Digital Horizons: Libraries, Vertigo, Marvel, IDW, and the New York Times

Apparently there was a panel at the New York Comic Con about digital comics and libraries. I want to know why I wasn't invited. C'mon, I have a blog about digital comics and a master of library science degree. Who better to lead that discussion? I'm offended and will henceforth boycott the New York Comic Con (not that I've ever gone before). Also, the article mentions Comixology as a digital comic provider that serves the library market. I haven't heard of this before and I wonder what kind of content they provide libraries--i.e. do libraries purchase single issues for their patrons to check out, or is there some kind of licensed package deal? Sadly, I don't see my local public library buying digital comics any time soon, as when I worked at the library five years ago trying to get them to embrace comic books as literature worth having in their collection was like trying to pull teeth. I can't imagine adding the digital aspect will make the art form seem any less ephemeral to them.

In the past couple of weeks both Marvel and IDW have announced deals with Comixology to release more of their digital content. My feelings about this news reflect my ongoing love/hate relationship with Comixology. On the one hand, I'm happy to know that when I get around to writing a Digiversity post here I'll have more options to choose from. On the other hand, I'm concerned by the prospect of Comixology's status as the primary source of digital comics being cemented even further. As I've said before, competition is necessary for the medium to grow, and I fear that if Comixology is the de facto monopoly when it comes to digital comics, they won't be forced to make improvements (and drop prices) in order to win customers.

Somehow I missed this in all the comics news that I read regularly, but Macworld notes that DC announced at the New York Comic Con that Vertigo titles will slowly be folded into the day-and-date digital release program. I've never gotten into any of the Vertigo titles I've tried out, but nonetheless I think it's cool. As with Marvel and IDW, more fodder for those future Digiversity posts.

The New York Times has an article about Barnes and Noble's boycott of DC titles in response to the Kindle Fire exclusive deal. This isn't really news anymore--I blogged about it two weeks ago--but I just think it's cool to see an article about my pet hobby in the New York Times. Kind of like seeing your ex-wife on Jeopardy. (Which, incidentally, also happened to me this past week.)

Digital Horizons: Up With Digital Exclusives, Down With Prices, Down With Piracy

The New York Times announced this past week that Archie comics has reacquired the rights to the Red Circle superheroes, and that they'll be publishing new comics about these superheroes in digital format only. This surprised me since DC was pushing the Red Circle characters so recently, but I guess they weren't doing well, so might as well sell them back to Archie. The really interesting thing to me about this news is that Archie is going to be offering these digital comics via a subscription service. Part of me is intrigued by the idea of paying a monthly rate to have unlimited access to anything I want to read (a la Marvel's Digital Vault), but another part of me holds onto the idea of wanting to own the comics I read, not just rent them.

Meanwhile, Fleen, "the webcomics blog about webcomics," reports the results of scholar Mia Weisner's research into digital comics buying habits and interests. Fleen finds most notable, and I agree, Weisner's report that 90% of comics readers who are willing to buy digital comics are not willing to pay more than 60% of cover price for them. I apparently fall in the 2.4% minority of stupid people who are willing to pay full price. Not that I'm happy about it. I really think digital comics would do much better if the price point were lower. $0.99 per issue, same as an MP3, seems like the right point to me. But apparently I don't believe that strongly enough to refuse to pay more.

iFanboy has an interview with a former digital pirate who has given up pirating because, basically, the influx of legal digital comics made the whole thing uninteresting to him. It seems like that's basically what happened in the music industry--at first the industry was afraid to go digital because they didn't want to make piracy too easy, but piracy thrived in spite of them until the industry finally did go digital, making the piracy more or less redundant (not that it doesn't happen anymore, but my impression is that it happens much less than it did in the late nineties and early naughts). Of course, the music industry sells individual units at one buck a pop, not three or four bucks. Just saying.

Digital Horizons: Catching Fire

There's been a lot happening in the world of digital comics while I've been neglecting this blog, but certainly one of the biggest things is the announcement of Amazon's Kindle Fire. At $199, this new tablet gives the iPad a run for its money, appealing to consumers who are turned off by the iPad's steeper price tag. Of course with its Android OS, it was clear right away that the Kindle Fire could be used to read comics via apps like Comixology for Android, but then DC came out and announced an exclusive deal with Amazon to distribute its graphic novels digitally via Kindle Fire. This pissed off Barnes & Noble, who responded by yanking the DC graphic novels in question off their shelves, and then Books-A-Million did the same (am I the only one who's never heard of Books-A-Million before this? Did the company form just for the purpose of announcing that they would be pulling DC graphic novels from their shelves?).

My thoughts on all this? (Because that's what you're paying for.)

