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UPDATE (as of 19th May 0:40 UTC)
Staff have provided more information regarding the whole situation in a FAQ
Mangadex was hit by quite the sizeable DMCA takedown, resulting in chapter numbers going down by more than 25% (that is, over 660k chapters) - and no, we're unfortunately not talking about Trump coming up with new tariffs.
Since this has led to a lot of confusion and off-topic discussions in the bugs, support and announcement threads and no real official announcement has been made yet, I'm making an unofficial one for the time being.
Q: Where are the chapters of the titles I was reading just yesterday? / What happened to my uploads?
Mangadex got a joint DMCA takedown notice, presumably on behalf of major publishers both Japanese and Korean.Q: Is there a list of that titles were affected?
No such list has been provided by Mangadex staff yet, but you'll find community-compiled lists in a lot of places like this reddit thread. Therefore, please don't spam this thread with affected titles.Q: Is this the end of Mangadex? Will Mangadex shut down?
There are no plans or indications of Mangadex shutting down (that I'm aware of). There was a change of site ownership but that seems mainly organisational. Mangadex is a popular site, more so than many readers are aware of. It's more surprising MD got this far solely on the backs of very few volunteers, than seeing them expanding the collaboration with Namicomi now imo.Obviously, this means Mangadex will have to comply with (legitimate) DMCAs in the future, so many uploads are/will be at risk of being taken down. Therefore, it really comes down to whether more publishers will be as short-sighted to target the least evil of manga piracy sites and send further DMCAs waves now... Additionally, there might be further rule changes regarding what is allowed to be uploaded to which title but so far that hasn't happened.
As things stand, uploading on Mangadex at the very least is still one of the best (and most convenient) ways to get your stuff on a majority of aggregators out there.
Q: What's next? / What about my read markers and comments?
An old v3 feature, allowing to show chapter metadata only without being able to actually read a chapter/access its images, is planned to re-release ASAP. This will include your read markers as well as comment threads.This also means that, even if a reading progress/library exporter existed, it won't work until then. And no, before you ask I can't recommend one (feel free to recommend something to put here), but it looks like T10_ considers making one.
Q: Is the removal of chapters permanent? / Can I appeal the removal of my chapter(s)?
As things stand, Mangadex staying compliant with the DMCA notice is the most likely outcome. However, there are plans to show who took down a chapter and when. This means you will be able to file a DMCA counter notice to challenge the takedown if you so wish (good luck with that).Additionally, if you believe (and can prove) chapters that aren't licensed by a publisher were removed incorrectly, you can report those on MD's end.
Q: Why are there sometimes chapters left?
Because of the nature of a DMCA takedown request, only chapters available at/before the time when the takedown request was issued were removed. It seems like the plan for chapters uploaded after the creation of this snapshot is to still be removed, probably to avoid further DMCAs.Q: Can we still upload new chapters to titles that were affected by the DMCA? / What about reuploading removed chapters?
While this is just my speculation as an official statement has yet to be made, I would strongly discourage doing so. Unless publishers suddenly have a change of mind, this would just be asking for more trouble and DMCA takedown requests for Mangadex. Therefore, I wouldn't be surprised if uploads to affected titles get deleted precautionary. This has also been the case for previous DMCAs (although those were on a completely different scale and applied to English chapters only...).TLDR: No and no, please and thank you.
Q: Why is there no official announcement?
There is (at least somewhat)! See the official FAQ.That being said, I'm sure they are just as unhappy with the situation as you are, so there's no need to vent your frustration at staff. Keep in mind Mangadex is being run by unpaid volunteers...
With that, I think I got the most important bits covered. I might or might not update this, depending on how this whole mess unfolds.
Looks like there are rough times ahead, so let's hope for the best for all of us and the site...
Seems like the moral of the story was to read Manhua all along, didn't think I'd ever say that
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