That’s nearly 2009 done; let’s be frank, in a lot of ways the year was a challenge, and it’s capping 10 years that really kind of sucked. Sucked in a way that prompts me to share the first comic strip that I can recall reading, more than 30 years past (certainly, I read comics before this one, but it’s the oldest that’s stuck with me): a kidney stone of a decade, indeed.

But … webcomics.

Sure, webcomics existed prior to 1 January 2000 (hell, you can see a stack of ’em in the links over to the right), but the start of the 21st century is when they exploded. For going on half that time, I’ve been sharing my thoughts with literally dozens of you, and if this particular implementation of a delivery system/business model/art form isn’t enough to redeem a time when we as a species seemed to be sliding backwards, well, it’s helped keep me from screaming myself awake. So there’s my Best of the Decade list in a single (possible obsolete now) word: webcomics. As Sturgeon would have it, most of ’em are crap, but there are so damn many of them now, it was inevitable that some would be gems.

It was not inevitable that some of the creators, rather than have their work undiscovered, would create comics loved so much by so many, that they could make this most frivolous of passtimes a career. It was not inevitable that one of those webcomics would launch a charity that would, in seven years, raise $US6.5 million to benefit children’s hospitals. It was not inevitable that numerous creators would score Hollywood movie deals (some of which will even get made). It was not inevitable that a new kind of publisher/merch fulfillment/services provider would not only slouch its way towards success, but bring a stack of creators along for the ride.

Maybe it was a series of happy accidents, maybe it was down to the pure determination of the parties involved. But it happened, and I think those of us reading this page are happier for it.

And, because it’s become a slight tradition for me to talk about Shaenon Garrity on New Year’s Eve, check this out: she wants to give you fifty bucks for free. More precisely, she wants to give you fifty bucks of original artwork just so she doesn’t have to move it:

From now until the end of January, for every copy of Skin Horse Volume One you purchase, I will send a randomly selected original daily strip. These normally sell for $50, but I’m moving and I need to lighten my load.

In one of the most profound lessons that I ever took to heart, Chuck Jones once wrote that his beloved Uncle Lynn taught him that being lazy is a virtue, and it takes a good deal of brains to be effectively lazy. Garrity has learned this lesson well, and to your benefit. Naturally, she knows how to work all the angles on this deal:

Oh, and if you want a specific strip, you can purchase one for the normal price of $50. Which might be worth doing if you don’t want your favorite strip to go to somebody who doesn’t appreciate it on the same level you do.

My only problem is that there’s too many strips that I feel that way about, and only so much money that I can spend, so I think I’ll take my chances (but if I were to randomly get a strip of Dr Lee looking all hot, or “Man, there ain’t nothing in this world sadder than a wet transvestite”, that would be extra rad). I wonder if I could order enough copies to be declared a distributor?

See everybody on Monday.

Gotta hop a train to go see cool stuff at The Met (which I hope won’t be overrun with tourists, but let’s be realistic), so any lengthy postin’ is right out. In the meantime, few things I found interesting this week:

• Wait, it’s gonna be 2010 (first of the barely legal teens), not 2012? Wapsi Square may be running a bit fast (or the calendar machine a bit slow), but can’t say I’m not loving the suddenly fast-paced movement on the mythic story arc.
• How to deal with robots that love you: a handy primer from Tom Siddell.
• Everybody’s reading what is likely the last week of Dr Ladysounds ever, right?
• For those who enjoy The Comedy Stylings of Corsetto & Milholland, a tweet that one may find … intriguing.

As of this writing, last week’s story on the Keenspot reorganization has clocked 140 comments; for the record, that’s more than any of the Wikipedia Purge stories, more than the time we were asked to govern ourselves accordingly, more than twice as many as the first big collective poo-fling we had here, near as I can tell the most on any single post in the five year’s we at Fleen have been doing this. I’ve never locked a comment thread at Fleen and I’m not going to, but at some point the discussion is really going to degrade to “Did not!” “Did too!” and I’m gonna have to ask you all to step back from the internet for your own health and well-being.

