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

[SaidNoOneEver]

If Donal hired someone else to help with the book, unless he took the time to renegotiate with Nasser, he'd be responsible to pay for it with his own half of the profits.

If Ethan didn't run his corner of CG like a two-bit gangleader and allowing the warcramps to run the asylum, the split might never have happened in the first place. By making his YouTube streams/shows the central hub of all social media promotion, Ethan's brand as a self-promoting put-down artist with an organized group dedicated to gayops would have to take center stage and if Nasser was assigned the gimp role, he'd have to put up or shut up. Nasser didn't do that and didn't play nice with WC. Ethan decided to ridicule Nasser fairly early on and quite honestly I suspect he advised Donal to dump him. They needed help and that's where Tuggy came in with his miscarriage-of-justice op (total BS) so Ethan could have a formal excuse to kick Nasser, who "doesn't know when to quit," from CG. The game since then has been to wear Nasser out and hope he drops any and all hope of getting a single cent.

Ethan when he still thought he could softly handle Nasser: "I have described Nasser as truly gifted. I would describe him as exceptional."
Ethan today: "$3500 isn't enough of a pay day for you for one shitty script?"

Like any slimeball perp, Ethan "I have no heart to fight with individuals" Van Sciver keeps coming back to the crime scene to try and finish what he started.

Something tells me Frog doesn't really believe the line he's taken here tonight and this is just him trolling for amusement.

 

[TheCosmicWarrior]

If the contract is 50/50 then Nasser is due anywhere from $10-15K. Otherwise Donal is skimming and perhaps doing something fraudulent. It doesn't cost that much to make a comic book when the lineart is done by one of the contributors.

 

[AnOminous]

If the contract is 50/50 then Nasser is due anywhere from $10-15K. Otherwise Donal is skimming and perhaps doing something fraudulent. It doesn't cost that much to make a comic book when the lineart is done by one of the contributors.

If they established a partnership, whether they knew it or not at the time, it doesn't have to be fraudulent for it to violate his fiduciary duty, which is vastly higher than the mere duty not to commit outright fraud. The same high level of duty would apply to both partners.

 

[Absurdity]

Something tells me Frog doesn't really believe the line he's taken here tonight and this is just him trolling for amusement.

Ethan is a very calculating individual when it comes to his Sciververse. I think he would love for people to think he's just acting the class clown so he can more easily pull off his phony neighborhood-friendly Uncle E-hee persona. He puts a huge amount of energy into his presentation. If it were to become common knowledge that he is every bit as willing to play dirty as the entrenched SJW superpowers he's supposed to detest, he better hope he has a bigger hold of his audience than a Stan Lee or a Todd McFarlane ever did. Unlike the aforementioned creators and their famous creations, Cyberfrog will never exceed the fame of Sciverfrog. That character is flatter than the pages he appears on.

 

[VIkkiVerse]

So Adamska is basically 100% agreeing with me here. Except for the idea of paying a writing $100 per page, which is close to Neil Gaiman rates. I'd say $20 per page for Nasser.

What Ethan is suggesting here is paying Nasser far below the industry average. A survey conducted in 2017 put the average script rate at around $65 per page. The writers guild recommends that a writer get paid 75% upfront with the rest being paid upon publication. If Ethan wants to pretend that Nasser and Donal's arrangement means paying Nasser out of "production costs", even though the arrangement had neither of them being paid this way and simply splitting the profits after other production costs were met, then Nasser is due payment of $3750 (using DC's lowest rate of $75/page) and that payment is already overdue and he is still entitled to half of the profit as agreed upon.

The disregard for the importance of writers in ComicsGate is why most of their books are shit.

 

[Jub-Jub]

What's a fair rate for a writer? Serious question, I have no clue.

It's a few years out of date but this was compiled from 142 comic pros responses.

Frog's numbers seem reasonable, with the exception of domestic mailing as that could be much cheaper with the US media mail option. Even if that was halved I'd expect Donal to price himself in the IDW tier for pencils, inks and whatever else so any extra Nasser thinks he would be getting is eaten up.

What Ethan is suggesting here is paying Nasser far below the industry average. A survey conducted in 2017 put the average script rate at around $65 per page

While Frog is lowballing him, Nasser is not going to get $5 more than the average marvel script writer let alone the average DC rate. He'd be in the Oni - Boom tier at max

 

[FROG]

Well, first, Nasser is a horrible writer.

