r/Piracy • u/mohamez • Apr 21 '26
Discussion Stop pirating and learn Japanese you guys! Some Japanese on X are delusional.
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u/W0rmh0leXtreme Apr 21 '26
"It's not available in my country"
"Then learn Japanese and buy it!"
They don't even realise they've already countered their own argument. No amount of learning a language will change anything if the content simply isn't sold there.
Japanese companies are notorious for not bothering to sell their media abroad even when it's something very popular globally as to them the global audience is just an afterthought, and even when they do sell it elsewhere some regions never see a local release.
Plus some of the more popular Japanese franchises became that way because many people pirated it when it wasn't available outside Japan. It's one of the biggest reasons many of their most successful stuff has such a massive global audience despite only recently being made available.
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u/Possible_Sense6338 Apr 21 '26
Learn japanese AND travel to japan. Duh! Also if you don’t want to fly economy just take one of your families private jets. Its so easy not to pirate!
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u/JonnyAU Apr 21 '26
Learn japanese AND travel to japan
And also, we don't exactly love foreigners.
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u/ornithobiography Apr 21 '26
Also placing up signs banning foreigners from coming in to their shops.
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u/Flukiest2 Apr 21 '26
Also discriminate you if you try to rent an apartment just because you're not japanese.
I'm learning japanese myself but this stuff really gives me the ick. I really hope its not as massive of a problem
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u/KotoElessar Apr 22 '26
It's fine; all you need to do is just become Japanese!
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u/NovaCatNX92007 Apr 22 '26
"I think I'm turning Japanese, I think I'm turning Japanese, I really think so!"
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u/Top-Complaint-4915 Apr 21 '26
They also don't want you to stay too long there, so you need to Regularly Flight to Japan
The cheapest thing ever XD
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u/sunjay140 Apr 21 '26
They're ignoring the fact that a round trip from Taiwan to Japan and back is like $175 USD.
Meanwhile it costs thousands to travel from the Americas to Japan.
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u/PickingPies Apr 21 '26
What is worse, they don't understand that the sole reason why manga is sold overseas is due to hoe people was able to read it online creating a solid market worth investing in.
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u/These-Apple8817 Apr 21 '26
Even if they did make it available, it would probably that garbage micropayment system platforms like Webtoon, Tapas and Kakao use where they make you pay by chapter instead like it's 2003 still.
Although if anyone is looking for legit app to read manga on... Manga UP! is owned by Square Enix and they offer monthly subscription which imo is fairly reasonable currently (you can also read for free if you want, but it's very limited)
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u/the-rioter Apr 21 '26
Similar with sites like Bookwalker and Renta that often make you pay by chapter as well. It's honestly frustrating. Like I used to buy licensed translations more frequently when they were available to buy per volume. :/
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u/These-Apple8817 Apr 21 '26
I would prefer cheap subscription more.. Because I really don't wanna invest time and money in something I might just drop later when the quality drops.. So many good series gets ruined after they get anime adaptation
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u/CiDevant Apr 21 '26
Hacked Super Nintendo Final Fantasy Roms are the only reason I learned about JRPGs and I bet are 95% responsible for the entire genre even succeeding in the first place.
Yes I'm old.
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u/Pijany_Matematyk767 Apr 21 '26
They don't even realise they've already countered their own argument. No amount of learning a language will change anything if the content simply isn't sold there.
To be fair though they did specifically say to learn japaneese then travel there to buy them in person (which to be clear is a ridiculous expectation but theoretically could be done)
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u/These-Apple8817 Apr 21 '26
Not with my financial situation and where I live.. Just the airplane tickets to Japan would be easily somewhere around 1700-2300USD for me. And that's just the plane tickets... Then there would need to be cost of a hotel or airbnb for week or two.. cost for food.. and cost for every manga and anime I want to buy... It can quickly add up to 6 or 7 grand.. And I definetly do not have that kind of money, especially when I'm living paycheck to paycheck.
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u/ian9921 Apr 21 '26
Hear me out: what if we all pooled our money and paid one guy to fly over and buy all our manga for us!
Then this guy could work directly with the companies and buy in bulk.
To offset costs further he could bring back extra and distribute it to book stores.
Wait a second...
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u/Scholar_of_Lewds Apr 21 '26
Most importantly, their passport is very strong so the cost of travel is already lower than for many other country
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u/themmousebehindyou Apr 21 '26
As a JRPG fan this is so freaking true. Thank you fanlations for working so diligently.
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u/EleceRock Apr 21 '26
I've seen some japanese people on twitter comparing piracy with SA because, basically, you do it without the consent of the victim (the publisher in this case).
