I've written up a little thing about fansubbing

[ScR3WiEuS]

i don't think we're discussing it in terms of productivity, but rather how much fun we have while doing it. back then, fansubbing might've had more drama, more "dangers" concerning your staff, but at least it felt more alive back then. what he meant, i think, is that it just feels kinda dead right now. an endless repetition of airing, subbing, releasing, airing, subbing, releasing, etc.
your first line kinda reflects what we mean. fansubbing is plain boring when it's regarded as a means of producing a fansub, but what's the fun in that?

"As for ego-subbing, group flaming, other drama, today it can be safely ignored and passed over."
that's just a sign of indifference. "as long as i get my release out, it doesn't matter what happens." that might be more mature and productive perhaps, but it's just not fun. a group makes up translations and releases it as a fansub? who cares,etc. it's that kind of indifference that results in brainless leechers that just get the first release they see.
i think i finally understand what some oldschool subbers said about the fansub scene becoming some warez scene ( even tho i still enjou it anyway ).
the fansub scene is slowly losing the aspects that makes it so unique. the relations between each group and person, the sense of involvement there was, etc.

[Shii]

Originally Posted by ScR3WiEuS

a group makes up translations and releases it as a fansub? who cares,etc. it's that kind of indifference that results in brainless leechers that just get the first release they see.

the fansub scene is slowly losing the aspects that makes it so unique. the relations between each group and person, the sense of involvement there was, etc.

I don't see the link between these two statements. One of them is about people who don't wait for a quality translation-- and one man's trash is another man's treasure (some people appreciate speedsubs, like me now that I know a fair amount of Japanese), and I have good evidence that there are plenty of people who appreciate the paced, quality-checked groups.

The other statement is about a lack of involvement somewhere. I'm not sure where. If you mean that people don't go to IRC rooms and get to know their sub groups any more, that was always just an illusion (IRC was only ever the beginning; distro went far beyond IRC into many mediums that the group never knew about), and it was part of the elitism that made early subbing aggravating. Groups still talk to other groups as much as ever, as evidenced by the heavy amount of allied releases. If you mean that people within groups don't know each other as well, that's an extremely vague statement.

[getfresh]

Originally Posted by Access

Does it matter that the chatter has died down and however you define 'culture' is dead to you? This is hardly what should be used to define what is a 'golden era'. One can make great achievements in times of relative silence, and one can accomplish absolutely nothing in times of heavy chatter and great 'cultural' exercises. You cannot measure the relative accomplishments of fansubbers in this way.

As for ego-subbing, group flaming, other drama, today it can be safely ignored and passed over. Before BT you had to protect your public channel, your best/exclusive distro, your bots, etc. Inevitably these things would become the targets of rivals or even enemies. Pre-ETG was the worst in this respect. But since the move to ETG, most groups are on some kind of stable service, and now BT replaces IRC as the primary means of distro.

Ultimately people can be motivated to fansub for any number of reasons, and the reasons really do not matter as long as they can do the job well. You may not agree with someone else's reasons, but why not benefit from it nonetheless.

maybe you should try reading what I wrote as a whole before interjecting, hum?

and this statement "Pre-ETG was the worst in this respect." is just .. .wtf... what do you mean pre-ETG. The ETG scene was well developed before bit-torrent was even being used.


Oh and on this point,
"As for ego-subbing, group flaming, other drama, today it can be safely ignored and passed over. Before BT you had to protect your public channel, your best/exclusive distro, your bots, etc."

You think groups don't still have to protect their distros or channels? Are you living under a rock access?

[Access]

Originally Posted by ScR3WiEuS

i don't think we're discussing it in terms of productivity, but rather how much fun we have while doing it. back then, fansubbing might've had more drama, more "dangers" concerning your staff, but at least it felt more alive back then. what he meant, i think, is that it just feels kinda dead right now. an endless repetition of airing, subbing, releasing, airing, subbing, releasing, etc.
...
the fansub scene is slowly losing the aspects that makes it so unique. the relations between each group and person, the sense of involvement there was, etc.

Anything done repeatedly will begin to feel that way after months or years. In the long run, the only thing that keeps it unique is working on different shows, the mixture of new people and old people that happens in the constantly shifting groups, etc. It is nothing new that most people quit after some period of involvement, citing the same exact reasons given above. That was happening in 2003, it was happening in 2004, 2005, and 2006.

I know where you are coming from, but I just don't think it's that big of a deal. You either find a reason (internally) to keep going or you leave. If you leave, you end up being replaced by someone else who still feels excited about it. If enough people get replaced, or if people in general decide they want the 'community' or 'scene' to change in some way, then it can happen overnight. It's not like the 'scene' is some heavy, solid body that has inertia and cannot be moved or changed. Ultimately, it's just what people make of it -- the only place it exists is between people.

