The Eastern Edge

Whether people agree with what I wrote last week about content piracy or not, I really appreciate the feedback I've gotten.
This is a very polarizing issue and it's really interesting to read the comments and all the debate on comic and manga websites about the future of manga and the role of scanlation. It seems that a number of people would like to see a perfect harmony in which the industry can be revitalized with the integration of the fan scanlation communities as a legitimate part of a new business model that puts more muscle into digital distribution.

However, while I agree that digital content distribution is the way of the near future, and I understand the sentiment that wants a role for ‘honest’ scanlators, I don't think that scanlators and their model will lead to a solution. In fact, it isn’t possible because legit scanlation isn’t scanlation anymore, is it? It would become industry crowdsourcing, which is basically getting your community to work for you for free, possibly in exchange for credit and maybe the vague promise of some form of compensation in the future.

Crowdsourcing is how Facebook got its users to voluntarily do all the grunt work to localize their site into multiple languages for free. The stunning part was how simple it was and how so few people seemed bothered by it. They just created a translation app and a project that made people feel they were involved and contributing in a meaningful way to their shared experience. I don't nessesarily think that was the best or most ethical way to do it, however, at least Facebook doesn’t sell content to users, it only hosts content and users can join and gain access for free. It’s like a giant ad supported virtual convention venue where people can get together to make, share and buy and sell things.
Licensors and publishers are different because they are selling content directly to users they would be asking to volunteer work for them. Would it be fair for a publisher to cut production costs by crowdsourcing from the same fans who also buy their content?
Deb’s Manga Blog got into this topic in an interview with Tokyopop’s Stu Levy last December, and I think some of the reactions prove that it isn’t as simple as just bringing scanlators into the fold.

I don't doubt that there are people who are intrigued the many ideas for new digital content distribution platforms, but anyone who knows about manganovel.com has to be skeptical of basing a business model on trying to get your fans to do your work for you without pay.

Maybe it's because of Crunchyroll that some people think there is a legit future for scanlation, but if all you had to do was rearrange a few parts to create a successful new business model the industry will want in on, I think someone would have already formed Voltron by now, don’t you? What some fail to realize is that Crunchyroll survived and thrived for the same reason Bittorrent and Napster, just to name a couple, were able to go legit. It’s because they had something scanlation communities don’t have - a viable digital content distribution system with a large existing user base that the industry wanted but couldn’t do every easily on their own. Go a little further down the line and higher up the food chain, you will see that Napster eventually got owned by iTunes largely because they weren’t the ones who invented the iPod. Apple went one up by inventing something and convincing people that they had to have it. Napster didn't and responsed by trying to convince people that iTunes users are stupid. Guess who won?

What brilliant rights management and content delivery system can scanlators offer to go with their user base that can’t be duplicated by anyone else who knows how to install a CMS and set up a community portal on their computer? If they invented the comics equivalent of iTunes or the device everyone wants to read comics on, or maybe a content delivery and management system like Steam, the publishers might give them the time of day. Crunchyroll not only had a system, but they are also now members of LIMA and the AJA, which means they are licensing content, not getting content handed to them for free like scanlators seem to think they are entitled to.

Whatever model publishers decide to use in their digital distribution strategies, they won’t be doing it together and I seriously doubt they will work with any third parties for the reason I give above. I think publishers will each set up their own competing systems for their own titles. In fact, many already are. No one site is going to be able to offer all kinds of comics from different rights holders for one fee like Crunchyroll does with cartoons. Even then, Crunchyroll is subject to the same legal and region restrictions most similar services are under their licensing agreements. The same goes for free online content like RI-NE. I think the simultaneous international release experiment is a great idea and I’d love to see how the English edition is turning out and how it's being presented. Unfortunately, I can‘t access it from Japan. Licensing agreement strikes again!

Publishers may be banding together to combat pirating, but they are certainly not forming a unified, region free digital comics market. Maybe they should. Maybe that’s the future. But it doesn’t appear to even be on the horizon right now. Just reading what the industry and fans have to say about the scanlation controversy and digital marketing strategies, which is all nicely collected at Deb’s Manga Blog, shows us that there really is no consensus or unified movement other than wanting to take a bite out of piracy and somehow get the industry healthy again.

Many scanlators don't seen to see themselves as part of the problem, but they don’t appear to have many useful, legal solutions to offer the industry outside of free labour either.
Digital distribution may sound simple, but content doesn’t get online or on electronic devices by magic. It doesn’t matter what business model you use, it’s still a business. Someone will get paid, so why should the people working their asses off at the bottom of the food chain give up their money (not to mention their spare time because if they aren’t getting paid, that’s when they’ll be doing their work, if they aren't already because of the low wages)? If an assistant to a comic's creator in Japan gets paid to draw backgrounds or ink some pages, why shouldn’t a designer in America who touches up art for translated FX get paid too? If the creator uses a letterer and pays them, why shouldn’t the English letterer, and the translator and adaptation writer who wrote those letters, get paid too? Where do you draw the line? Who gets paid and who doesn't and why?

Making money off people working for free used to be called exploitation. In the internet age it appears to be called a free-labour economy. Whatever people may think of crowdsourcing or free-labour systems, I think there are potential long-term consequences that have to be considered. Didn’t anyone learn anything from what happened with AOL and their community of unpaid volunteers?
A labour of love turned into a class action suit, and AOL is nothing but a footnote in internet history.

If manga publishers decide to turn themselves into free-labour companies, then they better be ready for the backlash when the next hit or an industry revival starts making a lot of money for everyone except the people doing all the work!

However, that’s just my opinion. If fans don’t mind providing free labour to produce content that the rights holders will be selling back to them, then who am I to say it’s wrong? But that's what "legal scanlation" will mean. Maybe crowdsourcing and free-labour business is the way things will go. Who knows, if it works in America, maybe the creators in Japan will start asking for volunteer assistants too and the entire industry from top to bottom will become a free-labour one where only a handful of people get paid anything at all? But even if that works in the short term, things go in cycles and there will be long term consequences. Kick the little guys in the teeth and exploit your community at your own peril!

As far as scanlaton goes, all it may have done is force the industry into the digital age faster (which is a good thing), and tempt certain publishers into toying with a free-labour system (which isn’t a good thing). Either way I don't see a legit future for independent scanlation because they have nothing solid to offer in terms of a business model or distribution system that the industry can’t do on it’s own quickly, easily and cheaply, with the promise of real benefits to contributors that a third party simply couldn't offer.

Whatever the case, it’s going to be interesting to see what happens.