Fansubbers Are Not Thieves, But Avid Consumers

enigmax
March 7, 2009
42
Fansubs,
INSUBS,
Legendas
Print

Last month the Legendas fansub site was taken down by anti-piracy action, only to return a short time later. Now, another prominent subbing community has closed its doors – and has launched a campaign to show the movie industry that they are not thieves, but avid consumers.

On February 1st, action by Brazil’s IFPI and MPA-affiliated Antipirataria Association Cinema and Música (APCM), led to the Legendas.tv fansubbing site being shut down. APCM, which represents the interests of Universal, Warner, SonyBMG, Disney, Paramount, Fox and others were quickly disappointed as the site returned, with hackers even taking revenge against an anti-piracy site.

Now, in response to continued attacks against communities that offer subtitles, the prominent fansubbing group InSUBS has launched a campaign to show the anti-piracy groups and their movie and TV industry bosses that the people they target are avid consumers.

The campaign is called “Queremos Cultura” (translated “We Want Culture”) and is linked from the InSUBS site, which is not currently engaged in subbing activities, largely to avoid the same fate suffered by Legendas.tv in February.

Those running the campaign are asking fansubbers and those that use fansubs to upload pictures of their original DVD and Blu-Ray collections to this Flikr album to show that they are far from being thieves or criminals. On the contrary, they are enthusiastic consumers who pay their way. At the time of writing there are already 570+ photographs showcasing some pretty healthy collections totaling some 10,000 products – everyone is encouraged to upload their own.

This campaign is trying to show that the problem lies with Hollywood. In some countries, people have to wait months, sometimes even years, before their favorite TV-show or movie becomes available. Some of the most dedicated fans can’t be tortured this long – it’s unethical.

The campaign video is in Portuguese, but we’ve added our own ‘fansubs’ at the end of the post.

We could be killing, we could be stealing. But no. We choose to disseminate culture. The subtitles we make are not what makes DVD sales fall, it’s their abusive high prices.

The long delay between the airing of a series in its country of origin and the rest of the world is the number one reason why people choose to download – the wait for the series to reach non-cable TV can take years!

Years to find out what happened with: The island people! Jack Bauer! Hiro Nakamura! Michael Scofield! True fans always try to buy the original products and many series owners got to know about these through the Internet. Today they are collectors.

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Muh

Its always like that.
They`re alianating their customers.
the king

mai boi, this culture is what all true warriors strive for
help meeee

Alienating, please learn to spell correctly.
…

This is about controlling the net, the hole copyright thing means the government can use it to censor dissidence.

Wait and see.
muuh-gnu

It doesnt matter if they are consumers, when the IP rights holder says he doesnt want his stuff to be translated, it mustnt be translated, no matter how badly the fans want it to.

Its our fscked up copyright laws that allow him to censor subbers. Its just futile to respect the fscked up laws and then to beg the IP rights holders to make exceptions, when they can prohibit them at a whim.

We have to team up and make non-commercial subbing (amongst other non-commercial activities) simply LEGAL, and we wouldnt have any of these problems any more.

The problems are not the copyright holders, the problem are our fscked up LAWS.
NubCakes

What a truly pointless waste of time.

Hey everybody, get your pictures of your “DVD collection” to show what a “great consumer” you are right here:

http://images.google.com.au/images?hl=en&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla%3Aen-US%3Aofficial&um=1&q=dvd+collection&btnG=Search+Images

Uploading pictures proves exactly nothing. Idiots… Last time I checked committing an offense made you a criminal and demonstrating that you have done something within the law does nothing to change that.

And as if subs are made to be displayed on purchased, legit DVDs – give me a break.

And again with the dramatic, agenda driven language rather than something that illustrates what is happening: “tortured” and “unethical” for Gods sake – we are talking about people viewing TV programmes and movies, not deceit, corruption or having pain inflicted upon people to extract infomation.

