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Why did Crunchyroll's subtitles just get worse?

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Re: Why did Crunchyroll's subtitles just get worse?

#221

Post by braiamp »

Pikamander2 wrote: post #199

> Multiple overlapping speakers are represented on the top and bottom of the screen. > This level of attention to detail makes for a better viewing experience Quality concerns aside, I've always disliked having text on the top and bottom of the screen simultaneously. My eyes are focused on the bottom of the screen, so I sometimes don't even realize that there's text at the top and have to pause/rewind to figure out w…

The top one is usually a background speaker, and not the focus of the scene. It is extremely rare that directors do that anyways.

Re: Why did Crunchyroll's subtitles just get worse?

#222

Post by perching_aix »

akimbostrawman wrote: post #218
perching_aix wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Extremists gotta extremize, right? They couldn't stop themselves from tainting their work with their beliefs, you cannot stop yourself from taking the few times this happened and magnifying it, as if it was predominant, and then reacting to it viscerally, even years down the line under no emotional pressure to do so. And then even with all that additional capacity at hand, the proposed solution is replacing the rarel…

It is not only a few times. I watch multiple shows every season for close to a decade and at this point it is the exception when most of them aren't butchered by political or "comedic" mistranslation. If I have to choose between funding political zealot humans and political zealot AI, I pick the later. At least AI aren't boasting and insulting there customer on social media about "fixing" art for the greater good. ht…

I also watch like half a dozen shows every season, and have been for more than a decade too. Pretty much the only scandal I actively recall is the Dragon Maid one, and even that was so long ago that at this point you could convince me that was the dub not the sub being "creative". Even saying "a few times" is just me granting the idea validity, rather than me actually remembering more.

That link is exclusively about manga translations at a skim btw, which I'll admit I know nothing about. Stopped reading any a long time ago.

> At least AI aren't narcissistically spitting in your face when circle jerking on social media about "fixing" art for the greater good.

Isn't this also a voice actor thing? I mostly remember these with regards to EN gacha game voice actors (US EN specifically).

Re: Why did Crunchyroll's subtitles just get worse?

#223

Post by Cthulhu_ »

bonecrusher2102 wrote: post #22

Hah, this is my time to shine. I worked in anime subtitling and timing for a number of years. I helped write our style guide — things like how to handle signs, overlapping dialogue, colors etc. It wound up being quite a large document! But the thing to realize here is that, all of these subs have to be placed by hand. There are AI tools that can help you match in and out times, but they have a difficult time matching…

I don't get it - these shows and their subtitles get streamed tens of millions of times across decades, but 4 hours per episode is too expensive?

I mean I guess there's a very long tail of mediocre shows as well that get thousands of streams at best, but still.

Re: Why did Crunchyroll's subtitles just get worse?

#224

Post by akimbostrawman »

perching_aix wrote: post #222
akimbostrawman wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is not only a few times. I watch multiple shows every season for close to a decade and at this point it is the exception when most of them aren't butchered by political or "comedic" mistranslation. If I have to choose between funding political zealot humans and political zealot AI, I pick the later. At least AI aren't boasting and insulting there customer on social media about "fixing" art for the greater good. ht…

I also watch like half a dozen shows every season, and have been for more than a decade too. Pretty much the only scandal I actively recall is the Dragon Maid one, and even that was so long ago that at this point you could convince me that was the dub not the sub being "creative". Even saying "a few times" is just me granting the idea validity, rather than me actually remembering more. That link is exclusively about…

>only scandal I actively recall is the Dragon Maid one

Then you have not paid attention at all. Almost every season there is a case like this same with LNs and VNs to a point where it's not even news worthy anymore.

> I mostly remember these with regards to EN gacha game voice actors

No there are multiple people that are infamous anime localizers that are gloating on Twitter how they fix anime by pushed there political agenda, anybody engaging with the medium beyond surface level would know.

Re: Why did Crunchyroll's subtitles just get worse?

