MangaDex Two Year Anniversary

[Plykiya]

Hallo hallo, and a happy two year anniversary for MangaDex

Another year has passed and it's amazing how much the site has continued to grow. We couldn't have made it this far without the generosity of our donators, the cooperation and hard work of all scanlators, or your participation as a reader. The amount of support we received during the short downtime as we changed hosts and moved to DDoSGuard was beyond our imagination. We're still motivated to continue improving the site as much as we can. All of our dev focus this year will be on v5 and you can read about what MangaDex v5 entails in our past announcement. Our anniversary contest will be extended until the end of January.

Now that we've settled in on our new host, it's time to address the previous announcement's donation issue. We never thought MangaDex would have become this big two years ago. We made the decision four months in to accept donations after people requested we take them so that we could afford servers to deal with the user growth. We've chosen to not use ads on MangaDex because of our own personal distaste for ads along with the fact we have no interest in profiting off of the website, but accepted we would use them in a last resort scenario after we've tried up all our other options to fund the servers.

We're currently paying for our servers with cryptocurrency to maintain information security. We still have enough from previous donations to cruise by for another three months but we need to come up with a solution before that happens. Donations through Paypal are off the table now and so we've decided to poll the community on what we should do next to fund the site.

Our total upkeep cost at the moment is $565 per month now that we're off of Cloudflare. We've come up with four options we can go through:
- The first option is accepting cryptocurrency donations, but since we know that people are less likely to go through the hassle of transferring to crypto just to donate to MangaDex, it'll be tougher to meet the monthly costs.
- Our second option is for a user to personally fund the servers we would need and hand us the access credentials, but it also means a greater burden on a select few.
- Our third option is affiliate sponsorship, partnering with a company and referring users to their service. We currently only have a single affiliate, Path Network, who are graciously acting as a CDN and providing enterprise-level DDoS mitigation for our image servers pro-bono. The affiliate option relies entirely on having companies reaching out and willing to be affiliated with us, which means it's not guaranteed it's even possible to pursue.
- Our final option is biting the bullet and going with ads. We still regularly get offers from ad networks and with our current traffic of 11 million users per month it would be extremely easy to meet our server costs. If we decide to implement ads we would make them as non-intrusive as possible, maybe even limiting it to just the front page or just to guests.

We still have no interest in profiting off of the website and any money from any of these options will only go towards server costs. We would appreciate it if you participated in the poll and responded about your feelings about any of the options.

Just like last year, we'll end this off with quotes from all of our staff:

@Holo - Overlord

Thanks for sticking with us another year! It's amazing to see the community continue to grow.
As ever, Miku best girl!

@Ixlone - Administrator

Looking for a TL to do some loli doujins, or Misao. chapters!

@rdn - Developer

mangadex our favourite site
a shining flower among the blight
fun to work with as has ever been
altough the code is not always as clean

we strive to get better every year
against all our detractors smear
much to our loyal readers' cheer

v5 will hit hard like a spiked harpoon
we're working hard each day till noon
but when is it out? - probably soon(tm)

Bonus meme:

Spoiler

@Teasday - Developer

Looking forward to a renewed site, hopefully with at least some degree of open sourcing so that all the eager dev volunteers we've had contacting us for the past two years finally get something to do as well, lol.

As for the goals and the direction of this site, as both a creator and avid consumer of scanlations myself I want to first and foremost keep working to ensure there's a place where we actually want to share the fruits of our hobby and to know they'll be appreciated. What we've built so far is not perfect - evidently not from the standpoint of 100% of the community (not to even mention outside of it) - and obviously I doubt we'll ever get to perfection, but better things are possible.

Maybe one day we'll all agree that sites like this don't even need to exist any longer, but until that happens, I'd love to see us be the best we can. Warmly waiting to see what form we will eventually take.

@FireFish5000 - Developer

To be honest, I was surprised when I was recruited for staff. I thought I had caused enough of a headache to be out of the running. Debating about what a isekai/genre is until I confused even myself. Reporting odd bugs unlikely to actually cause problems for normal users (and posting long distracting rants in them). Not to mention I had literally just added a hiatus message to my MD profile stating I was going to vanish for a few months to deal with RL. I was ecstatic at the opportunity and decided life can wait.

This is actually the first otaku community I cared for enough to join. I've always been the introverted/loner type, like the stereotypical worthless NEET that gets truck-kuned. But this community broke through to me, and having watched it grow before my eyes made it all the more dear.

Now, due to recent events, some of you may see clouds in the forecast. However, I believe a bright and lovely rainbow is just on the other side, we just have yet to realize it.

Spoiler

And we WILL realize it. One way or another we will make this dream will come true!

