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Sakura
Con - Sunday - Fansubbing
 Anime titles
are being released in North American within a couple of years of their
creation in Japan. That might seem to eliminate the window of opportunity
that fansubbers have used to create their versions of hot series. However,
the fansubbers have adjusted to handle their work faster as well, said
fansubber William Chow. Instead of taking months to create a fansub, the
translations can be made in week or even days if the subber works hard
enough. |
 The difference
comes in personal computer technology. In the same way that the i386 has
been supplanted by the Pentium 4, software makes it easier to create the
fansubs. DVD's and huge hard drives also help, because the data from a
DVD can be "ripped" onto a multi-gigabyte hard drive and directly manipulated,
said Chow. Many anime DVD's already have timing information that fansubbers
can use to keep their subtitles in sync with the vide, he noted. And that
sort of manipulation means that fansubbers can make lossless copies and
burn them directly to DVD. |
 There's still
a question about ethics and fansubbing, since the fansubs are still technically
violations of copyright. Chow and his fellow fansubbers still insist on
placing "not for sale" logos on their tapes, and they remove their fansubs
from their distribution lists when the series are commercially licensed.
Acknowledging that some would like to see fansubs stopped, Chow compared
their distribution to the rise of music sharing series; while Napster might
be limited, others will pop up to fill the void. |
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