But second, in my scenario, I'm giving the PENCILLER/INKER $100 per page. That rate is way below industry standard as well.

Offering Nasser $20-25 to write 48 pages of BRUTAS THE BADASS is extremely generous, considering that it's 20-25% of the artist's rate.

Which is absolutely to scale with the way creators are paid at the Big Two.

It's completely fair to hand Nasser $1000 for his script, Donal $4800 for his art, and then split what remains between them.

 

[SaidNoOneEver]

Well, first, Nasser is a horrible writer.

But second, in my scenario, I'm giving the PENCILLER/INKER $100 per page. That rate is way below industry standard as well.

Offering Nasser $20-25 to write 48 pages of BRUTAS THE BADASS is extremely generous, considering that it's 20-25% of the artist's rate.

Which is absolutely to scale with the way creators are paid at the Big Two.

It's completely fair to hand Nasser $1000 for his script, Donal $4800 for his art, and then split what remains between them.

His skill is subjective and irrelevant. Since the rates were not agreed upon beforehand he can pull whatever number out of his ass that he wants, much like you are doing for Donal right now. Instead I would suggest a compromise: forget about any additional payment on either side and split the proceeds 50/50.

 

[HonsPonzud]

Well, first, Nasser is a horrible writer.

But second, in my scenario, I'm giving the PENCILLER/INKER $100 per page. That rate is way below industry standard as well.

Offering Nasser $20-25 to write 48 pages of BRUTAS THE BADASS is extremely generous, considering that it's 20-25% of the artist's rate.

Which is absolutely to scale with the way creators are paid at the Big Two.

It's completely fair to hand Nasser $1000 for his script, Donal $4800 for his art, and then split what remains between them.

I'm also pretty sure that part of their written agreement was that Nasser would work on upcoming future issues of Brutas and other projects, Donal at the time was pretty excited and happy with Nasser's writing to offer to work on more projects too, so your whole biased narrative about "Nasser's writing was shit" and "writers should only get a small fee" you fuckers act as if writing isn't worth anything, just like you do with colouring when it's the art part that makes most of your panel shine, when writing alleviates not only a good portion of the work from the artist's shoulders but also gets the almonds of the artists working in other ways and visualize a scene with a different enough approach that would never have been considered by the artist itself.

In return, you aren't better than all these guys who would come tell you that "art" isn't worth anything and you should also pass it on for free or just for a "promise" for getting your name out there, and you can get scammed to infinity this way.

This guy puts it in better perspective than i can :

To come back to the issue at present between Donal and Nasser, there is more damage than just the financial profit sharing aspect of this first book when these future prospects were in the agreement, but yeah, maybe that's only how "i" see things, and i'm pretty sure there might be something to it.

 

[Mister Dongs]

At the prompting of a superchat, Frog went ahead and addressed the Nasser/Donal dispute at 3:07:28 of this stream,

Good sir. Fascination is rapidly growing over young Nasser's quest for funds. Any updates?"

Frog: Yeah, a lot of people are interested in Nasser getting money from Donal Delay.

Cecil: I have an update from Donal. There's a new page. And I don't understand why he's not paying Nasser. I've been giving him plenty of money.

Frog: Yeah I get it, Nasser should- Donal has plenty of money at this point, he's not giving any to Nasser. I've said- I've just, I know he needs to pay Nasser, but I think it's funnier if he doesn't. And when I say that Nasser goes off the rails and acts like I'm honestly sincerely recommending that Donal doesn't pay Nasser. But if he doesn't pay Nasser, it is going to be funnier for longer. Nasser is insisting Donal should pay him $5000, what did Brutas raise? I know Donal is fulfilling it right now, he's actually got all together. It turns out I backed it without meaning to. Here we go... it's called "Brutas the Badass" on IndieGoGoo. It raised $39,051, so that's the total, and I will tell you this that this is an awful lot of backers. 1293 backers. Just be aware. Just be aware, multiply this times 12 and that's going to be the shipping charge on average.

So you've got that. You've got whatever Donal wants to pay himself for drawing the book, the colors, the letters, the expenses, the actual printing costs, producing all of the work they've offered people. Nasser seems to think he's entitled to like somewhere between five and eight thousand dollars and I don't think it's there. So I'm looking forward to seeing what the final total is, what Nasser is going to get. But it aint going to be much though. It aint going to be much. And this by the way was a long campaign, this $39,000. This took him a year to raise. This is like a year's worth of Donal being on the... I mean, goddamn. Sorry Dad, I know I'm not supposed to use the Lord's name in vain. So Cecil, what do you think of that?