Funny how piracy is still a massively ocurring problem in countries of origin isn’t it …you’d almost think that the delay time of releases has little to do with piracy occurring. Oh wait, it doesn’t.
Hacker/pirates of the world UNITE

damn they stole my words OH no its so awful.
once again proving they aren’t artists and don’t deserve treatment as such.
Hacker/pirates of the world UNITE

@muuh-gnu
and who just lobbied to get those laws some wonderful lil wabbit
it was “organized rights groups” wanting and seeing greed for $$$$$
more $$$$ they see more they want , which actually more they will lose in the end ….as stuff gets more and more expansive.
Just wait till hyper inflation hits when the USA cant pay its bills
xXx_Gangztez_PriDE_xXx

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lol

i like the music
bob

9 wtf you on about speak english man cant understand a word you just said.
http://www.10ch.org/ www.10ch.org

There is only one word for this: appeasement. If you are familiar with history at all, you know how well appeasement works.
http://www.10ch.org/ www.10ch.org

Also, why negotiate with copyright terrorists? The IFPI and the ACPM are terrorist organizations. It would be a mistake to grant any concession to them.
renjin

I use a lot of fansub anime but I own over 1k dvds of anime bought state side. It sucks having to wait almost 2 years for some great series to get translated.
anon2

everyone is wasting their time doing this. the only way to convince the anti-piracy organisations that they are a bunch of wankers, stuck in the ‘dark ages’ and are totally alienating the very people they need the most by their ridiculous actions, is to stop buying anything put out by them. may take a couple of months but nothing is gonna hurt them more than hitting them in the pocket. they’re certainly not getting the message that if you don’t provide customers with what is wanted, the customer goes elsewhere!!
Izkata

@6: The topic isn’t the only reason people download. Others include: not having a TV, not being at a TV when a show is on, and so forth. I’m sure there are even more, but these two apply to me.
Qix

Seriously, without fansubs, I would not own ANY anime except Princess Mononoke. When instead, thanks to the advertising of fansubs on the internet, I own way too much. Anime is SO overpriced that you can’t buy on a whim, you have to already know what you want. Thats also the only reason I dont know more less than absolutely stellar shows. 30 bucks for every 4 episodes?! That’s minimum 100 bucks per season. It costs 20-40 bucks for seasons of American shows, animated or not.
Guspaz

I’m both a fansubber and a fansub viewer. I buy as many anime DVDs as I can afford (more than I can afford, really).

If it weren’t for fansubs, I probably wouldn’t have ever bought any anime. But because of fansubs, I’ve spent hundreds and hundreds of dollars on anime DVDs.

And so, a message to copyright holders: kill fansubs and you kill your business.
GEONEO

fansubbing communities usually take their content off their site after it has been released on DVD…. The exec’s really have to stop snorting cocaine. Hopefully, after they go bankrupt and resort to armed robbery to get their fix, they are caught and thrown in with a bunch of horny, sex deprived guys. THEY DESERVE IT THEY ARE THE REAL CRIMINALS !!!!!!
GhettoGanstaGrabba

Yo mah niggah Gangztez_PriDE homie bro son … what it be, dawg? Thatz def that yo azz be using Windroz wid Intrawebz Exsplorar yo, mah shawty be usin FoxyFire an shyt. True dat! Themz Linox / Unicks peeps be missin out, yo … MicrobeSopht be the shizznit fo shizzle. Yo, bust it … yo azz can uze Groogle to findz scner sitez dood so yo azz can be imprssin yo boyz an shyt word. Aint no halfsteppin if u be usin themz search enginez fo sitez dawg. Peace out mah niggah, I gotz to downloadz me sum hiphop on BruthaBay where all the dope niggaz be @.

Yo niggah G.
freetard

” This is about controlling the net, the hole copyright thing means the government can use it to censor dissidence.

Wait and see.”
——————

so…what style of tin foil hat are you wearing right now?
flash88

WOW Juging by a couple of these comments it looks like there might be something to that report about pirates being gangsters and terrorists! I sure hope my dling activities dont have that effect on me……
Ben

“This campaign is trying to show that the problem lies with Hollywood. In some countries, people have to wait months, sometimes even years, before their favorite TV-show or movie becomes available.”

