11 replies to this topic

[kethean]

I understand that a manga originally came from Japan, and the name is japanese originally.

 

But... I do not understand japanese.

 

I come to this site to access manga in a language that I CAN understand.

 

As an english reader, if a manga's name has a translation, then it makes sense for the translated name to be used.

 

If in some cases, the scanlator has specifically left a name that's halfway english/japanese, then fine I can get used to that as well. It's not ideal, but after a while you get used to it.

 

But as of late, it feels like a lot of titles have been having their name specifically changed from their longstanding ENGLISH name to a japanese name.

 

That is just extremely jarring and I don't see any purpose for it.

 

If it was the other way, from a japanese name to english, then yes, I understand that. If it was that the scanlator read somewhere that the author's intent for the title was to be read in some different fashion, I'd also understand.

 

But I do not understand the reason for, to name one title, "We Can't Study" suddenly had a need to be changed to "Bokutachi wa Benkyou ga Dekinai". As above, if it had been changing "We Can't Study" to "We Never Learn" which is also under alternate titles, I'd understand. But why Bokutachi?

 

If a title is going to become nonsensical (and it IS nonsensical), why not go the full way and make it "ぼくたちは勉強ができない"? It's just as unreadable, and at least it can be justified with "But that's how it was meant to be read!!!" (That's a terrible excuse, but at least it's one).

 

I mean, as with the partly translated names or the ones that never were translated, I will get used to it. For example, Tomo-chan has ALWAYS been "Tomo-chan wa Onna ko!" instead of "Tomo-chan is a girl!".

 

But I really do not understand the rationalization behind changing a manga's name from something understandable, that has been in use for MONTHS if not years, to something pointless, confusing, and jarring.

 

If you go to the scanlator's website, they themselves use "We Can't Study", not "Bokutachi whatever". So clearly this wasn't a scanlator request, which I could also understand (I'd disagree with it, but hey, they're the ones providing the translation service, I'm willing to bend over to keep getting translations for stuff I'd otherwise not be able to read).

 

So clearly this came from elsewhere.

 

So...WHY? Can someone please explain to me why we are having something so pointless occuring? Is there a way to revert this as well?

Edited by kethean, 17 December 2017 - 01:39 AM.

[svines85]

 

Look, don't take this the wrong way, but I'm getting the impression you're thinking this was some kind of institutionalized, "official" site decision.......and hey, I don't know, you're only giving a single example to begin with, and in that case maybe it was but I really doubt it........more than likely it was just some member changing it because that's the title they saw, like, every single other site using as the main title for it.

 

 

https://www.mangaupdates.com/series.html?id=139035

http://mangafox.la/manga/bokutachi_wa_benkyou_ga_dekinai/

http://mangapark.me/manga/bokutachi-wa-benkyou-ga-dekinai

http://kissmanga.com/Manga/Bokutachi-wa-Benkyou-ga-Dekinai

 

 

Batoto has always had problems with the  many ways that just about anybody can come along and change whatever information they feel like, I'd guess that's just what you're running into here.

Edited by svines85, 17 December 2017 - 07:08 AM.

[SushiAddiction]

For people who cross reference romaji is good. English names vary because of translation and makes it very hard to find what you are looking for.

batoto could have had a double entry for main title. Eng & Jpn. They do that on AniDB. Even then there is never really a official english title that be relied on. That's because even if there is an official english release the titles may not be updated to that name on reference and other sites. So then you are stuck with different english translations of a Japanese title.

You'll see in my sig below, I've made a huge list of Isekai titles. English names used on batoto wasted a lot of time referencing between baka updates and batoto.

 

Some people don't see/experience this as a problem and use the english title. If they did this on baka-updates the site would be very annoying and not really worth using unless there was no other choice.

 

Best solution is romaji. Then dual entry. Then selectable dual entry for those that don't care about maybe not finding a manga because of eng translation variations.

 

It has not been done the same way for decades without reason. Some people don't realise this and use english names. Some realise this and change the name back to romaji.

 

For accuracy romaji is the only way.

 

I've not found titles on batoto because eng name was used. Same with a few others sites. I don't use them unless I have to.

Edited by SushiAddiction, 17 December 2017 - 11:17 AM.

[kethean]

Okay so the reasoning is essentially indexing/consistency with other resources.

I’m more used to the translator or an official translation taking priority, but that sort of makes sense.

Does feel annoying when a name changes out of nowhere, but I did understand that it was a wiki style set-up.

For svines: I probably gave that impression that I thought it was official due to posting in support forum instead of general discussion. Perhaps that would have been the better spot to post. As noted above, I do realize that its an open contribution set-up and I’ve dealt with wiki edit wars before. I wanted to find out if there was a reason and perhaps if it WAS an official decision as I only did a cursory glance of the forums for the topic. Posting where I did seemed a safe way of seeing a response even if it was no more than “This isn’t an official decision”.

