She Brought Up the Friendly Protagonist as a Villain. - Ch. 3.5 - ANNOUNCEMENT, NOT AN EPISODE

[Solistars]

bruh what the heck is she saying, like we’re sorry you dont care about ur health and draw 24/7 (this isnt necessarily sarcastic like i feel sad for her) but shes clearly manipulating her korean followers by making herself look like the victim and the translators who also spend a lot of time on cleaning and translating for free as the villains. korean authors literally know nothing and assume that the translators are villains even though they put so much effort in releasing the chapters for the english readers and thanking the authors.

 

[Thifa]

Aight then. I don't read korean, so I certainly wouldn't pay for something I can't read (I would actually try to support the ones officially translated in English, as long as I can open the website, since there's some that can't be opened in my country), and it's not like I've read enough of this manhwa to really want to know what happened next. Time to move on to other series lmao.

Also lol, it's hilarious how they keep mentioning about their wrist. Like, I know they're salty their work is scanlated w/o consent, but it's not like their bad working habits happen because of the scanlation team? That's definitely emotion manipulation for their korean readers lmao

 

[beazacha]

Imagine if guys like the author for Solo Leveling had this mentality, they wouldn't be making as much bank rn; honestly if the group is directly generating profit is an issue but most have a pretty transparent use of the patreon or ko-fi donations to buy the originals (money that goes directly to the author's pocket). Most of us would never look twice to Tapas or Tappy if wasn't the scans pointing out the official translations and unless you want spoilers most of us read translations here that follow the og release and buy the official chapters as they are available.


If anything this toxic and nasty approach only make people averse to support the author or even to keep reading; instead of such vain threats just quit publishing altogether like you claim you'll do.... 3 chapters in and I'll happily drop it and make sure to never spend a dime when it gets licensed. For the group: ty for the updates, I can imagine how upsetting must be read stuff from an author I assume you guys liked very much.

 

[davishak]

Author has all rights to their work, but they're also hella toxic. I have no regrets about dropping this.

 

[Kuroku2]

@thifa Manga/manhwa artists do have really tight schedules and it's really easy to get a bad wrist from the industry, it's actually commonplace. I wouldn't call it "bad working habits" as that's really the nature of the job. Publishers leech off of the artist's work and take the lion's share of profits while putting strict deadlines that must be followed or the artist gets dropped. Some companies are better than others, but the industry could be so predatory. You can look up Lezhin's history for example.

The artist isn't saying that scanlators are causing her strenuous work, but here she is with an injured wrist and working to meet deadlines all the same and translators take her work, translate and post for free, and didn't even ask permission. I mean, it IS her right to be upset over this, after all it is her livelihood.

Aggregator sites earn A LOT of money from pulling such chapters from sites like mangadex and posting it on their own site without giving the artist a dime from ad revenue, so that's something to be upset about for sure.

On my own personal stance, I believe that scanlations are a good thing to introduce people to series that wouldn't have been looked at before, like say attack on titan for example. Official translations wouldn't have been as huge if it wasn't for scanlations building the fanbase. Still, I don't blame the artist for being upset over the situation honestly.

 

[soupcrackers]

I understand the author's anger, but if they threaten to stop the webtoon it only hurts their Korean audience. If they think it is best for their health, they should quit it now. It won't get better if they are already in such a bad state at under 10 chapters. Even without scanlations, web scrapers will get their hands on the raws. Foreign readers were never in their money pool to begin with since there is no resource for us to pay into. I've spent well over 1000 dollars on webtoon apps this year only because Mangadex linked the official translations (and I even bought some raws because I couldn't wait for translations), I really don't appreciate this foreigner hate the author has. I understand their feelings since I am also an artist, but they should have calmed down and thought things through.

Glad to drop this, I'll consider this assisting with their health, lol.

 

[MtnCat]

I'm just going to drop it which means I'll probably forget about it by the time it's licensed so the author won't get any of my money

 

[akomni]

and nothing of value was lost

 

[YumGumYum]

[*]Not officially serialized yet.

Spoiler

posted in KR version of "Canvas/Challenge": https://comic.naver.com/genre/bestChallenge.nhn
example of "Canvas/Challenge" for EN audience : https://www.webtoons.com/en/challenge

[*] A big chunk of KR readers wish you to R.I.P. and consider you as human trash which can't be recycled.
[*] Author gained some publicity from a foreign hate. Yay?

 

[nxnce]

dude why is she making it seem like the scanlators are taking credit for her work? just bc the readers are thanking the scanlators that doesn't mean we think they're the ones who created the webtoon. like yeah i understand they didn't get permission to translate. most of these scanlator groups don't bc everyone knows it's illegal and unfair towards the author. but i at least think that the groups who stay as true to the original as possible, without distorting the author's intentions, should be shown appreciation. some groups go above and beyond with their scans and it's pretty damn applause worthy for their efforts and skills. but authors like this clearly have no interest in spreading their work to the foreign market and i think it's just sad.