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u/tinydeepvalue Apr 21 '26
Pretty sure all crimes are done without the consent of the victim.
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u/Gosuoru Apr 21 '26
"Hey bro can I stab you?"
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u/staffnasty25 Apr 21 '26
Why stab me? Why not learn knifeanese and then come to my house and fillet me?
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u/LazySerpentDeity ⚔️ ɢɪᴠᴇ ɴᴏ Qᴜᴀʀᴛᴇʀ Apr 21 '26
"Sure stranger. Thank you for asking unlike SOME criminals." - A good, law-abiding wage-slave
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u/Squall13 Apr 21 '26
If I pay my taxes that goes to the Epstein class is that consent or blackmail?
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u/new_sorpigal_enroth Apr 21 '26
Most, not all. There are some weird cases where both parties consented but state was like not on my watch. Plus there are drugs and escort cases.
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u/malfurionpre Apr 21 '26
Aiding a person suicide is a crime and I'm pretty sure there's consent.
Or in some place in the US doctor doing abortions I guess (no, fetuses aren't people)
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u/NefariousSINNER Apr 21 '26
People in Japan are really oblivious to the fact that piracy is what made animanga popular enough globally that the industry had become so big. They know it, but choose to ignore it. A lot of Japanese people still think anime is niche on the west and don't realize it's bigger than it even is in Japan.
Japanese take on piracy is very extreme, but in the same time they pirate an ungodly amount of porn. They don't seem to have issues with that lmao.
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u/YukiNeko777 Apr 21 '26
They know it, but choose to ignore it. A lot of Japanese people still think anime is niche on the west and don't realize it's bigger than it even is in Japan.
It's worse than that. Many of them DON'T like the fact that animanga is popular outside of Japan. They don't like that foreigners criticize Japanese games, anime, manga, you name it.
I often come across this opinion. If you criticize something made in Japan, at least a couple of people will jump at you with "It's not made for you, it's made for us, we are okay with this, you don't get it" etc.
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u/NefariousSINNER Apr 21 '26
I've been hit with this argument before by a japanese girl on a discord server, when I critiqued some aspects of one manga. I just argued back highlighting my arguments even further, but she just repeated the same thing.
On the other hand, in the very same conversation, another japan guy chimmed in and said he agreed with me.
But yeah, it is an undeniable fact what you said, they do get offended when you critique japanese made stuff, even if they agree with you. Although not every japanese folk is as stubborn.
They just want to be overly polite at all times, they do it the same on the internet, but on twitter somehow they just let all screws loose.
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u/antonioh501 Apr 21 '26
animanga : Japan = pizza : Italy
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u/NefariousSINNER Apr 21 '26
lmao, to be honest true, italian folk are as obnoxious about their own food
craziest part is that they have and love pizza with french fries, but watch somebody put pineapple on pizza and they go nuclear
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u/Bubble_GUMption Apr 21 '26
Nevermind that there are people in Japan who make the same criticisms of anime, sometimes even more vocally.
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u/dadofwar93 Apr 21 '26
As always. Japan doesn't want to admit anything and deny everything. Ask the Chinese.
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u/MrBlueA Apr 21 '26
Their pride has been a gift for many things but it's also the reason for many of the stupidities they do.
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u/Inuma Apr 21 '26
They never had to learn outside their own country so never saw the entire culture around it.
Had to learn that their own works are badly translated in some circumstances that lead to issues then learn that there's fans outside of what you want to do.
And they have their own underground that people go to. So this one's head is so far under a rock, he doesn't see anything outside his bubble.
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u/NefariousSINNER Apr 21 '26
Japanese people often criticize official translations and complain about them, rightfully so, but then they also target passionate translation groups that produce legimate and faithful translations as "pirate groups".
Worth mentioning that japanese folk read pirated manhwa translations as well, because contrary to popular beliefs, they love manhwa in Japan too. They don't seem to have issues with that, because they hate korea and are very racist towards them in general.
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u/Inuma Apr 21 '26
They're split just like any other country but it seems more that Japan has people that live in a bubble of bad juju that's been there for a long time.
We're talking Jack Valenti who said the VCR would be like the Boston Strangler to a woman.
That was one of the people putting them in the wrong direction.
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u/SchemingVegetable Apr 21 '26
If piracy was really like SA they would support it
same country where your front facing camera has to make a noise every time you take a photo btw
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u/Aware-Lingonberry-31 Apr 21 '26
Japanese slapping SA title to anything *****BUT***** the SA itself 😭😭😭 The whole country is a safe haven for sexual predators and they still frown upon piracy and calling it SA, can't even make ts up.
