The OFFICIAL Unofficial Achewood Message Board
Trivial Pursuits => Arts & Entertainment => Topic started by: Death Ray on February 18, 2009, 08:31:58 pm
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Alt weekly papers, the original Internet for cutting edge comics , have struck the same iceberg as the rest of the economy and, in order to save dollars, are shedding comic strips like dandruff.
The situation has inspired articles such as this one (http://www.chicagoreader.com/features/stories/hottype/090212/) in the Chicago Reader, and led to popular indy tooners like Max Cannon to issue a red alert (http://www.redmeat.com/redmeat/) to his readers that fans of indy strips need to be more outspoken.
Consequently, this has inspired a few dicks to come out of the woodwork, notably a guy named Ed Decker, himself an alt weekly freelancer, in an effort to kick sand (http://www.sdcitybeat.com/cms/story/detail/funny_with_an_asterisk/7780/) in the face of struggling cartoonists, as if we were a bunch of Bernie Madofs who suddenly can't get caviar to flow from our kitchen faucets (my own response to Decker here (http://www.whatisdeepfried.com/2009/02/18/it-is-to-laugh/)).
The weird thing is, comics are usually one of the major reasons people pick up alt weeklies. If anything, weeklies ought to commit to a permanent comics page and start giving space to comics like Achewood, which are the natural (and prosperous) evolution of the revolution in comic strips that weeklies began with the likes of Life in Hell, Too Much Coffee Man, Derf and others. What does it say when the print medium has room still for obsolete 3-panel eye-sores like Moose and Molly but not sublimely funny comics like Tom the Dancing Bug?
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Our local weekly has given up its comics, which used to include Lynda Barry, which was the first thing I turned to when I picked up the paper.
I was angry when they dropped but the comics but have to admit, I still pick up the paper every week. So dropping the comics hasn't done them any harm as far as losing me as a reader. I have sometimes written to this paper about other issues, but didn't even bother to argue when they dropped the comics.
I think that I have finally given up - I just no longer think of newspapers as a place to read comics. I still try to read about three of the comics carried by the Washington Post but it is kind of a chore - they are printed too small and I have to search them out in the three full pages of crap comics that they run. If I had any sense I'd find a place to read those online as well. I also write to the Post regularly when they are idiots about something else but never write to them about the comics - they are clearly a lost cause.
I am not arguing that this is a good thing, but it is my reality. I would rather live in a world that had good comics in newspapers, but now that we have good comics on the internet, it is not worth my time as a cause.
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I am not arguing that this is a good thing, but it is my reality. I would rather live in a world that had good comics in newspapers, but now that we have good comics on the internet, it is not worth my time as a cause.
Perhaps this is worthy of its own thread, "what are you willing to do to get your favorite strip?" You may not know this, but it is unlikely that most of your favorite strips are as profitable as Achewood.
I have actually been discussing with some cartoonists a coordinated national "tip your cartoonist week". Anyone want to throw in their two cents on this? What would incentivize you to throw a few bucks once a year at your favorite three or four comic strips?
(by the way, I'm keeping those two cents to cover my health insurance costs)
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The LA Weekly's comics are basically down to incomprehensible masturbatory local political in-jokes and can frankly bite me where I dangle.
Maybe before I moved out here they were better?
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I am well aware that most artists, writers, etc have to have day jobs and I already do what I can as far as throwing money at them. I buy books and tshirts from most of the strips I read regularly and subscribe to the Achewood premium thing. I have done enough non-lucrative creative activities in my life and know enough people who do them that I feel a sense of obligation to do this, but we already know I not normal - we have discussed elsewhere the fact that I have a rule against buying used books by living authors, after all. I'm not sure my experience is a useful one to draw conclusions from - it would say that the solution is for everyone to at least have a friend who's a writer or musician, etc. so they understand the economics of the situation in a personal way.
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Screw 'em. Tell 'em to get on the internet like everybody else.
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Newspapers are dying. They are obsolete.
Why mourn the loss of your alt weekly with one or two comics in it when there is the internet with thousands of comics including the ones your alt weekly used to carry?
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See, I don't agree that newspapers are obsolete. I still need something to read with breakfast, and I want it to be something that won't cause economic pain if I spill my cup of tea on it.
