{"id":46141,"date":"2025-03-26T18:16:52","date_gmt":"2025-03-26T09:16:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/?p=46141"},"modified":"2025-03-26T18:16:54","modified_gmt":"2025-03-26T09:16:54","slug":"japanese-archive-of-out-of-print-manga-crowdfunded-back-into-existence-following-visa-and-mastercard-suspensions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/japanese-archive-of-out-of-print-manga-crowdfunded-back-into-existence-following-visa-and-mastercard-suspensions\/","title":{"rendered":"Japanese archive of out-of-print manga crowdfunded back into existence following Visa and Mastercard suspensions\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

J-Comic Terrace Corporation has announced that Manga Library Z<\/strong> will officially re-launch on April 25, 2025, thanks to a successful crowdfunding campaign to revive the platform. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Manga Library Z (previously J-Comi) is an online manga archive originally launched in 2010 by Love Hina manga artists and politician Ken Akamatsu. The platform was created to help preserve old and out-of-print manga titles in digital format. All manga on the archive was hosted for free with permission from the original artists and publishers, with an ad revenue- and premium subscription-based system in place to compensate artists financially. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, in November last year, Manga Library Z announced that it would be shutting down<\/a> after 14 years of service. Due to the platform hosting adult manga (among other genres), their payment processors abruptly terminated payment contracts, and credit card payments were suspended on the site. This apparently happened despite Manga Library Z complying with \u201can international credit card brand\u2019s request that we suspend the distribution of works containing specific words.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Manga<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

As a result, the archive was left without a stable source of revenue to return to its contributing manga artists and thus decided to shut down, with a promise of returning<\/a> once an alternative was found. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fortunately, thanks to a successful crowdfunding campaign hosted on Motion Gallery<\/a>, Manga Library Z will be reopening. The campaign started in early February and has since amassed over 8.8 million yen (around $60k USD), surpassing its original target of 3 million yen by a large margin. The site is expected to be up and running in late April. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Related Articles: 
Manga Planet loses support from payment provider for providing mature content<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Credit card restrictions are spreading even to Japanese platforms for women\u2019s adult content, including audio dramas and BL doujinshi<\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The digital manga archive Manga Library Z is officially coming back in April 25, after readers crowdfunded its re-launch.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":55,"featured_media":46143,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_gspb_post_css":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3,65],"tags":[17],"class_list":["post-46141","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-nongaming-news","tag-japan-related-news"],"blocksy_meta":[],"yoast_head":"\nJapanese archive of out-of-print manga crowdfunded back into existence following Visa and Mastercard suspensions\u00a0 - AUTOMATON WEST<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The digital manga archive Manga Library Z is officially coming back in April 25, after readers crowdfunded its re-launch.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/japanese-archive-of-out-of-print-manga-crowdfunded-back-into-existence-following-visa-and-mastercard-suspensions\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Japanese archive of out-of-print manga crowdfunded back into existence following Visa and Mastercard suspensions\u00a0 - AUTOMATON WEST\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The digital manga archive Manga Library Z is officially coming back in April 25, after readers crowdfunded its re-launch.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/japanese-archive-of-out-of-print-manga-crowdfunded-back-into-existence-following-visa-and-mastercard-suspensions\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"AUTOMATON WEST\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2025-03-26T09:16:52+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2025-03-26T09:16:54+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/20250326-46141-header.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"931\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"612\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Amber V\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@AUTOMATON_ENG\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@AUTOMATON_ENG\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Amber V\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Japanese archive of out-of-print manga crowdfunded back into existence following Visa and Mastercard suspensions\u00a0 - 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