• Of course B&N and Random-Bookstore-I-Never-Heard-Of are free to do what they want, but I think it's kind of silly. I don't know what percentage of DC's graphic novel sales come from people happening upon Watchmen while casually browsing Barnes & Noble shelves, as opposed to people who know what they want and will buy it wherever it's available, but I suspect it's not a very high percentage. Which makes me think they're hurting themselves more than DC. 
• I'm glad to see graphic novels and collections being made available digitally, and through a medium other than Comixology. Variety is the spice of life and the impetus for better business. 
• I'm really really tempted to buy myself a Kindle Fire, specifically for the purpose of reading comics. Yes, it's smaller than the iPad, which I've already decided is not quite big enough for reading comics, but c'mon, it's only two hundred bucks. Also, I like my Kindle so I trust Amazon to make a good tablet, and I buy so much digital content from Amazon that it makes sense for me to have an Amazon tablet where I can easily access all that content. If I had not just incurred huge expenses above and beyond my income due to major life changes, I would totally buy it, just to buy it. Even so, I still might. But maybe I'll wait a couple of months until I get my Christmas bonus so I can pay off my credit card balance first (populating a new home with furniture is expensive--even Ikea furniture!). (FYI, Dear Reader, my birthday is next month, which happens to be the same month the Kindle Fire is being released. Just saying.)

Digital Horizons: Bringing the Mountain to Mohammed

A few examples this week of comic book publishers bringing the mountain to Mohammed, digitally:

Graphicly a new comic book app on Facebook, which I think is a pretty cool idea. As the linked article points out, people spend a lot of time on Facebook anyway.

This week DC announced two TV tie-series, Fringe and Burn Notice, each of which will be offered only in digital format. Another case of bringing the mountain to Mohammed, as the target audience for these books doesn't necessarily go to the comic book shop, but certainly spends time online (who doesn't?).

Finally, publisher SLG has announced that they will no longer print monthly titles but will release them digitally instead. Even more so than with big publishers like DC and Marvel, I see digital as the future of independent comics--these publishers can't depend on the comic shop crowd to keep them alive, so again it makes most sense for them to bring their comics to the web, where potential readers can find them more easily. It seems there's precedent for digital monthlies increasing the sales of graphic novels, too, so this strengthens the industry overall. Also, I like SLG's digital price point, $0.99, as that allows for more of the mountain to get to Mohammed, who's used to spending that much for music downloads so three bucks is kind of steep.

Digital Horizons: Collections and Sales

This week Marvel announced that it will be releasing digital collections as opposed to just single issues. I approve. This makes sense for someone who's trying to catch up on backstory--you buy several issues all together and get them at a discount. I don't know anything about Marvel's app, but I hope they allow for bookmarking. If you're working your way through a 300-page collection, it would be nice to easily return to the place where you stopped.

Apparently Ultimate Comics Spider-Man 1 broke digital sales records for Marvel. I'm not surprised. It would be interesting to be able to compare digital sales across companies and see whether UCSM or Justice League 1 sold more. My guess would be UCSM. Skitch Maillaro at Inside Pulse notes that UCSM 1 was available first thing in the morning, whereas DC waits until 2pm Eastern to release their same-day comics. I agree with Skitch that there's no real reason not to do this. Are there really people who are otherwise planning to buy print but will instead buy digital because they can get it a few hours earlier?

David Brothers at Comics Alliance takes a look at claims about digital sales--for example, Justice League 1 breaking digital sales records and now UCSM 1 doing the same--and points out that without numbers, it's just hype. He quotes Tom Spurgeon as saying it's basically "the 'I have a girlfriend in Canada' of sales analysis." This made me want to listen to my Avenue Q soundtrack again.

Digital Horizons: Digital Comics Everywhere!

In digital comics news this week:

• Comixology came in at #2 of the week's top-grossing iPad apps, which I guess is pretty cool. Sounds like the Marvel and DC apps did pretty well too. 
• CBR spoke with Archie CEO Jon Goldwater about digital comics and he was all like, "Yeah, we were doing same-day digital before it was cool." Okay, not really, but that's what I would have said if I were him.
• CBR also spoke with Dark Horse CEO Mike Richardson and he was like, "We do digital comics too!" 
• Bluewater Comics is taking advantage of the timeliness digital publishing allows by publishing a digital comic about Muammar Gaddafi. Seems like a good way to make the most of the medium, if you ask me (and by reading this blog you have implicitly asked me).
• Richard Rys at the Philly Post says digital comics just aren't the same as feeling a paper comic between your fingers, and that the internet just isn't the same as a comic book shop. Meh. I went to library school with a lot of people who made more or less the same sentimental arguments against digital books. I wasn't convinced then and I'm still not convinced now. Technology changes. You get used to it. I like my Kindle, I like my Comixology.
• At first I thought this Blog@Newsarama post was going to be about artists doing page layouts with the iPad in mind, but it turns out that it's about Warren Ellis saying basically what I said in my review of Knight and Squire: Digital comics work best when comics are written with the single issue in mind, not the eventual trade collection. When I pay two or three (or four!) bucks to download a comic, I want to feel like I've gotten a complete experience, even if it's part of a greater whole. 
• This week IDW released a bunch of digital comics in Apple's iBooks store, which I guess is a pretty big deal. I figure the more venues digital comics are available in and the greater variety of digital comics available, the better--it's always good to have options. 

