CUFFS C&Ds TLWiki too
April 27th, 2010, by
Posted in Translation
, Tagged: CUFFS, Sphere, TLWiki, Yosuga no Sora
CUFFS sent a cease and desist letter on behalf of their Sphere brand to the TLWiki administrator requesting that the Yosuga no Sora translation project be removed. As such, the files have been removed from the wiki in compliance with the request. The text and translation of the email as posted by Moogy is reproduced below.
CUFFS ユーザーサポート <support@cuffs.co.jp> to moogy0@gmail.com
1:24amDear moogy0@gmail.com
I’m CUFFS’s staff.
I can speak English so little that I wrote in easy Japanese.私は有限会社CUFFSのスタッフです。
英語が話せないので、簡単な日本語で書きます。あなた方が公開しているプロジェクトの中に、私たちの著作物ヨスガノソラ(Yosuga no Sora)があります。
しかし、私たちはヨスガノソラを他人が公開したり、翻訳することを認めていません。ヨスガノソラ翻訳プロジェクトを中止して、シナリオスクリプトを削除して下さい。
ヨスガノソラのファンの誠実な対応を期待します。
—
TL:
I’m one of the employees at CUFFS. I’m not very good with English, so I’ll write this in simple Japanese instead.
One of our copyrights, Yosuga no Sora, is currently included in your open translation project. However, we do not permit third parties to publicize {files of, presumably} or translate Yosuga no Sora.
Please stop your translation work on Yosuga no Sora and remove its script files.
We hope that you will do the right thing, as fans of Yosuga no Sora.
Although suspicious, there is no indication so far that this move is linked to the Eden* translation project in recent days.
April 27th, 2010 at 4:31 am
ANOTHER ONE :O
the world is going to end, really…
April 27th, 2010 at 4:34 am
Arghhhhhhhhhh now all company start to acting up
I need to start learning japanese now dude
April 27th, 2010 at 4:48 am
The companies are merely asserting their rights to protect their works from piracy and unauthorized translations. Please stop whining like some toy has been taken away from you.
April 27th, 2010 at 4:49 am
the timing of the move is too suspicious for comfort, I wander if minori is using the “attack on foreign” erogamers as a selling point.
either that, or they have simply contacted other companies that have their TL project hosted by TLwiki and worn them about it.
either way, the fan TL community have stated that they will stop if they were ever asked to do so by the right holders. So far, I support Moogy’s actions.
April 27th, 2010 at 4:57 am
I’m starting to get worried… Maybe I should start downloading everything I can right now…
Or we could take a leaf out of their own books and make TlWiki inacessesible to Japanese IPs.
April 27th, 2010 at 5:03 am
boards.4chan.org/jp/res/4982525
current thread
April 27th, 2010 at 5:17 am
And the demise of the eroge fan translation scene begins.
In general, DMCA takedowns from foreign corperations have little actual power behind them. By taking projects down, it sends the message that they don’t need to care about the foreign market, and instead can make the “annoyance” go away with one quick e-mail. This is horrible because this gives little reason for them to care about the English market as well. If they see that fan translations will continue with or without their consent, they will then see it as lost revenue, and they will be more willing to get an official translation out.
April 27th, 2010 at 6:14 am
The more these companies push, the more these projects will go underground. It’s hardly the death of anything…
While these first few C&Ds might be a little harsh (I was waiting on ef), the T/L groups will reorganize and continue. Quality games will still be bought by the consumer and tripe will continue to be tossed aside.
April 27th, 2010 at 6:53 am
I am rather concerned. Visual novels are near non-existent enough outside of Japan as it is (apart from China).
3 times in a row. This is crushing indeed.
April 27th, 2010 at 7:20 am
Lol’d at how well received this was.
Proves that people just hate minori.
April 27th, 2010 at 7:29 am
>>10
Or that being cordial is the proper way to handle things. Granted, any Japanese game company now knows exactly who to email for C&Ds, because of the link on the front page of TLWiki added after the whole minori thing.
April 27th, 2010 at 7:29 am
Sorry if it is not okay to reproduce this at other websites.
I have reproduced this article at the Sankaku Complex forums.
April 27th, 2010 at 7:30 am
Those Minori bastards probably contacted all their Japanese brethrens and it seems the end of all translation projects is near. This is just sad.
