Diseased #Comicsgate - The Culture Wars Hit The Funny Books!

[AnOminous]

Maybe a similar, though more modest program, might work elsewhere. Dunno. Seems crazy to me. But there it is, as a thing.

There are places it's a lot cheaper to rent than the Haight. Considering a lot of people don't buy much at these stores but then endlessly hang around there like it's a social club or something, it seems reasonable to ask the community to support them. Maybe they could even tell Marvel/DC/Diamond to fuck off with their monopolistic ass rape that they try to cover up with fake progressive politics.

 

[RodgerDodger]

None of those numbers are particularly significant other than the graphic novel numbers. They're dismal, of course, but they've been dismal for years. The toys numbers aren't great but probably have to do with things that have nothing to do with comics.

The dollars versus units thing does seem to be consistent with the general idea that the shrinking comics industry is squeezing more money out of fewer buyers, but it isn't like some sudden catastrophe even with CG factored in.

Not that this is any cause for optimism. It could just be that the market has found a bottom where even "professionals" sending out literal pictures of their assholes to people isn't enough to drive anyone away who wasn't already driven away by the absolute garbage being sold.

I don't know. I somehow don't think they are anywhere near bottom yet. In fact it feels closer to the top of the steep decline. They doubled the number of merchant closures year to year. And overall sales still seem on a steady downward trend month over month. With just a few peaks surrounding major interest releases. Do Graphic Novels to the mass merchants such as Barnes & Noble go through Diamond or are they direct from the publishers or a book distributor?

Would a model like what this bookstore does possibly work in the comic book sphere?

Borderland Books



They've got 300 people each paying $100/year simply so the bookstore can remain open and cover costs. These "sponsors" get nothing beyond some minor perks. They also got a bunch of customers together to loan them $2.2 million dollars so they could buy a building. Yeah, there's a lot of money sloshing around San Fran, but it is also expensive as hell to do business there. Maybe a similar, though more modest program, might work elsewhere. Dunno. Seems crazy to me. But there it is, as a thing.

Even though this makes the Businessman in me cringe to see, good for them if they somehow make it work. I'm a firm believer that if you need donations of crowdfunding to pay the rent, you have failed as a business concern and should just give up now before you leave your family homeless via escalating debt. But if they have somehow managed to make a bookstore work as some sort of Hippy community collective pay for membership social club, well go for it. The problem is I can't see a huge crowd of people lining up to pay $100+/year in order to have that wonderful warm ambiance of a comic store, and to interact with intellectually stimulating comic fans? At that point you might be better off simply approaching a local university psych department about underwriting the costs of keeping the store open in exchange for allowing them to run unusual and unethical psych experiments on the customer base. It's not like anyone would notice or care.

 

[Bongsnake McGee]

There are much much cheaper ways to experience the comic book shop as a psych experiment thing.

The Million Year Picnic in mass does some interesting things with the way they set up their displays, for instance.

For some reason they don't charge 100+/year for their patrons for the privilege to shop there though.

 

[AnOminous]

Even though this makes the Businessman in me cringe to see, good for them if they somehow make it work. I'm a firm believer that if you need donations of crowdfunding to pay the rent, you have failed as a business concern and should just give up now before you leave your family homeless via escalating debt.

That or just the whole idea of physical places where books are sold is essentially obsolete, but people still want the physical place for its own qualities and are willing to pay for it. That's just adapting to a different market and essentially selling a different thing.

 

[RodgerDodger]

That or just the whole idea of physical places where books are sold is essentially obsolete, but people still want the physical place for its own qualities and are willing to pay for it. That's just adapting to a different market and essentially selling a different thing.

There is something to be said for operating it as a niche "club" or "co-op". That could in fact be an interesting model to move some niche hobbies to. Heck Model Railroad clubs have done that for years, just due to their needs for space.

 

[damian]

Would a model like what this bookstore does possibly work in the comic book sphere?
Borderland Books
They've got 300 people each paying $100/year simply so the bookstore can remain open and cover costs. These "sponsors" get nothing beyond some minor perks. They also got a bunch of customers together to loan them $2.2 million dollars so they could buy a building. Yeah, there's a lot of money sloshing around San Fran, but it is also expensive as hell to do business there. Maybe a similar, though more modest program, might work elsewhere. Dunno. Seems crazy to me. But there it is, as a thing.