And sometimes they never become available. As a fan of Asian entertainment living in Canada, I know this out come all too well.
trench

I couldn’t agree more with that quoted statement, the same applies to torrenters in general. It’s time that the rec/movie biz learned that sharing is beneficial to them in the long run and to stop going to war with their customers.
GrizzlyBear123

What the producers fail to recognise is that there is no regon 1,2,3,4 ect.. There is only the whole world. The sooner they abandon the old way of thinking the better. Distribute for the whole world at once. Make shows availible online immedatly, not after ten days or years. We pirate content because we want to see the content.
Sites like Hulu with ads added to content do not bother us. LET US SEE IT NOW! Not Later.
NubCakes

@23: “Make shows availible online immedatly, not after ten days or years. We pirate content because we want to see the content.
Sites like Hulu with ads added to content do not bother us. LET US SEE IT NOW! Not Later.”

Um excuse me, why is it that massive piracy occurs still in The US of A when they have Hulu and see content first? Your statement is demonstrably fellacious.

Distributing to the whole world won’t do much to stop the level of piracy: people will *say* that’s the reason they pirate … Along with a load of other garbage that basically always seems to avoid stating that selfish interest is a large part of the reason they pirate, completely avoiding the question of potential returns to the creators of course, easier to ignore that. And there’s usually a followup statement of “I’d support the programmes – but it’s crap, old, not worth it…etc.” – and they’ve ALREADY SEEN IT.

Despite these protestations the content is still often worthy enough for them to continue to download the TV show and continue the charade in their own mind of why they are pirating… Usually along the lines of “Well, I support stuff that I really like – that’ll be the NEXT thing I watch though” and “commercial pirates are really evil and bad men – thieves even – but I’m not because there’s no money involved”.

People are frikkin deluding themselves and won’t hesitate to spout off to others about their delusion. At the core, in the developed world anyhow, piracy occurs because of selfish self-interest: taking the easiest way to plesure, a general lack of caring about supporting content and because they can, almost always, get away with it – and most importantly, little to no finacial LOSS occurs to the pirate.

It’s easier, more convenient, doesn’t have ads and is free. Many people seem very reluctant to admit that, like it or not, a certain level of money not being paid to creators – usually justified with “I wouldn’t have bought it anyway so no ones losing money” – funny, people bought stuff before they could pirate. And come up with all sorts of reasons, usually blaming something the producers or distributors are doing.

And yet, based on evidence – let’s see: The US of A is where a large amount of material is screened first – yet they still have a massive piracy problem… despite content being in cinemas, on TV screens and available on DVD first in USA there’s still a huge piracy problem.

So it isn’t the fact that you have to wait – “tortured” and “ethically” maltreated (as the ridiculous use of language in this article says – appallingly overdramatic with little analysis and calls to emotion for kneejerk reactions).

Face it – a large majority of poeple pirate when they can see content first before anyone elsewhere anyways. I admit that I am not compensating creators for their service to me – a form of theft (though don’t confuse that with larceny – it’s not a loss of tangible goods) – I’m self-interested and couldn’t care less about compensation.
The Internet

The more you try to control it, the more you are hated.
Widget

@NubCakes

You’re saying that people shouldn’t care so much about waiting only a few years until they get to see what the rest of the world sees, and then you expect them to pay rediculous amounts of money for the delayed media. What they’re trying to say is that *if they could*, they would indeed go out and buy the media that they are instead forced to pirate. It looks like what’s happening (from these pictures) is that they “pirate” their shows or whatever then still go out and buy them when they come out officially any way. This “piracy” only gives them reason to go out and but the stuff if anything.