Some of you are still getting tagged as spam, so do remember to email me if you comments don’t show up (caching effects mean that even when I post, I can sometime see my comment in the Fleen Mission Control administrative end of things, but not at the site — just give it a few); for ease of tracking, let me know about what time you posted, and what name you signed. Oh, and to satisfy my mercenary tendencies, I’d be remiss if I didn’t point out that there’s a lot of people reading right now, and cheap, open ad buttons from Project Wonderful for any that want to reach eyeballs. Just sayin’.

Now that we’re that much close to bidding the story goodbye (and believe me, if there’s anything that warrants a followup, we’ll talk about it; Chris Crosby has been very generous with his offers of answers), let’s talk about another goodbye.

Today marks the end of DAR! A Super Girly Top Secret Comic Diary.

The short form is that DAR!iarist Erika Moen wants to tell other stories; that’s also the longer form, for Moen is nothing if not brimming with stories and talent. It’s been a constant presence in her life for six years (or, if you prefer, about a quarter of her life) and in my browser for about half that. I’m a little brokenhearted (for me) and a lot thrilled (for her) that it’s ending, but ultimately I feel DAR! has served its purpose.

If memory serves correctly, Moen and I met at SPX about five years ago super-briefly; neither of us is too sure if we actually did. We’ve corresponded by email a handful of times, and we have some mutual friends. But from her comics, she feels so much more connected and familiar than our very casual history would suggest. I don’t mean to say that I “know her” because I’ve read her comics, nothing so shallow as that — but it’s pretty clear that Moen has spent her adult life putting her soul out for anybody to share in that wanted to. I’ve smiled for her and hurt for her, wanted to hold her and tell her it would all be okay, and realized that holding her almost certainly means holding on for dear life. I feel privileged — honored — that she’s shared herself so generously.

I’m going to miss that feeling I get where it’s like the two of us are hanging out and we’re probably a little drunk as she’s telling me about her day and then the tender moment ends with farts. But I’m looking forward to what Hurricane Erika cooks up next, and am ready to ride along wherever she may go. If you haven’t read DAR! obsessively, now’s a good time what with the long weekend coming up and all — start from the beginning and watch what growing into the person you’re going to be looks like for one woman who’s just getting started.

The unusually high volume of comments on a particular recent post from people without a history of posting at Fleen has made the spam filters go a bit wacky. If you’ve had your comments disappear (it’s happened to several posters) or are getting denial notices when you try to post, please use the contact page to let us know and we’ll clear that up.

This has happened before, during The Great Todd Goldman/Dave Kelly Contretemps Of Aught-Seven and during the MyFridj story. The only real alternatives to this occasional unpleasantness are:

1. Requiring moderation on all comments
2. Requiring accounts for all posters
3. Allowing a flood of blogspam

The first is a pain for me, the second is a pain for you, and the third is an offense against God, Man, Nature, or whatever you personally believe. So we’ll have these situations from time to time, apologize in advance, and thank you for your patience.

Christmas Eve, Christmas already some places. Lots to do for tomorrow, and I don’t think that my pseudo-journalistic hackery is what you’re dying for right now. Enjoy the holiday (if it’s your thing), or at least the break from me. See y’all Monday.

Committing actual journalism takes a lot of time. I don’t wish to journalise more today, so we’re going mega-brief. And since every webcomicker and their dog is running filler or taking off for a significant part of the next 10 days or so, the coming days may be brief as well. I suspect that you’ll deal.

You know what? This isn’t new, but it escaped my notice until now. New Star Blazers stories, more than twelve chapters worth, are being released as a webcomic.

I was twelve years old when the first English language dub of the Space Cruiser Yamato series was syndicated in the US; by sheer chance I was sick and home from school at 2:30 that afternoon when something new showed up on channel 9. After half an hour of animation that was nothing like the rest of the cartoons I watched, I was astonished to see that this was merely the first episode and the story was “To be continued”. There was an ongoing storyline! More characters than I could count! After a couple of days I had to go back to school, but I followed the show as often as I could; unfortunately, it got yanked from the schedule before summer vacation came around, and I was barely able to piece together the full story of those 52 episodes.

