![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
halfcactusJust trying to keep track of various media culture news. I apologize in advance for all the internet drama I am importing from other platforms. 😂
Crunchyroll:
Crunchyroll has swapped Aegisub for Ooona as their subtitling tool. Reasons why this is causing outrage:
1) Ooona is a product of an Israel-based company
2) Ooona is the same software used for Netflix and Amazon subtitles. This means the subtitles are more, hmm, minimalistic? And lack the same amount of onscreen translation and styling that are standard in the anime community. It's also subscription-based (and cloud-based). From what I understand, the change in services is meant to make it easier to conform to Netflix / Amazon's subtitling standards (using one subtitle version across all platforms instead of converting from .ass), but a lot has been lost in the process.
Here's a detailed write-up about it, with plenty of screencaps and subtitle samples for reference. It's so long I never finished reading it. 😂
Several high-engagement Twitter threads have alleged that Crunchyroll now uses "AI subtitles" or "AI software". I haven't found any definitive info that supports that, but I've seen some Reddit posts/comments point out the use of AI in closed captions.
Twitter has rolled out a feature that allows you to see what country each user is based on (something that I think has been in c-socials for a while, I hate it lol). You can set your profile to display your continent instead. It was really noisy for a few days, but now the novelty seems to be gone.
OmO fictions: An international knovel platform for BL that uses """ethical""" AI translations (ethical in the sense in that they have the authors' permission to use AI translations, it's on the contract and all).
Ken Chu allegedly dropped from F4 concert tour: I didn't even know they were planning a reunion tour, but I guess that's the power of Mayday for you
Pocket Comics is dead and will be officially gone on Oct 31, which makes me sad because they're the only international platform I know that had Goldiluck (my fav manhwa!!!). Goldiluck is still up on a 🏴☠️ site, but that one's been under fire recently, so...
TIL Baiheverse is translating audio books and audio dramas, which I think is an interesting endeavor. If I were a Baiheverse user, I would try to archive the audio and video content.
Manta:
Ridi's Subsidiary Prodifi Launches AI-Powered Webtoon Localization Tool
+ November 2025 update:
Prodifi, the subsidiary of RIDI, has announced a service termination next month due to “internal service strategy adjustments.” (this article includes Lezhin's statement about its involvement with Prodifi)
RIDI is the parent company of the international webtoon platform Manta. The localization tool supposedly streamlines the process of adjusting typesetting (for speech bubbles, sfx, etc) and supports multiple languages. It is unclear to me how much auto-translation is used in the actual translation process, and with Prodifi's service termination announcement it's unclear if they are still able to use the software. I'm not tapped into the translated manhwa scene enough to have anything to say about the translation quality, but readers have been very unhappy with Manta's new pricing scheme and even unhappier with the recent AI revelations.
Subtitling controversy
Crunchyroll has swapped Aegisub for Ooona as their subtitling tool. Reasons why this is causing outrage:
1) Ooona is a product of an Israel-based company
2) Ooona is the same software used for Netflix and Amazon subtitles. This means the subtitles are more, hmm, minimalistic? And lack the same amount of onscreen translation and styling that are standard in the anime community. It's also subscription-based (and cloud-based). From what I understand, the change in services is meant to make it easier to conform to Netflix / Amazon's subtitling standards (using one subtitle version across all platforms instead of converting from .ass), but a lot has been lost in the process.
Here's a detailed write-up about it, with plenty of screencaps and subtitle samples for reference. It's so long I never finished reading it. 😂
Several high-engagement Twitter threads have alleged that Crunchyroll now uses "AI subtitles" or "AI software". I haven't found any definitive info that supports that, but I've seen some Reddit posts/comments point out the use of AI in closed captions.
From their Notion site:
We realized that relying exclusively on 100% human translation would prevent many valuable works from ever reaching global readers. But with recent improvements in AI translation quality, we saw an opportunity to address this challenge.
We understand that opposition to AI usage often stems from concerns about it potentially replacing human writers—and we feel the same way.
That’s why we explicitly inform all of our writers and publishers that use of AI is strictly limited to translation purposes only, never for creating original content.
And we’ve received full consent from all writers and publishers we work with.
We operate through 100% legal contracts with authors and publishers, and proceeds go directly to the authors. Constructive criticism of our service is welcome, but it should not distract from the importance of supporting authors legally. 😔
— OmO fictions_official (@omo_fictions) November 25, 2025
We want to express our sincere… https://t.co/TSs4WWbAPk
again, it's disgusting how even the *authors* know their work is being fed through AI. it's no AI until it benefits them a tiny bit https://t.co/4UA47MLQTT
— レン (@riamuyumemi) November 25, 2025
Controversy about AI tools
Ridi's Subsidiary Prodifi Launches AI-Powered Webtoon Localization Tool
+ November 2025 update:
Prodifi, the subsidiary of RIDI, has announced a service termination next month due to “internal service strategy adjustments.” (this article includes Lezhin's statement about its involvement with Prodifi)
RIDI is the parent company of the international webtoon platform Manta. The localization tool supposedly streamlines the process of adjusting typesetting (for speech bubbles, sfx, etc) and supports multiple languages. It is unclear to me how much auto-translation is used in the actual translation process, and with Prodifi's service termination announcement it's unclear if they are still able to use the software. I'm not tapped into the translated manhwa scene enough to have anything to say about the translation quality, but readers have been very unhappy with Manta's new pricing scheme and even unhappier with the recent AI revelations.
![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2025-11-26 04:47 pm (UTC)... also I've cancelled my CR subscription sometime back already due to one too many CR issues. Gone back to uh, traditional ways of watching. Because why pay when there's no respect for the medium? (The people who work there are probably fine, it's the higher ups who have zero respect and zero care).
Re: OmO AI translations
Huh, so authors are important, translators are not, is what I am hearing from what they say. Pretty much, they just want to earn more money while cutting out the payment to translators. Got it.
no subject
Date: 2025-11-26 07:03 pm (UTC)