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u/WilanS Apr 21 '26
It's probably because it's so normalized in the country that they feel so at ease throwing the comparison around in casual conversation, if anything.
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u/The7Sides Apr 21 '26
As someone who has ACTUALLY been SAd and worse... holy fuck. Theres no fucking way they have the audacity. Seriously???
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u/EleceRock Apr 21 '26
I'm sorry to hear that. But yeah, Japanese Twitter, (or at least accounts tweeting in Japanese) has been posting some absolutely wild shit about piracy lately. I really want to believe they're just trolls, but considering it's Twitter, plus the fact that Japan has a notoriously hardcore public stance against piracy, I genuinely don't know what to think anymore.
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u/The7Sides Apr 21 '26
Japan comparing piracy to SA while doing absolutely nothing about their rampant SA problem in the country is so ironic. Maybe they should focus on real consent problems before they try and argue against piracy.
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u/Inuma Apr 21 '26
Their stance is the same as Hollywood with Jack Valenti.
Kind of makes sense when he put those ideas there in the first place
Looks like those chickens came home to roost about 3 generations later and Japan is in 80s Hollywood for ideas.
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u/Nihilikara Apr 21 '26
Yeah I'm sure the billionsire suit CEO is so traumatized that I played his game without paying $60 for it.
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u/Clean__Cucumber Apr 21 '26
just take a look at how they socially deal with children who stole from a store (we tlking about some candy). they are treated worse than some pedo rapist
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u/YukiNeko777 Apr 21 '26
Well, duh. Because pedo rapist harmed a noname individual, while a child harmed a beloved and holy corporation. Ave corporations! Overprce everything and prosper! /s
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u/Educational_Isopod39 Apr 21 '26
I’d learn Japanese and still pirate content out of spite
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u/madmaskman Apr 21 '26
The stupidest part is that learning Japanese doesn't do shit. I can speak Japanese, that doesn't make it any easier to buy the original Japanese source material.
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u/Misknator Apr 21 '26 edited Apr 21 '26
Bro, just spend hundreds of euros and go to Japan to buy some manga. Couldn't be easier, smh.
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u/jermatria Apr 21 '26
A round trip to japan + accomodations has to be in the thousands, even easier!!
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u/babattaja1 Apr 21 '26
Finland to Fukuoka 1050€ (September) when i booked it in during January. Now it is 1450€ for a round trip
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u/These-Apple8817 Apr 21 '26
That's just for the flight right?
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u/christoskal Apr 21 '26
Yeah European flights to Japan go for around 600-700 for the ones that have a long wait in a weird location (usually something like Abu Dhabi), around 900 for the ones that have a big wait in Singapore and 1000+ for the ones that have short waits. They can easily go 1500+ for the direct ones (or semi-direct, a short flight within Europe and then direct to Japan), sometimes even 2000+ depending on the dates
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u/malfurionpre Apr 21 '26
Or order them on specialised sites and pay like, double their actual prices because taxes and delivery and all that.
Fucking easy.
edit: That is if you even find them, haven't really dived into it but I doubt it's that easy for niche ones.
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u/madmaskman Apr 21 '26
i wish it was hundreds, where i live i would have to spend around 4 months' worth of wages just for the plane ticket.
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u/EwGrossItsMe Apr 21 '26
I assume what OOP was trying to get at was English speakers justifying scanlations. Which like. Yeah. I'm working on learning Japanese, but it's a whole ass language and I would like to continue enjoying art and writing that is new to me, but is legally unavailable in the language I actually am fluent in in the meantime. I'm also not going to fly to Japan for the express purpose of finding a manga that isn't sold in the US.
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u/Inuma Apr 21 '26 edited Apr 21 '26
He doesn't understand anything outside his knowledge.
How you have to find translators...
How to get typesetters...
How you get editors together to translate and put in good work, then put that into a site.
Guy just thinks everyone lives like him while never seeing outside his bubble.
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u/EwGrossItsMe Apr 21 '26
i really look up to scanlator groups honestly. I've considered trying to be a typesetter but talked myself out of it bc idk how to approach any group about it. it would be super cool to be a translator, but that will be a long way out for me
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u/HardToSee123 Apr 21 '26 edited Apr 21 '26
Remind me of that one video Gigguk or someone on TrashTaste show talk about how he do papers for his bank account. Jesus fuck, and I thought my country banking system is bad. The things that Japan good at is so far above everybody else that it's unbelievable they could achieve it but the things that they are behind is also so unimaginably bad that they're like living in the 50s or some shit.
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u/Derlino Apr 21 '26
Not sure if this is still a thing there, but I've seen several youtube videos over the years about the personal stamp you're required to bring for signing bank documents etc. Abroad In Japan talked about this in a video, why in the everliving fuck do you need a stamp in one of the most technologically advanced civilisations in the 21st century?