Since that day thirty years ago, I’ve discovered around the world, guys of a certain age know that this cartoon holds a special power over them. It predated the ability to record TV cheaply, boxed sets of favorite stories, and magazines or discussion groups that gave easy access to others that shared our interest. For decades, we had only memories, and now there’s more stories aimed straight into my amygdala.

I’ll be honest — the webcomic doesn’t match up to what I watched bundled up in bed with half a grilled-cheese sandwich forgotten in my hand. Nothing could. But damn if reading it doesn’t bring back some memories.

Dudes of a certain age, get into your pajamas, plop yourself under the covers with your laptop, and start reading. It’s not the same, it can’t be the same, but it’s a hell of a ride.

And let me tell you, it’s much easier to just sit back and ramble until I fill up a column; sometimes though, a story presents itself and you’ve got to follow it wherever it goes. And yikes this one goes lots of places.

A small bit of background — as you may or may not have read, last week Keenspot and Kel McDonald parted ways, with a certain degree of hard feelings, judging from McDonald’s telling of the tale. Keenspot responded, the flood of comments began, musings appeared from third parties, at least one other creator decided to leave (no permalink; newspost on 18th December) as a result, and Bobby Crosby tossed in his two cents (at some point in the future, there may well be a “Bobby’s Law”, the point after which no useful discussion on a webcomics topic can take place). The claims and counter-claims of the parties were all out on the record, and if it seemed perhaps similar to John Troutman’s departure over the summer, there also didn’t seem to be much of a story there.

Fast forward to two days ago.

I was given (or, if we’re gettin’ all journalistic up in this bitch, “leaked”) what purported to be a confidential communication from Keenspot to its creators (and which you may read for yourself below the cut). Short form: the (in the copies I have received, unsigned) communique announced that on 1 July 2010 new, mandatory contracts will go into effect, which would essentially transform Keenspot into a traditional publisher and away from the nature it has had in the past (although we should note that Keenspot has had numerous corporate personae over the years). Creators that signed the contract would be required to be hosted by Keenspot, use their updating program, turn over control of ad slots, and accept a 50/50 revenue split on the advertising.

We’ll let those terms soak in for a moment.

I spent time yesterday contacting various Keenspot members, looking to confirm the validity of the document; some declined to speak on the matter, but those that did all confirmed that the posting was genuine. More than one said that they had not known about it until contacted by other creators, none said that they had received communication directly from Keenspot.

By last night, Keenspot CEO Chris Crosby had contacted me to make himself available for questions, and also confirmed the news. So it’s official: sometime about six months from now, Keenspot will cease to be what it has been, and will become something entirely different.

In the meantime, the existing creators will have to decide whether or not to accept the new contract terms; the announcement makes clear that Keenspot does not expect many of its members to stay. Crosby noted that:

As well as not inviting or accepting any new members, we may also politely decline existing members who decide to sign the new contract. We’ll be having long discussions with each interested creator (assuming there are any) in order to work out what’s mutually beneficial and what’s not. If Keenspot cannot bring something substantial to the table for the creator in question, we will stop working with them.

He went on to describe the business decision to reduce their pool of associate creators by such a severe degree (I have no formal data to back this up, but I feel it would likely be at least a 90% reduction) as allowing a greater degree of focus and ability to manage those comics that remain:

Keenspot has always been spread far too thin, and this will immediately solve that problem.

The reactions of creators that were willing to talk with me (and each on the condition of anonymity) to the announcement are uniformly negative. One creator of long standing expressed it as:

Every Keenspot member I’ve spoken to agrees that this is the Crosbys’ way of firing everyone without having to fire anyone, since trying to ditch Kel [McDonald] blew up in their faces.

