This is like the great K-drama download shutdown of 2012 starting with Megaupload, which wasn’t even related to K-dramas but due to the shut down of download sites prompted by US copyright holders of movies, TV shows, and songs. It just got a lot harder to find your favorite K-drama, TW-drama, J-dorama C-drama, and definitely US show to watch as popular Chinese language subbed streaming site Maplestage (hosted in Taiwan) got shut down this week and the two college grad operators arrested and marched out of their homes.
That swiftly led to all big TW-streaming sites including gimy.tv, discussion forum eyny closing its video platform, momovod, pttplay, and 777drama all subsequently self-shutting down. The raid on Maplestage was coordinated by the Taiwanese authorities from the prompting of the US Motion Picture Association along with the Japanese equivalent movie association. Like I said, it’s even not K-drama related but definitely a lot of K-dramas got exposure through fans chancing about the streams so once again it’s a double-edged sword. For the immediate aftermath of this sweep is that it has led to all the licensed and paid streaming sites to increase viewership in the days since.
Wow. I watch from licenced sites anyway but vaguely remembered something called Maplestage. So wow, didn’t realize it streamed US shows.
Should have known better as the Americans are way more aggressive protecting their intellectual property rights.
Yes I remember the big Kdrama shutdown from a few years back. I am still bitter at some of the sites shutting down.
If I are talking about Dramafever they licensed shoes legally. Was bought by Warner bro’s, and later deemed not profitable enough to keep running it.
DF was aggressively protecting the intellectual property rights and they cause the streaming sites to shut down. The Korean production house that gave exclusive licensing rights to DF was also and is still also known to be very, very pro- active over their IP rights.
I am not a DF supporter. They valued profit as all companies do and they pursued it to the Nth degree.
Wb sold to att. Att dropped df
It was bought by Viacom and then dismantled.
Well good step.
I m glad netflix bought some shares of studio dragon so we get acces to all a list aftors k drama
Nooooo!!!! They are so fast on uploading subs ?. It shall be missed. I don’t mind watching on licensed websites but they are so slow with subs and Netflix is pretty good at licensing good chinese dramas but definitely misses out on some gems
I agree with you. I only watch Chinese & Taiwanese dramas. They had so many dramas and they were always so fast of uploading them. IQIYI is the slowest uploader of all of them. I know you can download their APP, but i rather not do that.
I liked Maplestage. It is where I watched Japanese dramas since it got subbed the day after the episode aired. It was a good place to watch Taiwanese dramas as well.
I still remember when megaupload shut. So sad 🙁 used to be that no matter how niche and unpopular something was you could find it, but now only the big, popular and latest shows might be available (especially on the licenced sites) 🙁 I fell out of Japanese dramas because it just got too hard to find the good ones to download, and even subs got harder to find. (And anime was much like that too. Even manga has gotten that way. So hard to find free scanlations and most things aren’t available to buy anyway, unless it’s some big big and popular series, you lose so much choice when restricted to just the stuff for sale ?) For kdramas I don’t see that happening but I miss when old and amazing shows like ruler of your own world, alone in love and such , small and oft forgotten shows were available even if you got there late. 🙁 So many people get into dramas through illegal means but then turn into paying customers in some way too (often in unrelated ways such as ending up a fan of Korean music, or skincare, and also then going on to visit Korea even but still)
I follow maplestages for several year real awesome web better than other websites with license really they shouldn’t be arrested, the company’s they should hire them because they do better job. I don’t like many Korean dramas, I like Chinese, Thailand, Japanese. and maplestages was one the best one websites,
I feel really sad cause there is the maplestage hosted in US that self shut down due to the pandemic. They’ve been around longer than the Taiwan one but affected at this time. Sad.
The two sites weren’t related. And one in Taiwan needed to be seized and shut down. They were asked repeatedly to change their name and didn’t. So now the authority was brought in. Get it? Stubbornness gets us nowhere.
I usually watch chinese drama from maplestage, and two days ago, i read the announcement that they say sorry for closing the site
The report in this article is wrong. 8maple dot ru and Maplestage are “NOT affiliated”. 8maple was seized and shut down in Taiwan and needed to be shut down. Maplestage made a decision to shut down due to the pandemic.
From the official MapleStage’s website:
“ 謝謝大家多年以來的支持，我們不得不說再見了。祝大家一切安好。
Thank you for everyone’s support throughout the years. During this difficult time, we’ve finally made the decision to shut down. We wish everyone all the best!
Stay Safe,
The Maple Team
Note: Maplestage™ has no relations with 8maple.ru
We were made aware of the 8maple.ru situation hours after we shut down our services. Due to the impeccable timing, we feel the need to clarify that maplestage.com has no relations with the other entity. They started using our Chinese branding (楓林網) sometime after we gained popularity in the early years. We asked them to stop using our name countless times but did not get any meaningful response. We did trademark the English name “Maplestage”. But because we are US-based, we could not find any reasonable way to protect the Chinese counterpart. In the end we had to give up trying.
Maplestage.com is shutting down now primarily due to the ongoing Pandemic. This global crisis had made our already small Ad revenue stream non-existent.”
http://www.maplestage.com/
Maplestage – you have the best site for Chinese dramas and variety show which I will watch everyday for many years. I was so sad to know that Maplestage is no longer in existence and even had withdrawals symptoms for days. I really don’t mind paying a monthly subscription fee just to keep you guys going… Please re-consider coming back…
It’s such a shame!! Govt of all places taking great entertainment away because of stupid polotics!!
Come on people has to make a living. Our govt from any country is not gonna pay for our living and health!!
These shutdowns are always provoking mixed feelings.
Because these are the only available source for some content.
I‘m a loyal paying customer on all kinds of legal (streaming) sites.
But sometimes you can’t find a specific manga/drama/music title on any of these legal sites. It just isn’t there!!
Than the only chance to get a specific content are these upload-sites. I don’t like it because I want the artist get paid, but if it’s not available anywhere…
We have the web, it shouldn’t be to difficult to make all kind of content globally legally available without digital regions and licensing.
Interesting….I think with COVID19 and a surge with online traffic, big players in media and streaming are now going to crack down hard on these non legit streaming sites to secure their income stream in the coming years.