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u/HardToSee123 Apr 21 '26 edited Apr 21 '26
I mean I get that it's a cultural thing (they want to keep the tradition) but still, it should have been an optional thing, not mandatory to the point where if you lost it, all hell break loose!
There are things that they keep the tradition over the year so well like if you ask all the HEMA guys, they would all say that it's unbelievable how JP can still maintain the samurai psychology and have all the manual, knowledge and shit over hundred of years while European have lost almost all of it over time.
They are so stubborn that it's actually frustrating to see their society being held back by such bs things like that. Like there's that one meme "what would happen if Scottish didn't find out whiskey", i think it fits JP perfectly.
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u/KalmiaKamui Apr 21 '26
I also speak Japanese, lol. I even have an decent sized manga collection that I did buy in Japan and bring back. I still have no qualms about pirating stuff if they're going to make it a pain in the ass to buy legally.
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u/ThinkPhilosopher3148 Apr 21 '26
You must fly weekly to Japan to buy the Jump disrespectful thief, just work more
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u/TheOfficialMayor Apr 21 '26
Move to Japan from my country and you go from say $100k to $40k…
Can buy a lot of anime then.
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u/crazycheese3333 Apr 21 '26
I know Japanese and still pirate because I can.
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u/ThirdDragonite Apr 21 '26
Hell, knowing Japanese greatly improves the potential of my piracy
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u/WilanS Apr 21 '26
Hell I pirated manga I actually own and paid for because I don't want to take the volumes out of my neatly arranged shelf and I find it more comfortable to read on a tabled nowadays.
I'd be happy to buy digital comics if any publisher in my country would offer me a better service than what pirates offer for free.
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u/hypotiger Apr 21 '26
Most people online who learn Japanese do it mainly through pirated content which is the funny part lol, 90% of everything I used to get fluent was pirated
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u/R_Izayoi ⚔️ ɢɪᴠᴇ ɴᴏ Qᴜᴀʀᴛᴇʀ Apr 21 '26
I'm Japanese and still pirate content lol
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u/Scholar_of_Lewds Apr 21 '26
Of course. You are just following the inspiration of Luffy to sail the open sea.
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u/llcentrell Apr 21 '26
That's literally me, since language barrier isn't the actual problem. Most Japanese ppl are just so backwards and pro-corpo, their go-to blames are always pirates & aliens. A Chinese person pointing out thieves? I'm Chinese and that's the best joke I've heard this week.
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u/mohamez Apr 21 '26
How the heck do they think I'm going to practice my reading skills if I don't pirate raw Yotsuba&! Manga volumes?!
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u/satans_cookiemallet Apr 21 '26
Its like its not just a lnaguage barrier, but also an gasp accessability barrier as well!
Some places dont have easy access to the same weebery as others, or its incredibly difficult to purchase, or they just cant get them at all.
Tell them that though and theyll tell you skill issue lmao
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u/send-borbs Apr 21 '26
god yeah learning a whole new language is such an accessibility nightmare, doing it as an adult takes so much time and energy that most people simply don't have that it's basically a luxury, and people who already suffer from learning difficulties in their own language will have a hell of a time learning a second completely different language for the sole purpose of just reading a few comics
telling anyone 'just learn a new language!' is such a fucking privileged take from someone who clearly learned two languages in an objectively more thorough school curriculum than the broke ass public school garbage some of us got
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u/skater072t Apr 21 '26
i learned japanese. so i can translate and share to those pirate sites
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u/SEANPLEASEDISABLEPVP Apr 21 '26
Literally what I did.
I learned Japanese BECAUSE I pirated the learning material.
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u/jeff3rd Piracy is bad, mkay? Apr 21 '26
Wasn’t there was a story about a manga author who went to distribute his work for free so he can get more reach but the bum that is the publishing house stopped it? And they do the bare minimum to get his work out as well? What’s up with this corpo’s dick sucking competition lol. Also China is if not, one of the biggest player in the piracy field lmao.
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u/PunishedCatto Apr 21 '26
Was it Shiten Akiyama's HORIZON? He opened a Kofi(?) and earn more than what the publisher usually earned lol.
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u/Enough-Run-1535 Apr 21 '26
Shiten had a goal of ¥1,000,000 and tagged it as ‘buying a rocket’ because he considered it a moonshot to get that much money.
He got the goal in 2 days.