The new contract is ridiculous, completely unreasonable, and they know that. It doesn’t just mandate a revenue split, but requires cartoonists to give up their domains, and the contracts are slated to last three to five years.

The Crosbys are doing their best to pretend that this has been in the works for ages, but it’s clear this is fallout from the beating they took over trying to fire Kel. They were still adding new members up until very recently, like Tiny Kitten Teeth. Those aren’t the actions of people contemplating a radical restructuring.

For the record, in case the “of long standing” part wasn’t sufficiently clear, that last quote was not from Frank Gibson or Becky Dreistadt of Tiny Kitten Teeth. Asked to respond to this point, Crosby replied that the announcement did run earlier than planned:

[P]artly in reaction to the Kel McDonald situation, but this is something we’ve discussed over and over again internally for years. We formally decided on finally doing it within the past month or so. Terminating Kel’s contract was a step in the direction of reducing the line-up (as she represented four Keenspot comics), but we don’t plan to terminate any other existing members in advance of the change.

He also indicated that the two most recent Keenspot additions (from August and October of this year) were from prior to the final decision on the transition, although that would put the acquisitions well within the period of “years” of discussion of the forthcoming change.

The other chief objection I’ve heard from creators is that the form of communication (posted to a forum) was insufficient. One reported being in communication with five other creators, none of which had learned of the impending changes from Keenspot’s efforts. Crosby characterized the notification as:

The initial announcement was made via a mass E-Mail to the private Keenspot member list that linked to a private forum thread where the full announcement was located.

Although this has been disputed by creators; one told me:

I did have to read that Keenspot thing on the message-board and rumors had been out for days and days before they made their official announcement. Scott Kurtz knew before I did.

Continuing on the topic of a more formal announcement, Crosby said:

When we formally introduce the new contract in January, we will contact each member directly. We decided to do the initial announcement earlier than originally planned in order to give attentive members as much time as possible to make other plans. In any case, all members will have at least six months to do so.

As an aside, one has to wonder if the mechanism for announcing the changes wasn’t the real cause of friction with the Keenspot creators who have spoken with me. From a purely logical standpoint, one also has to wonder about the secretive manner in which Keenspot attempted to make the changes.

Certainly, a company has the right to do business as it sees fit, and nobody is suggesting that Keenspot’s principals should have had their strategic discussions in public. But once they decided on a course of action, a direct email to all creators outlining the plans, followed by at least a small public announcement of forthcoming changes, with details to be forthcoming once the creators had been consulted with formally, would have allowed much more control of the process, and likely far fewer bruised feelings.

In any event, the thought that the process could be kept secret was a severe miscalculation; in the entire history of the world, no memo headed FOR YOUR EYES ONLY, DO NOT REDISTRIBUTE OUTSIDE OF [whatever] has ever been kept quiet absent an understanding on the part of the recipient that the sender has the means and willingness to absolutely ruin (or end) the life anybody that talks. No disrespect to the Crosbys and what they’ve built, but Keenspot ain’t the CIA.

Which leaves the question of what Keenspot is, or more accurately, what it will be. As one creator expressed it,

By the summer of next year, Keenspot will effectively be The Crosby Show.

Presumably, Chris, Teri, and Bobby are choosing colorful sweaters; some of the new fabrics are actually pretty lightweight and won’t be overly warm in the San Diego heat. But that slightly disturbing mental image aside, where is Keenspot headed? It’s had a long history in the world of webcomickry, and it’s completely fair to say that the medium would be in a very different place today if Chris Crosby and Gav Bleuel hadn’t seen the potential for a replacement to the failed Big Panda webcomics portal. Crosby sees the changes as offering a chance to resolve tensions:

I had hoped Keenspot the webcomics collective and Keenspot the independent publishing concern could co-exist happily. But after two years [following a 2008 reorganizaton and the buyout of former partners] the resounding answer is no. Those two sides of Keenspot resent each other, and neither side is happy.