Cecil: How much has Nasser received so far?

Frog: Too much...

Cecil: Then that's plenty-

Frog: ...Zero.

[Some unrelated talk about Yanzi Lee's preferred surname]

Cecil: Donal is in chat, he says he'll give Nasser $2.15 and a free sticker.

Frog: You laugh but that's what it's going to turn out to be. It's not that much money. Nasser's saying like "This is lifechanging money for me" and I'm like "What do you mean?", like, it isn't going to be that much money. So.. it just isn't. It's going to take a lot of money to ship, and then the thing about it is you have to ship it and make sure everybody gets the book. Because about 5% of all your shippings will get lost in the mail, will get returned to you. On average about 5%. And you're going to have to hunt down those backers, especially since this campaign is about two years old. That's why it's in your interest to fulfill your campaigns and make sure they get their merchandise, and that's pricey. Donal is right to delay payment on this until all of the campaign is completely fulfilled, meanwhile Donal if you want to buy a computer or whatever, it's for 'business' *wink*.

Lost in all this is specialized Micah-hater Alien Xenomorph setting off Raz0rfist, clipped by DeadwoodDale:

 

[Adamska]

Well, first, Nasser is a horrible writer.

But second, in my scenario, I'm giving the PENCILLER/INKER $100 per page. That rate is way below industry standard as well.

Offering Nasser $20-25 to write 48 pages of BRUTAS THE BADASS is extremely generous, considering that it's 20-25% of the artist's rate.

Which is absolutely to scale with the way creators are paid at the Big Two.

It's completely fair to hand Nasser $1000 for his script, Donal $4800 for his art, and then split what remains between them.

Eh, I'd say a writer should get at least somewhere between 25 - 40% myself, but that's more because I feel that a good story is pretty important even in a visual medium. To use an example, the Thing Volume 1 had good art, but the writing was dogshit and filled with plotholes. Volume 2 (Climate of Fear) had shittier art (in the form it was done in a cheaper style), but a much better writer; you could actually make a decent sequel out of it. In this case, I like the second story moreso than the first, despite the first clearly having a better artist and style.

Sure, the writer isn't as important in the work, since the Penciller has to take their ideas and create them, and their (the writer's) work usually has a decent deal less labor time than the penciller, thus why they get paid more. But they still, especially in a partnership or creative role, have a pretty strong role in the final product.

I also advocate a bigger percentage than expected due to the very fucky spoken/bootleg written agreement and badly thought out copyright elements. I'd give more just on the side of caution since shit like fiduciary duties are going to rear its ugly head due to that partnership dilemma.

To sum it up for those curious; a payment should be the following,:

Donal: Pencilling fee + Profits
Nasser: Writing fee + Profits

The final price can vary for the labor, but you pay one partner for their work, the other merits it too. Especially when they are still partners, as disliked as they are.

And not paying your workers is the biggest sin an employer can do, and those people deserve their own medicine thrown back at them. Or a kick to the dick with gold plated shoes.

 

[Elwood P. Dowd]

dispute at 3:07:28 of this stream,

Still can't get my brain around the fact that people will listen to hours of this tedious spergery. (Yet, they do. And I used to. )

 

[Newman's Lovechild]

I feel that a good story is pretty important even in a visual medium.

That. The thing I think Frog and Yaboi and CG at large miss when thumping the podium about the 'visual medium'* is that doesn't come close to the definition of comics. A whole lot of art and entertainment are visual media. I won't spergquote big chunks of Scott McCloud (I don't have the book with me) but comics at their heart are storytelling, and a good story needs a decent writer. Otherwise you end up with a basic collage of overrendered panels in rough sequence. Exciting in places, ultimately empty, and often stupid.

* Using it to rationalise why they need to draw enormous tiddies and to hark back to the age of the superstar artist in the early 90s, squeezing money out of the rubes in exchange for a hundred variant covers. Because that ended up so well the first time.

 

[NasserRabadi13]

I'm also pretty sure that part of their written agreement was that Nasser would work on upcoming future issues of Brutas and other projects, Donal at the time was pretty excited and happy with Nasser's writing to offer to work on more projects too, so your whole biased narrative about "Nasser's writing was shit" and "writers should only get a small fee" you fuckers act as if writing isn't worth anything, just like you do with colouring when it's the art part that makes most of your panel shine, when writing alleviates not only a good portion of the work from the artist's shoulders but also gets the almonds of the artists working in other ways and visualize a scene with a different enough approach that would never have been considered by the artist itself.