Plus, most of the people here still disagree with your opinion of who should be getting the money for producing the media (you agree with the big media companies, which means CEOs and businessmen should get all the money as opposed to the screenwriters, techies, costume designers, cameramen, etc. It’s the same with music; if you could guarantee me that at least half the money I spent for a CD or music download was going to the artist(s) that made the song, I would buy it, but until then…
Anonymous

@Nubcakes

“Um excuse me, why is it that massive piracy occurs still in The US of A when they have Hulu and see content first? Your statement is demonstrably ___fellacious___.”

lrn2spell mr.failtroll
seriously

go back to /b/
Sage

@ Nub Cakes:
Your argument breaks down to, “nobody’s better than me, so clearly you can’t have a better reason than ‘I want’ for the reason you pirate.”

Which is BS. Still, let’s go down the list.

1.) “I’d support the program, but…”

- There’s no question that a number of people aren’t going to buy things no matter what the businesses do. Still, that does lead us to #2…

“Funny, people bought stuff before they could pirate…”

- No they didn’t. They would wait until it came on television. They would borrow it from a friend. And maybe…MAYBE…if they REALLY wanted to see it, they would rent, so they’d pay a fraction of the actual cost. The fact is, before some of my friends discovered piracy, if I loaned them something, they’d watch and then NEVER buy. This is nothing new. The fact is, you can’t look at them–you have to look at the ones who are willing to go out and buy it after they’ve already seen it for free. And even though I’m sure you just can’t imagine that there are more honest people than you, there are plenty of people who don’t mind doing this.

“The US of A is where a large amount of material is screened first – yet they still have a massive piracy problem… ”

- For other reasons. In the case of anime…WTF, 20-30 dollars for three episodes? I CAN GET A WHOLE TELEVISION SERIES FOR THAT! They need a better method of distribution, which is something American anime fans have been saying for years. The guys complaining here aren’t American anime fans, they’re fans from other countries.

And, while we’re at it, of course, piracy occurs because money is HARD TO EARN, and the idea of throwing away $10-100 (from movies on DVD to whole anime series) on something that will suck is insulting.

The fact is, a lot of people spend more money if they walk in to a store knowing they’ll enjoy a series/movie rather than if they walk in not knowing anything. And the vast majority of those who don’t had been finding ways out of spending money on stuff anyway.

Lastly….

“I admit that I am not compensating creators for their service to me – a form of theft (though don’t confuse that with larceny – it’s not a loss of tangible goods) – I’m self-interested and couldn’t care less about compensation.”

So, basically…you’re self-righteous about the fact that you’re not being self-righteous. Man I do love the internet.
Anonymous

@NubCakes The Poorly Disguised MAFIAA Employee:
“Distributing to the whole world won’t do much to stop the level of piracy: people will *say* that’s the reason they pirate … Along with a load of other garbage”

When you saw your colleagues from the IFPI miserably fail at The Pirate Bay trial by assuming they didn’t have to back up their claims with evidence, that should have been your clue to bring a little proof to the table.

But like them, you seem to be a great believer of Joseph Goebbels’ philosophy that if a lie is big enough and you repeat it enough times, the world will eventually believe it.

And since your job here is to regurgitate the MAFIAA’s own special little brand of fantasy, the lies you most frequently repeat are A., people never fileshare because the MAFIAA are amoral, bloodsucking robber-barons, people only fileshare because ITZ FREE!!(hence the MAFIAA is absolved of their wrongdoings and filesharers end up looking like selfish freeloaders unmotivated by any real ideals or principles, which is the “point” behind that particular lie). B., filesharing is stealing(your latest bullshit that it’s a form of theft if you don’t compensate a creator for their service to you would mean, among alot of other things, that it’s stealing to buy used CDs and DVDs), and C., nobody should ever use The Pirate Bay(it’s a vile cesspit of malware and viruses, so if you download anything SAY GOODBYE TO UR PC!! LOL! And public trackers are so unsecure, using TPB is just like TURNING YOURSELF IN TO THE FBI!! OMG11!1!). Oh, and they’re also a commercial business that makes loads of money while committing copyright infringement.

It’s kind of understandable, though. I mean, they’re lies – you can’t exactly back them up with proof. So you’re really sort of forced to go the whole Goebbels route.

