tahu157 Posted March 31, 2015 Share Posted March 31, 2015 So, there's always that somewhat obscure VN that you've had your eye on for as long as you've known about it, but no one else knows it exists, and there is no interest in translating it anywhere. You don't speak Japanese, and though you're studying it, you're not getting very far, so you can't read it or translate it yourself either. One solution could be finding a professional translation service that will translate the scripts for you for a price. It's cheating I know, but has anyone ever heard of any "translation" groups or individuals doing this, or does anyone know if it's even legal? You certainly don't own the rights to the scripts and text, but you won't be causing any financial harm to the company that made the game either if you don't ship the patch with an illegal copy of the game. Thoughts? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nosebleed Posted March 31, 2015 Share Posted March 31, 2015 It's not just cheating, it's downright illegall because you don't own the rights to produce derivative works (translation patches) of the original work so paying a legitimate company to do it would be a crime and if you tried to do so you're putting yourself in the spotlight and risking legal action. Fan translations themselves are illegal if you don't have the rights to the intellectual property, but they're in a grey area due to several factors (mostly Japan not really bothering with them since it doesn't affect their market much and the fact that the translators are, for the most part, anonymous and aren't profiting from it). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tahu157 Posted March 31, 2015 Author Share Posted March 31, 2015 Yeah, that's what I'd figured. Twas' worth a shot though. Back to the studying then. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
XReaper Posted March 31, 2015 Share Posted March 31, 2015 yep you should highly refrain from doing so, got myself badly screwed while doing that for GoT & other licensed animes, one of the main causes i´m broke edit: & NO darknet is NOT that save as one might think Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kelebek1 Posted March 31, 2015 Share Posted March 31, 2015 No, it's not illegal, unless you then sell the patch, or at least request money for it, or distribute the patch in a way a court would find as damaging. You can take whatever text and translate it for your own personal use, that falls entirely within Fair Use clauses. It's not illegal to translate Martin Luther King's speeches to Arabic or any other language, nor is it illegal to have War & Peace translated into Chinese. The only problems come in when you start to sell and distribute those works. While you can have those books translated, you can't sell them or give them out for free. Without paying any license fees or any negotiation, then selling and distributing will get you a real-life B&. Selling and distributing without the rights is a big no no, but just getting text translated for yourself is not illegal. In distributing it, well you're on the same page as every other fan-translated work. How the scripts are translated makes no difference. It's not technically illegal, but companies don't like it and will C&D you and take you to court if they have to, and they'll win as well. But it's a civil case and not criminal, so the most you'd be faced with are fines (paying for the damages to the company). You could end up winning if you end up with a bunch of otakus on your jury though who decide to side with you. If you want to spend your own money to pay translators to translate a game, then go for it. It doesn't change your position from one of a standard fan translation project, and you're just out of pocket at the end of it. But if you really care enough and you're willing to spend the money to get it translated, go for it. I'm sure everyone would appreciate it. As long as you don't try to sell the patch, then you're in no more danger than any of the other projects on here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
XReaper Posted March 31, 2015 Share Posted March 31, 2015 basically you´re right, unless you do it simply for yourself, there should be nothing wrong with it. the problem arises when 3rd partys receive money for working on something what you´re going to offer 4free, where you´re not the actual license holder, same goes sometimes with receiving donations & definitely when working together with streaming sites ahemm (in that case you´re screwed when tracked down, no more civil court only & stuff) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tahu157 Posted March 31, 2015 Author Share Posted March 31, 2015 Yeeeeaaaaaah, I guess I knew all along it was a bad idea. And on top of that the entire idea is disrespectful to actual translators. So, double whammy. Thanks for the feedback though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Decay Posted March 31, 2015 Share Posted March 31, 2015 There have been translators who have worked on commission before (by that, I mean someone pays them to do a translation and the patch is released for free). I believe Dark Translations/Sanity Ends accepted commissions, but they ran into legal troubles multiple times. I think that was primarily because the publisher whose games they were translating were really anti-fanTLs. Doing fan translations on commission is still a bad idea. edit: There is also the Fun Translations group that actually sold their patches to the public, but they went AWOL and their site is down, and it's impossible to find their patches anywhere, they're just gone forever. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deep Blue Posted March 31, 2015 Share Posted March 31, 2015 Just be a bit smart and if you pay someone to do the job try to stay low and don't get any attention from it, then release the patch if you want but anonymously (this now is a question about ethic and moral)...but people don't like that, they like to be recognized, "I did that, I translated that!" (Even if they didn't earn anything by doing it) Is it illegal to pay someone for translating a novel? No, it is if you want to release it to the public for free. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Getsuya Posted March 31, 2015 Share Posted March 31, 2015 Honestly though? I think unless you get a fan translator with an unusual amount of pride most fan translators would go 'Wait you want to give me money to do something I was doing for free before? Freaking sign me up!' If it's important to you, quietly grab a fan translator or two you think you can trust, send them Paypal 'gifts' and collect the script when it's done to hack back into the game. It's shady, but even if the companies come cracking down on you you've still got a full script to pass around anonymously and there shouldn't be any backlash on the translators because, if they're smart fan translators, there will be no connecting their real identity to their pen name. