Summary

  • Shogakukan launched Novelous app with manga titles on Android and iOS.
  • App uses AI-assisted translations partnership to cut costs in half.
  • Fans have mixed feelings about app, concern over translation accuracy.

Shogakukan, one of the major publishing companies in Japan, has launched a new novel and manga app in the US and Canada. It's available for Android and iOS devices.

Shogakukan is the publisher behind magazines such as CoroCoro Comic (in which most Pokémon manga are published), Shonen Sunday (Frieren: Beyond Journey's End, Case Closed/Detective Conan) and many others. Actually, Shogakukan founded Shueisha, so the two companies are part of the same conglomerate, but they mostly act as independent companies.

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Anyway, Shogakukan has recently released Novelous, an app with over 80 titles, including Kengan Ashura and Witch and Hound. Apparently, only manga titles are available for now, but the company plans to include light novels in the future. Users can buy coins (or collect free coins) to access chapters.

A.I-Assisted Translations Controversy

According to a report published by Nikkei last July, the app uses AI-assisted Japanese-English translations, in partnership with Mantra's translation system – Mantra is a startup company in which Shogakukan has invested. With this, Novelous would allegedly be able to provide a growing number of novels while cutting translation costs in half.

Mantra is the same company that has been providing AI-assisted translation for the English version of The Ancient Magus' Bride manga. As the company has positions for "Translation Post-Editor" open on their website, it's likely the translations are not fully made with AI.

However, many professional translators have claimed that editing content translated with AI might sometimes take more time than doing it from scratch, as the results can be highly inaccurate and require looking at the source material to redo the translation.

Fan Reaction to the Novelous App

The news was met with reluctant reception from fans. On Reddit, many are expressing concerns that the translations will be poor. Others are also worried that many novels that could be licensed by other companies will now only be available in the app. Many pointed out that Shogakukan has been reluctant to license digital content to foreign publishers.

Some of them disagree that AI translations are bad, though, with a few stating that AI would provide "neutral" translations, as they claim that translators might put "their ideologies" into the text.

Novelous is only available in the US and Canada.

Source: ANN