April 27th, 2010 at 7:35 am
>11
No, or else minori won’t say they mailed mooky before vandalizing.
Stop sucking cocks.
April 27th, 2010 at 9:26 am
And stop talking like one.
I am amazed how some think that cussing and insults are going to help matters.
April 27th, 2010 at 10:12 am
This is how it should be done. A simple, formal, email. While its a shame they want to close the project the handling is considerably better than minori’s.
April 27th, 2010 at 10:15 am
>>14
Who’s mooky? ;)
minori did not make it clear who they emailed. I assume they emailed the project staff as opposed to the TLWiki staff.
April 27th, 2010 at 10:15 am
To everyone who says this is the demise of translations, just remember how the fansubbing scene has continued and even grown despite the objections of certain compaies with even MORE legal power (as American companies like funimation).
Although the activities may be illegal somewhere, they will just move themselves around and continue in some form.
April 27th, 2010 at 12:43 pm
Change group name, release on torrent/megaupload, only talk about progress or anything else on irc. It isn’t hard to avoid this shit, just get rid of your flashy “HERE WE ARE LOL” websites.
April 27th, 2010 at 1:14 pm
Yeah, minori emailed Neko, the contact for the eden* project, not TLWiki specifically.
April 27th, 2010 at 2:02 pm
I wish I knew Japnese, and could get out of Amercia, great so I can
only play Will and CD Bros games, I was looking forward to this too’
why do eroge comapnies, hate Amercia, expect CD Bros?
April 27th, 2010 at 2:08 pm
>>21
In the case of CD Bros, it’s because the company is mostly dead. :)
April 27th, 2010 at 2:58 pm
omg so the 2012 prophecy is truee… “EF YOU” minori…and your brethren.
April 27th, 2010 at 7:27 pm
What’s wrong with these people? I am very shocked with these turn of events… Sigh, probably I’ll just turn on to translated doujin games since there is no problem so far…
April 27th, 2010 at 7:53 pm
This is still better than minori and their childish edit war. Seriously, a proper way would be just to email (like this), but no, they had to delete everything and act all righteous. What a bunch of jackasses.
April 27th, 2010 at 8:33 pm
LOL of course the game developers will ask them to take it off if they saw their script files dissected into pieces and put up for the whole world to see.
April 27th, 2010 at 11:48 pm
Anyone thinking this will be the end of fan translations should look at fansubs. Many anime of the current anime have white text rolling at the bottom in the start, you know what it says, “don’t upload this to web” (or something like that). No fansub group has stopped subbing despite being told that the creators don’t want their work to be shared.
April 27th, 2010 at 11:50 pm
I knew learning japanese will come handy at some point~
April 28th, 2010 at 9:02 am
>>27
Fansubbers are almost never the ones uploading stuff to the web, it’s people in Japan itself uploading to Share and PD for their own benefit.
Other than that, though, you are basically replicating what I said above, so I agree.
April 28th, 2010 at 11:59 am
Do anybody sell translating konjaku? or was it konyaku? or kojaku?………. meh.. whatever
they’re just keep widen the gap between nihonjin & gaijin………
Omaera wo bukkoroshitakatta ano hi no natsu IN TOKYO!!!
April 28th, 2010 at 8:05 pm
Dammit, this makes me sad. I didn’t really care so much about the minori news, due to the trollish nature of everything going on making it seem unreal, their known gaijin hatred, and the fact that I don’t like their games at all anyway. But Yosuga no Sora was something I was really looking forward to playing.
Why, CUFFS, why?
April 29th, 2010 at 1:56 pm
these japanese companies are being stupid
they make money from the fans that are willing to buy import versions of their games people will pirate them either way
April 29th, 2010 at 11:56 pm
I’m not even sure if this letter here can be really seen as a “C&D” letter. This thing looks so different from every “normal” C&D you find in the net, especially being japanese, not giving any timeframe and whatnot.
But anyway, their message still stays. (As long as you don’t suspect some random support-member to write shit without consent of the others from cuffs)
It’s sad, really. :/
April 30th, 2010 at 6:57 am
>>33
Probably because the other ones you see have been drafted by lawyers. :D
April 30th, 2010 at 12:51 pm
Well, it seems, we’d better start learning Japanese, as I already do.
May 2nd, 2010 at 12:12 am
[...] the follow-up takedown request by CUFFS inspires me is something along the lines of “I told you [...]