Thoughts on uploading manga from big-name publishers?

Since long before I came here, uploading “whole chapters of manga” was discouraged, but it was widely tolerated to upload doujinshi and thanks to many excellent translators, soft-translated doujinshi have become a staple of Danbooru that’s widely popular with users who don’t just come here to look at porn.

From what I see, these comic-type uploads are generally accepted (if they are drawn well enough, but this post is not about quality):

• fan-works from the usual sources (Pixiv, etc)
• self-published doujinshi and original works of similar format, even if bought at conventions or aftermarket outlets
• permanently free official comics, often released one page a day or week (pool #5674, pool #12727, etc)

The Uploading Guidelines reflect this quite well by listing Manga from big-name international publishers under Generally Rejected.

I think that longer manga series from big-name publishers are more what the scanlation community is going for, while we concentrate more on one-shots, short(er) doujin series and standalone images, which seem less attractive for scanlators.

However, I’ve recently noticed an increase in manga from big-name publishers being uploaded by unlimited uploaders, sometimes even when the series is already being scanlated elsewhere, and I think that that’s better left to the scanlation community and online readers such as Batoto or Dynasty Reader, just as videos are better suited for Youtube.

There’s also the potential issue of ending up on the bad side of some big publisher. The 2014 METI campaign also comes to mind...

So what do you guys think about this? Unlimited Manga Works or stick with the Uploading Guidelines?

kittey said:

However, I’ve recently noticed an increase in manga from big-name publishers being uploaded by unlimited uploaders, sometimes even when the series is already being scanlated elsewhere

Could you give some examples?

Type-kun said:

Could you give some examples?

I wanted to avoid that because the ones I noticed have been uploaded by the same user and I’m worried about the issue itself and don’t want to blame that user. :-/

• pool #11343, pool image 165 onwards are from the bought tankoubon release, I believe.
• pool #12764

Those are still all fanart comics or original comics from known artists and not from a big copyright like One Piece or One-Punch Man.
I'd say that these should still be allowed since Danbooru isn't only an Ecchi/Hentai website, but also a website where people want to read comics from their favorite artists.
I think if it's published comercially then they should be treated the same as scanned images from doujins that the artists are selling, right? At least, I don't see what the big difference might be if there is any.

Chiera said:

Those are still all fanart comics or original comics from known artists and not from a big copyright like One Piece or One-Punch Man.

Since when is MF Comics Cune (a label owned by Kadokawa and publisher of series such as Hinako Note and Pan de Peace) fanart?

kuuderes_shadow said:

Since when is MF Comics Cune (a label owned by Kadokawa and publisher of series such as Hinako Note and Pan de Peace) fanart?

I was more referring to the second pool, which was badly worded, I admit. But looking at the other, it is also original, so I take that back.
Why should original comics fall under the more restricted view?

(answering the question in the earlier post, not the weird one about "original" comics - because guess what, all comics that aren't fanart of someone else's work are "original" under that logic)

I think the logic is that most doujin works are not produced for the sake of making the artist a living, whereas a commercially released one is the bread and butter of the artist - and also of their editor, various others at their publishing company, etc.
That and the increased chance of legal action.
Plus it's a relatively easy place to draw the line - certainly if you made things more lenient there'd be no boundary more easily enforced until you got to "allow everything".

Then again I'm not the best person to be answering such things - if the site took the approach that I would like then anything not from a free and freely available source* would be (preferably double) deleted.

*and no, illegal scans don't count.

Chiera said:

Those are still all fanart comics or original comics from known artists and not from a big copyright like One Piece or One-Punch Man.

So for you the difference between original and any other copyright with its own tag is how big it is (popularity, monetary worth)? I suggest aliasing all the unpopular copyright to original then. (No, I don’t.)

That doesn’t make any sense. The series I mentioned are only tagged original because they started off as original characters on the artists’ Pixiv accounts and later got contracted for commercial serialization.

kuuderes_shadow said:

I think the logic is that most doujin works are not produced for the sake of making the artist a living, whereas a commercially released one is the bread and butter of the artist - and also of their editor, various others at their publishing company, etc.
That and the increased chance of legal action.
Plus it's a relatively easy place to draw the line - certainly if you made things more lenient there'd be no boundary more easily enforced until you got to "allow everything".

Edit: You read my thoughts and summed them up nicely.

kittey said:

So for you the difference between original and any other copyright with its own tag is how big it is (popularity, monetary worth)? I suggest aliasing all the unpopular copyright to original then. (No, I don’t.)

That doesn’t make any sense. The series I mentioned are only tagged original because they started off as original characters on the artists’ Pixiv accounts and later got contracted for commercial serialization.

I guess the first paragraph is something we agree on :P.
But I think it should be reflected better then...Original series that have more impact and are commercially sold shouldn't be tagged as original then. I guess the Aldehyde series (pool #12764) should be tagged with a copyright name then.
I don't know if this is sold commercially by the artist wlop, but they also have an original series that is called and also tagged as ghostblade.
It wouldn't solve the problem per se, but I guess if these are also backed by larger companies then we should make a hard ban for those.