Before I go back to the previous example, I'd firstly like to address the over-arching issue with my own perspective.
Who else here thinks "sniping" is a misnomer?
I think sniping is not a binary bad or no-bad issue and there are several arguments from both sides that should co-exist.
I think it is not a misnomer, but it is certainly an over-stated and exaggerated issue. The applications of the term are variable but there are certainly times when it is correct to apply it. It is relevant to bring up in a limited number of examples, this one included.
Some quick definitions:
Sniping = releasing ahead of another established and active group on the same platform without informing them.
Acceptable quality/release = fulfilling the basic translation/scanlation requirements; i.e, easily readable text/syntax, not obviously bad translations. It's usually a low bar.
The times I think it
is a relevant issue is when a series is being scanlated by some group at a constant rate with generally good community feedback, and another party comes in to snipe with an acceptable quality scanlation for reasons other than advancing the series.
This works against the
'health' of the series (by which I mean the future quantity of acceptable translations) because it inevitably ends up with no group actively scanlating the series, possibly for extended periods.
An example of this is
Isekai Ojisan as we are discussing.
The times I think sniping it is a relevant definition
but not a relevant issue is when some group is scanlating a series at a constant rate with generally good community feedback, and another group comes in with an equivalent or slightly sub-par scanlation with the intent to advance the series (so long as they keep advancing the series for some time!).
This positively affects the
health of the series because the series gets more updates (usually faster).
An example of this is
Maou-jou de Oyasumi, which although had consistent updates anyway, a recent group coming in to snipe the series for a while ended up with the original group releasing much faster (and still are).
There are also times where very low quality scanlations (unacceptable quality) are released with or without the intention to advance the series. In this case I think it is
not a relevant issue because the majority of readers anticipate these chapter(s) to be re-released.
The health of the series
is not affected in this case because most readers will heavily favour the previous groups' scanlations when they come out.
An example of this (one amongst many, many) is
The Monster Duchess and Contract Princess. The original group wouldn't have stopped anyway, but the disgruntled ex-member's translation was poor and did not match audience expectations at all.
And as for all other accusations of sniping, I don't consider them as such.
Okay! So that's basically my perspective. I like healthy series. In general, sniping doesn't bother me at all.
And just a preface to the following: though I may keep some of my response seemingly bias towards Striptease, I'm not actually trying to defend them, I'm just trying to present
the woes of the sniped scanlator.
Firstly, there will always be takers for superior-quality work —— I find it hard to buy the argument that a solid group would have a hard time finding appreciable (if not universal) reader penetration —— And if the group has a solid repuation for high-quality releases, the readers would be doubly inclined to do so. —— But we're still talking about MD, right? And not some first-come-first-served, "winner-takes-all" aggro site?
You are correct in your assessment, but superior quality has diminishing returns. Striptease had superior quality releases but Kontol's releases were
already good. The problem with Kontol's release was that it actually looked like a serious effort. It actually
was a serious effort. The translation was good, the scanlation was good, he was releasing faster. He even had valid translation notes that also looked nice (they're part of the chapter, too!). I make a big deal out of high quality releases because I
know exactly how much time gets spent, but I don't think that makes for a superior scanlation effort at all. It's fun, or it's a tribute to the series— but do you actually notice as a reader? So Striptease may have been better, but not by much.
And it wasn't just a one-off release, he did another chapter after a little while. I would have been duped.
On Striptease's side, they dropped the series immediately; the following day. A FF– for not even sticking around more than 24 hours. Ignoring their pettiness for the sake of this argument, Kontol's second chapter made it look like he was going to keep releasing. Reader support increased...
A shame about Striptease, huh...
But then it all stopped.
Okay, back to the argument.
The reason why the quality of release is significant is variable, but the end result is usually the same.
My thoughts would be along the lines of what I've already stated...
It's almost not worth pursuing —— There is limited reward in scanlation to start with. The main reward that I think the average scanlator would aspire to is 'getting their work out there'...
For me, hypothetically, if there was another group delivering an acceptable quality on a series I am doing, any number of positive comments on its quality won't make up for the fact there's already a good scanlation out there. It just feels depressing to work on in that condition. You only know the feeling if you do it, I guess...
That's me, but like I said: the end result is usually the same. For all scanlators. You can see this in a lot of series that
had more than one group releasing at once.
This one, this one, this one, this one, this one, why is it that most of these series end up with only one group working at a time? This is just two pages in my follows; you'll also have many series in yours that you can find with the same result. Their reasons are varied of course, but one thing is clear:
Nobody likes continuing to work on a series when they're behind.
I don't have a fitting analogy right now, but although it's not really a competition, there's no prizes, you'll always get thanks... It just feels gutting. It's not fun at all. No way.
Unless the advanced scans are of unacceptable quality (in which case you are patching something which everyone is hoping will happen), a group that has started releasing and looks like they are taking over the series leaves you with two options:
– Work your ass off to try and compete, where their lesser quality scans may be acceptable while sacrificing your own quality likely won't make readers that happy (hard for high quality folks to give that up anyway).
– Leave them to it, leaving behind all of the time you may have spent on future chapters and letting (maybe) slightly subpar scanlations take over.