I was just talking about implementing something similar to this to the owners of my local comic shop. Club memeberships, like pay certain amount of $ for some minor perks like free bag and boards, 5-10% off orders of >$25 and other stuff like that.

 

[LateNightComics]

So being gay, trans, and into BDSM is bad now?
Do you have to be “politically” gay or trans now?

I can't understand if the image was too trans or not trans enough. Here's another version without the background.
To all the spergs I fucked I couldn't have done it without JDA and Renfamous. Thank them for me.

 

[TowinKarz]

That or just the whole idea of physical places where books are sold is essentially obsolete, but people still want the physical place for its own qualities and are willing to pay for it. That's just adapting to a different market and essentially selling a different thing.

I'm willing to pay for it to browse physical books, partly out of habit and partly out of genuine love of doing so, but they've got to be quality books. I'll gladly pay the $5- $8 markup on Carl Hiaasen novels and true crime compliations if it means I can sit in a sofa and thumb through a couple before making a purchase, but I realize I may be a dying breed in that regard. And those who will do that for comics, in current year, may already be gone.

The ruthless march of technology is a bitch.

 

[MG 192]

Honestly if they just shut down everything, fired all these shitheads, and hired some hacks in Japan or even Korea or the Philippines or Vietnam or some shit, they'd do better.

This. People have been saying that the manga industry is the future of comics since they do sell and are not beholden to identity politics or major comic book writers with egos the size of Jupiter in public. Personally, I also think this is an opportunity for the manhwa and manhua, the Korean and Chinese comics market respectively, to gain a foothold into the shrinking American comic book industry, especially if they can create heroes with international recognition like Japan has with franchises like Dragon Ball and Sailor Moon.

The ball game is wide open and there are no greater opportunities for foreign markets to achieve relevance. People still want comics, they just have to be cheap, accessible, portable entertainment.

 

[Fagnacious D]

I can't understand if the image was too trans or not trans enough. Here's another version without the background.
To all the spergs I fucked I couldn't have done it without JDA and Renfamous. Thank them for me.

We get it. You've posted it before already. The way you obsess over the image makes me think this is your fetish.

 

[Boss Bass]

I'm willing to pay for it to browse physical books, partly out of habit and partly out of genuine love of doing so, but they've got to be quality books. I'll gladly pay the $5- $8 markup on Carl Hiaasen novels and true crime compliations if it means I can sit in a sofa and thumb through a couple before making a purchase, but I realize I may be a dying breed in that regard. And those who will do that for comics, in current year, may already be gone.

The ruthless march of technology is a bitch.

There’s absolutely a benefit to physical stores with knowledgeable staff, it just cuts into profit margins.

Don’t worry in five years we will all be autistic shut ins who buy everything online and talk only to hugboxes.

 

[boofit]

There’s absolutely a benefit to physical stores with knowledgeable staff, it just cuts into profit margins.

Don’t worry in five years we will all be autistic shut ins who buy everything online and talk only to hugboxes.

As long as there's plenty A-class self cleaning sex bots around why not

 

[Love Soze]

I was asking about this a few weeks ago:

 

[Water-T]

Twitter death threats from the Anti-CG crowd and REEEing from Ren incoming to that cancer charity in 5...4...3...

 

[damian]

https://twitter.com/MarkBrooksArt/status/1087191571437703168 http://archive.fo/djubq

https://twitter.com/MarkBrooksArt/status/1087223111253135360 http://archive.fo/idaT4

https://twitter.com/GailSimone/status/1086678506983968768 http://archive.fo/Y2Iza

https://twitter.com/GailSimone/status/1086715640973389824 http://archive.fo/Q1ZaH

https://twitter.com/GailSimone/status/1086791542646366208 http://archive.fo/oqviv

EDIT:
Bill found time to shit on the MAGA teens, probably while he was hiding from his aunty:
https://twitter.com/sinkevitch/status/1086790971977719808 https://archive.fo/ERfJn

BILL SIENKIEWICZ: PRO RE-EDUCATION CAMPS.

 

[Elwood P. Dowd]

Would a model like what this bookstore does possibly work in the comic book sphere?

