AI VS MANGAS

France is the second market for mangas in the world, and as soon as a new manga is published in Japan, hundreds of teams of fanatics scan and translate it into French. They are called scantraders (scan+translation), are all passionate volunteers, and work in clandestine conditions via Discord, just because they love the genre.

They put their version online after hours of work and checks. If the manga is officially published, they delete their version and redirect the readers to the legal version. 

However, their labour of love is threatened by a new actor on the market: AI. Several AI manga translation tools have been developed that translate mangas automatically for free without the need for specialists. Or that’s what they’re supposed to do. 

Verdict: “At present, it’s shit”, says one specialist bluntly.

AI programmes are unable to understand the different TOV between characters, wordplays, and Japanese cultural references. What’s new?

For the moment, the scantraders carry on spending long hours into the night to the satisfaction of their readers. But the fight between human brains and AI has started in a domain dominated until now by fans. It is unimaginable that AI will one day equal the same level of skills and the love for the genre. Because that’s what makes all the difference. 

Like in any creative industry, AI is disrupting the order of things with dire consequences, see the movie industry and the strikes in Hollywood. Consumers are not dumb; the tech bros wish they could impose their vision and products on everything and everyone. It’ll be a while yet before they—and their robots—get anywhere close to replicating the human touch convincingly.