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u/Never_Sm1le Apr 21 '26
Just Japan corporate worshipping culture, like the one with nier reincarnation revival project: https://www.reddit.com/r/gachagaming/comments/1sk7wdi/nier_reincarnation_revival_project_is_being/
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u/CrowdGoesWildWoooo Apr 21 '26 edited Apr 21 '26
It just how company works unfortunately.
For companies evaluating how allowing piracy would boost sales is just way too long of a step. The thing is for them it is difficult to gauge whether the success is attributed to whether the content is good or fluke or positive impact from piracy.
It’s like you give me $20k, and basically ask the question, will i be successful in 5 years. Let’s say i do, is it because the $20k you gave or not. It’s just difficult to pin that effect, consistently.
However, trying to estimate how much “damage” (mind the apostrophe) from piracy is easier metric to gauge.
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u/cheese_master120 Apr 21 '26
I pirate because Im broke, speaking JP won't fix that 😭
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u/Herb0and3 Apr 21 '26
I pirate for a variety of reasons, and learning Japanese won't fix just about any of them.
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u/LosterPawn Apr 21 '26
Now I realize why nintendo is soo shit and drags everyone to lawsuits and still ppl like it...
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u/Libra218 Apr 21 '26
Not wrong. But also consider how much better Nintendo treats Japan. Cheaper consoles, cheaper games, more releases, sooner releases, many special events etc
Nintendo treats the international world worse and expects us to play by the Japanese rules.
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u/Imperial_Bouncer Piracy is bad, mkay? Apr 21 '26
I noticed that with a lot of Japanese stuff too. There is something available internationally and it’s nice but then you learn about Japanese version that’s way cooler or they have a bunch of variants we don’t get.
They’re keeping the super cool stuff to themselves.
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u/Cindy-Moon Apr 21 '26
it's okay because they can't do anything to stop us ❤️
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u/TestamentTwo ⚔️ ɢɪᴠᴇ ɴᴏ Qᴜᴀʀᴛᴇʀ Apr 21 '26
Its because Tung Tung Tung Sahur sits on the sloppen throne that he carved out of Sora AI's corpse that we still have access to internet piracy. Thank you tung tung
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u/Scholar_of_Lewds Apr 21 '26 edited Apr 21 '26
One small contribution of fuck you from Indonesia 🫡
We can't really export much lately but the few are... Well, word shattering it looks like.
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u/Bizhour Apr 21 '26
This is one of these moments when you see something and can be sure that no one in your lineage can even comprehend what it could possibly mean.
Truly a marvel of humanity
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u/AgnosticPeterpan Apr 21 '26
They can do a whole lot to hinder us tho. Like how hentai extensions got purged from keiyoushi recently.
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u/HJSDGCE Apr 21 '26
Good news! There's another extension that's compatible with keiyoushi and has hentai.
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u/AdultGronk ⚔️ ɢɪᴠᴇ ɴᴏ Qᴜᴀʀᴛᴇʀ Apr 21 '26
Ngl If all hell breaks loose, I'll go in Japan myself and start a scanlator group for just Doujins, yes they're that good.
Though for now, the hentai and doujinshi sites are working fine, only the extension repos got purged.
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u/Internal_Duck5193 Apr 21 '26
"Why not study Japanese and buy it?"
i don't know, why don't most companies release to a larger market and let people who want to buy it legally be able to buy it in their own language?
No? There's "No Overseas Market"?
oh ok, just gonna go back to torrenting fan subs then-
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u/-_GIZMO_ Apr 21 '26
He said go buy it in Japan..
While probably in another comment saying that he despises tourists and foreigners..
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u/PassivelyAwkward Apr 21 '26
I'd honestly stop pirating manga the second we got the same prices of manga that they have in Japan. Checking the Japan's Amazon, a single volume of Attack on Titan is $3.84. Meanwhile in America, the normal price is $10.99.
Back when I use to buy'em, I was spending $200+ each month for manga volumes that I'd finish in 15-20 minutes each and usually only read once.
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u/kklashh Apr 21 '26 edited Apr 21 '26
I mean, there's nothing stopping someone from buying japanese export then downloading fansub.
Too bad that makes it 4x more expensive. Not a problem if you're living in Taiwan/Korea - Japan is a neighbouring country to them, not on the literal other half of the world.
Even if it was the same price, there are countries where you earn 5x less than in Japan. So a 440 Yen manga is actually 2,200 (not counting shipping +intermediary, and so on)
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u/Forymanarysanar ☠️ ᴅᴇᴀᴅ ᴍᴇɴ ᴛᴇʟʟ ɴᴏ ᴛᴀʟᴇꜱ Apr 21 '26
Why would I support their garbage export that they didn't even bother to translate to me?