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zoom909 Posted April 1, 2015 Share Posted April 1, 2015 I've found a couple of sites where they claim they will translate any text you send them for a price, regardless of what it is, for your "personal use" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zalor Posted April 1, 2015 Share Posted April 1, 2015 Assuming there is a specific VN you really want to read, I think the best thing you could do is read up on basic and essential Japanese Grammar using Tae Kim's guide (should take a week to a month depending on how thoroughly you read it), then hook up the VN with Jparser (here is a tutorial on how to do that) and slog through it. You'll ability to read Japanese will increase gradually using this method, and then you'll be able to read other untranslated VNs. Of course if you don't want to invest time in learning grammar and slogging through Japanese, Machine translators exist for a reason. And they translate for free. The results are usually bearable but not satisfying from what I've heard. To answer the thread: I think if you pay a translator to translate the extracted script of the VN and you only use it for yourself, it should be legal. However, I believe translators generally get paid by how many words they translate, so I would imagine it would get rather expensive. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sanahtlig Posted April 1, 2015 Share Posted April 1, 2015 Many companies look the other way for free fan translations. They're much more likely to pounce if they get tipped off that other people are profiting off their hard work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vince Posted April 1, 2015 Share Posted April 1, 2015 well, as long as there's no 3rd party who'd profit from this, and it's strictly for your own use. there'd be no problems. actually it's up to you whether you want to distribute it on teh web, but i wouldn't do it, let alone give it to others by 'selling' it. since shits could stem from just that, and you wouldn't even want to go against a certain company on the court as an individual. except by some fate you ended up as what kelebek1 said. i think it's the same case like when you make yourself copy by photocopy-ing it a book. i think it's still better to use jparser and mecab. you could build your vocab and grammar bit by bit, soon you'll be reading untranslated vn by no time. rather, just try it on the vn you want to read. look here http://kipchu.wordpress.com/2012/08/02/visual-novel-help-translation-tools-for-playing-untranslated-visual-novels/?wref=tp Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tahu157 Posted April 3, 2015 Author Share Posted April 3, 2015 So, three reasons really that it's not a good idea. - It's a grey area legally, and paying someone is traceable - It'd be cheating and buying my way into a field of people who are not only hard working, but sacrificing their time and energy for no gain other than to share what they enjoy. That'd be a real dick move. - It's not plausible financially to do it anyway. I went around and got a few quotes from various translation companies. The first one was only going to be $5 per script, give or take for a few. So $5 times 26 scripts, that's $130. A bit steep but probably worthwhile. As it turns out that was only paying for a machine translation, which was free for the first 500 words anyway, so if I wanted that I could just put in 500 words at a time. However, the actual human translations cost about $0.16 per word, and each script on average has around 10K words. So, $1600 per script times 26 scripts and you're looking at $41,000 to translate a long VN. No wonder Sekai Project was asking for so much for all three Grisaia games. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iamnoob Posted April 3, 2015 Share Posted April 3, 2015 So it's illegal... but why? The VN doesn't lose any money from someone paying for a translation. In fact it makes it tap into the ENG market by spreading its name, making earn more. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CryingWestern Posted April 3, 2015 Share Posted April 3, 2015 1: Most VN developers/companies won't sell on the english market, nor will they ship their products out side of japan. 2: They make alot more money if the VN is localized offically, not fan translated. 3: It's pretty much the same with Manga and Anime, they earn more money because we have to purchase the license to their stuff, which they have complete control over the price of the license. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Getsuya Posted April 3, 2015 Share Posted April 3, 2015 Actually the best reason I can give to not go through with something like this is that most translators, even with money incentive, would still be hard pressed to keep interested in a long translation project enough to actually complete it. And when money is involved it gets even more drama-inducing and tangled since suddenly you're being cheated out of your money because they're wanting to drop out halfway through. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nosebleed Posted April 3, 2015 Share Posted April 3, 2015 So it's illegal... but why? The VN doesn't lose any money from someone paying for a translation. In fact it makes it tap into the ENG market by spreading its name, making earn more.It's got nothing to do with that. An owner of an intellectual property is the only one who can legally consent derivative works. That's how it's always worked. Otherwise companies could continuously copy other countries products (by copy i mean a 1 to 1 reproduction, not cheap knock offs) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tahu157 Posted April 3, 2015 Author Share Posted April 3, 2015 I wasn't talking about finding a fan-translation group and paying them, but rather a professional translation service whose whole job is to translate. They would definitely be better about staying on the job because it /is/ their job. EDIT: This was meant to quote Getsuya's reply. Not sure why it didn't work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nosebleed Posted April 3, 2015 Share Posted April 3, 2015 I wasn't talking about finding a fan-translation group and paying them, but rather a professional translation service whose whole job is to translate. They would definitely be better about staying on the job because it /is/ their job. EDIT: This was meant to quote Getsuya's reply. Not sure why it didn't work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fiddle Posted April 3, 2015 Share Posted April 3, 2015 My, what a splendid visual novel this appears to be, though it also appears to be untranslated as of present. Jeeves, good sir, do hire a professional organization so that I may humor myself with this piece of art. It will cost $41,000, you say? Why, that is no dent in my copious fortunes! And please be certain that only I am the one who enjoys said translation, for a lawsuit would prove especially detrimental to an individual of such superior social standing as myself. Mhmm, yesss, yes. Karakkan, Emries, tahu157 and 1 other 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iamnoob Posted April 3, 2015 Share Posted April 3, 2015 It's got nothing to do with that. An owner of an intellectual property is the only one who can legally consent derivative works. That's how it's always worked. Otherwise companies could continuously copy other countries products (by copy i mean a 1 to 1 reproduction, not cheap knock offs) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Decay Posted April 3, 2015 Share Posted April 3, 2015 They usually don't oppose it if money isn't involved. But they will get real salty once someone starts profiting off of their work without them getting a cut. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nosebleed Posted April 3, 2015 Share Posted April 3, 2015 No I mean. I understand how the law works for these intellectual property stuff. But what I was curious about was why the authors/company of the VN will oppose to such things? As I said it doesn't make them lose money and increases their popularity. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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