck seriously. You'll need to find a lot of capable staff to enforce rules 'cos you will find that a lot of uploads, are often missing credit files and sometimes, even have the watermarks(placed by group) removed. And also, missing pages and even stuff from other chapters/manga. Once, I found yaoi and also lolicon inserted into some shounen chapters I was checking.

Post #499712 - Reply to (#499711) by VampireBanana
Member

6:34 am, Oct 6 2011
Posts: 24


Quote from VampireBanana
Well, good luck seriously. You'll need to find a lot of capable staff to enforce rules 'cos you will find that a lot of uploads, are often missing credit files and sometimes, even have the watermarks(placed by group) removed. And also, missing pages and even stuff from other chapters/manga. Once, I found yaoi and also lolicon inserted into some shounen chapters I was checking.


The main idea is for the scanlators themselves to upload the chapters. So unless the scanlators' accounts get hacked or they are just jerks, that shouldn't occur. Though I should probably implement a screening process anyways. :/

Thanks for the support though. smile

Post #499713
user avatar
Web Developer
Member

6:35 am, Oct 6 2011
Posts: 43


The situation with manga aggregators is in no way different from one, two, three years ago. This is just mass hysteria.

Knowing how to pay server bills of course isn't all there is. I can say those cheap 500gb-1tb will get you off the service the moment you start using it fully because you're hosting supposedly illegal content. You need servers like Linode, SoftLayer, or even Amazon S3, which means 10-12 cents per GB of bandwidth, else you will be left on the sidewalk the next day. The costs can get terribly high unless you have 40+Tb bandwidth and enough advertising to back that up.

Then, you still need programmers. I personally aid two dozens scanlator groups with their servers, and some of them are the largest scanlators out there. I have to do this because there is so little programmers and experienced server admins in scanlation you could count them on two hands – and four of them work with me.

These programmers do not want to run aggregators. If we wanted to run one, we would already run the biggest out there, but best of all, it would be decentralized. We don't do this because we actually don't care this much about how people read our releases, neither we want to deal with massive quantities of illegal content – we want to leave that to sketchy Chinese companies or to who has the balls to do so.

My suggestion is to stay cool, don't try too hard, keep up the news on your site and inform, inform, inform. We shouldn't engage in too large projects with too many legal implications. I personally do not want aggregators fully endorsed by scanlators. We would cross the line there.

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Post #499714 - Reply to (#499713) by woxxy
Member

6:44 am, Oct 6 2011
Posts: 24


Quote from woxxy
Then, you still need programmers. I personally aid two dozens scanlator groups with their servers, and some of them are the largest scanlators out there. I have to do this because there is so little programmers and experienced server admins in scanlation you could count them on two hands – and four of them work with me.

These programmers do not want to run aggregators. If we wanted to run one, we would already run the biggest out there, but best of all, it would be decentralized. We don't do this because we actually don't care this much about how people read our releases, neither we want to deal with massive quantities of illegal content – we want to leave that to sketchy Chinese companies or to who has the balls to do so.


I happen to be a programmer. Technically software developer but- y'know.
I also have experience with databases (really large ones) and large programs.
But that's besides the point.

I don't think that this project is so much an aggregator as it's supposed to help solve the situation. If publishers want the content removed, it'll be removed. If they want it hidden from x country it'll be hidden. If they want it to stop being scanlated, they'll have to take that up with the individual group.


Post #499719 - Reply to (#499714) by irational
user avatar
Web Developer
Member

8:06 am, Oct 6 2011
Posts: 43


Quote from irational
I don't think that this project is so much an aggregator as it's supposed to help solve the situation. If publishers want the content removed, it'll be removed. If they want it hidden from x country it'll be hidden. If they want it to stop being scanlated, they'll have to take that up with the individual group.


That's pretty much what any not too rotten manga aggregator does, besides it's entitled to scanlators and gives earnings to red cross.

Your "we donate to red cross" banner will sure look nice, as you'd be basically getting popular through donating the money scanlators are losing on paying their servers, while yours gets fully paid.

I don't agree with your idea. Batoto is actually helping me thinking less about the money I spend on my server (and, overall, lose), and focus on scanlating and helping other scanlators. There might be some loopholes that you don't like, but one can't ask too much.

The only winner here is who helps back to scanlation. Aggregators aren't out enemy, they are rather the publishers' enemy. Stop thinking about this aggregator bullshit I've stupidly started, and go think about how your programming skills can make scanlation better and faster, because hardly anyone thinks about that.

