Several major companies, including manga publisher Shogakukan (the original founder of Shueisha), will invest in a startup that aims to bring about 50,000 AI-translated manga to overseas markets.

Through a new report by Nikkei, a group including Shogakukan (Detective Conan, Frieren), the Japanese government's Japan Industrial Innovation Investment Corporation and eight other companies will invest 2.92 billion yen (~$19 million) into an AI startup that aims to translate over 50,000 manga titles using AI in the next 5 years. Manga startup, Orange, was founded in 2021 and includes manga editors, AI makers, game developers, etc.

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Manga startup 'Orange' claims to be able to translate a manga volume in just a few days

Orange claims its AI can translate manga in 1/10 the time of a purely human process, describing its method of AI translating text, followed by editing from the translator. The startup adds that a fully translated episode can be completed in just a few days. Orange partners with other manga publishers, and their AI-translated works will come to the US this summer via the upcoming app “emaqi.” Products will include manga for men, women and adults, with expansion into Spanish-speaking markets and India a key consideration.

Naturally, Orange's claims and methods will be closely scrutinized. The industry's strong push towards AI, with Crunchyroll claiming that it is “focused” on testing AI for anime subtitles, has been met with equally fierce and equally important backlash from fans are translators. Many translators claim they were fired and rehired under worse conditions to work with AI, even though the AI ​​translations were often poor, leading to professionals doing similar work at lower rates. less remuneration.

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Companies concerned about Manga piracy argue that AI can minimize the damage

However, Nikkei emphasizes the opposite argument. Japanese anti-piracy group CODA emphasized that the loss in the publishing industry caused by piracy is between 2.57 billion USD and 5.4 billion USD. A major factor contributing to piracy is the delay between releases in Japan and overseas regions such as North America, which was recently named a piracy country. world's worst comic rights in 2023. With many fans seeing piracy as a service issue, AI translations could mitigate this, making copyright scanning of websites less more feasible.

Source: Nikkei