NNL Hates You

[Adust Wanderer]

Yes, unfortunately, leechers, NNL hates you. In fact they might not make the distinction between "bad pirates" and the site, so suffice it to say, they hate Hongfire (along with some other sites out there, but that's their business, not ours).

Which is weird right? Who would take the time and energy to hate such a fuzzy entity as a "site" which is basically a disparate number of people (most of them lurkers, I might point out) doing what leechers do -- leech? What has it got to do with them anyway?

We won't make a fuss about it, and so accept from the outset: piracy is bad. Of course, of that sentence "piracy is bad", "piracy" is a pretty easy term to understand in terms of digital property. "is" is just a grammatic connector linking idea and property. "bad" is what we might have some trouble with. It implies some sort of moral code which binds everyone -- something most people in today's society would disagree with. If you take a hardline stance, you might even say "piracy is bad -- but only from the point of view of the rich and the powerful". Certainly you are welcome to take this view, though I am by no means advocating it. This manifest will not argue against the maxim "piracy is bad", just so we're clear about it.

Fact of the matter is, from the time this community began to grow in size and popularity, we have faced hatred for doing what we do. We won't talk about the rest of the INTERNET DRAMA surrounding "moral indignation" about what we do here. But anyone who has browsed other "anime-related" sites and found the word "Hongfire" floating around will have a fair idea.

Recall for a moment, then, the time at the birth of Hongfire. Certainly, Hongfire started from a simple idea of a simple man, whose name now adorns our URL, our banner, as well as some other stuff. This man had some money, and he had a wish. He saw a need out there -- people clamouring for anime, and associated anime stuff. This was the time before SHARE, when WINNY was the choice of the elite. This was the time before Tokyotoshokan (though its predecessor was around), before DATorrents, before many many of those quality communities and sites we see today.

The predecessor of TT was similar to TT today, except that it offered anime fare. And anime was all the leechers had to leech in terms of English-language sites. The more savvy of the leechers, who desired greater things like games, game-related things, and anime-spinoff things, and doujins, and weird pornographic non-mainstream anime and various strange things from Japan, had to go through Japanese sites, Chinese sites, and the god who eats bandwidth for breakfast and hard disk space for lunch, Winny.

Then, the man called Hongfire gathered a bunch of followers, and he started the first incarnation of the Hongfire site. These followers, and those who followed them, began the less-than-glorious task of taking material from Winny, and in their own time putting it into torrents, making it available for the English speaking community. It was not an original idea -- people have been doing it on and off. But the concerted effort of those early founders, and the general atmosphere of the site, combined with the demand for such material on the Internet, sparked off the success of this site, and certainly changed the nature of the material leeched by the online anime community quite a bit. There was more choice now, and the barriers to Japanese culture had been further lowered.

In a way, what Hongfire and his early followers did could be likened to the Promethean myth -- taking fire from the gods, and giving it to the masses. Fire can both illuminate and burn, and this site did get burnt a couple of times.

But in the background of all these, there were various small communities of people interested in "bishoujo games" (which may or may not be hentai in nature). These were hardcore fans who hacked into the Japanese games, took out the data, and spent months if not years translating them, then reintegrated them into the games. These were also ones who translated and subtitled game trailers -- something no one else in the main anime community were doing. These communities were quite small, and to avoid mincing words, we will also say that the material they were releasing, though of high technical standards, were a trickle.

Make no mistake. These groups were present before Hongfire came into existence. They have continued with their work in the midst of everything, and today they still exist, producing their quality stuff. They are to be applauded for their dedication and work. Their technical expertise and their willingness to endure long hours of work for what they love is admirable indeed.

But perhaps not surprisingly, some within those communities had over the years developed an advanced form of elitism. They had somehow become the gatekeepers of Japanese bishoujo games culture, and Hongfire's Promethean ruse riled them to no end. Perhaps it was because what was once contained in their own little community had been blown wide open for the masses to get at. Perhaps it was the same panic that subcultures feel when they've become recognised and brought into the mainstream. The need to differentiate between "us, hardcore longstanding elite keepers of this stuff" and "you, immoral profiteering muck-raking pirates taking advantage of our precious subculture, sultifying it, making it a popular whore".

Given the above explanation, it would be of no surprise to anyone to hear of this community described as "a hellhole choked with scum", "shady" and other quite emotive phrases which cast this site in a negative light. In short, Hongfire has become the icon of the evil, unthinking masses, to be fought against by the shining knights, in a desperate bid to save their beloved.

We respect the efforts of such groups to preserve some kind of firm stance on this issue. But we believe it has more to do with moral posturing and elitism than any other motive, despite what they claim. Certainly, the hard work put into such things should not be underestimated, and we advise the leechers that sometimes there is no such thing as a free lunch. If you wish to leech fast and hard, you might have to put up with the fact that you have to play the game in Japanese. It comes with the territory.

Fact of the matter is, the methods suggested by these groups for "authentication purposes" are such an invasion of privacy and property that they go beyond the Sony rootkits, and certainly beyond such things as Windows Genuine Advantage technology. At last report, it required a gruelling answer to 10 timed questions, and 3 photographs, including one of the purchaser, the destruction of the customer feedback card, and the destruction of a support disc. Certainly if I bought the game, the last step of actually destroying a physical part of the game (despite that part being "useless") would be the greatest hurdle. No self-respecting person who has spent ~8000 yen on a game and shipped it over to their part of their world, would feel no pain at having to snap and break part of it. It certainly seems like they are saying "we want a piece of your soul for this patch".

