kickingbear

The hesitancy of comiXology to publish Saga #12 has been in the news this past week. Eventually everything sorted itself out and the issue was published on time. It had nothing to do with Apple censorship, nothing to do with Image comics or their creators. It was, as I understand it, a decision of comiXology’s not to put the issue up for sale. So, that stinks. You’d like to think the future of comic distribution would be going to bat for the best creators and their work.

Yeah, yeah. A minor hiccup in the grand scheme of things.

Let’s talk about what comics actually are. They’re an art form in which sequential images are displayed in order to tell a story. Mike Monteiro ranted recently on his terrific Let’s Make Mistakes podcast about the term, “graphic novel”. While I agree that’s a horrible term, Mike, it’s like you’re telling an entire field of professionals to call themselves, “creatives”.

The word “comics” evokes dismissal as light hearted taffy. To be comic is to be funny. That’s an incredibly poor encapsulation of what comic-books can be. They are sequential artwork and writing placed carefully upon a page, the sum of all that design work tells the story.

Yeah, super-heroes have stolen the art form from us for any number of reasons. But let’s not conflate application with possibility. Do we judge the value of television by Dallas or The Wire? Jackass The Movie didn’t diminish Citizen Kane or 2001 did it?

There is incredibly great work out there that is trapped in the confines of what is called “comics”. It’s a disservice to the work that it’s so easy to dismiss. It’s bold, it’s brilliant, it often requires a sense of the world in which it is a part but, really, there’s a richness there that belies the confines of “comic”.

I am thrilled to have been invited to speak at NSNorth at the end of April. Many of my fellow speakers are good friends and others I hold in high regard for their work. The organizers aren’t half bad either.

The number of tickets available is very limited so if you’d like to attend please sign up soon.

I’m a fan of these smaller independent conferences. I believe in the value of interacting with the community in more personable groups. When I call someone an abject and unapproachable asshole it makes a lot more sense when they’re standing next to me and laughing.

Gus will be speaking. I hear he makes pizza.

I hope to see you there.

I’ve left these pages fallow.

My intention here has been to inject what were hopefully interesting and novel ideas. Regardless of their particular merit.

Originally the subtitle of these pages was “Stupid Cocoa Tricks”. My friends have out done me in that regard. I then moved on to a generalized critique of (Apple-ish) Things That Were Stupid. Turns out that people either got a lot less stupid, got far better coverage of their stupidity or, in the case of Our Macalope, showed me the horns. (His Glisten. With blood!) Also, people tend to find pieces written by authors who employ “fallow” as a verb particularly assaulting. Annoying. Irritating. Uninteresting. Right. Whatever. Fuck you two.

So, I’ve got a new thing now. I talk with people. Sometimes they’re quite smart. To their credit not one of them will right to express their disapproval of that assessment. Though 100% of them cringed at that last joke.

Please join us and listen in on my new podcast with Rene Richie called, “Debug”. We’ve recorded five episodes so far and we’re proud of each of them.

“Debug” is a recording of the conversations I wish I’d had the time to have with developers I respect.

Rene is good enough to filter out the dirty bits. Like, “Who the fuck uses fallow in a sentence!?”