Lecture6Review

=Class 6: Economics as Applied to Comics: and lessons for other media?= This is just a copy of of the Professor Jones powerpoint text to use as a reference/guideline, add any notes or links you may have that elaborates on his points for each heading.

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Reinventing Comics
• 9 basic elements • 3 components focused on potential of digital delivery

Reinventing Comics (1): Creation as Art
• Comics as Literature • Comies as Art • Creators’ Rights

Comics as Literature/Art
• Many of you have already discovered this in writing the paper - examples? • Comics can be both if properly done

Comics as Literature
• Storytelling and narrative • Gets more complex than simple serialized strip - a full story from beginning to end (or a serialized strip that takes months/years to tell story?) • Examples?

Comics as Art
• No longer simply “men in tights” • Japanese influence - a range of interesting non-action transitions, new forms of expression

Creators’ Rights
• Reaction to similar battles between creators/publishers (examples?) • Full ownership and control • Fair share of profit • Challenges coming from this?

Reinventing Comics (2): Industry and Audience
• Industry Innovation • Public Perception • Institutional Scrutiny

Innovation in Industry
• Creators’ rights require innovation in industry model - and sometimes drive it • Simple model of “getting into the business” - photocopy a drawing and sell it yourself - trite but true - but it’s more complicated in practice

Steps in Traditional Publishing
• Author • Publisher • Accounting • Marketing • Printing • Distribution • Warehousing • Retail • Transportation among above • Etc.

Creation and Distribution…
• Many will sacrifice control over non-creative tasks to gain broader market • That’s often a good idea. Why? • Sometimes not a good idea. Why?

Public Perception
• Comics as kid-lit - why? • What effect does stereotype of comics have? • What effect does traditional model of production have on enforcing this stereotype?

Comics and Censorship
• Emergence of comics in US history - tainted by censors who lamented the debasement of culture, perversion of youth - pretty much everything • Ironically, drove comics underground where they became even more debased and perverted (e.g., R. Crumb?) • Driven by perception - if comics were seen as valued art, would this happen?

Reinventing Comics (3): Diversity of Audience and Creation
• Gender Balance • Minority Representation • Diversity of Genre

Comics and Gender
• Traditionally creators and audience were male • Creators have been female - but still expected to follow expectations of audience • To what effect? • Alternatives?

Minority Comics
• Stereotypical audience, and many creators (even if they aren’t) - white, male, straight, Christian, young, physically able, middle class • To what effect? • Alternatives?

Diversity of Genre
• Superhero domination of shelf space via perception, creation and audience - a vicious cycle • Non-traditional graphic novels - breaks through ideas of what a comic “must be” • Required breaking through comic store as core distribution channel

Reinventing Comics (4): Digitization and the Internet
• Digital Production • Digital Delivery • Digital Comics

Digitization
• Production of comics digitally - including McCloud’s two last books, but others - examples? • What does digital production do to creation of the art?

Digital Delivery
• Like other media, removes steps in production process - ideally funneling consumer money to producer with fewer middlemen • Middlemen role - still useful - why?

Micropayments
• Addition to Reinventing Comics as technology improved to make it plausible • General principle re: chains of distribution - consumer fairness (rel. to creative rights) but audence fairness as well - rights to sample, test and pay fair prices

Micropayments (2)
• Consumer obtains product from source (whatever source may be) • Consumer values product (as I’m sure some of you did…) • Consumer wishes to compensate producer directly - but how? • Still an open problem - why?

Digital Comics
• Adds a new dimension to creation • Dependent on tools - tools to create Reinventing and Making Comics • Other options?

New Directions: WebComics
• Can include immersive environments in whatever medium • May even include games (e.g. Myst, but even first-person shooters?) • Can even be simply regular comics put up on the web (http://www.thewebcomiclist.com/)

Flash-based Comics
• Why Flash? • What does Flash contribute to visual and experiential effect of animation? • Why is it still comical in nature?

Examples
• Weebl’s Stuff/Weebl & Bob • Homestar Runner • Alternative financing strategies? • New/Mass media issues (esp. around the Quizno’s ads?) • Other examples?