The Economic Impact of Manga Piracy | How Illegal Reading Shapes the Industry - video Dailymotion

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📉 The Economic Impact of Manga Piracy | How Illegal Reading Shapes the Industry  Manga piracy has become one of the most debated issues in the anime and manga community — but how much does it actually affect the industry? In this video, we break down the real economic consequences of reading manga illegally, from lost revenue and delayed translations to the struggle of smaller creators trying to survive in an increasingly competitive market.  We explore how scanlation groups, unofficial websites, and online leaks impact publishers like Shueisha, Kodansha, and Shogakukan, and why global demand for fast releases has made piracy more widespread than ever. At the same time, we examine reader behavior, the rise of legal platforms like Manga Plus & Crunchyroll Manga, and whether strict anti-piracy measures really work.  If you want to understand how piracy shapes the future of manga — both negatively and positively — this deep dive covers everything.  📚 In this video, we analyze:   The financial losses caused by manga piracy  How piracy affects authors, editors, and publishers  Why global fans turn to pirated manga  The rise of legal digital manga platforms  Japan’s anti-piracy laws and recent crackdowns  The ethical debate: access vs. industry support  💬 Do you think piracy harms or helps the manga industry? Share your thoughts below!

Transcript

00:00You love manga, right? But have you ever considered the invisible price that piracy

00:04charges your favorite artists and the future of the industry? Let's uncover the complex

00:08economic network of manga piracy, showing you exactly how it affects everything from

00:13your favorite series to the global market. The reality is that manga has become a cultural

00:17and economic pillar of Japan, and one of its most profitable cultural exports, but its industry is

00:23suffering extremely from the scourge of piracy. Despite manga's global success,

00:27millions of fans now access scanned comics online for free, resulting in huge losses for creators

00:34and publishers. In this video, we will explore exactly what manga piracy is, how it operates

00:39on a global scale, and quantify its economic effects, from the income lost by mangaka to

00:45the serious consequences for sales and jobs in the industry. Essentially, manga piracy involves

00:50illegally reproducing and distributing Japanese comics, usually without paying royalties to their

00:56authors. This often occurs when volunteers, fan subs or scanlation groups, purchase original manga,

01:03scan them page by page, translate the text, and upload the images to websites.

01:08WIPO describes this phenomenon as scanlation, the act of scanning, translating, and publishing manga on

01:14the internet, which strikes at the very heart of manga and threatens its very existence. In practice,

01:19it all started as an effort by fans impatient with the limited international supply, unable to read manga

01:25in the original language, many fans learned Japanese, bought the volume, scanned it, and shared it online.

01:32With the advent of e-books and tablets, this process became professionalized. There are now

01:36scanlation aggregator sites where thousands of complete episodes are uploaded for free download or

01:41reading. The scanners themselves earn income, they place advertisements on their pages and can redeem

01:47points for each download. In fact, there are more than 1,000 groups dedicated to this digital,

01:52cooking your own food, jisue, which makes illegal distribution a profitable business. In short,

01:58manga piracy has transformed material created for sale into a free resource for millions of users,

02:04financed by advertisements rather than legitimate sales. Manga piracy is not a phenomenon isolated to

02:10Japan, it is global. In recent years, anti-piracy groups have counted billions of illegal accesses to comics.

02:17For example, in 2024, the Association of Japanese Publishers, ABJ, reported some 1,332 websites

02:25dedicated to sharing pirated manga. Of these, 294 are aimed at Japanese audiences, 466 offer English

02:33translations, and 477 are in other languages, including Spanish. These pages attract massive traffic,

02:41in a single month, June 2025, 913 pirate sites recorded around 2.8 billion visits from users in 123

02:49countries, with a total of 700 million hours of reading. These figures illustrate the scale of the

02:55problem, pirate manga sites receive hundreds of millions of visits per month. In Japan, the 10 most

03:00visited pirate sites each exceed 100 million visits per month. In addition, illegal manga sites cater to a very

03:07diverse audience. According to a study by Kyoto News, the predominant language on these portals is

03:12English, 51%, followed by Japanese, 16%, while languages such as Spanish represent a small but

03:19significant share. Geographically, the countries with the highest amount of illegal reading time are

03:24Indonesia, 12.8%, Japan, 12.4%, and the United States, 11.2%. All of this confirms that manga piracy is a

03:34global, multilingual phenomenon, driven by readers in English and Asian-speaking countries as well as a

03:40growing number of Spanish-speaking fans. The economic consequences are colossal. A recent ABJ

03:45report estimated that manga piracy caused 381.8 billion in losses in 2023. Although this figure is

03:5320% lower than the 506.9 billion lost in 2022, it still represents billions of dollars in potential sales.

04:01In fact, the pandemic temporarily triggered a spike in piracy. In 2021, losses peaked at 1.019 trillion

04:09yen. To understand how the phenomenon has evolved, one need only review the annual estimates,

04:142020, is almost equal to yen 2.10 billion in losses, before the pandemic. 2021, almost equals 1.19 trillion,

04:23pandemic peak. 2022, almost equals 506.9 billion. 2023, almost equals 381.8 billion. This volume of losses

04:34equates to several billion dollars annually that legitimate creators and publishers are not receiving.

04:39To put this into perspective, the 10 most popular pirate sites in English alone represent 800 million

04:44dollars per month in free reading that evades payment, more than 9 billion dollars per year.