As for the rest, pre-ETG I mean EFnet or other IRC servers. The move to ETG, 2001 I think it was(?). "Pre-ETG was the worst in this respect" -- ie. on EFnet if you lost your channel, it was just tough luck, nothing you could do. It could be down for days, or more. AnimeCo moved to ETG, and many others followed. This was naturally more stable, more secure, and everyone (except for the troublemakers) benefited from it. The move to ETG was nowhere near as big as BT, but in its time, it helped. Enough about that.

[ScR3WiEuS]

of course. that's why i stated that i still enjoy fansubbing. why? because i don't treat it as most other groups. i run my group on a non-serious basis. someone wants to flame? go ahead. someone wants to post jokes on the website? fine. someone wants to do some joke releases, like Nintendo DS encodes. awesome.
but after having been in about 15+ groups the past 7 years, i just noticed the trend in the groups i worked for.
i'm not complaining or anything. things evolve, change. that's only natural.
i was merely saying that everything is a lot more businesslike/serious nowadays.
despite the drama, the feeling of involvement you had when working for a single group, and devoting your time to that single group, was a lot stronger. fansubbing was more passionate. that's not just me growing bored of fansubbing, cuz i still have that feeling. i'm mainly noticing it in the way other people behave. and i guess i just miss it a bit. i'm not saing we should all go back to single-group memberships etc. that's not really "productive." but i wish both fansubbers and leechers would be more passionate about it. no matter what some people might say, leechers just see the fansubbers as tools nowadays. a way to get your anime. that wasn't the same back then. it's not a simple matter of respect, but rather involvement.

fansubbing is indeed what you make of it. but that only applies to the fansubbers. leechers have always been leechers, but i miss the old leechers.

[Shii]

Originally Posted by ScR3WiEuS

no matter what some people might say, leechers just see the fansubbers as tools nowadays. a way to get your anime. that wasn't the same back then.

Back then the group knew who the leechers were on IRC and could boot them or ban them. Naturally those people would want to show respect. Now either you release or you don't, and the only respect you get will be based on the quality of your work.

[ScR3WiEuS]

not really you know. i wish that were so.
if quality was a basis of respect, then why are a couple of the best known and most respected groups out there also the worst groups out there?

[Shii]

This is your opinion...

[ScR3WiEuS]

heh. then most things in life are just opinions i guess

[getfresh]

Originally Posted by Shii

Back then the group knew who the leechers were on IRC and could boot them or ban them. Naturally those people would want to show respect. Now either you release or you don't, and the only respect you get will be based on the quality of your work.

lol? "Back then" there were distros other than the group channels that always had the new releases right after they were released so banning people would never stop them. Hell there were even http topsites with all new releases on directDL. There was more FTP sharing and there is always usenet. People back then, including leechers were not for the most part the one trick ponies they are today who without a torrent wouldn't know how to find anything.

they were resourceful people, and they treated the subbers nicely mostly to say thanks as well as to be friendly with someone who like the same series as them or has the same hobby. When there was less anime available leechers were just grateful for what they could get, as were subbers getting releases they hadn't seen. So yeah groups talked shit about each other, and individual subbers downed on each other, it's called a rivalry. You can see rivalry everywhere in the world. Competition increases the likely hood of advancements in any market. Be it free or commercial.

Personally I have been friends with ton of the leechers who came into groups I worked with over the years. And when they saw me other places, even after I stopped subbing for extended periods they treated me exactly the same. And I know its the same with many other subbers.

Also, hate to tell you but banning ppl back then did squat. Just log off, unplug your modem, reconnect it, log back on under a diff nick and poof you can get back in the channel (unless you were static, and then you could just proxy). I don't get where all these wacked out theories are coming from...

[Access]

Banning people, it was an iterative process. Yes there were active ways around it and the smart troublemakers used multiple nicks/personas (and ip addresses) at the same time to begin with (one to chat with and one to leech). It all just depended on how far the guy was willing to go and how smart he was. There were times when we had to ban whole countries or blocks of IPs, not permanently of course. There were special bots, other countermeasures, but you had to be careful something didn't go frankenstien/haywire.

As for "back then", it was a mixed bag with more bad than good. Distro was a machine in and of itself. Some groups had it down and others didn't. Internally groups had their own private servers and if something was rare (but also in demand), that also meant it was also worth more in trade. The downside was that that every distro bot, every FTP server, every website was run by someone. Usenet was the only thing that could be done on your own and forgotten about, and not everyone even knew it existed or had good access to it. For everything else, some activity was required on both sides.