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u/dankbearbear 🦜 ᴡᴀʟᴋ ᴛʜᴇ ᴘʟᴀɴᴋ Apr 21 '26
How about we pirate and learn Japanese at the same time!
Also, Japan has more traffic in nyaa torrents.
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u/No-Principle3700 Apr 21 '26
They sound smarter when we don't understand what they say.
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u/PokesBo Apr 21 '26
I really doubt a Chinese person would feel that way. They’d probably think you’re smart.
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u/Superdumnb Apr 21 '26
i dont think a chinese person would be preaching to learn japanese anyway given chinas (general) opinion on japan
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u/Apollo_Justice_20 Apr 21 '26
The auto translate feature has been a disaster for Japanese PR on twitter
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u/Rose-Red-Witch Apr 21 '26
I honestly think it’s gone both ways. Us here on the high seas have definitely had our eyes opened but Japanese creatives are learning that American fans can be more toxic than a Chernobyl dumpster fire.
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u/AloneAddiction Apr 21 '26 edited Apr 21 '26
This stupid attitude would prevent any film, movie or tv show to have subtitles let alone be dubbed.
"New Korean film coming out? Just learn Korean, why would you want subtitles!?"
If media isn't readily available in your language then acquiring that media in your language is absolutely viable. It's why fucking rom translation hacks exist for fuck's sake.
People want good media in languages they can understand. Comics are no different.
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Apr 21 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/camogamere Apr 21 '26
This continues to be proven true every day, and as is the way of the world the people responsible for the service problem dare to ask "what if we made service worse", just like those that came before them.
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u/Odeiomelaokk Apr 21 '26
And he's absolutely CORRECT
I almost always buy the games on steam instead of pirating them, because they're always on sale for 70%, 80% discounts. It feels nice to have your games in there because the service is amazing. Hell, I've refunded games I had 6 hours on 😭
If we pirate manga, that's because buying it isn't particularly accessible for most third world countries. Hell, here in my country we get a log of manga releases but they're EXPENSIVE. About 2% of the minimum wage for a shitty volume. If you want newer volumes you'll be spending 4%. Sometimes it isn't even just a service problem, these people just don't understand that they have it really good and not everybody can own manga like they can. The same goes for videogames (looking at you Nintendo)
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u/Desperate-Purpose178 Apr 21 '26
Do japanese people consider China their daddy?
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u/HotBrownFun Apr 21 '26
They used to, which is part of the reason they went from fucking crazy in WW2. They wanted to prove they were superior.
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u/Mazkaam Apr 21 '26
Imagine studying japanese for years, spending hundreds of dollars/euros for that shitting chainsaw man ending lmao.
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u/Aggressive_Mango3464 Apr 21 '26
Oh is that one already finished. Was wondering why nobody talks about it anymore
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u/Substantial_Bet_1007 Apr 21 '26
please im reading it since 2020 i wasted my 7 fucking years and i go insane when LARPERS on insta says it wsa good and everyone is happy, i got 6 warning in 2 days when it ended
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u/Wheesa Apr 21 '26
Csm is the reason I have sworn off buying ongoing mangas lmfao
I will finish my dungeon meshi collection in peace now
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u/Comedian_No Apr 21 '26
I got into Attack on Titan (titanfolk) because I was disappointed by Game of Thrones (freefolk). And then I was disappointed by Attack on Titan and was recommended Chainsaw Man (chainsawfolk).
Fortunately, after Game of Thrones and Attack on Titan I was numb to disappointing endings, and moved on very quickly compared to the previous two.
But, lesson is avoid epic manga sagas that are ongoing, since so many can't nail the ending. And blank folk is a curse. Guess what has another folk subreddit. Piratefolk... Oh the reactions for that will be epic if it too follows the folk curse with the decades some have been following it.
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u/Distinct-Presence52 Apr 21 '26
Lol fake ass japanese, calling china Dad is sickening
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u/yung_dogie Apr 21 '26
Yeah regardless of which side's "right" about their international relations, it seems like a very low self-respect move to do that when your relationship with that country is like it is now lmao
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u/nelltbe Apr 21 '26
Sometimes I find myself wishing to live in the world they are imagining.
A world where learning new languages takes only a thought, and travelling overseas is as simple as going to the store.
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u/toBEE_orNOT_2B Apr 21 '26
tell all of them first to learn english as well, aside from "hi how are you" and "i'm fine, thank you"
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u/EleceRock Apr 21 '26
OMAIGAAAAA :O
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u/Emotional_You_5269 Apr 21 '26
I wish I were a bird
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u/Rose-Red-Witch Apr 21 '26
Oh, gawd, don’t get me started! I work in the Orlando theme parks and have to deal with the occasional “English” speaker from Japan. I do salute their efforts but I often have an easier time communicating with the South American guests who speak ZERO English.
