Rolling 2015 Reading Funnybooks Thread

sims has posted a piece on comicsalliance: http://comicsalliance.com/ask-chris-being-part-of-the-problem/

about as mature and reasoned a self-examination as you could hope for, i guess, but that's not going to cure valerie d'orazio's ptsd.

jesus, that backlash in what forks posted is ridiculous. american tumblr youth screaming at fellow americans for doing anime/manga wrong because they aren't japanese seems very tumblr, though

"I have PTSD—post-traumatic stress disorder. I have specifically been diagnosed with it because of cyberbullying that I experienced between 2007-2010."

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

care to elaborate on that?

¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

okay, then i guess i'll continue to assume that you're consciously choosing to disbelieve a woman's claims that bullying led to mental health problems

i think mordy believes her, his stance is more tough shit/deal with it

at least that's how i read those runes

i guess we'll never know

imo there are definitely shitty parts of the web that are worth avoiding, especially if they're places where you've been repeatedly harassed, but when it comes down to it you can't really be a successful person in the comics world without any sort of engagement in the news/forum/social network realm. and if those areas are full of harassment, it hinders your professional career.

there's a bunch of macho shit-talk that is completely unnecessary and some forums and websites should probably be shunned, but if some asshole writer is specifically calling you out, repeatedly, for no reason other than the fact you're a woman and a convenient target, it's bullshit.

the shrugging-off of her concerns might be intended to read like "well, if it bothers you when these communities are shitty, don't engage in them!" but the real message is "if if bothers you, I guess comics aren't for you!"

otm

yup, otm. it's the shrugging-off of those concerns that creates the environment where bullshit like gamergate can fester

otm

I'm even willing to believe Chris Sims and other bullheaded people can change, and even internalize what they're saying in public to the point where apologies are legitimate and directed and phrased in a way that doesn't seem creepy!

The other side of this is the festering rot in these communities that will see any apology as kowtowing to perceived hostile forces. You have to ignore those people, because they're never going to be placated as they will never get that their investment in a fucked-up status quo is hindering not just their community, but their own development. I didn't get into mainstream comics in the early 90s (oh god) because they were a gross shithole with bad sexist imagery, I got into them because they seemed cool and exciting when I was a kid.

If comics and the corresponding community had more diverse, interesting characters (which there were, I ended up buying as much independent stuff and things like the Vertigo line when I could) available it wouldn't have turned me off of comics, it would have helped me be a more well-rounded person.

not belittling anyone's concerns or problems but

when it comes down to it you can't really be a successful person in the comics world without any sort of engagement in the news/forum/social network realm.

are there any writers/artists with no web presence who also don't do conventions?

xp because it seems to me people could just choose to engage as much or as little as they'd like to, same as in any field where you're self employed and the quality of the work (art, criticism or otherwise) could stand on its own without engaging literally every person who has anything to say about anything you're doing.
again NB: not relating this to Sim's/D'Orazio's situation

and if so, when did they really become established figures and what is their background? xp

there's also a difference between "engaging literally every person" and being specifically targeted, for sure

those creators doing the set-in-japan thing you linked above would have probably been fine just ignoring the people making the most noise and accepting constructive criticism, imo, but I'm not sure what the volume was

xp forks: I don't know how you can be in any self-employed field today without actively engaging potential fans/customers/employers via social media, blogs, forums and so on. no more room for quiet toilers in this age.

and let's face it the quality/"cream rises to the top" method of making it is mostly a myth as well

word

tbh it seems to me that for at least a decade the best thing you could possibly do to "make it" in superhero comis is be volubly encyclopedically fannish online

that, or be a second tier supermarket novelist or third-fourth tier TV guy

xp i won't argue the latter point at all but the former i think is more malleable. people can quietly toil and produce work of quality, just not at the speed of creation that is the current webcomic standard.

It's impossible to do that now, because while there have always been countless talented people working in obscurity, the internet allows/requires them to (*sigh*) brand themselves, advertise, platform. So if you're NOT doing that you're already putting yourself a rung down from thousands of others out there across the planet gunning for the same spots. I suppose that's how capitalism is supposed to function - rewarding the hustle over all else...

my wife went all-in on graphic novels for my birthday, I have quite a lot of reading ahead of me, lots of really cool looking stuff:

Sex Criminals vol. 1
The Technopriests
Megalex
Final Incal
Julio's Day
Love and Rockets #7

Just finishing Megalex, it was pretty batshit insane. Will probably tackle Technopriests next.

that, or be a second tier supermarket novelist or third-fourth tier TV guy

sick, truthful burn

I got the shipping notification that the newest collections of Prophet and Lazarus are heading my way :D

are there any writers/artists with no web presence who also don't do conventions?

Alan Moore?

Carmine Infantino?

I think Moore's Facebook page is managed by his daughter Leah, and he's not particularly active in supplying content for it, but it's an official web presence. And his zine Dodgem Logic had a website when it was a going thing.

The best answer I can come up with is Ditko.

haha yes of course

Obviously it's different for people who were big before the internet was. I don't think a big internet presence is that essential to success but I think it really depends on the sort of audience who's going to like them.
But I think it's different for writers and artists. Writers probably have to work harder at the social media aspect.

