----- Original Message -----
> From: "Martin Woodard" <reply@mwoodard.com>
To: <megami@ML.usagi.org>
Sent: Saturday, March 02, 2002 7:06 PM
Subject: Re: megami M new OMG scans.


> Y'know, I never really had a problem with the translations; you had to at
> least buy the original material for that to be of any use, so the author
> got some sort of kickback.  This is just outright immoral and illegal.
>
> I'm surprised I don't see more of y'all speaking up against pirates like
> the guy who made this site.
>

A few things,

#1 Note that the scans of a quite inferior quality... much of the dialog in
this form is untranslatable as is and thus not really suitable for printing
out either. Heck they aren't really clear at all when viewed at their normal
resolution on screen. Thus, even though they give a look at what you'll get
from the Manga, they obviously aren't intended as a replacement for the real
thing. Further the site only posts a very small number of the chapters (not
even enough to make up one Vol)... And some of those chapters have huge gaps
between them ... thus insuring that the fans will still need to buy the
collected volumes to get the whole story. So recognize it for what it is...
it's there to provide a little taste of the product to prospective fans...
ones that might never have seen AMS!.. so that they'll start buying it.

#2 I take a REAL issue with your high handed, and frankly ignorant, attitude
about the whole existence of the translations done for the manga. I think
you misconstrue the purpose of langage friend...it is not designed to
PROTECT someone's work.. the language barriers are merely there because we
have a world in which many languages have developed. You act as though the
translations provided on the web are in some way, less than moral, or at
least that appears to be what you are implying.  Speaking as a linguist
myself, (I worked as a linguist in the millitary) let me tell you a few
things about langauge pal... performing translations of someone elses work..
and making these translations available to others for free is THE RIGHT
THING TO DO. It fosters communication between people and facilitate the
breaking down of barriers of communication. There are enough barriers in our
lives regarding understanding literature created in other languages, that we
don't need you adding to the problem. For example, Anthony Yu.. he
translated the 15th century novel A Journey to the West... prior to the 20th
century.. there were no copies of it translated definatively... He did it to
preserve the work, and to open up the rest of the world to the beauty of the
story, where previously you could only read it if you knew chinese. He did
it without expectaiton of recompense. He did a service to people everywhere.

If you want to get all riled up.. go take this over to Dalnet or some of the
IRC channels on the net, there are huge numbers of manga scannings and
translations going on on the web.


Regardless, the facts are, the scans are bad enough that they are pretty
much valueless to fans (though good enough to provide even more encouragment
to fans to go out and buy the real thing, rather than settle for the cruddy
scans you see on that site) and the translations are perfectly legal.


-Steve