Support the Author
If you enjoy something, it's always nice to be able to throw some money at the guy who made it, and as a plus, it makes it more likely that the manga will continue.
But how? No one's selling localizations of [insert manga here].
Fear not, for we live in the era of information technology, and even Japan has started to notice that foreign credit cards don't bite.
Actually, they do. Recently credit card companies have been trying hard to enforce censorship upon various storefronts, which is why stuff like Pixiv and DLsite have dropped them, making it much harder for us to buy from them. At this point, I'd prefer if they went back to completely isolating themselves, just to keep these fuckers' demands out of their media.
I will do my best to put links to all avenues of support I can find onto the manga pages here, but it can't hurt to do a little
digging on your own.
On a sidenote, sales of localizations usually bring the mangaka very little money. You're just paying the publisher. If you want to support a manga, you should buy the raws. Same thing goes for anime. The original creator isn't seeing shit of the money you're paying for crunchyroll & co. Pirate localizations. Support the original creators.
Digital Manga
Assuming the author is selling something on there,
BookWalker is the absolute simplest way to buy manga straight from the
source as a filthy gaijin. In fact, they're so eager for your money, they even made
a handy guide (backup) for us
overseas peasants. It comes with a YouTube video and everything! If you just want to support a manga a little, this is by far the easiest option.
The only drawback with BookWalker is that their DRM is notoriously hard to crack, so if you're one of those weird people who actually like to own what they buy
even though you can't read it, EOP, you'll have to make do with other services that are a bit harder to buy from.
One of those services worth mentioning is
Kobo. Though remember how I said that they've started
to realize that foreign credit cards don't bite? Kobo is not quite there yet. But while they don't accept foreign
credit cards,
they seem to have no problem with foreign
debit cards. So if you have that, the only thing stopping you from buying their
manga is
a VPN with a Japan exit node (there are enough free options to choose from), and a Japanese address, even though we're just
buying a digital product. And no receipts or anything will ever be sent to that address. And that address will never be checked by
anyone.
What do we do about that? I certainly don't recommend you look up the address of a random fast food chain store and use that.
And while the Japanese store is available in english (see link above), some parts of the checkout procedure may not be fully
translated. But it's nothing some common sense and google translate won't get you through.
I believe in you.
Despite probably sounding like a fishy place to any sensible person due to the very generic name,
DLsite is actually a widely used storefront for both independent and
official publishers, carrying manga, light novels, games, and various other digital goods. Most of the website
interface is available in English, and they accept a lot of foreign credit cards. But no PayPal, unfortunately.
DRM measures can vary depending on the seller, but generally, they make you use a specific program, DLsiteViewer, to read
purchased manga.
It should be noted and praised, that you can download your manga and later read with the DLsiteViewer program without
any internet connectivity whatsoever. There are tools to rip from it, but be prepared to install an outdated version of
the reader from questionable sources.
Others
Apart from buying manga, you can also support the author through various other means. I will outline some of the most common
places where you can throw money at mangaka below.
booth.pm is an indie storefront where creators can sell various goods, both physical and
digital, to an international audience. I have never bought anything physical, so I can't speak about how that works,
but I've never had any issues purchasing digital stuff.
What's on offer is completely up to the author. I've seen continuations of finished publications to 3d
models, and everything inbetween being sold before.
This site is great way to make sure the author gets a little more of your money than if you just bought a volume of manga, since they
get to keep over 90% of the sales price
(94.4% minus 22 yen to be exact).
booth.pm accepts PayPal, Visa, and Mastercard.
You can think of
Fanbox as a japanese patreon. You pay a monthly
subscription to access some exclusive stuff the author uploads there. I have personally never used it, but again, the site says
that they accept PayPal, VISA, and Mastercard, so you shouldn't face any issues if you decide to support an author through this
method.