 

[riflow]

It honestly sounds like the author isn't in a good place to be making the comic to me. Its common for authors to strain themselves making their work but that shouldn't be the case for the entire duration of the series, esp if long term you continue to strain your body it can lead to permanent damage. (I actually suffered this post art school in uni, my wrists would spasm from overworking all the time and it got to the point I couldn't draw for longer than 30 minutes, I know some others who literally have caused that to be completely permanent and require medical apparatuses to be able to do their hobby/job safely.)

Regardless tho, I respect stopping translations as she's expressed this anger and dislike towards fan translation.

 

[Hayako22]

I understand the author. It feels so bad when they get your work stolen, but that's not what this is about. We know this is illegal. But most of the scanlators here work for free, and they often insert the original source, supporting the creator. Moreover, I think half of the thanks are for the creator and half for the translators. 🤔
I've been doing it myself for years, but I've never asked for money, so I don't understand this outrage. It's also in her interest to acknowledge her work as widely as possible and thus get to know her, to buy from her. But by targeting only the korean target audience, it doesn't help her or anyone. Plus, she wrote that she was in a lot of pain. I'd advise her to either seek help or stop. Health is the most important thing! Get well soon! 😪

 

[orangokitty]

...

 

[duskyloltun]

@orangokitty the author does make money with the webtoon. Authors in that platform do get payed depending on many factors. And all translations are illegal if they don't have the authors consent if it is under copyrightlaw. Mangadex and many other sites share such works. It is regrettable that we can't get translated manga in other countries otherwise but it still doesn't make it ok. The author may need to create this work even at the risk of their own health due to lack of funds. Currently not many people can afford to not work given how covid issue has been going on.

Also translating your work costs money. From the announcement the person can't even hire help so much less make a translation to sell it. Many things aren't as easy as it seems. No matter how much support they would get selling internationally it is still the authors choice so it still doesn't make it right to translate illegally. That being said we will all still use mangadex to read illegal translations anyways so no point in trying to preach morals in this site.

 

[Torrence_Jet]

It's kind of sad that the author is getting a lot of hate for this. She's obviously very upset (and rightly so) since her work is being illegally distributed without her consent. Some people might consider piracy as a good thing since it gets the work to wider audience but what many people don't realize is that since the work is now available for free to the public very few will buy it when it's officially licensed. There are some popular works that can get immediately serialized and are readily available but are still being fan translated so piracy still hurts the authors. Of course there are some big works that aren't as affected, but I imagine that authors who aren't so well known are easily damaged by this. Since this is being illegally translated this might not even be picked up by a company for an official english release since they have to consider if it can make money and it probably wouldn't so much since the chapters are alreadt available on the net. Anyway, we're all here reading illegally so who has the right to preach. I just hope that more understanding can be extended to the author. She's working her ass off and she's not getting paid properly. She's not alone with this sentiment. A lot of really popular authors have expressed their displeasure of fan translations.

 

[Llevella]

Well, I don't get how drawing and health issues are connected to piracy. It's just wrong to start publishing without staple chapters and it's really wrong to overdo yourself. Like... how long is she hoping to go if she's already injured? What the point? This is a really serious issue. If her publishing studio is making her work like this maybe we should discuss it?

As for piracy - I willingly support authors on tapas and tappytoon (lezhin is too expensive, for example). In this case, it's published under Naver's wing, so it means that chapters are going to be mostly free, so views are most important for the author. Also, there is a chance that this may be translated into English through Webtoon (cus Webtoon=Naver) if it's popular enough and also for free. At Webtoon system, ppl have to pay for advanced chapters and if a manga is already translated somewhere, fewer people are willing to pay, they can just sneak peek at it somewhere else. If the author has hopes for being translated on Webtoon, pirate translations may be really harmful to her.

Also IMHO, everyone should respect the rights and wishes of the author, whose art and work you're consuming. "Ur story not good enough for me to respect u, but I'm gonna read your work. For free" sounds like bullsh*t for me. I respect my time and I don't read the stories that are not good enough and even if I don't like the story it's totally up to the author to decide if it should appear elsewhere. I'm well aware of the fact that authors coexist with the community for mutual benefit, but this reaction "I wanna read your story so you don't even have right to ask for piracy stop" is purely toxic. If an author loses smth - it's their choice. All this hate looks totally immature from my point of view.

 

[Katahdin]

It sounds like the author/artist is in a really bad place right now. I wish them the best in their health and if possible, hopefully, if they are financially able to, they can rest and take a break. Thank you to the scanlators for bringing attention to this series. I think it has great potential to be serialized. While I don't think this series will probably be translated to other languages officially based on the adverse reaction from the artist, I hope people who read Korean are able to enjoy it.

 

[orangokitty]

...

 

[Aldis]

@Llevella The author logic is that she worked so hard to draw these until she got health issues yet it stolen easily.

From outsiders like us, those are indeed two different issues the author need to resolves. She's the sole author and artist, so I think there's no studio and she publishes it herself. And I also need to remind you all that she published it on Naver Challenge.
It might not officially serialized.

I hope it got serialized asap. Like the poster before me, if it's Naver, bigger chance to have it published on English Webtoon.

 

[duskyloltun]

@orangokitty the preaching morals part was for myself not you. And people don't make the smartest choices due to emotions so even if the author is in need of money they could even quit their job just to make a point. Human are complicated creatures in that manner.