If computers had been invented before paper, paper would seem like a really cool idea. Cheap, portable, doesn't require electricity, lightweight, never crashes, can be read in the bathroom, disposable. Cool!
Until they figure out something electronic that really serves the same purpose, there will still be a place for newspapers. Unfortunately they are all so convinced that they're dying that they're all making decisions that hasten the process by making themselves more useless.
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See, I don't agree that newspapers are obsolete. I still need something to read with breakfast, and I want it to be something that won't cause economic pain if I spill my cup of tea on it.
If computers had been invented before paper, paper would seem like a really cool idea. Cheap, portable, doesn't require electricity, lightweight, never crashes, can be read in the bathroom, disposable. Cool!
Until they figure out something electronic that really serves the same purpose, there will still be a place for newspapers. Unfortunately they are all so convinced that they're dying that they're all making decisions that hasten the process by making themselves more useless.
Something like...electronic paper (http://"http://www.eink.com/index.html")?
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Dunno, but "Electronic paper" still sounds like something that can't stand up to an unfortunate encounter with an errant beverage.
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Dunno, but "Electronic paper" still sounds like something that can't stand up to an unfortunate encounter with an errant beverage.
"Errant Beverage" is now the new name of my fantasy punk band. Here's your Dr. Pepper.
If I may steer this back to how web cartoonists might get stingy netizens to surrender some Dorothy's from their wallets, here's my brainwave for the day: If your favorite strip (say, Achewood) was part of a well promoted national tip effort once a year, what would put you over the top to get you to PayPal the artist $2.00, something you might part with several times a month at iTunes? If Onstad offered a collection of his work for a $5.00 donation, would that motivate you? How about an anthology of original comics from popular web cartoonists for the same price (some Achewood, some PVP, some Girls With Slingshots). Interested yet? Or not?
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Don't know if this is what JL was linking to, (link was broken), and I don't know if this is the ultimate solution, but this (http://www.amazon.com/Kindle-Amazons-Wireless-Reading-Generation/dp/B00154JDAI/ref=amb_link_83624371_1?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=center-1&pf_rd_r=1GWXTQSAT3MJNY1TSQCY&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=469942651&pf_rd_i=507846) is a huge step in the right direction I think.
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I'll tell you what DOESN'T motivate me to give more bread to internet and/or alt-weekly cartoonists:
Creating premium-only sections and then radically cutting back on your "free" content, causing me lose interest in the entire product by providing me with a lot less of said product.
I mean, I've bought a few of your comics over the years, Mr. Death... I've bought Achewood stuff, I've bought Red Meat books... Derf, someone else you mentioned, his traditionally printed comic about his childhood association with Jeffery Dahmer was one of the best things I've ever read in ANY format, I'd buy that five more times if I could... I have no problem at all supporting artists by purchasing merchandise or collections or sideprojects.
But for some reason, when you change the rules of your publishing model mid-stream in a way that makes the whole thing suffer overall, it just pisses me off.
I certainly have three dollars a month to throw down the inter-hole and I love Achewood when it is at its best but I simply refuse, ideologically, to buy the fuck*ng "premium content" because its existence has fucked up the rest of the output. I will probably buy more than thirty-six dollars in Achewood stuff this year, I have a friend who is way into it as well and usually if I get him a birthday or Christmas gift, it's from Onstad's store but...
I just can't get my head around putting those thirty-six bucks toward something that's actively leeching off the regular stuff.
So... you know.
Something other than that.
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Why is the alt weekly free? Because it's paid for by advertising.
Hey internet comic creators, solve your cash flow problem with advertising.
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I would tend to pay for content that is substantially different in form or function from what is offered for free. In the past, I have purchased the following to support various comic artists:
T-shirts
books:
- dead-tree versions of comics
- related books, such as the Achewood recipe books
music CDs
video games
I have also just straight-up made donations to people whose work I like and want to support.
I'm with LFM when he says that a marked decrease in the availability of free content diminishes my interest in paying for additional.
And I do think that it makes very little sense to have a web site with thousands of unique visitors per day and not sell ad space. You can always sell a "premium," ad-free subscription to those who would prefer not to see ads. I think Penny Arcade does this?