I chose one example simply because it was recent and I could point to the indexing used by the translating group, but didn’t consider other cross-sites and apparently the reasoning for romanji.

While I still dislike that style of indexing, I can see some basis for it after sushi’s post.

Anyway, I didn’t take it the wrong way.

I still stand by the idea that an english name makes a manga more accessible, but that would be to myself. A point I hadn’t considered last night when making initial post, batoto does also have multi-language support. In that sort of environment, sushi’s rationale works particularly well.

Thank you both for the insights from the other side of the fence.

[svines85]

 

For accuracy romaji is the only way.

 

 

Yeah, I think so, for the most part. The biggest issue here on batoto (regarding your "I haven't found titles here because...") is that the alt names don't reference in searches here like they do over on baka.........so yeah, romaji is probably the best way to go, or, at the very least, uniformity with what the majority of other sites are using as the main title.....not saying they're "right", just that uniformity is better in this instance.

 

 

 

Oh God, wiki editing wars, yikes, you had to remind me

 

Yes, it can get just like that, you usually see it with wars over the tags but it happens with the titles and alt names too.........and yeah, probably just someone thinking they were doing the right thing in most cases unless you think it looks like outright vandalism (which, yeah, plenty of that happens around here too unfortunately).

 

But I do agree with you, it's a pain to get used to one name only to have it changed, no argument here at all

[CucarachaEnojada]

Troll wizards did it.

 

Now,if only they use their magic to change the korean,chinese mangas names too.....

[Daktyl]

I'd like to point out that as long as the romaji/english name is in the alt names section of the comic page, it really doesn't matter what the official title is. Any searches for the title of a manga also searches the alt titles so they'll show up.

[SushiAddiction]

I'd like to point out that as long as the romaji/english name is in the alt names section of the comic page, it really doesn't matter what the official title is. Any searches for the title of a manga also searches the alt titles so they'll show up.

 

Yeah but not always easy to spot when you get many search results. I've also added 3 entries to Alt Names because nothing showed up in search. I'm sure I've still missed others besides and now I just read them on another site.

 

I would like dual entry for main title but I doubt that will happen. It would be good for those that don't like romaji. Translators rarely use english titles on covers so I can see searching by english title will become very messy. You can see that already with Alt Names. Which is the correct one.

[svines85]

I'd like to point out that as long as the romaji/english name is in the alt names section of the comic page, it really doesn't matter what the official title is. Any searches for the title of a manga also searches the alt titles so they'll show up.

 

No alt names ever come up in search results for me here on batoto, never have and I've tested it in the past..........just like I tested this one with the alt the op left, and like I just did it again,  which of course didn't come up in the search ("No (more) comics found!") and is of course right there in the alt names........yeah, it doesn't work, (at least not well, I suppose I'll give you that since I've no intention of wasting any more time with it) and it never has.

 

Batoto's search function has always been inferior and it still is. But that's not the point of this thread, so forget it.

 

Oh, I'll take back the "no alt names...", the Spanish language one will pull up a result, but not the English "We Can't Study" one. Nice >_<

Edited by svines85, 18 December 2017 - 08:26 AM.

[Daktyl]

Oh, I'll take back the "no alt names...", the Spanish language one will pull up a result, but not the English "We Can't Study" one. Nice >_<

I did some investigation. If you type in "We Can" it shows up, as well as if you just type in "study". It seems non-alphanumeric characters breaks the alt title search. Good to know! I'll pass that on to Grumpy.


As for the OP, the information on Comic pages is edited by users. Most likely people are coming from MangaUpdates or similar sites and just swapping the English and romaji titles to match other sites (romaji titles seems to be the default on many).

You can change it back to English yourself, but no doubt somebody will come along and change it back to romaji just for continuity's sake. I understand the changes can be jarring (I've put off reading chapters of series I like because I didn't recognize the name in my rss feed for instance), but there's nothing Batoto can do aside from locking the comic page from edits altogether, which only happens when edit wars/trolling happens as series are often updated with new tags, alt-names, summaries, etc.

Edited by Daktyl, 18 December 2017 - 08:51 AM.

[SushiAddiction]

I suggested to add a note on submission page that "for manga main title from baka updates shout be used". Waste of time.

 

I'm happy batoto exists but it has it's flaws. Owner-san seems indifferent to them.

If you know what greasemonkey/tampermonkey is, this and this make batoto a little easier. The rest you'll just have to live with.

Edited by SushiAddiction, 18 December 2017 - 12:48 PM.

[svines85]

I suggested to add a note on submission page that "for manga main title from baka updates shout be used". Waste of time.

 

I'm happy batoto exists but it has it's flaws. Owner-san seems indifferent to them.

If you know what greasemonkey/tampermonkey is, this and this make batoto a little easier. The rest you'll just have to live with.

 

Batoto still has the best reader of any of the composite manga reader sites (by far, and I still/always greatly appreciate that, no matter how snippy I might sound)........well, mainstream manga that is