Fansubs on Youtube

[kippykinkel]

Some of you may have noticed fansubs being uploaded onto youtube. While this may seem benign, there is a possibility that this trend could bring unwanted attention to the fansubbing community. Generally, fansubbing has operated in a way that could be described as "underground." By limiting access to the fansubs, the fansubbing community has thrived and survived for quite awhile. However, now that fansubs are being offered to everyone through youtube, this could shine a spotlight onto fansubbers which could devastate our institution.

Discussion
Do you think uploading fansubs onto youtube is benign, harmful, or beneficial to the continued existance of fansubbing? If you believe it is harmful, what possible actions could prevent harm from occurring? If you believe it is beneficial, what could fansubbers, and others of the fansubbing community, do to help?

[Kraco]

I'm paranoid but not an android. Harmful. Brings unwanted attention. Just like Narutofan (or whatever was that site that sells fansubs for profit). I want to enjoy fansubs till the day I die, and so better careful than sorry sounds good to me.

Well, to be realistic I don't know how much it matters. And nothing can be done about it, anyway. Fansubbers can't defend their rights, even if they wanted. They do have copyrights to their translations, but not even to the information their translations contain, not to mention the video and audio they distribute. So, they couln't do anything about somebody uploading their efforts. And besides, they are all just against selling their translations, not distributing them for free.

Yet I can't understand why anybody would want to watch the series in stamp sized, uber low quality 15 mins clips (or are they ever that long?).

[BioAlien]

i don't think it can be bad for the fansub community, but it can't be good either.

And the quality is bad on Youtube, better just download the whole episode with good quality from the Subbers website/tracker

[Yukimura]

On the one hand, Youtube has bad quality ususally and would hurt the overall experiance of watching a show. On the other hand, Youtube has already weathered some heat over its displaying of copyrighted matierials, like all the AMV's andclips from TV shows they run. So far big companies like TV and movie producers haven't really ripped the site apart as it is much like free advertising to have fun clips of shows readily available, even politicians recognize the power of video sites like youtube, using them for more slanderous ad campaigns then what would be allowed on broadcast media.

I'm not sure who's more vehament about stopping 'copyright infringement' the MPAA and co or the licensing companies, but if everyone else is leaving youtube alone I don't think the licensers will be the ones to break the status quo.

NOTE: I have occasionaly come across youtubelinks that had been removed with a caption to the effect of "Removed b/c whoever owned this material complained" so there is some precedent, however I would hope that whoever uploaded the content wasn't sold out by the site to woeve made the complaint.

[Ryllharu]

I'd say that ultimately, the good and bad effects nearly each other out, so I'm going with benign. The end effects will be minimal.

The good effects are that it brings more attention to fansubs and further shows companies what may or may not be popular. I'd like to bring up the original purpose of fansubbing. Back in the 80's Fansubs were done by editing subs onto VHS tapes of anime shows off satellite TV, then copied and passed around. The purpose was to bring attention to these series and hopefully have someone license and distribute the series here in the States. That's how we all got to see Macross, Sailor Moon, and the various other series that made the anime community today. YouTube helps out with this by hopefully grabbing more attention with various series.

The bad effects overwhelm the good just a little bit, but in the end won't affect the community too much. The quality on YouTube compared to the downloaded subs from the group who produced it, are well, shit. This may give the group who produced a once quality product a minor hit in reputation. At the same time, it may bring the viewer to the actual subber, so it really depends on the viewer's response. If the series is licensed, it might bring unwanted attention to the Sub group, harming them directly, but a quick removal request by the company to YouTube may end it there.

In the end, it really depends on the viewer and the material, but I really don't think there will be any real profound effect from it.