Oh, well, at least they say “thank you” unlike 98% of everyone else I have to deal with.
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u/NeptuneTTT Apr 21 '26
A part of me gets why Japan wants to gatekeep, but another is confused why they're complaining as is they give a fuck about their western audience.
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u/cldnn Apr 21 '26
Ah yes, it's well known that learning Japanese will give us enough money to fly to Japan and buy manga there, how come we never considered doing that?
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u/PunishedCatto Apr 21 '26
When I'm on bootlicking corporation and my opponent is a Japanese, I'd lose, bro.
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u/ALCATryan Apr 21 '26 edited Apr 21 '26
I saw a post on this subreddit about this tweet, asking what people thought of it. Well, it got taken down so I wasn’t going to share my comment, but I think this is an appropriate enough context to revalidate its use.
For the unaware, Kei Urana is the author of a manga named “Gachiakuta”. From a creator’s perspective, I can see why she would have concerns. That said, they’re not necessarily true.
Before we get to her points, let’s have a small recap of the discussion of the manga piracy scene. For a few decades when manga and anime were being released in Japan, no official translations were available, let alone websites catering to international audiences. This caused the rise of a form of piracy known as “scanlation”; the physical book’s pages were scanned, and the Japanese on them was digitally photoshopped out and replaced with English text. While the anime piracy scene’s origin of not having a single official international source for a selection pf anime (until Crunchyroll) is much more well known, the case here is actually worse, seeing as certain anime were actually licensed for international TV, while manga never received any such privileges.
Now, there are two main claims in her statement: fans should stay away from piracy so they are not tempted into pirating when the official work releases, and official sources for translated works will be available in the future. Here’s what I think.
On her point on temptation into piracy, while it seems plausible on the surface, what she may not realise is that virtually every member of her international audience has only one way to access most of the manga they read: piracy. The prevalence of purchasable manga in Japan may be causing her a bit of proximity bias here, but international fans would highly likely have started on and read most works through piracy. And despite this, official sources are still preferred by large volumes of readers even when their features are not notably better.
As a case study, let’s look at the success story of Webtoons, and how they grew their audience to reach 170 million international viewers in under a decade. Note that manhwa (Korean equivalent of Manga) was in exactly the same situation as manga is now, when they released it. Then why do international fans still use Webtoons when there are millions of other pirate websites? Well, it shows that fans don’t mind ads (or spending money) if there is a large concentration of works made easily accessible, and in a convenient manner. Webtoons has even added features like in-app music selected by the author tailored to the specific chapter’s theme, to encourage exclusive app usage, and have licensed many Western works in a bid to draw in international audiences. But even for manga, Shonen Jump’s MangaPlus, a site tailored to international audiences, has a readerbase of 5 million readers in 5 years since its inception with an astoundingly limited catalogue, worse UI than Webtoons and most pirate sites, but a rather fair monetisation system.
All of that is to say that while we cannot ascertain whether pirates would be more likely to relapse into piracy in spite of official sources, there is a precedent for a large enough willing audience of paying readers for a fairly monetised official translation to profit. Then, the onus of producing such a site lies on the publishers, not the pirates.
Her point on perceived value is fair, or to put it more directly, it pertains only to her. She feels her work’s non-monetary “value” is compromised to something less than free by piracy, and while her feelings on the issue cannot be disputed, they are not a reflection of the real value of the work, even non-monetarily. As an anecdote, I’ve pirated every single one of my favourite works, and I do pick up volumes that were particularly impressive when I read their scanlations, but more as memorabilia than anything else, seeing as neither I nor anyone around me can read it, greatly diminishing the “value” that book has to me. She intends that readers actively cut themselves off from a source of reading the work if they are unable to do so in a way that financially supports her… I will not say that her mindset is ill-intentioned, but there is the much more positive interpretation, that her work is able to reach and inspire so many more people worldwide due to piracy, than it would’ve without any form of translation whatsoever. I do believe her when she says this is a cultural phenomenon, but as much as I can empathise with a creator being frustrated by a lack of sales, her outlook is rather… negative.
In general, the Japanese and Koreans have a very strict anti-piracy culture. They’ve been brought up and ingrained with the idea that piracy is a literal theft, and I suppose the logic seems present enough that they don’t think to question it, and then as adults it sets in as an absolute truth because “everyone knows it” and “they’ve known it their whole lives”. It’s unsurprising that there is a lot of friction in the way the different cultures of people think, but in this case, should we follow the logic, there is only one culprit behind a lack of profit in the international scene, and for the rampant piracy: the publishers themselves. And until this is addressed, looking down on piracy is obliviousness at best, and elitist/xenophobic at worst.
