How Crunchyroll Can Beat The Rippers

[Kokujin-kun]

As you all may know, Crunchyroll, Inc. has been plagued by certain groups that will not be named in this post that rips their subtitles for their featured animes almost immediately after they post them on the website. However, I believe they've just figured out a way to beat those rip-and-run groups at their own game.

Here's exhibit A. This is from the recently aired third episode of "Mitsudomoe: Zouryouchuu" which was simulcasted on Crunchyroll this past weekend and was immediately pirated by certain groups. Describing how this scene happened will take too long, so I'll just say Futaba, the one lifting the skirt, was looking for some panties for that boy, Shinya. Even on this very forum there are people who are surprised that the dark-haired girl, Hitoha, does not wear any panties. But is it the right translation?

Spoiler for picture:

Well the original Japanese line from whence that translation came was 履いてないのをだよっ！！ ("haitenai no wo dayo!" source: Mitsudomoe manga Vol. 3, ch. 40) Now, it's true that "haitenai" means "not wearing" but what about the "no"? Well, all of you Japanologist are free to correct me any time, but "no" is a particle that, among other things, connects a modified noun with its appositive (sensei no hon = teacher's book), acts as a dependent indefinite pronoun (watashi wa ookii no wo mimashita = I saw a big [something]), or is used as a sentence-ending particle that indicates an explanation or an emotive (anata wa yasashii no = you are kind). It appears that the translator has chosen to recognize the "no" as a sentence ending particle that indicates the declaration that someone is "not wearing," and the object not being worn that we can infer from that spectacle are the panties. And obviously the subject is Hitoha.

However, we also have an extra particle "wo" which indicates that the preceding noun or phrase is the object of which an unspoken verb acts upon. That means "haitenai no" is the object of the sentence, which would make the "no" in that object a dependent indefinite pronoun that points to the word "panties." In that case, "haitenai" would be a describing word for the word "panties" not for Hitoha.

So from that analysis, "haitenai no wo dayo" should be translated to "The panties not being worn!"

How do you know this is right? Look at Exhibit B:

Spoiler for picture:

This is the scene that happens immediately after the fact. Futaba does say "silly me" (ukkari ukkari) as she searches the drawer for extra pairs of underwear nobody is wearing. How would it make sense for her to react that way if Shinya says "She's not wearing any!" But if he says "the panties you're not wearing!" it would make perfect sense.

But is this the work of inept translating? I thought so too, before thinking about it more deeply. I mean Crunchyroll can just change the scripts to their streams anytime they want and no one will be the wiser, so why not stream the rough translations long enough for the rippers to take them, then later stream the correct translations? It's pretty much almost foolproof, except for those who watch the initial streaming. Of course the rippers might catch on and adjust accordingly. But in any case I applaud their ingenuity. Those who watch the Crunchy rips now think Hitoha secretly goes around commando while people who actually paid for the streams will still think she's just a normal 12-year-old who hides under desks, reads dirty magazines, and gives off a death aura.

It is the perfect troll

[KiryuuKazumanosuke]

This... isn't right. You should probably rethink this post.

[Kokujin-kun]

Not until someone deletes this topic for being too asinine.

[Quarkboy]

Putting my response to the first post aside (which would be "What?")

it is true that corrections are often made to CR's subs after the fact. It's one of the benefits of using soft-subs.
So yeah, when you download from a ripping group, you get v1.0.

But do 99.9999% of the people care who download rips? No.
So it won't "beat the rippers" at all.

[Sparvid]

Personally I would find it annoying, since I (when it's possible to me) watch new episodes on CR the minute they're avaliable.

[Quarkboy]

Originally Posted by Sparvid

Personally I would find it annoying, since I (when it's possible to me) watch new episodes on CR the minute they're avaliable.

At least for the shows I work on or handle, at this point I have 3 different people working on them (translators, editor, and qcer), so typos are kept pretty minimal.

But sometimes it's not just typos, but revelations in the series itself that would cause one to go back and reinterpret something in a previous episode...
That's just unavoidable when doing translations in real time, and fansub groups had to deal with this sort of thing too.

The point being, anyway, that having a system which allows subtitles to be updated is a good thing, and something that the ripping groups do not have, and cannot pirate.

In a perfect world the shows would be ready a 2 weeks ahead of time and there's be $500 an episode to hire a gaggle of interns to check every episode twice.
But streaming works on much much tighter budgets, and three people going over it once is all that can be practically afforded without a massive increase in revenue from the streaming.

[False Dawn]

Originally Posted by Quarkboy

But sometimes it's not just typos, but revelations in the series itself that would cause one to go back and reinterpret something in a previous episode...
That's just unavoidable when doing translations in real time, and fansub groups had to deal with this sort of thing too.

That's why fansub groups always used to do batches when they'd completed a series - so they could go back and change things to fit what comes later. Though, it seems pretty rare to do that these days.

