Discussion Petition: No More Splitting Chapters

Discussion in 'Novel General' started by flowingcloud, Jul 22, 2021.

?

I support this petition.

  1. Yes

    83.6%
  2. No

    16.4%
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  1. flowingcloud

    flowingcloud Well-Known Member

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    I don't want to point any fingers here but I can't be the only one who gets pissed off when the translators split the chapters into parts, but don't indicate what chapter they are according to the raw.

    For example, Transmigrated into a Parvenu’s Ex-wife in the ‘90s. (I randomly selected a novel that abuses this "chapter splitting" I claim to be a plague of NU right now.) Clearly it states that there are "148 Chapters (Completed)" and "Divided in Translation" in the Status in CCO section, but how much has been divided up by the translators? I mean, currently there's 249 chapters and still releasing daily on the translator's site. According to the current top review at the moment of writing this petition, "the translator has broken up 6 chapters into 22 chapters". That's kind of ridiculous to know that one chapter can be split into roughly 3~4 chapters without us even knowing.

    Again, the previous novel was just used as an example and I am not shaming or calling any individual translator or group out in any way, shape, or form. I just wanted this issue and to see if I am the only one irked by this infuriating trend that has been ongoing for the past 1~2 years.

    I do not mind having chapters split into parts, but the translator (or group) should give us an exact indication we are in the novel. Splitting up chapters to make it look like you're releasing daily or milking out Patreon money really doesn't float my boat. Thus, I will now propose my new rules that I hope that Novel Updates will adopt if there are enough people who are annoyed by this issue like me.

    Rule: (Please suggest amendments to this if there are any.)
    Chapters posted shall adhere to the chapter ordering of the original source material. Chapters split at the translator's own discretion shall be marked IN the posting of the chapter title. Translators shall include the indicator of the chapter ordering of the source material in the title of the post, which would be reflected in Novel Updates automatic posting bot.
    Ex: Chapter 256 of Mushoku Tensei of the source material web novel split into three parts shall look like:
    c256 part 1, c256 part2, c256 p3 on Novel Updates.
    Ex2: The third chapter of volume 1 of Sword Art Online of the source material light novel split into two parts shall look like:
    v1c3 part 1, v1c3 part 2 on Novel Updates.
    Translators may also include the indicator in other places, however, they must have it reflect on Novel Updates, or else it is invalid.

    Please give your opinions on this topic, or if it was just me and I'm just being an arse about this issue. Personally, I find it rather disrespectful to the author to split the chapters into parts without putting proper indicators of what exact part of the novel I'm on, or if I would like to gauge how far the novel is before I start reading. For example, if I saw the novel only had roughly 30 more chapters before it was completed, I would probably wait until it's completed before I start reading, and vice versa, if there are plenty of chapters left, I would read since it won't be completed soon. Also, it is impossible to tell how far the translations have gone when the translator arbitrarily changes the novel chapter ordering.
     
  2. Zald Ecrofirt

    Zald Ecrofirt Well-Known Member

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    Its true that some do that and its annoying, but the division in parts in NU already exists for example : The Guild’s Cheat Receptionist
     
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  3. Megatron

    Megatron Decepticon

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    I hate it too, sometimes I like to visit the wiki for minor spoilers and the levels don't match up to the chapters, lmao. I don't mind the translator making a little extra on ad revenue, but I agree with you, they should at least do the labels correctly
     
  4. riririn

    riririn Well-Known Member

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    I don't mind naming names, so here's some groups that split and renumber chapters:
    • Sleepy Translations
    • ShainaG Translations
    • Fuyuneko
    • Fringe Capybara
    • Wordrain
    • Lunar Letters
    • Fans Translations
    From what I've seen, they will take chapters that are ~3k characters in Chinese (a very typical length of a chapter, translates to somewhere around 2k in English) and split it into three 1k parts that get translated. Frankly, if I see the novel is translated by one of those groups I just decide not to read the translation because I know the splitting is going to screw with the pacing.

    The problem I anticipate with banning this split-and-renumber system is that the renumbered chapters will get autoadded unless someone notices and reports the issue, even if it becomes NU policy not to accept renumbered chapters. I don't know how it could be made so that the bot would be able to tell. Edit for clarity: I mean if they were renumbering against NU policy with the hypothetical rule change, it would be hard to detect except with user reports.
     
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  5. asriu

    asriu fu~ fu~ fu~

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    oh this cat not mind split chapter but this cat hate the renumber stuff
    it bothersome to mtl....
     
  6. lnv

    lnv ✪ Well-Known Hypocrite

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    Yes, the renumbering stuff should be banned. It confuses everyone and not productive towards what NU stands for (which is tracking release progress).

