Inside Scanlation

immi: Hey, I'm immi. I mainly run MangaArt now, though I've been around as mainly an editor or QCer for other groups in the past.

immi: MangaArt started out as a mailing list founded by MiMi-chan some time at the beginning of 2002. She started "scanlating" manga with some people on there, but then they expanded to IRC and set up an official #MangaArt channel on May 24th, 2002. We've mainly been doing shoujo manga for a long time, with some smaller groups breaking off to dabble with other genres, such as shounen. Nowadays, while we still do a lot of shoujo projects, I try not to limit our projects to just shoujo, but anything that would interest our staff.

immi: I started scanlation as an editor with Endless Dimension because I wanted to work on Miho Obana's stuff (which was Andante back then) back around 2002, I think. I joined MangaArt a little later, so I guess I have been around with MangaArt since near the beginning after all.

immi: Personally, I think the scanlation community back then was a lot more lax. Nowadays, it's become more like a business than a hobby. From what I remember, there were few if any fights over projects back then. Perhaps this was because there were a lot fewer groups controlling the resources. Nowadays, it's like everyone and their pet dog has started their own new group, creating what I feel is a lot of small factions.

immi: I think the main problem we've had were during the transition(s) of different leaders and the loss of people as they all move on with their lives. We've been through 3–4 different leaders now, including me, so it's been pretty rough. So for me, when I took over/helped the previous leader, Siu, re-organize the group after a major loss of people, we had a lot of things to rework. MangaArt went through a major infrastructure overhaul you could say. But I guess it's actually not too bad being able to transition from one leader to the next. I know many groups have died out after one leader leaves, so I could say we're lucky in that sense, being able to survive all these years.

We've also stayed pretty safe in terms of doing licensed projects, so I don't think we've had any run-ins with the publishers. A lot of our projects aren't that main-stream anyway.

Added August 2009: We're actually going through another potential transition period as I start to move away from scanlation. In my spot, I'm leaving the group in the capable hands of Suyara. She's awesome, so we've always been blessed with great people/leaders! I'm sure MangaArt will still manage to survive many more years of fun!

immi: Oh, I like to keep all of my information on an Access database. This was how Siu, the previous leader, did it, and I just liked the way it helped me organize, so I stuck with it. If you're running a group, you should try it ;)

In terms of getting people to do work, I would bug everyone all at once, like maybe once a week or every few weeks, depending on when we need something/my own motivation level. Most of our staff who go on IRC regularly are pretty close, so it definitely makes things a lot easier since I would also talk to them regularly.

immi: Hm, that's hard since I haven't worked for many shounen groups (sadly). In terms of the projects or quality, I feel like there's not much of a difference besides the readership or genre of course. There are shounen groups that produce good quality scanlation, and there are ones that produce things that look like they were done in a minute. The same goes for shoujo groups.

In terms of the people, I'd say they're all about the same, too. There are both guys and girls working for both types of groups. And when people think "shoujo," they tend to think of maybe a bunch of fangirls going around screaming "kyaa" all the time or whatever, but I think that's not the case. There's no real sex difference, only maybe age differences.

However, when you look at the IRC scene, there's definitely a huge difference for both types of groups. Shoujo groups that stay on IRC and are big are almost nonexistent. IRC is pretty much dominated by shounen groups and the like. That, I'd say is the only real difference.

immi: Honestly, I'm not too sure since I don't follow shoujo much anymore. I think it does happen though. I know there's been a lot of competition between different shoujo groups for projects too. Some would do work faster, but at a lower quality, while others would wait and take their time. In terms of that, it's the same.

However, I don't think the shoujo speed scan scene is as intense as the shounen groups'. I know that for some of the more popular series like Naruto or Bleach, there'd be a dozen groups releasing the same chapter on the same day—the day the said chapter was released. I don't think any of the shoujo groups would actually do something like that, where they would release on the day it comes out...

immi: Haha, well, we've had a lot of hard times these past seven years, but we've also had a lot of fun, which is why we're still around. We're a pretty close group of friends, and I'd like to do what I can to keep it that way. I hope we'll reach our 10th year anniversary in three years and then... go on a trip together! Bermuda or Hawaii, here we come! But I guess it all really depends on a lot of things.

In terms of stories... I guess we have too many? We're really more like a group of friends than actual scanlation group, so we probably just hang out and talk more than actually do work (now you know why we're so slow). But we like to record everything stupid and fun on our quotes, so if people are really curious, they can check them out on our channel. Also, once in a while, I like to spice things up with random events/things to do together. You'll have to visit our channel to find about all the goods ;)

immi: I personally don't really follow individual groups anymore. I just follow some projects, a lot of which aren't even shoujo anymore. I guess the main shoujo group I know that is currently big is Aerandria. They seem like a cool group of people and they have a *a lot* of projects. I suspect any current shoujo readers would know of them.

immi: For groups that I've looked up to, they're mainly a lot of the older shounen groups. I've always been a fan of SnoopyCool and Null. They have great taste and good quality. I also thought Toriyama's World and MangaProject had some of the best quality works when they were still active.

immi: The main project that was really popular for our group was the Daa! Daa! Daa! series, which we finally managed to finish. I suppose Nagatachou Strawberry is now our most popular project.