For example, can you imagine trying to prove that even one single person who’s ever commented here on Torrent Freak is full of garbage when they say they fileshare out of valid moral, ethical, or philosophical reasons? Well, unless you physically hunt them down and hook them up to a lie detector, it isn’t possible. You’ve got absolutely, possitively no way of proving that they are infact full of garbage. So the best you can do is simply lie about it and insist that they are. And when pressed for actual evidence, just keep telling the lie until people stop questioning it.

What I’m really trying to say here is that I want you, your fellow employees, and heck, even your bosses at the MAFIAA to know that I realize you’re only ripping a page out of the Joseph Goebbels propaganda playbook because he had a talent for manipulating the public. It’s got nothing to do with his… Uh… Political leanings.

So don’t worry.

I won’t go there.
Robert

I agree. I don’t recall exactly how many anime dvds I currently have, it’s somewhere around 1,200 – 1,400.

I often watch a series to completion thanks to work of fansubbers. When, and if, it becomes available as a commercial release, I then buy it.

If it was a series I didn’t like, I never watched more than a few episodes anyhow. Oddly enough, I am watching Shikabane Hime on Hulu right now, they are up to episode 20. My review of the subbing on that one, they need to study from the fansubbers, their timing is just awful on Shikabane Hime. Good series, mediocre subbing.
Pingback: blueZhift Blog » Fansubs and Global Society
birdy

@Nubcakes

1st – Hulu does not make all television shows available. What I can watch on Hulu I do.

I don’t think pirating is really hurting that much though. I just recently got into LOST. Some people recommended it, and I downloaded the 1 and 2nd season. By that time ABC had put all seasons on their website and I watched the third season there. Since then, I’ve bought the box sets of all of the available seasons. Something I would have never gotten into, I went and spent money to purchase because of pirating.

Pirating is no different then sharing your DVDs with your friends. It’s like a big global word of mouth. Are there people who will never purchase anything and just always borrow?- yes, but since these companies would never make money off these people anyway; to say they are losing money because of this practice is disingenuous. In fact this person may still be helping the cause just by recommending a film to a friend who will watch it and buy it.

The fact is people who purchase CDs and DVDs do not want to do so blindly anymore. Not when we are in the era of googling and wikiing everything. Times are changing and the industry has to change with the times.
jmndos

Well, I pirate what I cant watch now or don’t get a chance to watch.

Example.

Stargate is released an entire YEAR early in the UK….an entire year….so I just download the entire season….
collector and subber

Like several previous posters, I would not HAVE an anime collection, had it not been for the first generation of fansubbers. After the first few series I viewed, I was hooked.

I got involved in the FS community and have continued to buy the series that I enjoy in the years that passed, first on LD, VHS, then DVD and now BluRay. I have at least 250+ entire series on DVD not counting LD *lol i know* and VHS *also lol*.

Do I spend more than I should?, yes. Do I begrudge the unreasonable high prices I pay?, somewhat. Would I drop $100.00+USD on a series I had not sat down and watched through at least once?

Give us a legitimate way to see the anime we love, and we will pay.

You may respond: Crunchyroll. I say that is a QUALITY operation all the way…and will be dead in 6 months based on internal rumblings that have been heard.
Thomas

If it wasnt for subtitle sites I would have returned several movies.

My girlfriend needs subtitles on movies and several movies in my collection of more than 300 Blu-ray movies are without any subtiles.

So I rip the movie, add subtitles. burn a copy and keep the original.

Btw. I do the same for movies that have a shitload of commercials, trailers etc. and disables half the options to skip them (YES!! I AM LOOKING AT YOU DISNEY)
Pingback: Super Loozer » Au brésil, les fansubbeurs réagissent !
Not a Pirate

NubCakes I have to disagree!
I own quite a sizeable DVD collection. Enough for me not to be able to afford a Camera :-)
I especially like foreign films, from Japan and America. But they have horrible translations!
So I (completely legally) copy the movies without breaking the encryption (thats what a dvd-drive does) and apply lovely rich translations from enthusiastic subtitle-community.
I put DVD back onto the shelves.
Not so hard now, is it?
100% fair use!
lotlyAxorry

I need a driver for my phillips snn6500 wireless netcard
or smc2632 wireless net card
I can`t make them run on linpus linux lite

please help

regards
lotlyAxorry
Violent_Diplomate

@ Nubcakes and his various Opponents.

