Evil Genius

Was wondering what impact, this ruling will have on sites like this one, considering Berserk is among the comics affected?

Taken from another Manga website:

On Wednesday January 9th Approximately 48 hours after receiving a request to remove files licensed to Digitam Manga Publishing, Mangatraders.com received an official takedown request from Tokyopop Inc. The list of series we've been asked to remove is approximately 4 pages long and it was not sent in a format conducive to copying so I can't post them all here. Check this list to get an idea of what is probably going to have to be taken down. From analyzing the list we can tell it was definitely created on or around January 6th, 2008. As a response we have made all site content invisible to non-registered users and disabled new user registration. It remains to be seen if there will be a user purge but it is not out of the question as it is quite possible a member or members of the community are in fact representatives of cooperate interests. We will cooperate with formal requests because we are encouraged to by law but we will no longer make ourselves obvious targets by publicly flaunting our business to anyone who wishes to look.

Just so you know from reading the said forum, everyone is referring people to this site. I'm hoping doing so doesn't provide this site unwanted attention from those with interests outside of Berserk fans.

First of all, Berserk is licensed by Dark Horse, and not by TokyoPop. If you check the list of licensed manga by TokyoPop, Berserk is not on the list, but I guess mangatraders wanted to be on the safe side with that. If they (Dark Horse) decided to take legal action on scanlators, we may probably be amongst those affected. I have never visited mangatraders, so I don't know what kind of site it is. I have no idea what Digitam Manga licensing is and how that plays in.

Secondly, the only other manga that is licensed by TokyoPop is NHK, which has been finished. Also, we have been removing chapters from the tracker that has been recently released by TokyoPop.

Thirdly, as for people being 'referred' to this site, I don't think it matters much. We have always put our website and forums url on the credits, unless mangatraders remove them from the chapters like Narutofan does.

EDIT: OK, it's Digital (not Digitam) Manga Publishing. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Manga_Publishing.

Now, I don't know any law terms or anything, but I think Dark Horse owns the rights to the mangas, while Digital Manga helps publish it. Whether or not they share the rights, I don't know. I think that is why TokyoPop had to come in and say 'remove the titles'.

Eldo wrote:First of all, Berserk is licensed by Dark Horse, and not by TokyoPop. If you check the list of licensed manga by TokyoPop, Berserk is not on the list, but I guess mangatraders wanted to be on the safe side with that. If they (Dark Horse) decided to take legal action on scanlators, we may probably be amongst those affected. I have never visited mangatraders, so I don't know what kind of site it is. I have no idea what Digitam Manga licensing is and how that plays in.

Secondly, the only other manga that is licensed by TokyoPop is NHK, which has been finished. Also, we have been removing chapters from the tracker that has been recently released by TokyoPop.

Thirdly, as for people being 'referred' to this site, I don't think it matters much. We have always put our website and forums url on the credits, unless mangatraders remove them from the chapters like Narutofan does.

- I guess that puts me at ease.

Though I realize Berserk being licensed by DH over here (being a proud owner of all published 20, soon to be 21, high quality volumes), I assumed such threats may have had overreaching implications. If not, then I can't understand why the said site would have removed Berserk if it has nothing to do with those licensed by Tokyo Pop, when you consider the hundred or so other mangas that have yet to be removed.

- As far as Dark Horse, I seriously doubt they would ever take issue because of your policy of removing current volumes. And for being so slow and far behind in releasing their volumes, doing so would be a complete injustice to Berserk fans here in the states.

- In regards to referring to your site, I actually believe it is a good thing, if my concerns were unfounded. Interesting to see if the user volume will increase in the next couple weeks.

I'm not sure if MangaTraders used your scanlations or not, but they do reference their sources from what I've seen. For a site like NarutoFan not to cite the source of their content is ridiculous, especially when you consider they charge for their service.

*If this is a non-issue feel free to remove this thread.

id say if youre worried about legal action then do what mangatraders is doing... making all information visible to members invisible to non-members

thats too bad for mangatraders... they are a pretty good site that hosts shit loads of manga... i hope they dont get taken down as there are (im sure) many manga on there id like to read that i didnt get a chance to read when it was initially released.... neh, mitana

Well there's always anip.homeunix.com which is a server somewhere in asia (China or Thailand or something I think), so they won't be sued so fast, and they have shitloads of mangas from all translation groups too

Right, so I guess it is my turn to weigh in.

We voluntarily remove torrents from the tracker that have made it to store shelves here. We highly encourage everyone to buy it.

NHK for example, when all is published will be completely removed from the tracker. We have already done this with FMA and number of other projects we worked on in the past.

Knock on wood, no letters yet and we've been around for awhile.

This server doesn't host any copyrighted material. The tracker itself contains only torrents which is just meta data, also not copyrighted. Hence, this is why we don't do direct downloads either... however there are kind souls that offer it.

I have the documentation that says that I operate in the red on this thing, so even with the adverts and donations, I (nor EG) do not make any profit from any of this. It would be nice to break even though.

Transparency is always key.

