The Year of the Digital Prog

[paulvonscott]

The Future is here!  You can have 2000AD transmitted directly to your mind via brain beam!

At leat I think that's what Tharg was saying in this week's prog.  Surprised nobody has commented on it.  Download your prog instead of going to the newsagents or getting it through the letterbox.

I just wondered how many people would give up the hard copy of 2000AD for a digital version?  Is it the beginning of the end for print?

Be interesteing to know if you can download it onto one of those readers, and what the experience is like.

Link: Channel 99

[IndigoPrime]

"Is it the beginning of the end for print?"

I doubt it. This debate continues to rage, but I'm firmly of the belief that the magazine industry is fine IF (and that's a big 'if') the quality of the output is high enough. The big problem right now is that too many publishers are scared of the internet and are reacting by cutting costs, rather than investing and thereby ensuring that rates are better for print publications (thereby ensuring a higher quality) than for web.

For 2000 AD, I think the printed article is a major selling point, and I think the quality of the publication is such that it should remain 'safe' from online attacks (that said, it's not like there's a deluge of web-based comics, and the whole CoolBeans fiasco meant few others have been excited about trying something on that scale).

For me, the digital Prog is a good idea for people around the world to test the water, to see if 2000 AD really is their thing, and that can only be good. In the extremely unlikely scenario that 2000 AD goes digital-only (which I suspect would be a last throw of the dice in a massively declining market), I imagine most existing readers would give up on it.

So, overall, a good idea, and likely merely another string to the marketing bow, rather than anything to concern existing readers.

[paulvonscott]

"It's not like there's a deluge of web-based comics"

There's certainly a lot of web-comics about, that have their own audience.  Marvel are getting into the act, and if successful so will DC no doubt, followed by everyone else.

I wonder how many people will buy both...

[LARF]

You cannot read a digital prog in the bath.

You cannot read a digital prog on the bog.*

You cannot read a digital prog on the steps in the back garden whilst you are having a fag.*

You cannot read a digital prog when your kids have the laptop.

You cannot read a digital prog when your kids have the laptop, and the other Mac.

You cannot admire your collection of digital progs on your book shelf.

You cannot admire your graphic novel collection if they are digital.

You cannot read a screen for long, zoom in look closer, admire the colours, trace over, cut out, paste onto your bedroom wall, cover your school books with a digital prog.

You cannot have the same feeling as you do hen you get the prog in the post on a Monday morning and you savour it for later when the kids go to bed and you snuggle down for an escape for half an hour.

You cannot replicate the excitement of turning the cover and delving into the Nerve Centre, without trying your hardest not to peak at the first page of Dredd until you have read Tharg's message.

Now some might argue that yes you can print them out - but the will be low res, depends on the quality of your printer, and it will be on shitty paper unless you are willing to fork out a small fortune for high quality silk or gloss and then that will be more than buying the prog.

I wouldn't mind reading the prog online, but it wouldn't be the same, there's no intrinsic value, you don't feel like you are getting something. You cannot just come back to it when you want, pick it up for five minutes whilst you are waiting for your pasta to boil, or your train to arrive, or you just find five minutes need killing before you have to do something else - instead you'd have to switch on your computer, login, load up and find the page - it all seems so alien.

[The Adventurer]

I might give it a shot (if they offer the service to us Yanks) mostly because I'm sure it'll end up being a bit cheaper then buying through Previews over here, plus I can finally keep up with the latest issue instead of being a month behind. Also, it sure will be swell to experience thrill power weekly, instead of two issues every two weeks.

I won't drop the print Prog right off though because I do like paper comics. But with Rebellion's TP line going full bore I might switch to using that for keeping print thrills for posterity.

We'll see, it's very interesting at least.

[LARF]

Oh yeah. Other things, a screen is landscape, a prog is portrait - you cannot appreciate the dynamism of a well laid out page when you have to scroll down on a 15" laptop screen. If the prog heads towards digital will this change the format that the writers and artists work to - will they have to start thinking differently about how the action is delivered on the page in order to fit in with the digital format?

[Pyroxian]

Yeah, I'm tempted to get digital weekly prog, and then just buy the Graphic Novels of the stories I like.

  Steve

[paulvonscott]

"Yeah, I'm tempted to get digital weekly prog, and then just buy the Graphic Novels of the stories I like."

I can see a few people who are borderline 2000AD readers going (and coming back) that way.

Wonder if they'll do back progs?

[Floyd-the-k]

I was enjoying the occasional Marvel comic online. Their reader was very good; looked like pages flicking and it was pretty easy to make the page size fit the screen. Then they started charging for it, the bastards!
I tried that ten-seconders thing, but couldn't get past having to open individual frames, so eventually (remembering that I had the thing in the progs) gave up.  If 2000AD is that frustrating digitally, I wouldn't bother.

[The Adventurer]

"I tried that ten-seconders thing, but couldn't get past having to open individual frames, so eventually (remembering that I had the thing in the progs) gave up. If 2000AD is that frustrating digitally, I wouldn't bother."

You don't have to open individual frames, you can read in pages as a PDF. Which works pretty well.

"If the prog heads towards digital will this change the format that the writers and artists work to - will they have to start thinking differently about how the action is delivered on the page in order to fit in with the digital format?"

This isn't necessarily a bad thing, the future is digital, that's a fact. And formats will have to change to accommodate that eventually. Best to get started somewhere. And honestly, 2000AD's magazine sized format already works a lot better then the US tall/thin style which is very common.

[skurvy]

Is there any portable device other than a laptop that is good for reader comics? I know you can get digital book readers but as far as I'm aware they just read text and not image files.

[pauljholden]

Help! I can't see any reference on that site to digital 2000ADs (aside from a three part dredd and the 10seconders)

- pj

[Marbles]

I'll give this a go tonight - looks good. Wish it was .cbr files rather than .pdf's though.

[Bico]

DC have already made inroads to web publishing with the Zuda competition, where creators get 8 pages each month to see if they can attract enough votes to be picked up as an ongoing series - as long as they don't mind losing control of the rights to their creation in the process.  Doesn't sound like much of a deal to me, to be honest, when you can get more people reading your web-comic just by having a link in your sig when you visit online forums - but there's been plenty of people willing to chance their arm so far, with varying results.

Physical copies of TPBs sell well despite online proliferation of scanned comics, and Marvel still publish some books (Runaways, Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane, Power Pack, Spider-Girl) despite sales figures in the toilet, purely because the trade collections sell well enough to absorb the cost of producing a less than successful monthly.  To me, this says 2000ad's long-term survival lies more with successful sales  of collected material, with the comic itself no more than a proving ground for whatever material might eventually be collected.

If you're self-published, offering free downloads of your book is a good idea, as it'll be more or less guaranteed to be read by more people than will actually buy a physical copy.  Breaking even is rare with self-published comics, so you may as well accept the loss and try to get the book read by as many people as possible.

Link: All your creator rights are belong to us

[Byron Virgo]

David Gallaher, winner of the first Zuda comp, is the boyfriend of ex-DC editorial staffer Valerie D'Orazio (you remember, the one who quit over all those "badass" rape-athons the company are so keen to publish these days?)

Also, supposedly all of the finalists in the comp had been asked to be a part of the enterprise before DC had officially named it as Zuda or suggested the idea of a contest. Which is a happy coincidence.