What does Digital mean for Comics?
So if you’ve been following The Bloc, and if you are reading this I assume you have. You know our opinions on reboots and our initial thought on Digital Comics as a new (and hopefully prolific) means of reading comics. But just what does Digital mean for comics?
ComicBloc and before that, GeoffJohns.com were founded on the idea that its easy and efficient to reach people today digitally. Word of mouth no longer spreads thru mouth, but thru Facebook, Twitter, forums and the like. Comic fans and their opinions have proliferated the medium from the beginning. Before the internet grew up, people were posting on AOL Online and other BBS’s because they wanted to be heard. I personally used to write a MINIMUM of one letter per month to the editor of Wonder Woman (sorry Paul (Kupperberg)). The digital forum allows for a much more immediate response, as well as an easy way for creators to interact with their fans that wasn’t even really imagined 10 years ago when the Bloc was properly formed.
Cut to today, and most creators have a Twitter account, a Facebook fan page and the like. Digital is here to stay (not that there was any doubt). But for comics as a print medium, the impact has yet to be fully realized. Comics are made to be read, and to a secondary degree, collected. Collecting digital comics is just not the same. But that really is not what the experience can or should bring for comic fans.
Digital comics offers a great way for people to read issues they are missing. To find that one particular issue that has yet to be reprinted in a collection or trade. They offer a new and unique way to take comics with you on the go, no need to worry about issues being damaged in shipping or travel. They present a new way for publishers to get their content to the next generation of fans, in a way they immediately can relate to.
Everything in this modern age is about immediate gratification. Want a new song? Download it from iTunes or listen to it just as instantly on the myriad of online music services: Slacker, GrooveShark, Pandora, Spotify, etc. Amazon, eBay, Overstock and the like offer almost instant purchase options for anything you can imagine. I almost single-handedly ran the market for Wonder Woman collectibles when eBay first launched, sending out money orders in actual envelopes almost every day for months. Paying with a money order is almost extinct now, and checks are moving the same direction. Money is digital. Shopping is digital. Why shouldn’t comics be the same?
The iPad is single-handedly responsible for people mentioning ‘HTML5’ to me at work and as such has felt to me more of a curse than a blessing. If it can also help to user in a new era of digital comics, I might just be able to forgive it. Heck, I might even go out and buy one with the express intent of reading comics on it (only when it supports Flash).
The film industry has been struggling against the digital idea for a long time. Finally they are embracing it, you can get fresh releases on Amazon, Netflix and even Hulu. Without raw numbers in front of me, I’d guess this has been a boon to movie watching, especially the lesser known films that had no where else to go.
Digital Comics fight a different battle. I don’t want you to buy me once and then move on. Digital Subscriptions are the ultimate goal. No more printed paper, no more hand-held, just a brilliant beautiful comic on you iPad (or preferred DCDD™) Movie fans enjoy watching their favorite films over and over. But having the ‘first’ edition of the movie means little (unless its Star Wars). For comic fans its very different. Not to sound redundant, but reading is almost secondary to collecting, no other medium is like that.
Firefly fans didn’t get mad when the Blu-Ray version was released, (ok a bit because I just bought the DVD), but we all can see the inevitable demise of film delivery on any kind of physical device. “I just stream it”, “Dude I’ve had that episode for months”, “I don’t need to own it I just want to watch it”. I’ve heard this and more in regards to video distribution. I buy Blu-Ray discs of the movies I like for the quality, and so I can watch them at any time. Digital movies promises the same, but formatless. When Lucas decides to redo Star Wars in 3D, well shit, I just hope we can get the originals in HD. Movies, while a collectible format, are one shots and evolve with the resolution of recording and distribution technologies.
Comics are paper based. Thankfully the quality of the paper and the way pages are put on them has changed with time. But the resolution of a page is based on YOUR eyes. A comic book from 40 years ago, in its pure essence, is as good-looking as a comic today. Now I’m not saying artists haven’t evolved, nor the art of coloring, I’m arguing that the final product is the same. A comic book. With pages printed on paper. That decays over time, and is damaged the more it is enjoyed.
The more enjoyment a paper comic gets, the less its worth. Digitized, its readable by everyone. But it loses its value. Anyone can buy the same exact issue for the same exact price at any time. So it loses value. Or does it gain it? Sure collectibility is gone. I can easily pirate and share an issue. But that’s not the point (I hope). Comic books are meant to be read, and reacted to. They are soap operas for nerds (sorry fellow nerds, they really are).