How to Spot a Bootleg

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paizuri
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How to Spot a Bootleg

Post by paizuri » Mon Mar 22, 2004 4:03 pm

Thanks to madmag9999 for suggesting this originally and Kai Stromler for typing out this descriptive post.
Kai Stromler wrote:This is why I keep saying we need a bootleg sticky in this forum, because every month someone mentions d*******a****d**.com [blocked to make things easier for the mods] and how they can get whole seasons for the price of a single North American release.

Well, there's a reason. The people who put out those box-sets are pirates. They buy one copy of the Japanese release, pay a guy in Hong Kong to sit around and do crappy translation (or if it's out in the US, they just rip all the content from a NA release directly) and make up subtitles, then send the data off to an unscrupulous DVD-pressing facility while another mafia employee pulls cover art out of his ass. The reason they can sell for so cheap is because they, unlike the official R2 producers, don't have to pay back the costs of making the animation, and unlike the commercial licensors in the States and elsewhere, don't pay licensing fees for the privelege of making money off someone else's work.

How to identify bootlegs:
* If the price is too good to be true, it's probably a ripoff
* If it's described as "Region 0" or "all-region", it's probably pirated; there are a few legit regionless or multi-region anime DVDs out there, but not many
* If there is no English dub track, and the subtitles are in Chinese and English, it's almost certainly a bootleg; there are almost no official licenses for anime in Chinese-language markets
* If the series is spread across half as many discs as normally found at retail (say, 3 for a 26-ep TV series as opposed to 6), it is likely not to be legitimate
* If it is indicated as being distributed by one of the bootleggers listed in the Pirate FAQ -- a good read in any case -- it is absolutely, definitely produced in defiance of the law.

Even Taiwan has now signed the Berne convention. This stuff is not legal anywhere. Don't support the Chinese Mafia.
Kalium also suggests reading this post here.

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madmag9999
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Post by madmag9999 » Mon Mar 22, 2004 6:30 pm

i've got two more things to add:
* if the pictures on the covers dont match.(find the title in a store and compare boxes and pics)
* if it ships from china (97% of all the media in china is bootleg)
so dont support the chinese mafia(drug and slave trade). and support the anime industry by buying the real deal
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Moonlight Soldier
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Post by Moonlight Soldier » Mon Mar 22, 2004 7:45 pm

Hmm also just read up on it to find out if a series has been licensed. I mean while walking around a convention the other day there was this booth that had the Inu Yasha movies and a bunch of Naruto dvds....the skepticism greatly rose...

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Propyro
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Post by Propyro » Thu Mar 25, 2004 2:03 pm

Moonlight Soldier wrote:I mean while walking around a convention the other day there was this booth that had the Inu Yasha movies and a bunch of Naruto dvds....the skepticism greatly rose...
yes, those were boot legs. If you looked at them it was painfully obvious. Like the fact that the DVD mattes were nothing but CD stomper labels, Season 1 of Invader zim on 1 dvd.

Plus if you looked at the covers they were printed with a regular color printer ... and the disks even said DVD-R on them. Also there are no official Naruto DVD's out in North America ... yet. Not to mention the fact that those guys were also selling a DVD of all the Final Fantasy X-2 cut scenes ... rather sad, all i got form them was a Love Hina mouse pad, which was also more then likely not an official product, but who cares.

[/|\]

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Post by Excalibur00 » Tue Mar 30, 2004 9:15 am

I really hate bootlegs, most are jus cheap copies that will never ompae to the real thing, though there r some that i applaud to because of how real the look.

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Post by Nestorath69 » Tue Mar 30, 2004 9:55 am

madmag9999 wrote:i've got two more things to add:
* if the pictures on the covers dont match.(find the title in a store and compare boxes and pics)
* if it ships from china (97% of all the media in china is bootleg)
so dont support the chinese mafia(drug and slave trade). and support the anime industry by buying the real deal

Now you listen here! I love my drugs and slaves!

On topic: You'll want to watch what you purchase online, then, because I bought a bunch of anime off of (insert website name here) and a lot of the information that you've provided shows that these are bootlegs.

:::Shrugs:::

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Post by OmniStrata » Tue Mar 30, 2004 5:54 pm

*Salutes*
I've spent sooo much money on legit stuff in anime that it sickens me to hear 'bout bootleggers and "hey, I got mine cheap" etc...

Digisubs exist for the sole purpose of "try before you buy". *my motto for eternity regarding this*

Good post...
definitely
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Sushi2
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Post by Sushi2 » Thu Apr 01, 2004 1:34 pm

Wouldn't it be possible to put names of websites down that are known to sell bootlegs as a warning for others?

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dokool
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Post by dokool » Thu Apr 01, 2004 1:42 pm

Sushi2 wrote:Wouldn't it be possible to put names of websites down that are known to sell bootlegs as a warning for others?
No, because then the people with less moral integrity would just go to the sites and buy from there =)

If you really want to know, ask people privately, but don't let a thread on bootleg prevention become a resource for obtaining them...

-DOKool

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Post by Sushi2 » Thu Apr 01, 2004 4:22 pm

Wow I feel really stupid for not realising that. It strangly did not occur to me that people would actually want to buy bootlegs...I was thinking about people getting ripped off. I would hate to buy something and find out it was a lower quality bootleg.[/b]

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