[G]oing forward our focus will be directed solely at properties we have a long-term investment in, which is primarily Crosby-produced comics and related projects. That’s what makes the most business sense for us as a company, and we make no apologies for it.

Crosby added that Comic Genesis (née Keenspace) will continue without major changes, “for the forseeable future.” In the meantime, Keenspot will be nothing but major changes for the forseeable future, and once those changes all shake out it appears that The Big Green K will pretty much stand for “Krosby Komics”.

More on this story as it merits. Fleen thanks all who provided information (both on and off the record) for this story.

(more…)

It’s a day to be blessed with gifts, if you’re a webcomicker, or a webcomics fan, or just if you’re me. Let’s run ’em down.

• Over the weekend, news broke that Ben Costa’s Shi Long Pang is one of the latest recipients of the Xeric Foundation‘s grants; look for the wandering Shaolin monk to have his way into print significantly eased by the award. Hooray!
• Also over the weekend, Phil & Kaja Foglio must surely have been gratified (perhaps even a little mystified) to see that Girl Genius is up for consideration at The Washington Post‘s comics blog as Best Comic of the Decade. Considering that every other nominee appears to be a strip that runs on WaPo‘s comics pages, somebody must have gone further afield that is the usual case in these sort of polls.

  Oh, yes, it’s a poll, and it’s awaiting your vote — you know what to do. Make this not only a victory for a long-form, independently-produced, full-color, full-page comic, make it such an overwhelming victory that none may dare challenge the Foglios again. Oh, and start saving your pennies because Girl Genius volume 9 just wrapped, which means that a book collection is on the horizon (and volume 1 is getting set for reprint in March– in color this time!).

• You thought the Twelve Days of Hipsters was awesome? Check this out: Octopus Pie Christmas Special! Singing! Dancing! Cat barf! Yaaaaay!
• Received in the mail today: an invitation from :01 Books to join their review copy list, which means I’ll be able to bring you timely writeups of new work by webcomickers the likes of Gene Luen Yang and Tracy White. Big thanks to Gina, Colleen, and all the folks at :01!
• Also in the mail today, a gift from Rich Stevens, who found exactly what I didn’t even know what I needed and sent it along as a gift for the holiday of my preference. This one keeps on giving because I now have the URL for the artists that created this glass, meaning that I can purchase more of these to form a matched set. And guys — they have moustache pint glasses and champagne flutes. I now understand what leads people to “register a china pattern” to ensure they have matching designs on their formal dining table. I have found my signature design and will follow this imperative to the ends of the earth (or at least the glass cabinet of my bar).
• And finally, if you’ll forgive me for being slightly maudlin, thanks to all of the creators that entertain me so tirelessly, the readers who write in and tell me I’m doing something useful, and the friendships that webcomics have brought me — these are the real gifts that I’ve recieved and I treasure them above all. Except the moustache glass, that’s better than anything ever.

I trust that everyone here has heard the old saying about the fox and hedgehog — how the fox knows many things (i.e.: every sneaky trick in the book, and some that aren’t), but the hedgehog knows one big thing (i.e.: how to curl up into a spiny ball with no weak points), and that’s why no fox has ever eaten a hedgehog.

Yates was kind enough to answer some of our questions on this exciting new development.

Fleen thanks Chris Yates for his time, and encourages everybody who knows a puzzle fan to keep their eyes open for the new mass-market offerings. And if those fans like the chipboard jigsaw puzzles, be sure to point them to the originals.

There will be another post up later today (or possibly tomorrow), an interview with Chris Yates on the very exciting news that he’s sharing today. For now, there’s a couple of stories that deserve some examination and not to be put off any longer.

• First of all, man nerds work fast when they put their minds to it. The XKCD Laotian school fundraising project resulted in success and a pretty damn inspiring dedication plaque from Randall Munroe:
  

  “Do not train children to learning by force and harshness, but direct them to it by what amuses their minds, so that you may be better able to discover with accuracy the peculiar bent of the genius of each.” – Plato.