Digital Horizons: New 52 Goes Live

A lot of talk this week about DC's New 52, and the accompanying same-day digital release plan. Time Out Chicago talked to several retailers to find out what they think about the potential threat digital comics pose. Based on this article at least, retailers seem for the most part unconcerned. One says, "If you’re a person who likes your comics digitally, you’re probably already getting them, for free, from pirate sites." A logical conclusion, and I hope for his sake that he's right, but anecdotal evidence makes me question the universal truth of his statement. I, for one, am one of those dreaded print comics readers who has now made the switch to digital (and would never think of pirating), and so is Scipio of The Absorbascon, and at least a couple of the readers who comment on his blog. Scipio is much less apologetic about this transition than I am, and honestly it makes me feel a little better to hear a former comic shop owner say this:

This is not a decision a former comic bookstore chain owner makes lightly. Stores that purvey entertainment "hard-copy" (e.g., video rental stores, bookstores, comic shops, computer game centers, record stores, video arcades, news stands) are, mildly put, not doing as well as they used to. The digitization of most forms of education/entertainment is a major coup for the accessibility of information of all types... but it's brick and mortar stores that are taking the blow. While many are making ingenious attempts at adaptation and leveraging of the new tech, the handwriting is on the wall. Or, perhaps, more accurately, on the screen of the touchpad. God has numbered the days of their reign and brought it to an end; it has been found wanting; its kingdom is divided and given to the Apps and the Netflix.  

On a more hopeful note, as far as the conventional direct market goes, another retailer notes in the Time Out article that "Record stores didn’t completely disappear [due to digital-music downloading], but the chain multimedia stores did. We’ll still have a place in the same way that Reckless Records does, despite iTunes."


In an article on Digidaydaily.com, DC Digital SVP Hank Kanalz is quoted as saying, "What we heard anecdotally is that people have been coming into comic book stores and buying more titles and asking about digital delivery." Which is nice, but doesn't really mean anything. I mean, I offered anecdotal evidence above, but I'm a blogger whose decisions have very little impact, not an executive making decisions that potentially have a huge impact on the comics industry. Couldn't DC, you know, actually look at some real numbers or something in order to back up this decision? Or is it that the numbers wouldn't support their friendly-to-retailers stance, so they stick with the anecdotal evidence?


Even more interesting to me, though, is that the same article speaks of DC's "plans in motion to make all 75 years of the company’s publishing output available at some point." I haven't heard this plan explicitly stated before now, but I certainly hope that's their plan. They have a lot of good stuff in their back catalog that I'd love to see made available digitally. 


Despite whatever reservations I have, I will agree with Kanalz that this is "an exciting time for comics." It's certainly good news for digital comics that Justice League 1 has set digital records. I hope in the long run it is good not only for people like me who like to read comics digitally, but for the industry as a whole. 

Digital Horizons: Marvel Claims Digital Supremacy, Digital Storefronts Go Live

Last weekend Joe Quesada made the claim that Marvel is the #1 digital publisher. This week Graeme McMillan, who is quickly becoming my favorite Blog@Newsarama contributor (with all due respect to his fellow contributors, who also write great stuff), asked (a) what does that mean? and (b) how on earth would Joe Quesada know that?

#

This week Comixology's Digital Storefront program went live. Apparently, some retailers are not happy about the terms of the program. For example:

...you give up your right to sue or form class action lawsuits; comiXology has the right to use your service marks to promote their digital service; you're obligated to promote the service in-store to existing customers; there are some circumstances where you don't receive even a single penny until you sell well over 600 comics, and so on and so forth...

I'm kind of bummed about this. As I mentioned the other day, I feel somewhat ambivalent about being one of those people who are giving up print comics in favor of digital, thus screwing over the direct market. I understand that the direct market is important for the survival of the comics industry as we know it. At the same time, I and every other consumer have to make decisions that make the most sense for us--comic shops are not charities we should be guilted into donating to. Digital is what makes sense for me right now, but I was  hoping the Digital Storefront program would give me a way to do what's best for me while still supporting businesses that I value.