If, using only public (non-exclusive) distro, you were trying to push out some release for an unknown show no one had ever heard of before, or something that wasn't going to be too popular with the 14-22yr old male crowd, from a group that was relatively new, it was tougher than if it was something like love hina or vandread or whatever the popular show of the day was. I'm not saying it didn't happen, but it took effort and you had to be willing to push all the right buttons. Back then, if you had a good, high-speed and exclusive distro bot, you could bypass that whole process. "Princess Tutu" and HnK's kira is a good example. Despite the type of show it was, it had no problem getting out there thanks to a good, exclusive irc distro bot. A show like cosmic baton girl comet-san wouldn't have even got out had it not been for that bot. Of course today has some downsides too, but it's not a big deal.

[Ugari-Pizza]

Originally Posted by Shii

I found a great essay by a LivE-EviL member while looking for screencaps of the #Anime-Fansubs 320x240 digisub of Love Hina (couldn't find any... I don't think they exist anymore)

http://forum.live-evil.org/index.php/topic,1040.0.html

edit: Click this video and set it to "original size", it's like we're back in 2001 and everything is exciting

Howdy all, I'm a pack rat and also an IRC leecher from way "back in the day".

First off: The fact that you guys are going on about the Love Hina encodes like they are ancient just makes me feel all the older. There are a lot of stuff getting subbed back then...Love Hina was just a big hit with everyone is all.

Secondly: I think I might have screenshots of what you're looking for. I'm not sure if this release was from #Anime-Fansubs release, but it is 320x240 and not tagged by anyone else.

Here are a few screencaps:










Here are some more screencaps from an early #animefactory encode of Love Hina:







I hope this post was helpful, I can take more screenshots if you'd like. I still have a lot of the older stuff laying around on hard drives and CD-R's littered throughout my home. I even have some of the really horrible mid-90's .RM and .asf stuff if you want a copy of it.

edit ----

I did some more digging and found this file. Episode 17 of Love Hina, encoded/subbed by #Anime-Fansubs@Efnet

[WanderingKnight]

Hey! I still have those Love Hina encodes! 26 episodes in a single CD! (And I think I actually had a lot of excess space, since I can see a couple of other things in the CD label here).

Those were the days...

[ScR3WiEuS]

those first few screenshots weren't anime-fansubs.
the other series of screen were of course.
hah, have those too on CD somewhere.
what really amazed me was the encoding quality.
iirc the encoding quality for love hina ( by anime-fansubs ) was amazing for that time.
i remember seeing stuff 2-3 years later that still looked worse.
people should stop dissin divx3.11a >.<; it was awesome!

[Tofusensei]

Originally Posted by ScR3WiEuS

people should stop dissin divx3.11a >.<; it was awesome!

sbc nandub ftw

-Tofu

[Ugari-Pizza]

Originally Posted by ScR3WiEuS

those first few screenshots weren't anime-fansubs.

Any idea who might have put them out? I'm thinking it was a smaller group because the Opening and Ending were removed from that encode. I was grabbing a lot of stuff from a lot of places (and renamed the files, shame on me ) so I'm not sure anymore...

what really amazed me was the encoding quality.
iirc the encoding quality for love hina ( by anime-fansubs ) was amazing for that time.
i remember seeing stuff 2-3 years later that still looked worse.
people should stop dissin divx3.11a >.<; it was awesome!

I agree for the time the quality of the encodes was great but the screenshots I posted were nothing out of the norm by 2001. I still have some Slayers (DivX3) encodes laying around that look just as good.

[ScR3WiEuS]

hmmmm, i can't really tell. besides the numerous groups having released love hina, there were a number of anonymous releases too. a translator i know even claims to have released the very first fansub, but just anonymously. kinda hard to track it down that way. i have about 5 versions myself, but i'd have to locate the CDs. i'll take a look later.
if you actually have those releases on HDD, you might want to scan it with anidb-o-matic tool. they should have more or less all versions in their database.

[Ugari-Pizza]

I'll copy it over to the external HDD tonight and scan them, hopefully that'll turn something up. I should also mention it's odd seeing fansubs with a 60MB file size per episode....been so long since the old days of waiting in line to download files from an IRC bot.

[Access]

Keep in mind if you watch those videos today, they tend to look better than when people watched them 6-7 years ago. In 2000 there was no xvid or CCCP, people were using the base codec to decode, fourcc "div3" or "mp43". The newer packs or setups will preempt this decoder in favor of the xvid decoder, ffdshow, or something with better postprocessing than the original decoder.


(an example of a show subtitled by individuals, not a group)


(credit)


(message)


(animated logo in the upper right corner)


(title screen)


(subtitle)


(credit)


(one of the more popular shows of the time)


(credit)


(well-known community member)

[Mentar]

Originally Posted by getfresh

Oh and on this point,
"As for ego-subbing, group flaming, other drama, today it can be safely ignored and passed over. Before BT you had to protect your public channel, your best/exclusive distro, your bots, etc."

You think groups don't still have to protect their distros or channels? Are you living under a rock access?

Been absent for a while, so I missed this part.

What's "protect their distros or channels" exactly?