One Piece More: World War Manga

Recently, the manga scanlation group, Mangastream has announced that they will discontinuing their translation of all Viz licensed properties. Among the long list of titles included was One Piece. What is the reason for stopping their scanlating of these series? It was a request by Viz Media.

Fans of Mangastream exploded with cries against Viz. Some had stated why they believe Viz is against the fans and comparing them to unfavorable organizations. There are others who have brought up many good reasons why Viz's Shonen Jump Alpha isn't a perfect product while others have stated the same about Mangastream.

I could go into a long explanation about why scanlation groups such as Mangastream are hurting the US and Japanese manga industries in the long run. Instead, I am going to direct you to an article that Tsukento wrote. He has brought up a number of facts that fans should remember such as: 

"Viz is a business. They have Shueisha breathing down their necks on making sure they don’t screw this up and to make sure they try killing off as much rampant piracy as possible. They kinda have to keep your money in their interest. It’s not like they don’t take an interest in the fans, either. After all, we did get an entire Shonen Jump dedicated to the fans. Yeah, they still need some kinks to work out with everything."
-Tsukento

The attitude that most fans have is that Viz has no right to do what they are doing. Viz has paid to publish these titles in the United States and at the end of the day they have to make money. Viz and many manga companies in the United States have gone above and beyond what normal companies do for their fans. Shonen Jump Alpha is a result of Viz's attempt to cater to the fans. While SJA isn't perfect, it is a step in the right direction and more than anything I expect a Japanese company to agree to.

You can read Tsukento's full article here.

Zach of the One Piece Podcast has also wrote something which can be found here.