    Though you should probably ping @Tony in the petition.
     
  7. AliceShiki

    AliceShiki 『Ms. Tree』『Magical Girl of Love and Justice』

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    Doesn't seem necessary. For most readers the number of chapters in the COO is irrelevant since they'll only look at the translation anyways, so the different numbering doesn't bother them in the slightest.

    And the translators probably do this kind of thing because they get more views if they pretend to release full chapters when they're releasing split chapters, so it's not like it doesn't make sense for them to do it.

    And lastly you'd basically need to put all novels with irky numbering on manual approval queue and have the mods check the raws and compare with English release... Absolutely not worth the mod time.

    So... Overall, while I get what you mean, this seems like making a Tempest in a Teacup... I get that it annoys you, but the issue is far too small for it to be a real bother for most users or require a change in NU policy.

    PS: Tony doesn't look at his alerts, so pinging Tony is pointless. If you want him to see this, you should report it and request it to be moved to the Suggestions and Bug Reports subforum.
     
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  8. lnv

    lnv ✪ Well-Known Hypocrite

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    It bugs people more than you think. Especially when there are multiple groups doing something, or if you are looking for raws or if you are trying to match them up with the manga and etc.

    Not to mention, the practice itself is deceptive.

    Uhm, pretty sure it is repeat offenders. So as long as people report it, it can be addressed quite easily.

    Then what is the point of the chapter tracking to begin with? Just auto assign numbers while at it.

    Allowing intentional deception for an index isn't a good practice. Even more so since 99.9% of the groups who do this are MTL anyways (with arguable if they actually do editing).

    Why, cause people keep overpining him? (to tease parth)
     
  9. AliceShiki

    AliceShiki 『Ms. Tree』『Magical Girl of Love and Justice』

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    People that look for raws are the vast minority of the community. I know that they exist, but almost all of them are either translators or people that wanna MTL... Both of which are a super small number when compared to the overall size of the community.

    Also, if multiple groups are doing something, then you're just out of luck I guess? It happens from time to time, but it's not that common anyways, since NU's policy pushes people away from competing on the same series.

    ... And I don't see how matching up with the manga would ever be relevant since the content of the manga is different anyways, so... Okay, I guess?
    Of course, yes, let's put more work on the volunteers when you don't know how much work they have or how much time each thing does, surely you are very capable of knowing if something is easy or not when you've never done it yourself... >.>

    I can understand putting more work on the back of mods for important issues, but this is a super small issue that affects a handful of people... And even then, all that it does is make you waste a few minutes searching the raws for what is the chapter you want... Absolutely not worth the mods' time.
    To link people to the releases of the translator in the translator's website, while also letting them easily know what was the last English release they read.

    The numbers themselves are irrelevant. What matters is that the link goes to the right chapter, that the reader can know the order that they need to read the chapters, and that the reader can easily remember what was the last chapter they read.

    Auto-assigning numbers wouldn't be feasible as translators can skip chapters, or they can start from the middle of a novel to pick up where another translator left off, or maybe they might retranslate stuff that the other translator did... It wouldn't work out properly overall, there are too many variables that could make it flop.
    The MTL argument is irrelevant. Also, if they don't edit, they wouldn't even be listed in NU anyways, so I don't see why you even mentioned the editing part... Nor the MTL part for the record.

    And NU is meant to be a directory of English Translated Asian Novels. Its purpose is linking readers to the novels and chapters they want to read, not to be an index that faithfully follows the raws.

    If you want to something that faithfully follows the raws, just go look at the raws themselves. NU has no need to do that to fulfill its purpose.
     
  10. Kumo723

    Kumo723 玄夜的帝后

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    I thought I was the only one pissed at this!! Especially the one with novel chapter split, I can't even find correct chapter on the Raw this way!! I'm totally fine if they don't released anything because I can wait but splitting chapters is really annoying. There are some translators that really hate reading from because they take up too many projects and they can't even handle the number. Thus they turn into splitting the chapters up. There is one certain translator group that take up way too many bl qt novels and its annoying cuz thats my favorite genre and someone couldve pick it up if it werent for them. Plus they DROP too many projects as well

    Dont forget the group i hate the MOST!! The bane of bl and i have a fellow friend that agrees too so i know its not just me. And oh yah!! Fuyuneko!! I hate this group too. Even worst than foxaholic!! They take up all the good bxg novels

    Im looking at u Foxaholic

    Dont forget the group i hate the MOST!! The bane of bl and i have a feelow friend that agrees too so i know its ju
    Actually quite a number of ppl look to mtl. Theres a real why mtl sites exist
     
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  11. AliceShiki

    AliceShiki 『Ms. Tree』『Magical Girl of Love and Justice』

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    Yes, I'm aware. That doesn't mean the number is particularly remarkable when compared to the overall userbase of NU... Because it isn't.