#225

Post by lasc4r »

onoesworkacct wrote: post #42
bonecrusher2102 wrote: post #22

Hah, this is my time to shine. I worked in anime subtitling and timing for a number of years. I helped write our style guide — things like how to handle signs, overlapping dialogue, colors etc. It wound up being quite a large document! But the thing to realize here is that, all of these subs have to be placed by hand. There are AI tools that can help you match in and out times, but they have a difficult time matching…

How many customers watch each episode of popular shows? 100k+? And we're talking a difference of ~7 hours of labor. $200 difference at most?

Reminds me of products on Amazon with little to know information about the product and photoshopped images. Somehow it was worth making, but selling? Who can be bothered.

Re: Why did Crunchyroll's subtitles just get worse?

#226

Post by IshKebab »

makeitdouble wrote: post #32

I really wish we could have had a subs/dubs marketplace. There was no way to make it a proper business when anime was becoming popular on the net, but it would solve an infinite number of problems. Could it be done now that the distribution channels are more mature in Japan ? - Japanese distributors wouldn't need middle-men for airing their shows abroad. They'd just stop region gate it and let fans inject the transla…

You couldn't do this legally without cooperation from the license holders, and good luck with that.

Re: Why did Crunchyroll's subtitles just get worse?

#228

Post by DoneWithAllThat »

This is a random aside but somewhere I have some slightly obscure early 2000s anime with fan subs, and in one of them they accidentally left an additional “working notes” subtitle track that I find fascinating. It basically has all the little messages between the participants discussing whether a given translation is accurate or should be changed, alternative ideas, disagreements over proper translation, etc. It really illustrates how subtitling is nowhere near an exact science and oftentimes whether a given translation is the best is highly subjective. You basically need to be a good writer to be a good translator.

Re: Why did Crunchyroll's subtitles just get worse?

#229

Post by perching_aix »

akimbostrawman wrote: post #224
perching_aix wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also watch like half a dozen shows every season, and have been for more than a decade too. Pretty much the only scandal I actively recall is the Dragon Maid one, and even that was so long ago that at this point you could convince me that was the dub not the sub being "creative". Even saying "a few times" is just me granting the idea validity, rather than me actually remembering more. That link is exclusively about…

>only scandal I actively recall is the Dragon Maid one Then you have not paid attention at all. Almost every season there is a case like this same with LNs and VNs to a point where it's not even news worthy anymore. > I mostly remember these with regards to EN gacha game voice actors No there are multiple people that are infamous anime localizers that are gloating on Twitter how they fix anime by pushed there politic…

> anybody engaging with the medium beyond surface level would know.

I'll readily admit to not caring about the people or the process behind how anime are made. I consider that a separate side of the hobby entirely. It is an unfortunate side effect of social media that I can less and less ignore these aspects, including VAs blackwashing characters and other utterly puzzling antics. It's not something I seek out myself, I watch the shows for themselves. 0% apologetic about this too

That said, if there's such an influence on the translations, I'd prefer to be rid of it of course. Which brings us to...

> Then you have not paid attention at all. Almost every season there is a case like this

That is entirely possible. Do you maybe have like a short list of examples? From the last few seasons then, at least a handful. Cause "infamous anime localizers that are gloating on Twitter how they fix anime by pushed there political agenda" sounds very readily bad, and yet a quick search (via AI, of course) left me completely empty handed beyond the high profile case of "Dragon Maid", and the lesser but still talked about "My first girlfriend is a gyaru" (which didn't do much other than namedropping SJWs iirc, a now outdated term).

Re: Why did Crunchyroll's subtitles just get worse?

#230

Post by Retric »

Loocid wrote: post #103
programjames wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the take is: If 100k people watch the episode, spending $200 more for higher quality subtitling comes out to... a whopping 0.2 cents per person (per episode). Let's just say that would cost an extra $1/month per person. Are they price sensitive enough that they won't go to a competitor that's a few dollars more expensive per month if it has better subtitles? I don't know, but maybe some manager believed they…

$1/month extra cost on $16/month of revenue is very significant though.

1$/month was just wildly off.

They have 17 million paying subscribers. If they subtitled 1,000 episodes of content a month * 200$ = 200k / 17 million ~= 1 cent per subscriber per month. Actual cost per subscriber is well below that.

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