I don't know anything about how the program works except for what I've quoted from Brian Hibbs above, but based on what I can observe, this is what I think needs to happen:

• Retailers need to be able to customize the display, just as they arrange the comics they display in their shops. Right now, what I see is basically Comixology's web app framed on the retailer's website.
• Retailers need to be able to offer subscriber discounts, and they need to be making enough of a profit that they can afford to do this. Right now pricing appears to be determined by Comixology, which means I have no incentive to buy from Comics Dungeon instead of buying directly from Comixology, except that I think they're good people and I want to help keep them in business. Altruism only goes so far in a capitalistic economy.
• Apart from alternative pricing, retailers need to be able to offer something Comixology doesn't. Like, I dunno, signed copies or region-specific variants? Again, consumers need incentives to buy from the retailers. 

The problem, as Hibbs points out, is that Comixology wants to be a retailer (actually, the retailer), not a distributor (not even the distributor). And Comixology doesn't have incentive to do otherwise, so as Hibbs says, the problem lies at DC's feet. Or mine, I suppose, as the consumer. I'm not sure what I can do, though, other than support the Digital Storefront program (such as it is) as my way of saying that yes, I want digital comics, but I want to get them without screwing over the direct market. Even if the program doesn't support the direct market as well as it should, it's currently the only option I have if those are my goals as a consumer. 

The other thing I can do, as with other issues I have with Comixology, is wait it out. Yes, they are very quickly becoming the iTunes of comics, but before long Amazon will come along and start offering DRM-free digital comics (i.e. digital comics I can actually download and own) at the same price, and Comixology will be forced to try new things in order to compete. Hopefully one of the ways they compete will be by teaming up with retailers in a more equitable fashion. 

If only everything I wished for on this blog came true...

Diving Into Digital Part 4: Welcome to Pixelated Panels

The downside of buying comics online--whether digitally or through an online store like G-Mart--is that you don't get the social connection that you might from the weekly trip to the comic book store. To be honest, the only comic book store, of all the comic book stores I've frequented over the years, where I made any kind of social connection was Drom's Comics in Davis, California, where each week I'd chat with the owner, who was a really cool guy, about everything from who Bruce Wayne's replacement would be after "Batman R.I.P." to the woes of trying to raise children in today's modern world. As uncommon as that experience was for me, it was a good experience, and I miss it.

The upside of the internet is that it provides opportunities for social connection that those of us who aren't exactly social butterflies might not get otherwise. When I discovered Living Between Wednesdays a few years back, I was ecstatic to learn that there were people out there in the world who not only cared about comics in the same way I do, but who also said really clever, funny things about them. I quickly discovered several other blogs in the comics blogosphere, like Green Lantern Butt's Forever, Every Day is Like Wednesday, and the Absorbascon. Inspired by these blogs, I tried starting my own comics-themed blog, but then I discovered that I didn't have much to say that other comics bloggers were not already saying (my friend, Theric, now uses that blog to review mostly indie comics; check it out).

With all the buzz around digital comics lately, though, and my own immersion into the new medium, I'm hoping I've found my niche. I'm taking my cue from another comics blog I follow, Collected Editions, except that while Collected Editions is the "wait-for-the-trade headquarters," I intend to make Pixelated Panels the read-it-digitally headquarters. What does that entail? I imagine this blog will evolve over time, but at least right now, these are the regular features I have planned:

• Day-And-Date: Yes, I know "day-and-date" is an absurd, redundant term, but I'm embracing the absurdity and using it to describe reviews of titles that are released (and which I buy) digitally the same day they're released in print. You can expect to see these reviews every Wednesday night. 
• A Month Late and a Dollar Short: Reviews of comics that I wait a month to buy, in order to get them a dollar cheaper. Consider these reviews your reminder that Hey! These comics are a month old now, and maybe worth checking out for a buck less than cover price.
• Digital Dollar Bin: Reviews of comics that you can get for $0.99, either because they're on sale or because they're old enough that this is the designated price point. 
• Digiversity: As you may have guessed by now, my thing is superhero comics published by DC. In order to broaden my horizons, and perhaps yours, I'm challenging myself to regularly sample new things, whether it's a Marvel or Vertigo or Archie comic I can get through Comixology, or a webcomic on some random dude's website. I'll report back on my findings. 
• Digital Horizons: A weekly roundup of news related to digital comics, and my ponderings thereon.
• Unpixelated Panels (with a tip of the hat to the Collected Editions feature, Uncollected Editions): This is where I'll talk about comics that are not yet available digitally, but should be. And eventually this blog will be so popular and have so much sway with digital readers that the powers that be will have no choice but to respond to my call to action. 

So there you have it, folks. If you're not wowed by the awesomeness of Pixelated Panels yet, just wait. I'm sure I'll come up with something. Hopefully. Maybe. Pretty please?