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I would tend to pay for content that is substantially different in form or function from what is offered for free. In the past, I have purchased the following to support various comic artists:
T-shirts
books:
- dead-tree versions of comics
- related books, such as the Achewood recipe books
music CDs
video games
(snip)
And I do think that it makes very little sense to have a web site with thousands of unique visitors per day and not sell ad space. You can always sell a "premium," ad-free subscription to those who would prefer not to see ads. I think Penny Arcade does this?
The advertising point is, of course, fully valid. At the same time, people are not likely to throw advertising dollars at a site that is not yet sufficiently trafficked. Getting to that point is the artist's challenge, and one that I would think the most loyal readers would want to contribute to overcoming.
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And I do think that it makes very little sense to have a web site with thousands of unique visitors per day and not sell ad space. You can always sell a "premium," ad-free subscription to those who would prefer not to see ads. I think Penny Arcade does this?
Lots of sites do this.
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The advertising point is, of course, fully valid. At the same time, people are not likely to throw advertising dollars at a site that is not yet sufficiently trafficked. Getting to that point is the artist's challenge, and one that I would think the most loyal readers would want to contribute to overcoming.
I was going to make this point earlier, but now I think it's necessary to say.
For every Achewood there are at least 1000 shit comics. If not many folks are visiting your site and reading your comic perhaps it's just not that good.
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Yeah, a hybrid advertising/micropayments-to-eliminate-advertising model is rad. That's the model of the blog service I use and I pay for the ad removal.
I know that some strips use micropayments or small subscription services for direct add-ons to the free strips... colourized versions, additional commentary, rough draft stuff, small animations tangental to the art of in the art, audio files of the dialogue, etc etc etc... and that's basically cool with me. I'd pay for something like that on a strip that I really dig as I do Achewood at its best.
What's galling with Achewood's subscription service is... I mean... Christ, it was an incredibly irregular strip to begin with. It didn't have a set schedule, sometimes it only had one actual comic a week, sometimes less. With Achewood in particular, the "additional material" like the character blogs and such... it wasn't really "additional material"... it was often the replacement for an incredibly erratic strip. The lunch WAS the meal, as the Buddhists wouldn't say, you know.
And so now that those other parts of Achewood that filled in for actual strips are... "premium content"... and yet the actual strips are even more erratic?
It swallows down hard to be told that the stuff that used to fulfill the continuance of a sparsely-updated strip is now paid material AND the strips are even less frequent.
Achewood may well be an extreme example of the "premium content" model, though.
Perhaps if you're talking about a strip that has always been strictly and reliably two or three times a week and has never used other forms to replace those comics, paying extra for that kind of material isn't as infuriating and crazy.
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For every Achewood there are at least 1000 shit comics. If not many folks are visiting your site and reading your comic perhaps it's just not that good.
This is truly not fair. There is so much stuff out there - music, books, comics, etc - and no magic way for any of it to hook up with the people who would love it. Haven't you ever read a book you loved, by an author who's been writing for years that you never heard of, and thought, "this is wonderful, how did I not know about this?"
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As for the point of getting advertising dollars for an unestablished strip... well...
I mean, I don't think there's any model where an online comic by an unknown creator isn't going to START as an unpaid labour of love.
I don't think there's any sort of way to go about it where you don't have to build a following at your own peril at the beginning of the process.
There was no model of comic art where you stepped in without a portfolio of work and were just paid a living wage, regardless of the publishing technology used.
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LFM: I find your attitude curious. This is why: you're a writer. Someday when you publish a book, don't you expect to get paid for it?
I was saying earlier that if people actually knew people who did creative stuff and saw from personal experience that most don't make a living, maybe they'd realize that expecting to get everything for free on the web wasn't reasonable. I would have thought you'd be the one person here who already saw it from that angle. If even you don't see that, that seems worrisome to me.
We don't have a right to Achewood for free. After all, he could decide to do it all as print-only books, and we'd have to pay for all of it. He gave stuff away for free for years and thereby built a fan base that thinks it's worth money. So, now he charges money for some of it. That seems to me like a model that works.
I also don't see how the regularity of the strip affects the argument. Plenty of art forms don't occur on a regular schedule - do you get mad if someone doesn't release a new CD every January? Yes, it's the normal comic model to have a strip every day, but the normal comic model also doesn't include strips that vary in length, blogs, cookbooks, roasted chicken c*ck jokes, etc, so why are we expecting any part of the normal comic model here, you know?
