A bit of wank.

[searchsoleil]

You know what I really hate? I really hate scanlation sites that have forum-based downloading and require potential downloaders to jump through innumerable hoops before anyone can even touch their downloads section.

Of course, I always try their mIRC channels first, but on today's particular scanlator's channel, they didn't have any of their own releases available. THAT MAKES NO SENSE. So I trudged over to their forum thinking, "Oh Lord, what trials must I go through to obtain this manga?" Luckily, this particular forum operated under a password system that only required you to ask before you could receive. Which I suppose is fair enough. Except that on the downloading threads there was all this stuff about "DO NOT SHARE WITH OTHERS OUTSIDE THIS FORUM OR WE WILL STOP SCANLATING THIS MANGA AND REMOVE ALL DOWNLOADS," as well as "COMMON COURTESY REQUIRES THAT YOU LAVISH PRAISE UPON YOUR DOWNLOAD AND SCANLATION PROVIDERS." I was perfectly ready to adhere to the first rule and I dunno, felt decent enough today to actually leave brief thank yous once the downloads started. But then the first chapter finished downloading.

CHRIST CHILD IN THE MANGER, WHAT UTTER CRAP. I DON'T CARE IF YOU ARE THE ONLY SCANLATOR PROVIDING THIS LICENSED MANGA, YOU DO NOT GET TO LEAD ME THROUGH ALL MANNER OF INCONVENIENCE AND GUILT-TRIPPING ONLY TO LEAVE ME WITH THIS UTTERLY BELOW PAR PRODUCT.

The overall scan quality of the pages are bad. There are dark spine shadows. The text is blocky and pixelated. The translations are hardly proper English and frequently incomprehensible. There are even multiple cases of using white to edit out the original text in the nearly black spine label shadows, showing how little effort the editors must have put into maintaining consistency in their own work, putting aside completely what little regard they're showing toward maintaining the quality of this objectively very pretty and cute manga. I would not be surprised if the editors were working in MS Paint.

Normally, I really have no problem with a sub-par scanlation. Hell, I'm hosting a sub-par scanlation of Time Stranger Kyoko (although what I downloaded makes TSK's kind of sub-par look like high-resolution professional editing). The thing about that scanlation though is that its scanlator isn't COMPLETELY PRETENTIOUS ABOUT AND ZEALOUSLY PROTECTIVE OF WHAT THEY ADMIT IS THE PRODUCT OF AMATEURS. I easily obtained TSK and am free to distribute it so long as I leave in the credit pages, which I am perfectly willing to do.

I don't really have a point, other than, you know, WHY CAN'T WE ALL JUST GET OVER OURSELVES? I just needed to rant a little.

Comments

[arekuru.livejournal.com]

Fun with W Juliet II? I think I'm going to be hitting the DC hubs for that one, if at all. As long as it sticks to side stories and not the main characters, I don't think I'll be missing out on too much. (But if the next chapter goes back to the leads, I may have to break down.)

[search-soleil.livejournal.com]

Actually, I was trying to download the first volume of Kiniro no Corda (La Corda D'Oro?), since none of the bookstores near me have volume 1 (2, 3, and 4 they have in plenty!). I think this is more frequent with shoujo scanlators than with yaoi. Seriously. When it's yaoi scanlators, they're all over the HTML downloads and sharing the Savefile links with yaoi_daily. Very much like yaoi, it is all "wham, bam, thank you ma'am." As opposed to the shoujo scanlators, where it is all about the drama and the tears and the insurmountable obstacles such as hellfire and tacks in your shoes that you must overcome before you can be united with your true love.

[evercool.livejournal.com]

Ohohoho, I agree. More so because mIRC totally boggles my mind so the forums and sites are my only choice. Even worse is when the forums make you gain a certain 'level' of membership by posting in order to be able to download from their forum. ITS A TRAP.

*hugs* xD

[search-soleil.livejournal.com]

Lucky for me, I can use mIRC, although it took many painful hours and three different how-to guides. I think I ranted about it once nearly five years ago, bemoaning that it was completely inaccessible and that scanlators that used it were evil-doers in league with the dark forces of the underworld. La plus ça change... hahaha.

P.S. That icon is mesmerizing.