    And once again, it's just a minor inconvenience that will make you spend a few minutes searching for the right chapter.
     
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  12. Kumo723

    Kumo723 玄夜的帝后

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    U know many of us should several websites right? No its not a minor issue. This kind of things prevents truly relible translators from considering the same novel and like the op said, they're milking patreon money. I doubt anyone whos being a patreon is ok with this
     
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  13. lnv

    lnv ✪ Well-Known Hypocrite

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    By that logic, the majority of the NU community would have been fine with locked chapters as long as it was accessible for free. It got struck down despite already being implemented due to a vocal minority in NUF. So the precedence exists.

    So punish the groups doing it properly for the abusers?

    Not always, many manga have pretty similar content to the LN. And many mangas (at least korean) state what chapter it is based on in the novel.

    I've managed a lot of things so I am well aware the extra work needed and in this case it is quite little. It is no more extra work then reviewing any other complaint on this forum. And the complaint would be against a GROUP, not every single release.

    And once the policy is in place, less groups will be abusing it. The only reason this started happening was precisely because NU let it go. So more and more started doing it.

    Then is there a point in moderating NUF? NUF is a small community compared to NU. Let's not waste the mod's time for a small group right?

    But they don't know, because the numbers are wrong.

    You are talking about a small minority. Would be less work to auto-assign numbers /s

    The point is that they are in a grey area already of low quality releases. And doing this shady stuff on top isn't helping.

    So you are saying I can start an MTL with some editing, and divide up each chapter into 1 sentence/paragraph. Then claim each their own chapter and that would be fine? (it isn't against NU's policy)
     
  14. AliceShiki

    AliceShiki 『Ms. Tree』『Magical Girl of Love and Justice』

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    You may visit as many sites as you want, that's irrelevant. The issue still affects too much of a small amount of people and is barely an inconvenience on that. It's totally minor.

    Also, most translators won't bother with working on a series that has someone already working on it, it's not worth the time when they could instead work on another series. You're gonna get disappointed if you ever expect a novel with an active translator to get picked up by someone else, because there is just no point in doing so.

    And if you don't like supporting a given translator, then you don't need to subscribe to their patreon. As simple as that. Don't try to defend the patreons of a translators that are almost guaranteed to be fine with what said translator does... Otherwise, they wouldn't have started supporting the translator in the first place.
    What do you mean? Free chapters are listed on NU and paid chapters are not, this has been like that from the getgo, there was nothing being struck down, that's how the policy has been from the start.

    Do you mean the qidian adlock thingy? That Tony created a special filter that allowed you to see if a chapter was hidden behind an ad or not? I don't see how those two situations are comparable. Tony created a filter for people's ease of use when browsing Qidian chapters as they were in an unusual position in relation to the policy due to the being free, but not available instantly... How is that comparable to changing the policy when nothing is breaching it?

    To quote the Policy directly...
    Like, sure, adwall was only added there for Qidian, but that's because nobody did it before, so they had to decide on the spot where that fit into the policy since it was a confusing spot.

    Meanwhile, password protection with obvious passwords in the same page has been there for a while. I don't get this precedence you mentioned.
    The amount of times this comes into play are too small for it to be relevant. People don't compete for novels often on NU, especially not with novels that already have a steady release pace.
    Yes, pretty similar, not the same... You kinda proved my point there?
    Good thing you have plenty of NU work experience to know how the review process works and how many times they look over the same groups to compare thingies and making sure everything is alright~
    You're distorting my argument. Putting extra work on volunteer's back for an extremely minor issue is unnecessary and a waste of their time.

    Letting the same volunteers do the work they already signed up to do which happens to involve regulating the official place that people can discuss the site they moderate is actually a pretty important job OTOH.

    As I said in my post above. It's fine to give more work to mods for important things, not for minor and mostly irrelevant things that cause minor inconveniences for a small amount of users.
    ... I don't get what you're saying here. You mean they don't know the right order to read chapters? They do, the chapters are ordered, even if the number is not the same as the one in the raws, they're still in proper order.
    There is no Grey Area. Edited MTL is absolutely allowed on NU. Period.

    Also, you're not capable of judging translation quality without comparing the work directly with the raws. At most you can judge them by their fluency in the English language... And honestly, edited MTL is often extremely close in translation quality with human translations for as long as the series in question uses an easy to understand vocabulary that the MTL can get decently well.

    Obviously the translation quality argument doesn't hold for harder series, but then you'd need to look at things on a series by series basis. Webnovels in general tend to be pretty easy on the vocabulary and tend to not be too hard to get a pretty decent accuracy just from MTL alone.