Ditko does have a blogging fan that does Kickstarters for him and Robin Snyder.

lol yeah I don't think the most established/known writers/artists of the last few decades necessarily need much press at this point

so do you mean to say that all the major artists/writers for DC have twitter/blog/facebook engagement explicitly about their work? I avoid that shit like plague so i dunno but i would think they would all be under non-disclosure clauses with contract labor or am i being naive?

It is good that people are challenging racist and sexist aspects of comics but even after that most of it's going to be more or less the same junk.
I'm doubtful yet still hopeful that people are going to challenge the way the industry functions and highlight the poison of franchise obsession/loyalty, crass consumerism and collector mania.

What I wrote on a geek thread recently..

There's two new-ish shops in Glasgow with "Geek" in their names. I never went into either but I looked into the window of one of them today and it seemed to be mostly expensive collectable junk. I'm a bit worried but I don't know if this poses much of a new threat to anything that is good but it's not nice seeing more people buying into all the worst aspects of this culture.
People often say that this side of comics fandom is dying out and is being replaced by something more positive but I'm not so sure. The bad side seems to be going more mainstream.

Re: comics pros blogging. I think it's part of the progress now. As well as authors talking about being harassed, Jerry Ordway blogged about suddenly being too old fashioned to get steady work and Jason Pearson talked about an editor treating him badly. This used to be exclusive to places like Comics Journal or talked about in pro-zines decades after it happened but now the dirt can come out immediately.

$500 Martian Manhunter statuettes subsidize a shop's ability (their willingness being another thing altogether) to also order $50 coffee table art books that will be of interest to three customers.

xxp No, I am saying that if you are not an established writer/artist right now, you are not going to break into the industry (or really further your position in it) unless you interact with your fanbase online.

If you're self-publishing, I can't imagine not having some sort of presence to sell your wares. If you are an established indie, you would need to make sure you have publicity for projects and have to DIY since you don't have the marketing budget of Marvel/DC, and if you're writing/drawing for one of the larger concerns, you might be able to get away with doing your work and keeping your head down, but you're going to be completely in the dark about some of the "industry" stuff.

But yes, a cursory search indicates that yes, most of these people do have social media accounts.

Looking at comixology's top sellers, pulling out writers/artists:
Jason Aaron (Thor) https://twitter.com/jasonaaron
John Cassaday (new Star Wars) https://twitter.com/johncassaday
G. Willow Wilson (Ms. Marvel) https://twitter.com/gwillowwilson
Robert Kirkman (The Walking Dead) https://twitter.com/robertkirkman

That's literally just from the first four books on the page

i guess i'm not just saying that they have a social media presence... _I_ have a social media presence
but that they are actively engaging with fans, trolls and pros on a daily basis in, well, i guess the way we do with ILX?

in an open forum i mean.

Old Lunch- Even if that's true, it isn't a situation we should be resigned to. Those art books are often overpriced too. I think we're way too accepting of this crap, it just isn't okay. If there was always more focus on content and quality maybe this stuff wouldn't be a debatably necessary evil.

I don't know what you're looking for, forks. All of those people seem to reply to questions, occasionally send an @ message to their peers, and opine as many Twitter users do. I'd say that's public engagement.

Don't worry about it, it's not very important to me to puzzle out. There are more paths than one, obviously.

RAG: not sure what the solution would be, though. Only direct buy books from indie presses? Shunt business to the remaining B&M retailers carrying comics? I always saw the figure collecting as something the very most hardcore fans were into - hence stores full of figurines that never or rarely sell...

I don't expect any clear or easy solutions but I think these things need to be discussed more. It's interesting that the comic stores I know all gave up on videos several years ago. Obviously there are other places to get them but I liked it when there was a wall of animation, horror films, science fiction tv shows and other cult stuff.
I've always wondered how well the prose book section does in Forbidden Planet, and all those Doctor Who audio discs.
When I started going to comic shops in the late 90s, model kits were quite popular, I think in general that stuff was more interesting than the standard statues you get today. I do actually like toys and statues a lot when there is lots of craft and imagination in there, and doesn't look like it was created purely for the sake of more product.

If there was a God of comics he would cry.
http://www.entertainmentearth.com/prodinfo.asp?number=FU3082
http://www.watchmencomicmovie.com/watchmen-kubricks-bearbricks-mez-itz.php
http://www.entertainmentearth.com/prodinfo.asp?number=DC19725#.VQt4c9BFAv4

That Watchmen bear is worth several hundred!

For a good decade I used to buy Previews, but the last eight times I bought it I kept promising myself never to buy it again because it's filled with stuff like that. It made me furious. When I saw that a Star Trek Pizza cutter was a top seller and some perfectly good comics are cancelled due to low orders... there are no words. This is really fucked up. Diamond stopped distributing so many worthy comics in favour of more collectables.

http://images.tcj.com/2015/03/Cartoonist_Threadmill-650x858.jpg
http://www.tcj.com/tcj-roundtable-discussion-applied-cartooning/

The latest issue of Red Hood has a whole new take on sideboob; Koriand'r's sister ACTUALLY HAS A BOOB ON HER SIDE.

https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7288/16704813030_3d4e8e7629.jpg

totalrecallthreeboobedhooker.jpg

Still doing that Scribd subscription thing for another month. Browsing their selection is nearly impossible on iPad, but I ended up reading most of the Judge Dredd stuff recently published by IDW. Between that and the recent Valiant catalog, I think it's a reasonable deal.