  This school is a gift from the readers of XKCD, an internet comic strip. The world is full of exciting things to discover. We hope you find some of them.

  That news is about a month old, and it should have been brought up before now; I couldn’t let it go any further in good conscience. Judging from the progress photos at the link, the school is likely done by now. Finished. Built. Ready to educate. Well done, all involved.

• Second thing, and this deserves to be a much bigger story, in that it could literally save a life. Back in the Spring, Snowflakes launched, and it’s been a delight. Back on Monday, a flashback storyline began and it filled in a lot of color on one of the characters who’d been a little in the background since launch. But more important was the newsbox item on that day:
  

  For the next few months, we’re running a separate storyline for the American Heart Association, based on their “Be The Beat” program to promote heart health.

  You’ll still get Snowflakes Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, but two of those updates per week will be AHA strips.

  Let’s be perfectly clear, here: we are getting a tutorial on CPR in a webcomic and it’s fitting into the storyline.

  Allow me to share some things about CPR from the perspective of a guy who’s had occasion to use it. Disclaimer: This blog post is not an accredited AHA instruction and you need to go to class, okay? Okay. First off: When the heart goes kablooey, there’s no guarantee that it’s ever going to start up again. CPR by itself almost never results in a revival, and what’s important is getting a defibrillator to shock the heart back into proper working order. But even then, only about 70% of kablooies are shockable, and not all those that are will convert back to a non-kablooey rhythm, and every minute that goes by from onset to shock decreases the chances of success by about 10%.

  What CPR does is buy you time to get a defibrillator hooked up. And it’s easy. Easy enough that in a bad situation, a 911 dispatcher can coach you through it. But that takes time, and your form won’t be good, and you’ll tire too easily and then that time you’re buying starts to slip away again, so let’s take the time to learn it now. You’re all going to sign up for a class, but on the off chance you see somebody clutch their chest and slump to the ground on your way to the classroom, here’s what you do:

  Call 911. Make sure there’s no pulse — two fingers lightly against the outside of the Adam’s apple, and wait for a good 8 – 10 seconds. Got nothing? Open the patient’s shirt and make a fist. Place the heel of the fist on the breastbone, between the nipples, then wrap your other hand over the fist. Lock your elbows, and start pushing hard and fast.

  “Hard” means you’re pushing down about 1/3 of the body’s thickness. “Fast” means 100 compressions a minute; hum Stayin’ Alive or Another One Bites The Dust to get the rhythm right. If you haven’t had a class and don’t know how or when to breathe for your patient, don’t bother — just keep compressing (it’s likely in next year’s revisions of the CPR protocols, the whole rescue breathing thing will be dropped in favor of pure compressions anyway). Count out loud on each compression, so the rescuers who you called know how long you’ve been working.

  That’s it. Hard and fast. The class that you’re all signed up for now teaches you confidence (so you don’t hesitate), and how to use an automated external defibrillator, and different protocols for adults, children, infants, and newborns. It’ll teach you correct form so that your compressions are more effective (hell, I’ve held CPR certs since I was 20, and I didn’t know that my form was good until one day in the ER when a critical care tech told me that I was providing a strong femoral pulse from my compressions, while simultaneously not breaking any of the guy’s ribs) (don’t you worry about breaking ribs; if you hear popping sounds, keep compressing hard and fast).

  Neither this discussion, the calm voice on the other end of a panicked call to 911, nor Snowflakes is going to substitute for what you’ll get from class, but in a pinch any one of the three will be a damn sight better than nothing. Say it with me: Hard and fast. Hard and fast. Hard and fast.

  Now go sign up for that class (especially you parents out there — kids don’t have heart attacks, but there’s a bundle of nerves in the chest that if it gets smacked, there’s a one-in-a-zillion that it basically acts like the POWER OFF switch for the heart … it’s why you see Little League batters with big chest pads these days), and everybody thank the AHA and Snowflakes creators James Ashby, Chris Jones, and Zach Weiner for the Be The Beat miniseries.