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This is truly not fair. There is so much stuff out there - music, books, comics, etc - and no magic way for any of it to hook up with the people who would love it. Haven't you ever read a book you loved, by an author who's been writing for years that you never heard of, and thought, "this is wonderful, how did I not know about this?"
Of course that's true, but eventually the cream rises to the top.
Death Ray's point seemed to be that he couldn't make any money off of advertising because his site isn't popular enough. And the most sure-fire way to overcome that problem is to be good.
When you're good people write about you on their blogs and the viewers come. When you are good people talk about you on messageboards and the viewers come. When you are good people join your group on facebook and the viewers come. When you are good people wear your t-shirts and the viewers come. when you are good people tattoo your characters on their body and the viewers come. When you are good people dress up as your characters on Halloween and the viewers come. etc... etc...
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I just don't have your faith in the cream rising to the top. I see tons of crap on the top of the best seller list and let's not even get started talking about music. I know plenty of creators who I think are much more wonderful than stuff that is many times more popular. I just don't see the evidence that excellence is always rewarded with popularity.
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But I'm nobody and I've done nothing, 'bat.
While I'm trying to find myself creatively... and I still am... I'm not expecting to have my scattered unorganized notes paid for by strangers on faith.
I certainly hope that I'll eventually be paid for my finished works someday but I don't expect it and certainly won't quit my dayjob the first time I make a dime on it.
I think that serialized comic strips are sort of a slightly different beast than some kinds of art because they're necessarily works-in-progress in the early stages.
But even then, the model is completely different.
I'd be getting paid not by the people who might eventually read my book or watch the movie made from my script but by some asshole in a suit who thinks he can make a lot more money off it than what he's paying me for the rights to the words. It's a lot more similar to the way Jason was getting paid for alt-weekly works, at least in theory, he had a portfolio of work, he took this portfolio to some asshole in a suit who represented so many alt-weeklies and that asshole in a suit decides if the strips will ultimately cost him less than what he felt he'd get in increased ad revenue because of the strips.
It's not that artists don't DESERVE payment and so on but I suppose Los Angeles makes a person face certain realities.
Until you clear the check, you're working on spec, y'know.
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But with Achewood we're not talking about something in the early stages. If you think artists deserve payment why does it make you so infuriated that he is asking for payment for some of it now?
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Because I've been paying for the final material that strips on the website are the rough cut of on a fairly regular basis already, for one.
And for two, more irrationally I'll admit, because the dude changed the social contract of the strip in mid-stream.
There's something that drives me crazy about hacking about two-thirds of the strip content, charging for it, and acting as the situation is basically the same and the "premium" stuff is all material that would not have been created beforehand... when dude's generating less both free and premium now than free before.
There is the irrational truth that when you're an early-adopter, you feel some microscopic-but-actual sweat equity in the project. Like, I hung around buying glasses and chapstick and zines from rather early on and now that the project is successful... in a manner that feels microscopically-but-actually linked into my early loyalty and the early loyalty of a lot of people like me... we're expected to pay more for less?
It's... weird. It's weird and it feels exploitive. Feels like a violation of a tacit social contract.
Maybe it is completely insane collectivist-caveman psychic background noise but there we are.
Like... put up ads instead, man, you know?
We were all there buying pins and bumper stickers to get you to the point where you had enough click traffic to make serious bread offa ads and now we have to pay extra for less?
It feels kinda fuck*ng insulting, however irrationally.
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I don't think anybody is suggesting that Onstad isn't entitled to make money. What's frustrating is that he's changing the rules midstream.
Since we're also talking about newspapers here, imagine if your newspaper changes its business model with the result that it goes from a daily to a weekly. Also, your subscription price doubles. Haven't you the right to complain?
Onstad was making a living before. Obviously he thinks he'll do better this way. It's his right to make that business decision. As a consumer of his product (both the creative product and the T-shirt/paperback products) I feel shortchanged. I feel the same way I do when I notice there are only 6 Pop-Tarts in the box now for the same price 8 were before. Or when the candy bar comes packaged in a little cardboard tray to make it look like the same size it used to be. Giving me less funny per week and charging me more for it does not make me a happy consumer.