It seems Dark Horse is taking action against websites hosting Berserk. It doesn't apply to us of course, but news is news.

On a similar note, I have to say I won't be hosting any direct downloads anymore. The reason is that for once US law is better for internet users than German law. In Germany, if any lawyer finds I am hosting this stuff, he can send me something like a C&D letter, even if noone hired him to do it. He can then also ask ME to pay for his laywer fees, which will amount to something like 400-600$, even for just writing one letter. It's a really ridiculous practice, and this year it just got worse, so I won't be taking that risk anymore, I'm sorry, everyone. I've already removed the few chapters I was hosting from my webspace.

Artezul wrote:It seems Dark Horse is taking action against websites hosting Berserk. It doesn't apply to us of course, but news is news.

Dark Horse is so God Damn slow in regards to putting out their Berserk volumes, what do they expect? They may have a case for their recent and previously released material, but if they would be doing a great deservice to not only Berserk fans, but Dark Horse and Miura as well.

Who the hell is going to wait 2 or 3yrs waiting for Dark Horse just to get to part of the story we are at now. Does DH really expect fans just to be content just to sit on their ass waiting for Volumes they have aleady read, to be released every other 3- months, knowing that there is new material to be released. I guarantee you if that were to happen the Berserk fanbase would drop in half. And I for one would never by a Berserk Volume from them again.

Personally, if it wasn't for groups like this, I'd never even have become a Berserk fan. I have a general policy of not buying manga and anime unless I already know what it's like (i.e. that I'll like it), and the shrinkwrap means that I can't browse a volume of Berserk in the bookstore the way I do some other series that look interesting but I haven't seen online yet. I agree that Berserk deserves the wrap, it's very mature in content, but without being able to check it out ahead of time I'd never have started on it. That's part of why I think companies are stupid to crack down on the online fansubbers/scanlators.

Brainpiercing wrote:On a similar note, I have to say I won't be hosting any direct downloads anymore. The reason is that for once US law is better for internet users than German law. In Germany, if any lawyer finds I am hosting this stuff, he can send me something like a C&D letter, even if noone hired him to do it. He can then also ask ME to pay for his laywer fees, which will amount to something like 400-600$, even for just writing one letter. It's a really ridiculous practice, and this year it just got worse, so I won't be taking that risk anymore, I'm sorry, everyone. I've already removed the few chapters I was hosting from my webspace.

No problem, you stuck your neck out for us by hosting them. We can't complain.

Question is, how does this affect Bots hosting Berserk on Mirc? Are they somehow invisible to the Evil Eye of DH?

mIRC has been a haven for pirated programs/games/licensed anime/manga for a long time. It doesn't mean that some channels haven't been shut down, but I seriously doubt IRC has anything to worry about in regards to the xdcc bots in the channels, unless the server they're hosting their channel on has a strict policy in regards to copyrighted content being distributed.

I don't know which kind of websites and services Dark Horse and their legal team is actually shutting down, but if it's a situation where they're offering manga that Dark Horse has already produced, it's understandable. After all, you have to imagine they spent a pretty penny for the licensing/distribution fees of the manga for the states. If these websites might possibly be detracting from their overall sales of previous volumes it's only natural for them to protect their, and their investors financial investments.

And as far as BrainPiercing shutting down his direct downloads, no one at all is going to fault you in anyway for it. You've done a hell of a service for these forums giving those who either don't have the ability, or knowledge, to setup a torrent program a means to get the Berserk chapters. I can't say I've ever downloaded from your DD site that I know of, but even I appreciate that you upload to your own webspace and share your personal bandwidth with everyone here.

Brainpiercing wrote:On a similar note, I have to say I won't be hosting any direct downloads anymore. The reason is that for once US law is better for internet users than German law. In Germany, if any lawyer finds I am hosting this stuff, he can send me something like a C&D letter, even if noone hired him to do it. He can then also ask ME to pay for his laywer fees, which will amount to something like 400-600$, even for just writing one letter. It's a really ridiculous practice, and this year it just got worse, so I won't be taking that risk anymore, I'm sorry, everyone. I've already removed the few chapters I was hosting from my webspace.

Those Nazi...sorry, I meant those money grabbing bastards.

I just want to say thank you very much for the service you provided, and we understand that you have stuck out your neck for us. So again, thanks a tonne, man.

The IRC bot is still safe...FOR NOW.

The IRC bot is still safe...FOR NOW.

I hate cliffhangers.

To Brain:

Eldo wrote: Those Nazi...sorry, I meant those money grabbing bastards.

Quoted for emphasis. Lawyers have taken a real dive in my list of respected professions lately.

Well, thanks for your appreciation, guys. It really wasn't much, I only ever had 2-3 chapters online at a time, and bandwidth didn't cost me. It'll just go to waste now.

Concerning hosted mangas, there's always http://anip.homeunix.com which has the biggest selection of mangas I've ever seen on a website. And seeing how the servers are situated in thailand or china or somewhere there I recon it is pretty save from prosecution. Because well those countries have bigger problems than some dude hosting mangas.