It would be so much easier if they asked for 2 dollars to be sent to them via Paypal for every copy of the patch, with the money going directly to pay server bills, or to minori, etc. Certainly this would deter leechers below appropriate age (who shouldn't be playing H-games in any case), as well as most leechers who plain refuse to pay for stuff. In fact, it might even have the same effectiveness in filtering out "the scum". But it is not the purpose of this manifest to suggest such methods to these groups.

What is perhaps most disturbing about this recent development in events is the fact that these groups have abandoned any and all pretense that they are anything more than fans. It is the choice of fans if they wish to produce material for other fans to leech. It is also their choice to NOT produce this material. But fans do not tell other fans what to do. Fans do not dangle a piece of carrot in front of other fans and have them engage in a circus games of jumping through hoops in order to get at it. Fans do not have some kind of privilege over other fans in getting to see their full body shot, in getting other fans to break their own property. The game is not your intellectual property even if the patch is. Note that this manifest attacks not the moral principle behind anti-pirating stances. Instead it attacks the way such proponents are attempting to impose their will upon others, and the nature of the methods they are using. Seen in this light, it seems the actions of these groups have more to do with control and maliciousness than any kind of moral stance against piracy.

Hongfire is not a perfect site. It does not pretend to be. It does not pretend that some elements of it are 'immoral' or 'unethical'. But just because it is of this nature does not make the actions of these groups any more moral. Fan groups who have ceased to act in the manner of fan groups should rethink their position and viability as such a group. A commercial approach might be more suitable for such purposes.

No doubt, some might be tempted to use this manifest as an excuse to shut down their group, take down translations, etc, in a malicious attempt to have fans attack the site in which this is posted. Certainly this sort of thing has been done before. These kamikaze-type actions might seem heroic, but they reveal true intentions against the general fan community, where one would risk severely damaging the community for personal enjoyment and justification. Remember, this manifest is posted on another site. It is merely a piece of opinion. Any responsibility for or decision to take subsequent actions remain in the hands of group owners alone.

[Conrad]

Arrr...

Nice writing about the overall situation and history of fansub, piracy, torrents, Hongfire, mainstream and elistism bundled into one!

For me leeching and sharing subbed film and japanese games is not considered piracy. As it is only for personal use, and fer people who can't afford imported stuff. Getting decent anime title from store is pretty hard in here Western society. Dubbed stuff tend to be very poor.

Fer me a real piracy on the other hand. When ye start to copy and sell what ye leeched. Now that is illegal.

[Atachi]

behhh... all those others are just jelous, that we - who started as a small H-community - became one of the biggest Anime-forums


and yes, we do have a lot haters (mostly in the leading staff of other sites), but it's the users who love us - who cares about leaders that have their own site anyways - we don't need them to love us. they'll notice they can rant as much as they want once they look at their usercount

and yes, we are against elitism! (except some small one)
We are pirates - and the idea of elitism conflicts - information is ought to be for everyone, not only for a small group of elitists!


(but yes, "piracy is bad" but there are different kinds of piracy)

[Lisa Hayes]

lovely piece of work. subtle and yet, direct.

and, yes, HongFire is not perfect, for the ideals are different for each and every individual who visits the site. So, its best described as a conglomeration of different ideals between members of similar tastes.

btw, who or what is NNL?

[Conrad]

Yarrrr....

I wasn't aware that someone hate this site. The community here is pretty good, and without much restriction unlike certain torrent site.

Yeah who is NNL anyway?

[icie]

http://www.visualnews.net/?id=news

Read from 'fighting piracy' news item upwards.

[chompy]

Only thing i find remotely interesting in that piece was the choice of "hates you" as opposed to "hates us".
subtle.

[Atachi]

icie, thanks for the link


damn... now i at least know what they are talking about

and well... they didn't understand the process and background of "fansubbing" (or in this case "fantranslation") at all... charging for a translation? PISS OFF!

if they want to make money out of it, make donations!

fansubbing/fantranslate is to contribute to the community, not for ego or money

and well someone buys their patch and then it'll get torrented anyways *lol

[Village Idiot]

icie, thanks for the link


damn... now i at least know what they are talking about

and well... they didn't understand the process and background of "fansubbing" (or in this case "fantranslation") at all... charging for a translation? PISS OFF!

if they want to make money out of it, make donations!

fansubbing/fantranslate is to contribute to the community, not for ego or money

and well someone buys their patch and then it'll get torrented anyways *lol

You mis-read it.

They never asked for a donation, they asked that you buy the actual game.

[aegisol]

They are not asking for money for the patch, they are asking for people to buy the game and provide proof that they do indeed own the game. Simple and noble, right?

The thing that some people are enraged about is the number of hoops that NNL "requests" be done before they will transmit the patch, particularly the part about having to physically and irreparably damage items included in their $80-odd purchase, even though they are "unneeded." For others the part that goes too far is the requirement for a full body picture of the person holding the items they own.

I support the purchase of visual novels, but I do not support the lengths that NNL asks people to go through. There is a line between sanity and zealotry.