I like The Office. It's on broadcast TV, supported by advertisements. If suddenly it's only available on HBO for an additional $12/month and at only 15 minutes per (rare) episode, I'm going to be disappointed if not pissed.
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The advertising point is, of course, fully valid. At the same time, people are not likely to throw advertising dollars at a site that is not yet sufficiently trafficked. Getting to that point is the artist's challenge, and one that I would think the most loyal readers would want to contribute to overcoming.
I'm talking about something at its most basic, like Google AdWords. Pedro had a low-rent, unadvertised, Spanish-language flash-cards site that made $50 over three years just by adding Google ads to the bottom of each page. And this is for something he put together for personal use, threw up on the web, and let rot. All of a sudden we got a check in the mail, and he looked at his page stats and found out that every December and May, a new crop of SPA101 students would find his cards and use them to cram. We're talking about a total of a couple thousand unique pageviews over three years? Not high-traffic like Achewood.
You won't be able to quit your day job, but you can at least pay your bandwidth bill.
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I just don't have your faith in the cream rising to the top. I see tons of crap on the top of the best seller list and let's not even get started talking about music. I know plenty of creators who I think are much more wonderful than stuff that is many times more popular. I just don't see the evidence that excellence is always rewarded with popularity.
Well, what's good is very subjective. I think you're being a bit cynical. Maybe the cream doesn't rise to the top, but it doesn't sit on the bottom either. A good product will find an audience.
But I have to agree with you to a certain extent.
I guess that's the beauty and the curse of the internet is that it's so freely available to anyone. You don't need King Features Syndicate anymore to become a famous cartoonist anymore. You don't need Universal Studios to become a famous film maker anymore. You don't need Atlantic Records to become a famous musician anymore. You don't need NBC to become a famous television star anymore.
With all of this content available how do you sort through it to find the good stuff? We still need critics to tell us what's good and what's not. But then again, you don't need the Chicago Sun Times to become the next Siskel and Ebert. There are millions of critics on the internet, how do you find one you can trust?
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I think the whole "hey, the PAYING CUSTOMERS all voted you cheap assholes who aren't paying a PITY STRIP, isn't it awesome that I allowed them that choice" thing really bothered me too.
I mean, honestly, if the guy said "everyone send me thirty-six dollars so that I DON'T have to start some kind of premium service that robs everyone of enjoyment" I would be cutting the check right now. I like the Achewood strip that much. But... yeah. Yeah. The whole way it went down leaves a bad taste in the mouth.
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See, I can't get upset about the changing things mid-stream business. It is like getting upset that a band is playing stadiums now, when you got to see them in tiny clubs for no money when you were a fan way back when. It's too bad, but some of the alternatives are worse, like would you rather that they never make enough money to make a living and decide to quit?
However, on the topic of that would be good ways for web comics to make money: could you please NOT have a pledge drive like public broadcasting?
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See, I can't get upset about the changing things mid-stream business. It is like getting upset that a band is playing stadiums now, when you got to see them in tiny clubs for no money when you were a fan way back when. It's too bad, but some of the alternatives are worse, like would you rather that they never make enough money to make a
Bands playing in stadiums is a very bad example. A band playing in a stadium means they don't give a shit about their fans and are out for every dollar they can squeeze. Just because you can play in a stadium doesn't mean you should.
Maybe a better example is a band that goes on tour. They have reached a level of popularity that they can take their music around the world. Meanwhile the fans that have been with them from the start can't go see them every Saturday night like they have grown accustomed to.
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However, on the topic of that would be good ways for web comics to make money: could you please NOT have a pledge drive like public broadcasting?
WTOP has little bumpers welcoming listeners who are trying to get away from NPR's pledge drive.
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Can't shake the feeling that the proper analogy involves not a rock band but rather a waterfowl, some valuable eggs and a big fuckin' knife.
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Is that your obtuse way of saying Onstad is killing the goose that lays the golden eggs?
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I was going to make this point earlier, but now I think it's necessary to say.
For every Achewood there are at least 1000 shit comics. If not many folks are visiting your site and reading your comic perhaps it's just not that good.