In return, you aren't better than all these guys who would come tell you that "art" isn't worth anything and you should also pass it on for free or just for a "promise" for getting your name out there, and you can get scammed to infinity this way.

This guy puts it in better perspective than i can :

To come back to the issue at present between Donal and Nasser, there is more damage than just the financial profit sharing aspect of this first book when these future prospects were in the agreement, but yeah, maybe that's only how "i" see things, and i'm pretty sure there might be something to it.

As far as upcoming issues, I wrote 4 total issues of brutas and multiple drafts. There were also other projects we planned to do together too.

 

[Fathead]

Nasser did not create the characters. I brought Brutas, his origin & his sidekick to Nasser to write a story. I created the characters as a result of my fans asking for my version of Lobo before I even approached Nasser.

Nasser wrote a script where Gideon was a person despite the sidekick obviously being a floating robot.

The most Nasser contributed was naming the villains & saying a Cheeto is what woke Brutas.

Also, the numbers on display for Brutas costs are laughably low. Ethan is the closest, still lowballing & didn’t include Kyle coloring Willis’ cover, Kelsey coloring mine & Huerta’s cover for his 5pg story, which he also got a writing fee for.

EDIT: Nasser came up with Gideon’s origin.

 

[Adamska]

As far as upcoming issues, I wrote 4 total issues of brutas and multiple drafts. There were also other projects we planned to do together too.

The value would then be by the number of dated and completed pages at that time of the break-up that were completed. Again, mainly because even if the work is rejected, you did do the work. Old saying is you pay a shit worker, even if the work they did was shit. The other items would be put under "consultation", which is nebulous and I'd probably just lump it under profit.

Having demonstrable proof that is backdated of any project ideas is not a bad idea either, but that's like three years too late it seems for the both of you.

And oh boy, the slapfight revives.

 

[Mister Dongs]

And oh boy, the slapfight revives.

We need him now more than ever...

 

[SaidNoOneEver]

Also, the numbers on display for Brutas costs are laughably low. Ethan is the closest, still lowballing & didn’t include Kyle coloring Willis’ cover, Kelsey coloring mine & Huerta’s cover for his 5pg story, which he also got a writing fee for.

You're going to have to open the books to show that.

 

[Adamska]

You're going to have to open the books to show that.

This is also a pretty good way to kill any left over start-up just to guarantee there's no profit, just use it up on other costs. It's actually a pretty common tactic with creative works whose partners are feuding, though the usual method is to invest the left-over into the next project.

Just saying. Fucking over a partner, especially in the comic industry, is as old as 4 colors and a dime time.

 

[Analog Devolved]

Well, first, Nasser is a horrible writer.

But second, in my scenario, I'm giving the PENCILLER/INKER $100 per page. That rate is way below industry standard as well.

Offering Nasser $20-25 to write 48 pages of BRUTAS THE BADASS is extremely generous, considering that it's 20-25% of the artist's rate.

Which is absolutely to scale with the way creators are paid at the Big Two.

It's completely fair to hand Nasser $1000 for his script, Donal $4800 for his art, and then split what remains between them.

I can't believe Ethan involved himself in this autistic slapfight where two literal retards sperg endlessly over a twitter handshake deal that went south when Nasser decided to shoot himself in the foot and ask for a purple heart.
Ethan is right in everything he has said over the past several pages. The cost of art should have always been factored in and Nassers script was always worth dogshit. The best writers in the industry MIGHT get $100 per page. Where Donal's work should easily get $150 per page. $100 would be extreme low-balling but is also possible.

Their whole agreement is dumb as fuck. If it was smart there wouldn't be this much shit-flinging over it.
Nasser, you are a tard.
Donal, you are a tard.
Ethan is in it for the drama, he can milk this for hundreds of dollars in superchats and a few long streams if there is a lolsuit.

The only reason any of this is remotely interesting is because it's a perfect case study in how not to do business.

Also you can't media mail a comic book its against the law.

Nasser is realistically looking at a 4k dollar payout which is way more than most writers make off a comic book, its more than a lot of artists make.

But by all means, keep sperging. It gives Ethan content to yak about on his snorestreams and a lolsuit between cows will only give us all the information about the finances of making a comic and the business deal plus eat away at whatever profit there is for the book.