Kokujin-kun, I also have to echo everyone else's "What?" - I can only assume you're trollin' here because, from your explanation, it actually looks like you have an issue with the edit rather than the actual translation (you've gone literal, CR have gone liberal). I'm all up for a witch hunt as much as the next person, but if you're gonna bandy about the "mistranslation" tag, it'd be nice to have a bit more to go on...


EDIT: to illustrate the bit about reinterpreting previous eps, the one I remember most is when Lunar were subbing Bleach and they alternated between "he" and "she" for Yoruichi in cat form, despite the VA being clearly male. That came about because, inbetween episodes, the manga chapter where she transforms into her human form came out and that revelation actually made them change their subs for the anime.

[False Dawn]

To take this thread in a slightly different direction, I'm not sure Crunchyroll can beat the rippers, short of doing what Funi's done and start suing a list of John Does who download a specified episode release. I mean, the movie and music industries can't stamp out piracy and they have a helluva lot of dough to throw into that purpose - what chance does a niche streaming site have of achieving any kind of success when much larger industries have failed?


EDIT: Though, taking the thread title literally, Crunchyroll always beats the rippers because they release an hour after the episode is aired in Japan. There's no way anyone's ever going to be able to do that quicker.

[Kokujin-kun]

Originally Posted by False Dawn

Kokujin-kun, I also have to echo everyone else's "What?" - I can only assume you're trollin' here because, from your explanation, it actually looks like you have an issue with the edit rather than the actual translation (you've gone literal, CR have gone liberal). I'm all up for a witch hunt as much as the next person, but if you're gonna bandy about the "mistranslation" tag, it'd be nice to have a bit more to go on...

Oh, trust me, if you watched the episode itself, it is a major mistranslation, not an editing issue. My explanation of what was going prior to that scene probably wouldn't do it justice, but here goes:

A boy, Chiba, is tired of having to settle with just mildly ecchi scenes in mangas to fill his sexual appetite, so Futaba wants to buy him a real porn magazine. But because she's not eighteen, she decides to just draw a porn magazine herself since she is good at drawing nudes.

Of course she brings Shinya along as the "editor" and proceeds to show him the nudes she drawing in order to see if they are indeed arousing. Shinya suggests that having some of the nudes wear underwear would make them even more appealing, and Futaba agrees with him.

However, she finds out that she's is only adept at drawing nude women and not at drawing underwear on them. That's when Shinya suggests using real underwear as a model. Futaba, being a total airhead, starts to take off her pants in order to use her own underwear as a model before Shinya immediately stops her. Then, still confused, she thinks that Shinya wants to use Hitoha as the underwear model, which is where she flips her skirt in the first picture.

That is where apparently Crunchyroll translated Shinya's line as "She's not wearing any!" instead of "[Use] The ones you're not wearing!" ("you're" in this case being plural, but I guess if we want to get the point across better, it would be "the ones nobody is wearing!"). So it should be the latter translation that prompts Futaba to go to the underwear drawer looking for unused panties instead of the first.

In any case, it's the end results that matters, and right now people think Hitoha doesn't wear underwear (at least in that scene) even though the original Japanese suggested nothing of the sort. And like I said, if it was a clever troll, then I salute whoever came up with it.

[False Dawn]

Ah so you mean, it should be "Use a pair that aren't being worn!" instead of the line it is at the moment? I see. I didn't get that from your original post.

[Kokujin-kun]

Originally Posted by False Dawn

Ah so you mean, it should be "Use a pair that aren't being worn!" instead of the line it is at the moment? I see. I didn't get that from your original post.

Yeah, sorry ^^;. I thought it made sense to me who actually watched the episode, and I was too lazy to explain the whole situation in the first place.

[Daiz]

This isn't anything new. MX Media used to actively troll HorribleSubs by first putting up un-QC'd scripts for shows and then uploading the correct version a bit later after HS had already ripped it.

Though when you think about it, the only real effect it will have is that people will think "wow CR sure makes some TL mistakes" which'll probably just lower the changes of them ever paying for it at any point.

[jfs]

Originally Posted by False Dawn

EDIT: Though, taking the thread title literally, Crunchyroll always beats the rippers because they release an hour after the episode is aired in Japan. There's no way anyone's ever going to be able to do that quicker.

Except not always. In the case of Squid Girl, I saw people talking about a new episode a few days before CR got it, every single week.

I guess they can't get proper deals with the committees every time.

[Kokujin-kun]

Well, it's been a week and they haven't changed that line. So I guess it wasn't a troll :^\

[Quarkboy]

Originally Posted by Kokujin-kun

Well, it's been a week and they haven't changed that line. So I guess it wasn't a troll :^\

Have you sent in an error report?

[Kokujin-kun]

All right, done.