If anyone wants to know more about me, my profile is a good place to start. I never was big on blogging/twitter/fb, so that is my closest substitute. And anyone who has read my Worth Less, non-proofreader rant gets space brownie points!

@Electromaster - Moderator

It's been another fun and exciting year for MD. New features, growth, lots of new and interesting manga. I hope the next year goes well and the site continues to evolve and grow.

@Lymus - Moderator

Another year, huh?
Time sure flies, we've had our highs and lows, and as they say No Scanlation Without Drama.
Let's hope we stick around for more years to come.

As the years go by i somehow have less and less time for anime. There are quite a few shows i wanted to watch, but when to take the time? Though i've been getting more back into gaming, guess that's where the time goes.

In terms of manga we've had a nice influx of Isekai, though many only get their first few chapter's scanlated before being forgotten. The new trend of Otome Isekai has been nice too.
Shin Mazinger Zero got fully scanlated, read it, the art of Yuuki Yugo makes it worth it.
And if you need some cute, read The Demon King’s Daughter is Too Kind!

I wish you all a great year, full of reading wonderful manga.

@Zephyrus - Forum Moderator

I used to be a nice, mentally stable guy until you assholes in the chapter comment threads literally pushed me to seek medical attention. Now that I'm on anti-depressants, I ban people with a smile on my face! :v

I would hate to see us come to the point of having to use ads to pay for MD. I view MD as the most ethical piracy alternative to the other aggs that don't care about anything but padding their bank accounts. Every day that we're in operation, we deny profit driven aggregators like MangaRock and KissManga ad revenue. Unfortunately, we'll never be rid of piracy. But, MD plays an important part on the piracy scene by acting as a profit deterrent and driving as much traffic as we can to legal sources. If MD dies, for profit scanlator groups and aggregators go back to ruling. Don't let us die, dudes and dudettes.

@Daviot - Forum Moderator

Due to chronic health issues that including chronic fatigue, I generally don't have the energy to waste on drama, for better or worse. But as a published writer myself, I can confidently say that once the essential biological needs of being human are done with, humans need stories. MangaDex is in a strange-but-necessary place on the ephemeral place that is the internet, but without it, my IRL bookshelves and my shared experiences with friends, acquaintances, and strangers would be poorer for it.

P.S. Whether reader, scanlator, or wherever you fit in, don't be a jerk.
...okay, that might be asking too much. Try not to be a jerk.

P.S.S. And click the <(\)> spoiler eyeball if you really have to talk about specific events in a general title thread or what happened in the original novel version's next arc in a chapter thread.

@BraveDude8 - Forum Moderator

I got pressganged into helping with moderation, less stressful than my job. 10/10 would help again.

More seriously, I've been here in a lesser capacity since day one and it's been a fun ride. Fond memories of those fifteen second page loads, most manga having nothing uploaded and a completely unusable front page from people batch uploading two hundred chapters at the same time. I only started scanlating about a week before Batoto announced it was shutting down, so it's been pretty interesting to see the site build up from a blank slate.

Make sure to read The New Gate, the best manga ever in my entirely unbiased opinion. If it wasn't for that, I wouldn't be here.

@woulez - Forum Moderator

It's been a long year and a lot has happened, I started out as a regular on discord and ended up as a forum moderator during the last days of May last year.
I used to be very oblivious to the happenings in the scanlation scene and these 8 months has taught me a lot and I've gotten to know a lot of awesome people.
Some things hasn't been as fun though... this event around new years for sure wasn't and I do hope we don't have to rely on our so-called 'last resort' because of it.
As a person that likes a growing community, I want to make sure people know that we spend a lot of time talking on our discord, please join in if that's your cup of tea.
You can find a link to the discord in the "Community" drop-down menu at the top of the site.

I hope you have fun reading the content all these lovely scanlators work so hard on to release for you all to read.

@Plykiya - Public Relations

Pretty amazing that we've lasted two years without ads thanks to donations. I hope we go down the affiliate route since I've always wanted to talk about the amazing free to play mobile MMORPG Raid: Shadow Legends with over 1 million downloads and available on both Android and iOS! (or an affiliate actually worth supporting please contact us...)

BOYS SHOULD DATE BOYS AND BOYS SHOULD DRESS LIKE GIRLS

@Kafka - Public Relations

Hiya, lovely professional shill Kafka at your service and pleased to meet cha!
I love Slice of Life, Comedy, Drama, Shojo, Josei & Yaoi series. I have read every rom-com ever and will fight you IRL to defend my OTP.
In all seriousness, I have a big respect for all mods and devs here for allowing me to delve deeper into this hobby of mine! From casual reader to dabbing into scanlanating itself, it couldn't have been possible without MangaDex.
Thank you to Plykiya & Henny for bringing me into the PR team and to y'all for being part of this community!
Here's to (hopefully) many, many years more of MD!