This is an organised pro-fansubbing argument designed to provide some effective solutions for the future. An open mind is required, as well as the ability to accept and bring about massive changes in media marketing.

First off, I would like to point out that my ponderings are centered on the Anime industry, though they are still more or less applicable to all forms of fansubbing/”piracy”.

I am currently a massive anime fan, timewise I must have spent at least 3 of the last 6 years watching/reading the stuff. Whilst I do not buy the DVD boxsets (through fear of bankruptcy and dubbing) I DO buy the original manga comic books when they become available in my area.

I’m not trying to argue that I support the author this way so my piracy is fine (right?), because that sort of argument is weak and cannot lead to a solution. (Like I said people, stay open minded if you wanna read this, I ain’t gonna listen to critiscism from guys that only filtered out the bits they wanted to hate)

But now understand this, I seriously doubt I would even know about the existence of Anime and manga if one of my friends hadn’t come round my house and watched a “pirated” episode on the internet. What does this mean? That the author/producer/Copyright Holders lost more potential sales to another “pirate”? Or did they gain the sales of the mangas I buy that I wouldn’t otherwise have known about? Tell me, what have they lost, really, by having their product made known WORLDWIDE. Now here is a little lesson in physcology, okay? When you see something you REALLY like, you WANT to own a physical, material representation of that something. FACT. (AGAIN, no b#tch babbling here ok? This next part is what I want you to consider [SERIOUSLY consider])

Media marketing… Has changed. *puff*

In the last decade, over 40% of the world population has gained a regular internet connection, and with the modernisation of China and India along with many 3rd world countries, that percentage will naturally increase very rapidly making the internet the ultimate international marketplace. *hacking cough*

Now answer me this, anti-fansubber copyright holders, authors and producers, why aren’t you exploiting that market?

‘Yeah but we are! We’re putting DVD ads on it and everything!’

Shutup. You have in front of you the largest distribution network ever imagined, and yet you’re getting p#issed off at US, because WE are using that network to get YOUR products.

Another question, how does the television industry work? Afterall, anyone with a TV and an antenna can watch it, so how do you make a profit? Come on now, you should know this one, surely! It’s only how you’ve been making a living for the past, oh I don’t know, 60 YEARS!!!!

Now then, have you put 2 and 2 together yet? Thats right. If you were to put your show on the internet, with some ads in it, you would be earning cash exactly the same way you are now (just like TV, look at that!). Oh, except for one small thing. Your show (and its precious advertising slots) wouldn’t be shown just to a region, a state or even a country, but the entire world, at the same time. I think that also gives you the right to make those ad slots a bit more expensive, no?

And guess what, if you were to create your OWN subbing team, who would of course sub the ads as well and not remove them, then not only would the fansubbers/”pirates” goal be acheived, but you’d also now be making considerable money from what is under current laws, the biggest black market ever.

And there we have it, it’s all up to you, the anti-fansubbers. If you have such a big problem with this, get off your fat corporate asses and exploit what we’re doing, instead of keeping up these futile efforts of trying to condemn it. Because that is another fact; you can’t stop us. It’s far too easy for us, and far too difficult for you. Oh, that and we’re not going to stop either. We don’t care who posted what we’re watching, but we WILL keep on watching it.

So now it’s your turn. Why don’t YOU show ME the future? I’ll be watching…

To all that have read this post, know that this is a supported movement across the globe, gradually building. Please show your support for this Media revolution by posting your version of this argument in forums, blogs etc. wherever you see the topic of this conflict. Together, let’s work for an advantageous future for all.

Thanks for reading,

AnimeAddict, Streetyboy, Violent_Diplomate.

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Fansubbers Are Not Thieves, But Avid Consumers

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