Is this a joke? I mean seriously, expecting people to pay to read terrible machine translations?
Why are the new trial reads all machine translated?
Also there's barely any chapters released, so we get shit quality translation and you cut down the chapter count yet again.
Go fuck yourselves webnovel decision makers.
Dwarkin Not all chapters are released yet, and a few of the novels had 20 or so chapters, so they past the point where they start charging.
https://www.webnovel.com/book/immortal-hero-i-can-see-the-success-rate_19581965806817505
like this one for example.
At least give me all the raws.
I just can't believe how shameless they are to use MTL and not even try and hide it.
Man I won't even mind that quality if they had provided more chapters, but just 5 chaps is just not enough.
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Mute No the female trial reads all have 40 chapters, I asked customer support and they said the rest of the chapter human translated will come later today or tomorrow because there are some update issues and server issues
Astral_Ascent yeah, last week they told us same sh*t 
Astral_Ascent DId they say why they started using machine translations?
Astral_Ascent I hope the underground hinting novel was quite fresh but 5 chapter is....
Astral_Ascent the female lead have all 40 chaps cause there has been no new TL novels for them since last to last week. So I don't think there are any new additional chaps coming this week.
Something is seriously wrong with webnovel right now.
This time we got big gift from webnovel.
MTL trial read and genre fast pass.
What a way to end this month.
How is it that I can probably get better MTL results than a mega company?
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Max255 yeah, next year they'll buy subscription on DeepL, fire all translators and make us pay for mtl
Misguided_Rooster because they don't know how to use Google or Microsoft translator
They have had MTL before, but they were clearly labeled as machine translations, why do these trial reads not get that warning?
Also, i see a bunch of Simple MTL released translations not in the trial reads, are they next weeks selection? Ergh such a trash site.
They even list a name as the translator/editor giving us a false impression that it isn't MTL.
This says Lord_Immortal translated and edited, but it's clearly machine translated.
Ive long since
Mute I've long since stop reading in webnovel (for translated books). The only use i have for webnovel is to read original books and to search for translated book titles by reading the freebies and then if I'm interested, read the rest mtl'ed lol.
Mute oh yeah this time around there's a lot of interesting books compared to the trial reads for the past month or two.
Im happy yet also sad that they picked theres a divine tree in my heart when its been hiatus in the raw for so long.
Then im sad they didn't choose i won't play by the books when its been constantly updating high quality content
ExodusGaming555 Yeah some of them have an interesting concept, i can deal with it if it's only for the selection process and then a real translator takes over, but i doubt it, i bet it will stay machine translations.
@CKtalon any idea wtf is happening?
Well, MTL is the only way to keep things cheap so they can keep on being translated. It's a win-win, no?
Lonelytree No. I understand that company needs to earn, but if they really MTL novels and charge full price there is seriously something wrong with people managing the company. Can you imagine going to bookstore to find book translated to broken English? Would you really be willing to pay full price?
On the other hand how is book supposed to win if it scares away considerable amount of readers with terrible translation? You can't just expect readers to accept it.
Cynical_Taste We're looking at this from different perspective, you from the perspective of the reader and i'm from the perspective of a translator. There's no wrong party here. It's just how things are progressing.
The number of paying readers is plummeting. it's just not feasible to expect good human translations anymore. Hence all the dropped novels.
So if the company don't want to have more dropped novels, they have to find a cheaper alternative to human translators and like every field all over the world, AI is the way.
I'm not happy with this either because this means i have to work the workload of a machine with a much lower price (which I'm already doing) or find another job. I could gripe all day about it, but that's just how things are going to go.
It is what it is.
Lonelytree
The number of paying readers is not plummeting, it's just Qidian brings here more and more novels, so coins are spreading much thinner.
It's okay to use MTL for trials, but there are few conditions: use DeepL and not some sh*tty Chinese translator, proofreader to check with raws and editor to make it a little more readable.
Dwarkin That's what they were supposed to do anyway but we all know quality control and webnovel doesn't often go hand in hand lol
Lonelytree So if the company don't want to have more dropped novels, they have to find a cheaper alternative to human translators and like every field all over the world, AI is the way.
Either way, charging full price for a machine translation, and one that is, let's be honest, not all that great, is only going to alienate even more of the paying readers and lower any income by a far greater deal. This is the very literal representation of wringing the market dry.
They are also even locked from chapter 5. I looked at one and used a FP to open chapter 5. NGL, charging 6 powerstones for 1007 words just feels dirty.
When you do literally nothing for PR, addressing the general community, or outreach to attract new customers, this is bound to happen. A lot of people have been upset over the years and left, and the company has earned a poor reputation in many circles but never cared enough, or whatever reason, to properly address these issues at the time.
Let's be honest, readers aren't exactly rushing over to reddit to share the latest chapter releases anymore, nor is NU updating locked chapters and helping garner new readers for the novels. There are many factors which are lacking which has led to a plummeting of readers overall.
Whilst it is true they need paying customers more than free readers, the latter make up the majority portion and are a crucial factor in bringing in new audience (Not to mention the factor of what coins there are being spread thinner).
A balance between paying and free readers needs to be made, which is where PR comes in.
Lonelytree No, ot's not a win win, not atall, giving us a bunch of barely readable trash and expecting people to pay for it? It's a mystery why people willing to pay is dropping off.
I could accept MTL for trial reads, and then assigning a real translator, but this is bullshit and most of us won't be willing to pay to read badly edited machine translations that completely gut the essence of a novel, aswell as being full of mistakes.
Mute Hey, you asked why some of the TR are MTL-ed and the answer is cost efficiency. Whether that will continue after the book gets out of TR, who knows?
Lonelytree I'm sure people know, they just won't tell us.
But honestly, if webnovel can't afford to translate new novels, then they don't need to bring a new one out each week.
Mute But they can afford to... with Mtl.
Lonelytree To be honest I would expect translators to be one of the fiercest group protesting MTL.
Quidian makes unpopular decisions and to be honest mostly ignore issues brought up on this forum, so they lose paying readers. But I can't see how lowering quality of the product they offer would help. They at most lose more paying customers who will feel conned. It is slippery slope.
I am not really sure how big percentage of reading community is willing to accept MTL (I for one prefer to drop novel instead of looking for MTL), but I think that a lot of them do that because it's free.