In example, PhotoShop is scriptable in JavaScript and other languages. Seems hardly anyone knows that. You could do amazing things with it. I wish my team had more time to fiddle with it.

________________
Member of FoOlRulez and head coder of the FoOlSlide project.
Post #499721 - Reply to (#499719) by woxxy
Member

8:38 am, Oct 6 2011
Posts: 24


Quote
That's pretty much what any not too rotten manga aggregator does, besides it's entitled to scanlators and gives earnings to red cross.

Your "we donate to red cross" banner will sure look nice, as you'd be basically getting popular through donating the money scanlators are losing on paying their servers, while yours gets fully paid.


The 'donate to Red Cross' is an example of a charity. I don't know too much about charities and I haven't ruled out any guidelines on any charities that could be donated to. 'Red Cross' was the first thing that came to mind because Manga = Japan = Earthquake = Red Cross. (To put it simply.)

Quote
I don't agree with your idea. Batoto is actually helping me thinking less about the money I spend on my server (and, overall, lose), and focus on scanlating and helping other scanlators. There might be some loopholes that you don't like, but one can't ask too much.


This entire project is optional to scanlators. If they want to use Batoto they can. Only groups that want to upload manga to this reader will be allowed to. As for server costs, for my group at least (Nanbaa Scans), we're using wordpress and free forums to work. Though we don't have a reader of our own.

Quote
The only winner here is who helps back to scanlation. Aggregators aren't out enemy, they are rather the publishers' enemy. Stop thinking about this aggregator bullshit I've stupidly started, and go think about how your programming skills can make scanlation better and faster, because hardly anyone thinks about that.


I don't know how you may or may not have 'started this aggregator bullshit', however, this is how I think I can help. I don't see all the problems or how scanlation can be better/faster. To me, making it faster involves having more free time and having more people helping out. As for better, I feel that, that involves the skills of those in scanlation and the amount of effort they put in.

I'm sure there are people that could point things out to me, but at the moment this is what I know/feel.

Quote
In example, PhotoShop is scriptable in JavaScript and other languages. Seems hardly anyone knows that. You could do amazing things with it. I wish my team had more time to fiddle with it.


I don't use PhotoShop so I wasn't aware of that. Though that is pretty cool.

Post #499727 - Reply to (#499712) by irational
user avatar
MangaAddict.1+1=11
Member

10:26 am, Oct 6 2011
Posts: 846


Quote from irational
Quote from VampireBanana
Well, good luck seriously. You'll need to find a lot of capable staff to enforce rules 'cos you will find that a lot of uploads, are often missing credit files and sometimes, even have the watermarks(placed by group) removed. And also, missing pages and even stuff from other chapters/manga. Once, I found yaoi and also lolicon inserted into some shounen chapters I was checking.


The main idea is for the scanlators themselves to upload the chapters. So unless the scanlators' accounts get hacked or they are just jerks, that shouldn't occur. Though I should probably implement a screening process anyways. :/

Thanks for the support though. smile


You will still need to get people(either staff or group members) to check because once in a while, even scanlators can make mistakes. And that is: they accidentally, upload a version without some or all of the credit files or they upload a pre-release version where some of the files are missing.

We're all humans so yes, errors can happen.

Also, I support that server costs can be very very expensive... I recall that some of those scanlation groups ended up paying like over USD$1, 000 just for downloads(close to or over 1TB of data). Of course, it all depends on what server you choose and it beats me why they didn't put some of their stuff on Mediafire/Megaupload and so on, to offset the costs. After all, most people won't really donate and it's a huge bill. And the "price plans" you're looking at from many webhosts = overselling. In reality, your plan will have a lot of restrictions: type of file format, size limit, limited bandwidth per day, Mysql limitations, etc. and if you want a real plan which supports hundreds to thousands of users at a time, you will want a more premium server. That is: unless, you can get something for dirt cheap.

Well, about cost issue: in the end, no matter whether you or I like or dislike the idea, the comic retailers, secondbook retailers, DHL/shipping companies, webhost company and and so on, still earn money whenever someone buys a copy of a book, scanlates and hosts it. The ISPs also profit too indirectly because people still have to pay for a connection in order to use the internet.

I'm actually not really for Red Cross because in certain incidents in the past, didn't some of their money "disappear" when it was given over to the governments? And years later, when they did an audit, it seemed the money had disappeared... into many officials' pockets or even siphoned off by the military? Not sure about trustworthiness of other charities.

Last edited by VampireBanana at 10:49 am, Oct 6 2011

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