If you keep releasing but get behind, eventually you'll lose readership and while most people will still read your releases, if you stop they won't really care too much. Again, it's depressing. See the above examples for just a glimpse.
And this is also
just part of the game. It is how it is. That's scanlation. It's why no one really lasts that long.
Instead of keeping being involved in the series,
just move on!
There's so many thousands of manga out there to translate. So many thousands of manhwa. So many tens of good manhua.
Look at Striptease go. Of course they wouldn't stop for something like this. And of course it's a huge waste of time and energy to double-up scanlation on a series because you're haughty about your own quality. Readers get mad about it as well after some time (with doing a secondary release), I forgot to mention that — it's actually really important to mention that.
Readers ask:
why the hell are you doing this series when there's already another group doing it! Go do some other manga!
—— as frustrating as it may be that lower-quality work gets picked up by aggregators —— the outcome would be much the same —— didn't upload on mangadex at all but instead hosted on their own site or such.
I think I overdid my response to the previous quote, so I won't add too much here. I'm having enough trouble organising my thoughts (haha).
But I'm going to give the example of Solo Levelling and Jaimini's Box. I used to read it here, but when they quit I actually followed them to their own site. The majority of people of course read whatever came up first on any aggregate site. I wasn't a fan of their other work, I don't really care about any drama, I just liked their translation of SL. Many people did I think.
They didn't continue scanlating that series though, and think seriously about "why." If they were translating for their dedicated fanbase, I would have kept visiting them... why not just keep translating? I don't know what their most popular series was, but I only visited for that.
Most of their series had alternate translations elsewhere, and it comes back to the same thing. Who
really cares about your secondary translation? It's a rhetorical question of course, look at them now.
The fact that someone is spending even thankless amounts of time and effort on producing a work of a level of quality which they feel does justice to the work is still no reason to accuse another group —— of basically sabotage
True, and thus it's hard to tell the intentions of a new scanlator who comes in to snipe a series. Unless they tell you. Kontol
didn't say about it and so at the time it seemed like the real deal, it's just clear in hindsight that's what happened.
What is sabotage is what both Striptease and Kontol have done to the series
after the intial event.
In 4chan translation threads, Kontol (presumably)
posts random fully scanlated pages for the chapters which gives the impression that there's more to come. It's a simple troll, but it is effective in warding off people from seriously committing to scanlating any of the chapters over there.
As for Striptease, in their Discord they
say... they inform their fans at least that they're
"going to rescan all of the new chapters when the volume release comes out." This rumour keeps circling around from Striptease's fans and it's got to be the worst of the lot. It's so hard to get involved when
just around the corner Striptease is coming back to continue the series. What if they actually do? Damn them for saying that.
You're talking about people considering sniping to be a form of sabotage... no, sniping actually takes so much effort, if they want to learn how to sabotage a series, look at Isekai Ojisan.
—— But then in that case, wouldn't one also feel relieved, knowing that a comparably/more competent group is willing and able to take on that burden from there on..? —— Especially seeing as you're saying you couldn't hope to carry on at this indefinitely ——
For me, if someone comes in with an acceptable quality release — god forbid if Striptease does as they say, no I couldn't really complain about it. And I wouldn't. It would be better for the series overall. Recently a group wanted to pick up the series and I was ready to crack open champagne when they announced that. I've been trying since November to give the series an update, being really courteous to the other scanlator but trying to give the readers
something...
Anyway, that group decided to back out of that announcement after realising all of the above.
But for someone to come along now that I've committed to the series for real, well, no, it wouldn't be a relief to me at all, it's basically my worst fear right now so I'm rushing ahead to deliver the next update — without sacrificing my ideal quality, which really stretches the definition of r u s h i n g.
Obviously I've also got to take a break some time to join in the passing General thread.
Anyway, that's not even relevant now. I should delete this part but I'll probably forget~
So let me get this right - they "didn't care about the fans", but it was "obviously a huge deal if someone sniped them"? I'll just let that speak for itself.
I think it's important to remember that this is just a generalisation on my part. Truly not caring about the fans would be something like having the translator tell you the story and not bothering to scanlate the series. And despite that, most of the fans still cared about them. Rather, the fans cared about the
consistency of their updates.
But still, yes, as observed it was actually a huge deal that someone sniped them.
A big deal that
they created to spite literally everyone, successfully.
Enduring insults and condescension is a laughably small price to pay to that end —— And I have no reason to doubt that they cared deeply about the quality of their releases. —— But the inconsistency on display here makes it hard to take their outburst seriously.
And I agree. They deserved it, in some ways.
But the series didn't deserve it... which is in the end what really bugs me about it.
I seriously acknowledge their effort as a scanlator, I ultimately don't respect the effort of the other scanlator
now, I really wished they would have followed through with their promise to return (now I hope they don't), I would have praised them if they did, but my respect ends with their
rumoured return.
Anyways, thanks for sharing your side of the story. It did help shed light on a dimension that hadn't so far been addressed, though I don't think it changes much about the larger thrust of what I (and other like-minded people) have been contending here.
I should really properly read through these threads instead of just skimming everything five times before making a comment like this. But I don't have the time for that, y'know, I'm too busy type typing already... haha.
Sorry about that. I tried to give this comment something more relevant to the discussion though.
" then yeah, I think you're weak 