I think I will cross reference your response with the idealogically-sympathetic counterpoint made by someone on the Sinfest forum, where I am also having this discussion:
I think we are seeing the consequences of the "free lunch" model of commodity playing out all around us right now in the larger economy. And if you think that will not be reflected ultimately in one or more of your favorite cartoonists pulling the plug on a strip you really like, well...the recession is young.
But the very well made point is, there are hundreds of new strips every day. We'll just read a different one.
I think you can see the point. Flies buzz from turd to turd, satisfied with shit. If you are looking for a flower, then you are probably a bee, and bees usually give a little back to the flower.
Strained metaphor ends.
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Bee true!
But as for bands playing in stadiums... If someone gets hugely popular and doesn't play in large venues then most of their fans won't be able to get tickets, so there is a downside to refusing to do that, too, isn't there? You can either downgrade the experience or make the experience unavailable to a larger number of people. Basically when someone gets popular there is no way for it always to be like the old days. We can pine for them all we want but it won't change that fact.
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Cosmic timing: Toothpaste for Dinner and Natalie Dee just unveiled an Assetbar thing.
I know, Paul hates them. But I like Natalie Dee's animal pictures and I own like a dozen of their tshirts. Also, they have pugs.
So what do I do about this? Hmm. I have never felt that I needed more of their content, except the pugs. But, maybe there will be pugs. Also, they might still have to pay all the medical bills from the baby... so I guess I am doing it.
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Me? I don't like something?
Also, a band can easily avoid the stadiums and accommodate their fans by playing multiple shows in each city at an appropriate venue.
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But playing five shows for a hundred people is five times as much work as playing one show for five hundred people. Not exactly fair to call that 'easily.'
Also: I made the right decision about Toothpaste; enough pugs, and I forgot how much I like their writing without pictures. Also, so easy to spend more money since I am already on the Assetbar thingy for Achewood. There was an article in the Post today about the whole problem with newspapers being unable to make money from their websites and one person was quoted as saying basically that the problem wasn't that people didn't want to pay 50 cents for the Post, it was that they didn't want to type in their damn credit card number every time. I think there's something to this - like I will often hesitate to buy something when I find they don't take Paypal. This was even easier than Paypal since I was already logged in to Assetbar. No time to have second thoughts.
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But playing five shows for a hundred people is five times as much work as playing one show for five hundred people. Not exactly fair to call that 'easily.'
We're not talking about 500 vs. 100 we're talking 65,000 vs. 16 thousand. The artist are making huge sums of money at that level. And sure it's more work, are you suggesting they not work for their pay? I'm just saying that it's not ethical to take more while giving less.
And I'm just telling you that this is how your man Bruce Springsteen did it back in the day. When he was the biggest act in the country he could have easily sold out the Astrodome twice over, instead he booked 9 nights in the (relatively) cozy Summit.
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I'm just saying that it's not ethical to take more while giving less.
Ding Ding Ding!
Paul wins the internet!
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But wait, speaking of comics that you didn't know about and think, how did I not know about this: Daisy Owl. I know we have discussed this before. I keep forgetting to read it, and then remembering and being unable to imagine how I could be so stupid as to forget about it. I need to rearrange my bookmarks or something... but really, there is just so much competition. It's almost pure accident that you ever find stuff you like.
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Post a link and we'll all know this new comic.
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Definitely go with the RSS feed for Daisy Owl. It updates really sporadically.
http://www.daisyowl.com/
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It updates really sporadically.
See - just our sort of thing!
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I'm just saying that it's not ethical to take more while giving less.
That depends on how much one was taking and how much one was giving. As an extreme example, it would be the right side of ethical for a third-world factory slave to have a day off every once in a while and also be paid twice as much.
I suppose that might change the rules in midstream though?
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Those factory workers can't afford a ticket to the show at any price so let's leave them out of the discussion.
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While it might not seem immediately germane (I learned this word at 'Talk Like a Dick School') to the discussion, I think it shows that any talk of what Onstad did as 'not ethical' is a bit embarrassing. Please go ahead and put me out of my misery now by explaining how it was just a joke anyway.
Or if it wasn't a joke then maybe we can move on to labour unions and the historic struggle over working hours and pay, unethical bastards that they are. How very dare they?
'Not ethical'? Jesus wept.