    And lastly, the "shady stuff" is allowed by NU's policies, so again, nothing wrong with that. There is nothing that they're doing that "isn't helping". They're following the rules and doing things that work out the best for them while causing little trouble to a handful of users and no trouble for most users. That's fine.
    You're correct that you can do that according to the policy.

    That said, mods reserve the right to judge cases on an individual basis, and they have the right to reject your releases if they feel that's for the best to the site as a whole... So yeah, the one paragraph/sentence thingy would probably be deemed as trolling to try proving a point and be rejected.

    Like, common sense should apply and that doesn't need to be listed out in the policies. You're obviously trying to go to an extreme just to make a point, and the mods can just deal with extreme cases on a case by case basis.

    Or maybe it would just be accepted and that would be that, who knows?
     
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  15. Kumo723

    Kumo723 玄夜的帝后

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    Thats the problem. A translator wont pick up a project that someone else is working on which i mentioned!! These chapter splitters r a problem cuz they pick up too many projects tgen they can handle!! If they dont rlly want to translat, dont! If u do this prevents better translator that actually loces what they're doing from considering the same novel!! I would rather u not translate it and wait for someone else better to do it!
     
  16. AliceShiki

    AliceShiki 『Ms. Tree』『Magical Girl of Love and Justice』

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    Most dropped series never get picked up. You should be happy someone is translating a series you like instead of hoping the current translator drops it and a new one picks it up, because in most cases you'll just keep waiting forever.
     
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  17. Kumo723

    Kumo723 玄夜的帝后

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    Idk about the community, but rn ur obviously a minority in terms of nein or yes. Also ur works about the volunteer work makes me think u'd support maysims if u play sims 4. Ud probably defend her in saying, well shes volunteering to make cool mods for everyone. Will i have a word for both situations. If u dont enjoy it dont do it bc ur taking the joy out if everyone else

    Im not talking about DROPPED series. Im talking about series that dont have a translator yet. They r the ones with potential. I would rather unreliable ppl not pick them up since it cause me to discover it but never get it bc the translation is unreliable and it plants a seed of desire that never gets satisfied.

    Also one more thing, most of the times translated works gets lost in translation. They're literal and deliver tve intended meaning of the word cuz the englush language is lacking. If a chinese word means something different in japanese the translator might go with the Japanese meaning. Ive seen it happen. Someone translate a dog demon into a bird demon just cuz the word means tengu in japanese.
     
  18. Kaylee

    Kaylee Well-Known Member

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    If they split one chapter into 2 or maximum 3 chapters, I think it's still passable as long as the split chapters are not short as hell.
    What they do with the projects are not something we can enforce imo, if they want to milk patreon or they want view, it's fine since the readers there are fine with it.
    I do get annoyed, that's why I just mtl after I catch up with the translation or I stop reading those with more than 3 split chapters or 3 short split chapters.
    There are a lot of novel in nu that I can read, no need to torture myself with these.
    So, I dont rly agree with petition to force it to work out.

    But I wish the unspoken rule of cannot pick a project that alr get picked can be discarded.
    For example if the current translator is slow in up dating or only donig it once a month, if someone feels they can provide more good translation at the same time, and if someone wants to continue where the current translator stops. I wish they can do it without being scared of stepping anyone feeling.
     
    Last edited: Jul 23, 2021
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  19. lnv

    lnv ✪ Well-Known Hypocrite

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    The debate here isn't about not letting them split chapters, but about the naming of the chapters. Aka:
    12.1, 12.2, 12.3 is okay
    renaming them to:
    12, 13, 14
    is not okay as it confuses people and incorrect chapter numbers.

    As for groups picking up stuff others did, you can do that just fine.
    You either can:
    1) get permission from the other group
    2) release enough chapters to also become an active translator
     
  20. Rumby

    Rumby Rumbly Tumbly

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    I don't mind splitting chapters but it's just really confusing when tl just renumber / relabels it, especially when I want to mtl............ or another TL is picking up and/or doing same novel but relabels the chapters differently, so transitioning to new TL is not smooth.

    I remember getting pretty frustrated over catlovetowels https://www.novelupdates.com/series/suddenly-became-a-princess-one-day/?pg=8#myTable since the catlovetowels renamed parts as volumes & chapters; which did not make sense like suddenly v2c2 then next chapter is v3c2...... so I felt like I missed chapters but I didn't because the catlovetowels just splits & labels them that way.

    so I'm relieved other TL who picked up the novel started from beginning and just did numbered chapters, but definitely had to reread from beginning, because I couldn't figure out where I was on catlovetowels's translations and it was difficult to transition to new TL as a result. Felt like I wasted time as a result too >.<"
     
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