04:50And a 2025 study estimated that, based on the global volume of illegal reading, the rights affected

04:55amount to about 704.8 billion dollars in a typical month alone, projecting about 8.5 trillion dollars

05:02per year, 55 billion dollars, in manga and related publications. In short, the economic scale of manga

05:09piracy is enormous. As one analysis indicates, hundreds of multilingual fan sub-sites generate

05:15trillions, trillions, of yen in losses, affecting markets in Japan and around the world. Even with

05:21legal efforts and anti-piracy initiatives, the gap between free illegal content and official offerings

05:26continues to drain resources that could be invested in the industry. The direct impact of these losses

05:31falls first on mangaka, artists and authors. They are the ones who produce the original content and

05:37depend on legal sales and royalties per volume sold. WIPO warns that, rampant piracy, is making it

05:43increasingly difficult for manga artists to earn a living from their work. Many emerging mangaka

05:48receive only modest payments, illegal sales reduce official print runs, diminishing their royalty

05:53income. It is estimated that of the three 000 professional mangaka in Japan, only 10% can make

06:00a living from their comics full-time. Less income means fewer authors able to devote themselves fully to

06:06creating manga. As WIPO warns, if manga artists cannot make a living from their art, there will be no more

06:12manga. In other words, the creative cycle will suffer, authors could abandon projects, disappear

06:17after endless hours of work, or give up in the face of economic frustration. For the viewer, this

06:23translates into fewer new titles, rushed endings, or declining quality, long-term impacts that are

06:29difficult to reverse. Publishers are taking another hit. As legal sales decline, the income of companies

06:35that publish and distribute manga falls directly. In some cases, this has led to staff cuts and reduced

06:40investment. For example, a WIPO report notes that between 2007 and 2009, manga sales in the United

06:47States fell by 30%, leading one major publisher to lay off 40% of its staff. Although this case is

06:53historical, it illustrates how sudden drops in sales, in this case exacerbated by new scanning

06:59practices, can force publishers to cut costs. Lower revenues also affect the development of the

07:04industry as a whole. With lower profits, publishers have fewer resources for licensing, marketing, and

07:10producing original works. In the worst-case scenario, a successful title in Japan may not be licensed abroad

07:16because piracy reduces demand for official editions. In addition, the reduction in tax revenues from these

07:22companies affects the local economy. The publishing sector is part of a manga industrial complex that

07:28generates thousands of jobs, from printing to merchandising and anime adaptations, so its losses have

07:34repercussions beyond the world of comics. To counter these threats, major Japanese publishers have

07:39implemented countermeasures. Companies such as Kadokawa are releasing simultaneous editions in

07:45multiple languages in major markets, while Tezuka Productions offers legal digital versions of

07:50popular manga in English. The Japan Publishers Association has promoted legal initiatives against

07:55unauthorized scanning activities. In the West, manga streaming platforms, e.g., Crunchyroll Manga,

08:01Manga Plus, are also seeking to attract readers with official versions. These measures may explain why

08:07losses decreased 25% in 2023 compared to 2022, while search engines such as Google stepped up their

08:15efforts to remove pirated links. Manga piracy doesn't just hurt Japan, it has global ramifications.

08:21Since manga is a key cultural export, losses reduce the amount available to invest in new international

08:27titles, events, anime, and manga licenses in other languages, etc. They also erode the official

08:33translation ecosystem. If Spanish-speaking or English-speaking readers wait for free fan translations,

08:39they may delay or forego legal purchases, which in the long run makes foreign publishers more reluctant

08:44to invest in licenses. Remember that licensing manga takes months and money. On the other hand,

08:50the high demand for manga encouraged piracy in part because the official supply was not growing at the

08:55same rate. As Wipo explains, in the past many fans were frustrated by the inability to access the same

09:02content as their Japanese peers. That frustration led fans to translate comics that would never be

09:07released in their language, initially on a voluntary and enthusiastic basis. However, this fan response

09:13has become a serious plague that threatens the very existence of manga as a global industry.

09:18Consequently, combating piracy is not only a legal issue, but a necessary strategy to sustain the

09:24entire creative ecosystem. Today, piracy seems difficult to eradicate. Even with recent declines,

09:30there are already more than 1,000 active websites dedicated to this purpose. The ABJ report warned

09:36that new sites emerge every month, often reappearing with new domains to avoid shutdowns. As long as

09:42delays in official releases persist, many viewers will continue to turn to international fansubs. In other

09:48words, the gap between supply and demand will not close overnight. As the reports themselves say,

09:53it seems impossible that all the bleeding caused by piracy will stop completely in the coming years.

09:59In this overview, we have seen that manga piracy is much more than reading comics for free on the

10:05internet. It is a network that causes billions of euros or dollars in losses each year, directly affects

10:10artists and publishers, and ultimately can compromise the production of new manga. Recent figures prove it,

10:16around 382 billion lost in 2023, with global damage that could reach 8.5 trillion annually according to

10:24recent analyses. These amounts translate into fewer resources to fuel the industry, less job security

10:29for creators, and higher potential costs in the future. For manga fans, the call is clear, enjoying

10:35manga is compatible with supporting its creators. Accessing legal media, buying books, using official

10:41platforms, subscriptions, is the best way to ensure that your favorite authors receive fair compensation

10:47and can continue to create stories. By doing so, you help keep the industry healthy and thriving,

10:53rather than allowing piracy to undermine its economic base. In short, the economic impact of manga piracy is

10:59real and profound, and the solution begins with being a responsible reader who is aware of the value

11:04behind each panel.

The Economic Impact of Manga Piracy | How Illegal Reading Shapes the Industry

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