I would prefer that the industry remain vital and strong in a digital era.

But, for example, you mentioned CD stores. You do realize that the industry has been wiped out, and that local CD stores are now rare. My guess is that there has been over an 80% loss there, and even Best Buy is on the verge of discontinuing the product.

Even worse, you mentioned the music industry. As someone who is a parttime musician, I can tell you that the loss of money in that industry has wiped out the possibility of a music career by many times over. The only remaining way to make any money at all is in touring, and most tours lose money.

It is clear to me that we’re at the end of the line of LCS’s, even though a few will survive. (After all, there is one CD store left in my area—out of dozens.)

Your comments about digital representations make sense. I just hope that there will remain an interest in purchasing them.

On the other hand, like Big Little Books (or was it Little Big Books or something), maybe comics have seen their day….

Well that’s going to happen anyway, the direct market is a dead-end. My point was that any repeat business is going to be digital.

Simply making comics available digitally isn’t nearly the same as marketing them and creating a demand for them. The average consumer sees many ads daily for things competing for his dollars and leisure time. Ads for comics aren’t among them. Movies do practically nothing, apparently, to promote sales of the comics that the movies (IRON MAN) are based on.

Decades ago, superhero comics were easier to get into as a hobby than they are now. Marvel and DC are focusing too much on getting more/as much money as they can from their existing customers. If the move into digital comics caused comics shops to fail in any great number, what would the consequences for the industry be? I’d guess that the publishers of literary comics wouldn’t be hurt significantly. Their customers would buy their comics, with or without comics shops.

Marvel’s and DC’s success in selling comics probably shouldn’t be used as indicators for the health of the industry as a whole. A business model that relies on addiction to make someone a customer puts a low ceiling on readership for any series. Given the absence of significant advertising and marketing, perhaps it’s surprising that Marvel and DC have as many customers as they do.

SRS

You’re not going to grow your audience if you come off as selling porn. And a lot of people consider women displayed in bathing suits to be porn.

Not saying I’m one of those people, but the reward would seem to outweigh the risk in this one move.

“The idea that people being able to buy comics at a NEWSSTAND is going to somehow encourage them to drive 60 miles to find their nearest comic-shop seems to be nonsense to me.”

As a collector, I bought my first comics in the small town of Lake View, Iowa, at a grocery store newsstand. Fortunately, I lived in Omaha, Nebraska, and a shopping center with three newsstands was only a thirty-minute walk away.

A year later, I was hiking an hour uphill both ways, in the snow, to visit my local comics shop, The Dragon’s Lair.

But then, I guess I am “some random freak individual”! But if we don’t replenish fandom with new fans, then comic book stores will languish, digital or no digital comics.

I know of science fiction fans who travel TWO HOURS just so they can spend the day at Barnes and Noble getting their geek on. I myself once drove an hour to attend a Neil Gaiman signing.

Also… is one out of a hundred random enough? If so, then there are some 50 Million iPhones and 35 Million iPad Touches and 1 Million iPads already sold. That’s a possible 860,000 random freaks ready to make that pilgrimage.

Even if the person reading the digital comic isn’t likely to visit a store instantly, they might later. Or they’ll sample a digital comic, and develop a favorable opinion about the medium. Or they’ll read a great comic, and realize it’s not all “Pow Biff Bam”. Or they’ll tell their friends and coworkers. Or the publisher sends them an email about Free Comic Book Day with a link to the Comic Shop Locator Service.

*sigh* Yes, the seduction of a random innocent person into a fan is random. But whatever the probability is, the random number increases when the sample population increases. So the more people reading comics, the more potential fans. The more ways those comics can be read, the more chances those readers will become fans.

“AwesomeDude, I do agree that $3.99 is a barrier that I won’t cross either.”

Taken out of context just a little… many people balked when Amazon went to an agency model (30/70) instead of continuing to sell $9.99 ebooks at a loss. But has that hurt publishers and online retailers? Steve Jobs says no. (His presentation yesterday says that publishers tell him that the new Apple ibooks store account for about 22% of all ebook sales. iBook was the reason Amazon moved to the agency pricing… Apple made the first move.)

“However, a full-digital move is also deadly. My LCS would be gone, and I believe the transition to full digital will reduce the comics market to almost nothing. The cheapness of internet users (and high rate of theft) have caused such people to avoid paying for anything.”

Well, there are still a lot of music stores around (and music publishers). Some are small independent stores selling new and used CDs (and vinyl!). Some are national retailers who sell music as part of a more diverse product mix. Some people buy CDs because it’s easier to use than downloading a file to a computer. Others find that MP3 encoding strips out a lot of nuance, especially in classical recordings. (Some even look down on CDs, preferring vinyl or Blu-Ray discs.)

There are comic book shops using the independent book store model.
There are comic book shops using the hobbyist/aficionado model.
Stores that are competitive will find a way to stay in business, just as music and book stores have found a way to stay in business.

If I want a cheap bottle of wine, I go to the grocery store. If I want to impress someone, then I go to Bottlerocket Wine & Spirit, which has a friendly, knowledgeable staff and a good selection. The same applies to comics shops. If I want excellent selection and customer service, I go to Forbidden Planet or Jim Hanley’s Universe. If I just want something to pass the time, I’ll grab something from a newsstand.