Spoiler

We appreciate all the love and support that our users and scanlators show us. Even in hard times, it’s been amazing just how firmly you all have chosen to stand with us. Let’s work together to make 2020 our best year yet!

 

[Eonlars]

@Eonlars - Some Dude
"To be honest, I did pretty good and I am cool."

 

[hackguy]

Is there any specific reason for not using another service instead of Paypal? Maybe something like Patreon or Kofi?

 

[Plykiya]

@hackguy US companies comply with US laws, easily taken down.

 

[doutatsu]

Agree with @hackguy, I am surprised not to a see normal, monthly donation option with Patreon or any other provider, that lets you accept donations on a monthly basis. Asking even 1$ a month, with how many users you have, will easily get you enough money to keep servers running

 

[bocchi]

I can donate a server

 

[Teasday]

bocchi showing off why he's vip quality

 

[ionut189]

Skrill isn't a valid option for donation?

 

[As4shi]

I believe that going for ads is a good option. If anything i believe that having an option to remove them if you donated would be good.

I have seen some sites that allows you to do a single time payment to remove the ads, afaik since the amount of money that comes from one person through the ads is fairly low, so even in long terms this is probably a decent option. (please tell me if i'm wrong about the amount of money that one person can generate through ads)

Btw i also wanted to say that donating through cryptocurrency is pretty much out of question for me, at least for now. I believe this may change in the future, but this is probably also true for many people.

And of course thank you all for another year providing a great service to us

 

[Shinonome]

@Zephyrus - Forum Moderator
I used to be a nice, mentally stable guy until you assholes in the chapter comment threads literally pushed me to seek medical attention. Now that I'm on anti-depressants, I ban people with a smile on my face! :v

I would hate to see us come to the point of having to use ads to pay for MD. I view MD as the most ethical piracy alternative to the other aggs that don't care about anything but padding their bank accounts. Every day that we're in operation, we deny profit driven aggregators like MangaRock and KissManga ad revenue. Unfortunately, we'll never be rid of piracy. But, MD plays an important part on the piracy scene by acting as a profit deterrent and driving as much traffic as we can to legal sources. If MD dies, for profit scanlator groups and aggregators go back to ruling. Don't let us die, dudes and dudettes.

This

P.S. I have no idea how to convert to cryptocurrency ...but I guess I can learn how...

 

[Cybernatus]

Usual supporting methods are overrated nowadays boïs, just go by servers donation instead 🧐

And i'm not even kidding there, I'd rather gladly donate a server within given price range instead of others methods I'm not fund of.

 

[yanrishatum]

I didn't research it that much, but are there any services that could handle automation of cryptocurrency donation conversion? That most likely would have a fee for each transaction, but would provide convenience for people who aren't ready to go trough the hoops of getting the crypto. Fast google shown "thegivingblock", but they seem to mainly work for charities, probably don't want to deal with grey area clients, and most likely US-based.

 

[kuma]

Looking for a TL to do some loli doujins, or Misao. chapters!

bruh.

 

[Sailor_Waifu]

I may be super wrong but I feel that the problem with Patreon and Kofi is that

1. they will take a cut of revenue so 600 1$ patrons != 600$
2. since they have to comply with US law, the wouldn't even allow Mangadex to have a patreon since the mangas on the site are not legally obtained ie. publishers aren't paid for the right of use.

Cryptocurrency is the best choice the site has in terms of donations. Sadly alot of people don't want to go through the hassle of setting up a wallet to send over the cash.

 

[giosann]

I think a mix of all of them would be good.

I don't mid ads too much.

 

[XelaOozaru]

Thanks for all your hard work, especially lately, when times were hard. Crypt donation seems a bit of trouble, and tbh I know I will probably not donate this way, because of how much I struggled with cryptos. The sponsorship kinda thing with brands seems good to me. But can't the shop work as a donation system without crypto ? Or would it endanger your anonymity ?

Still, can't wait to read mangos with all you guys this year.

 

[Speedphoenix]

If you do add in non-intrusive ads for guest do implement it as an opt-in for users too
I wonder how much a small banner at the very bottom of the front page would generate...

 

[XXXXXXXXXIII]

Totally fine with non-intrusive ads. Other sites are doing it so most people should be super use to it anyways.

 

[azuremirage]

Yo deadass however you want my bread I'll throw you it. Word on my alligator timbs I'm down to throw bills bc I spend an od amount of time on the site might as well. Don't even need no icon or whatever just wanna show the squad love (gang gang shit)

Just for the love of God however it goes down if an ad starts playing audio or flashing at me I'm gonna fight someone keeping it 100

 

[hibari_shu]

Weebs together stronk