Borderland Books



They've got 300 people each paying $100/year simply so the bookstore can remain open and cover costs. These "sponsors" get nothing beyond some minor perks. They also got a bunch of customers together to loan them $2.2 million dollars so they could buy a building. Yeah, there's a lot of money sloshing around San Fran, but it is also expensive as hell to do business there. Maybe a similar, though more modest program, might work elsewhere. Dunno. Seems crazy to me. But there it is, as a thing.

I'll be damned. What I suggested above is already happening. Also San Fran.

Mission: Comics and Art is creating neighborhood community space for comic books and the arts
Archive - looks like shit, but I get yelled at when I don't do it.

Looking for $3k/mo, getting $2k. Not too shabby. Reading through the crap on his site and a couple of articles it looks like their 2018 sales + Patreon gimmebux essentially brought them level with where they were in 2016, following a disastrous 2017. At least by my back of the envelope calculation. And still in business, at any rate.

Whether this model would work outside of the San Fran playpen? Who knows? But there it is, and still in force,at least for the present.

 

[Jub-Jub]

None of those numbers are particularly significant other than the graphic novel numbers. They're dismal, of course, but they've been dismal for years. The toys numbers aren't great but probably have to do with things that have nothing to do with comics.

The dollars versus units thing does seem to be consistent with the general idea that the shrinking comics industry is squeezing more money out of fewer buyers, but it isn't like some sudden catastrophe even with CG factored in.

Not that this is any cause for optimism. It could just be that the market has found a bottom where even "professionals" sending out literal pictures of their assholes to people isn't enough to drive anyone away who wasn't already driven away by the absolute garbage being sold.

Watching a DnC video the other day and he mentioned that there were more milestone issues in 2018 compared 2017, if true i expect more variants and more over ships. I would love to find out these numbers because i feel like that would give you a great overview of the health of the industry and just how much of a crutch they relied on to achieve -5.6% issues sold. The numbers i would love would be purposeful over ships like 100% on Iceman #1 and true milestones sold e.g. the drop of ~400,000 copies of FF#1 and Wolverine #1 to issue #2s and the pictures of massive stacks still present after weeks on shelves of many similar big milestones. It would be extremely :autistic: to attempt and almost impossible to get, but it would be interesting to see just how big that crutch is.

To me the industry is still on a slippery slope and trending downwards; it's not quite snowballing or in free fall just yet but wouldn't take much to hit those points. Currently there are still 2000+ shops in the US but as more die and people have to drive further i can see the industry crashing hard and fast as some customers drop comics completely and other decide to just order the big names from amazon. Those pros tweeting arseholes and being more concerned about the right side of history are eventually going to have a rude wake up call when impulse, chance and pity buys dry up.

 

[Tanner Glass]

I'll be damned. What I suggested above is already happening. Also San Fran.
Whether this model would work outside of the San Fran playpen? Who knows? But there it is, and still in force,at least for the present.

I think the model would work anywhere and it would only be super expensive in San Fran compared to anywhere else.

I think a better model would just be to have a monthly membership geared around common comic book space activities, as most comic book stores I've seen are comic book stores + something else (most common would be + hobby shop). Most comic stores I see are more likely to sell a Batman POP Figure or T-Shirt than a comic.

A thing that comic shops never seemed to figure out in earnest is how to monetize their space for activities (stores don't get paid for hosting DND games, MTG Games, or other tabletop games) when the actual "rental of a shared space" model works for most co-working startup spaces.

Some stores already do this (entry fee for tourneys, cover charge for table space, a wider selection of food, etc) but I haven't seen one really expand on it hard, mainly just slow stores barley moving hobby supplies at huge markup.

 

[AnOminous]

I think the model would work anywhere and it would only be super expensive in San Fran compared to anywhere else.

It's cheaper but your customer base would be sparser and spread out over a larger area.

A thing that comic shops never seemed to figure out in earnest is how to monetize their space for activities (stores don't get paid for hosting DND games, MTG Games, or other tabletop games) when the actual "rental of a shared space" model works for most co-working startup spaces.

And this would be how they could do it. Rather than casual hanging around drinking coffee spaces, have some kind of regular event that people would actually go out of their way to show up.

They need to provide something you can't get online, and unfortunately, cheap books ordered while sitting on your ass in the morning in your pajamas is entirely available online, and bookstores can't compete with that aspect of it at all.

 

[damian]