E-book readers have been around since 1998. The Kindle launched in 2007. With the new agency model, publishers are now willing to release cheaper digital ebook editions at the same time as the regular trade editions. Some are bundling digital files with the paper edition. (Which I see Marvel and others doing at some point. Imagine a preprinted code inside the book which lets you download a free digital copy.)

Yes, people love “free”. Yes, people will steal. There are ways to work around that, and to even exploit it. (Just look at Free Comic Book Day!) Now imagine a digital coupon added to the digital file, which a user can take to the local comics shop and use to save money on a trade collection. Or using the metadata of the user to push email promotions linked to local stores. (BN.com does that… except their promotional emails are nationwide.) Or using the metadata to recommend other titles by author or character. Or adding a hyperlink which directs the reader to a dedicated chat room, which creates community, and seduces the innocent reader into becoming a fan. Or (and this is the one I most want to see), hyperlinks in the actual story so you can get background information on characters, strange vocabulary, and links to previous issues! (Remember those editor captions from 80s Marvel comics? It sells more comics!)

“The comics companies will probably die out as how many people would buy a Detective Comics online (probably not enough to pay the creators)?”

I’m not a music maven, so I don’t know exactly, but there are still a lot of musicians touring the country. Justin Bieber was discovered via YouTube. Radiohead’s “In Rainbows” let people pay what they wanted for a digital download. They also sold the album in a variety of physical formats, including vinyl!

As for selling enough copies to pay the creators, what about the many webcomic cartoonists who make a living GIVING away the digital comics? (Sure, they sell books and other merchandise, but how is that any different than what Marvel or DC would do?)

“Serial, paper comics have a loyal following, and much of that following is unlikely to pay for something that they won’t own, won’t pass on, won’t age with that special intrinsic value.”

True. Collectors will always be an important segment of comic book publishing. A book or magazine is an easy and elegant way to present information.

However, it’s not an either/or situation. I love reading XKCD online. I love being able to read the book. The periodical comic book magazine–7×10 inches, 32 pages, two staples–might become a non-standard format. It has its uses (Free Comic Book Day!) but if the economics do not work, then publishers will find other ways to publish stories and make money. It might be via digital copies. It might be a big, thick, Shonen Jump-style anthology on newsstands. It might be an original graphic novel.

And, hey, if periodical comicbooks become scarce, that increases their rarity and value! }]

“Who would find having a digital copy of Amazing Fantasy #15 to be preferable to having an original copy (even ignoring market worth)?”

My digital copy of Amazing Fantasy #15 (available on the “40 Years Of The Amazing Spider-Man” CD-ROM collection) is better. The reproduction is flawless, I can zoom in to almost microscopic detail. Everything in the comic is on the CD. (That software even has a reading feature, but Marvel did not activate it.)

I own a lot of MAD Magazines, started collecting in 1979. I love flipping through them at random. I also own the “Absolute MAD” DVD-ROM which contains over fifty years of magazines. Every page, every insert, every premium is on those discs. I can search by keyword (very important when looking for satire!). I can fold-in the fold-ins electronically, keeping my magazines in near-mint condition! The Table of Contents for each issue is hyperlinked to the actual pages. I also paid $125 that huge “Complete Don Martin” collection of a few years ago, even though it’s all on the DVD. Why? Because it’s a beautiful object, and it’s fun to randomly flip pages and discover something I may have forgotten.

Personally, I think mainstream digital comics will be a very good thing. Look at the plethora of webcomics being produced. Look at the mini-comics from the 80s and 90s. Each influx of new talent and creativity was encouraged by an easy way of publishing comics at low cost. Now, imagine that plethora of comics being supplemented by a large number of webcomics being published by DC and Marvel. Maybe new or forgotten characters will become mainstream. Maybe older creators will not be forgotten. Maybe more cartoonists will be able to make a living creating comics.

As I pointed out in a previous post on a different subject- not all $3.99 comics contain 22 pages. (i.e; Red Hulk page count vs Incredible Hulk page count) Some actually have seven to eight extra pages added to the story.

Why that is, I don’t know.

~

Coat

So I guess I’m that guy who’d find a digital copy preferable for some stuff, maybe even a lot of stuff.

However, a full-digital move is also deadly. My LCS would be gone, and I believe the transition to full digital will reduce the comics market to almost nothing. The cheapness of internet users (and high rate of theft) have caused such people to avoid paying for anything.

The comics companies will probably die out as how many people would buy a Detective Comics online (probably not enough to pay the creators)?

Serial, paper comics have a loyal following, and much of that following is unlikely to pay for something that they won’t own, won’t pass on, won’t age with that special intrinsic value.

Who would find having a digital copy of Amazing Fantasy #15 to be preferable to having an original copy (even ignoring market worth)?

This digital move needs to happen. Sorry HitW- diversify! FAST!

Sure wish I could skip the reprint crap Marvel is serving as backup features in some of their bloated $3.99 and $4.99 print titles.

I can say that for me, that’s exactly it. I enjoy reading comics on Wednesday, but that price was more than my market could bear, especially once I heard that quote where the dude from Marvel basically said they didn’t have to make them that price, but figured the market could bear it so why not.