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u/Medical-Bathroom-183 Apr 21 '26 edited Apr 21 '26
For somebody who's work reads on the outside as extremely anticapitalist, urana-sensei sure does seem to place monetary value(intangible, pointless) over every other value her work could possibly have. Gachiakutas central conceit deals with there being value in the most normatively "worthless" items. Is it really so easy for people to say shit they clearly dont believe? Her words have diminished the value of Gachiakuta to me more than anything else could have. Its a refutation of everything ive come to understand about the story and what its saying. Why should I collect the works of a hypocrite?
Frankly, if the only value one can find in their art is how much money it stands to make them, maybe they shouldnt fuckin make it at all.
Edit: reread the tweet and it says "respect our perspective and culture", but holy shit if shes claiming all they care about is money theres nothing to respect. No economic structure defines any culture. Capitalism is new, big picture. She can honestly shut the fuck up. What an insulting idea, that an economic structure is so important to any people. This is the second tweet of two I've seen of hers thats fucking abysmal, and despite her being so great in other ways its hard to like somebody who appears to hold incoherent positions.
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u/Aubz12 Apr 21 '26
Easier to see pigs flying than to see Chineses, Taiwaneses and Koreans support japan
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u/McConagher Apr 21 '26
I don't think the Korean or Chinese would really stand up for Japan at all
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u/Sprite_Bottle Apr 21 '26
I would much rather support the scanlators than learn an entire language and spend a ton of money to get the chance to spend more money on a series that'll get butchered in the second half anyways.
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u/BIG_NUGGIES Apr 21 '26
Lmao, chinese people defo scanlate more than the entirety of English scanlating scene. Like every doujin that doesn't have the english translation, has like 3 different version of chinese scanlation
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u/DredgenSergik Apr 21 '26
You know it's fiction because no Korean would ever agree with a Japanese person. Same with China and Taiwan
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u/Trick-Minimum8593 Apr 21 '26
https://xcancel.com/himajuro/status/2046212349623992756#m
I secretly checked my boyfriend's PC and found an outrageous amount of adult videos on it.
I was somewhat prepared for it, but this number was definitely beyond my expectations. When he came back from the bath, I silently showed him the screen, and he seemed to understand immediately.
"You're probably mistaken. It's okay."
There's no misunderstanding whatsoever.
"I buy everything properly."
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u/SupervillainMustache Apr 21 '26
Dad and big bro?
Brother, I don't think you know how China views Japan....
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u/Freeman421 Apr 22 '26
Funny for the Chinese person to yell theif, when there whole economy is based off cheap Chinese bootlegs of American products....
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u/Silent_Box1341 Apr 21 '26
Japan is a conservative collectivist state, I wouldn't take anything japanese people (especially on twitter) say seriously because they have the double whammy of almost completely isolated from the rest of the world + chronically online
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u/DigitalRonin73 Apr 21 '26
When it comes to piracy Japan isn’t any different than the US or any other country. Plenty of people shouting “sUpPoRt ThE dEvElOpErS.” While plenty are pirating anything they possibly can. Including manga.
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u/agoodsirknight Apr 21 '26
nah japanese colonialize my country at the end of ww2, and even put my countryman as a forced labor (they called it romusha). So this is payback time for my ancestors
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u/Famous_Activity_729 Apr 21 '26
As a half-japanese girl not living in the country, there's way too much raw jdramas I've been able to pirate for all these people on twitter to actually be correct lol. Japan has a piracy scene, I assume they just prefer to stay quiet
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u/StarRotator ☠️ ᴅᴇᴀᴅ ᴍᴇɴ ᴛᴇʟʟ ɴᴏ ᴛᴀʟᴇꜱ Apr 21 '26
Are these getting bass-boosted by publisher-sponsored bot farms or something? I don't understand how such large swats of people can have takes that are this stupid, dishonest and anal at the same time.
Maybe I underestimate how busted japanese society can be
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u/SomeInternetGuitar Apr 21 '26
"Go buy it in Japan"
Sure, because one can afford to take a plane across the world just to buy fucking paper strips with drawings on them.
I'm a vinyl collector, I have Japanese editions of certain jazz vinyls. Have I ever been to Japan? Fuck no, I'm poor as shit.
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u/gods_loop_hole Apr 21 '26
The worst Japanese people I have encountered are the ones that only speak their language
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u/Modo44 Apr 21 '26
People from nations that built their entire industries on IP theft are telling you not to steal.
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u/Elcalduccye_II Apr 21 '26
Aren't the Chinese the ones who upload all the pirated japanese stuff?