FBI takes down illegal comics website

[steelclaw]

A true fan would surely be willing to pay for something they really want! I am a big music fan-but I truly have `NEVER` downloaded any songs in my life! I spend a lot on original vinyl! Anyhow- if this means creators of comic strips will benefit financially - that's got to be good!

I agree, their's something about having it in your hands If I need say 3 Buster & Jets(Which I do)I wouldn't bother having scans of them I would only want the comic.
I'm also buying as much vinyl now as I was in the 80's, I'm filling in loads of holes in my collection.(Cheers Alan )

[Digifiend]

We've thoroughly thrashed out this debate on another forum, and I agreed reluctantly that, because illegal sites are ultimately a bad thing, we have to wait until the official publishers make their material available in some way. I still feel that a great deal of material will never be released officially (can anyone envisage a big DC Thomson back catalogue appearing online anywhere soon?), but this is the price we have to pay for not wanting to pay a price for things.

Kev F

The Beano does put individual strips up from time to time, as downloadable PDFs, but yeah, somehow I can't see them offering entire issues on free download!

[kevf]

Given the size of the Beano archive, I think online Beano material could only help boost the Beano profile. A Dandy/Beano app on the iPhone, filled with everything from Dudley D Watkins & Leo Baxendale classics to Mike Pearse and the last decade's worth of stuff worth seeing again would be a great and exciting thing. Imagine, the whole rest of the world could suddenly discover the Beano and, at 50p an App, DC Thomson could make a killing and...

I realise I am proposing yet another way for DC Thomson to get rich while paying their creators nothing, but I do this with my fan's head on rather than my hard-done-by artist head. It's long been my downfall.

Kev F

PS: I've put some novelty, collectable, and comicky items on eBay, to try and raise funds to take my comedy show The Scottish Falsetto Sock Puppet Theatre to the Edinburgh Fringe. So think of it a bit like the charity auctions I used to run at the Comic Festival and bid in the same spirit. Okay, there is a bit of a difference between giving 10 grand to ChildLine and putting a comedy show on in Edinburgh. But not much.

On offer till tomorrow is a page of Beano artwork, framed with script, caption and reference material: http://bit.ly/9DIEGj

+ A Batman canvas http://bit.ly/b2DwcN
+ A Hot Rod Cow canvas http://bit.ly/aeU2Bg
+ Bash Street Kids flipchart page http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll? ... 0433820889

and other less comic related items you won't be so interested in. Do please check these items out, you never know what you might snap up.

Cheers - Kev F

[chrissmillie]

StarscapeOnline.com has moved over into providing it's comics as free to read online or to download. Why? Here's my take on it:

Previously, Starscape has gone with Diamond Distribution - the biggest distributors to comic shops worldwide -to get our comics out there. Response has been good, in that they all sell out and we get re-orders. But still, sales are small. Profits even smaller due to the US comic-size that shops demand. It's an expensive, non-standard format. If stores accepted a standard A5 or thereabouts, it would be so much easier but most comic shops won't even look at anything non-standard size - even if that's 2000AD!

So, it's difficult to get indy comics into comic shops, even with Diamond on your side. And yet, people evidently like them when they see them, so what's to be done? Well, as profits are small, why not dispense with them altogether? Our e-comics are being read literally in their thousands. In fact, enough to make most candidates for top 100 selling comics had they been paper versions.

To get right down to it: we want you to read our stories and you (evidently) seem to enjoy reading them. A few greenbacks here and there isn't going to make a lot of difference. So now, when you go to our e-comics, you won't find just a teaser chapter. From now on, our whole comic is free to read or download, with paper versions to buy for you traditionalists. Enjoy!

[Digifiend]

Try before you buy. Good idea.

[ISPYSHHHGUY]

If everyone on here pooled their resources, and scanned in all their collections, then I reckon that a fairly good subsciption service could be available for an online comics archive.......money taken in would have to be split between the publishers, creators [if they are still around, or their families] and lastly to the enthusiasts keen to keep the flame burning, who would scan in the goods.


However, financially, this doesn't seem like a viable option at the moment: perhaps in the future, when hi-def images can be up/downloaded en masse, and when it is convenient [most of us on here are still limited to adequate A4 scans, and the thought of waiting for individual scanning of thousands of pages appals me].].


Otherwise, these creative works [60s BIMBO/ Thunder and JET/ Countdown, and many more] are in danger of near-extinction after most of us enthusiasts are gone.



I am all for an ever-expanding subsciption online comics service, primarily to stop many of these creative works from heading for oblivion......who knows, this idea may even generate a fortune for an investor.

[Lew Stringer]

If everyone on here pooled their resources, and scanned in all their collections, then I reckon that a fairly good subsciption service could be available for an online comics archive.......money taken in would have to be split between the publishers, creators [if they are still around, or their families] and lastly to the enthusiasts keen to keep the flame burning, who would scan in the goods.


However, financially, this doesn't seem like a viable option at the moment:

Nice idea, but who has the time to do it?

[ISPYSHHHGUY]

Yes, that was sort of the point I was making , Lew: the technology to do this is too cumbersome at the moment.....maybe in the future, hi-def photgraphy will make it viable simply to photograph individual pages in good enough detail, but this technology doesn't exist at the moment.....the field of photography will evove further, however.

[kevf]

Nice idea, but who has the time to do it?

That guy from html comics managed to scan in 600,000 pages. But he might have gone off the idea now.

Er, aren't we just suggesting doing exactly what he just did?

[Lew Stringer]

Yes, that was sort of the point I was making , Lew: the technology to do this is too cumbersome at the moment.....maybe in the future, hi-def photgraphy will make it viable simply to photograph individual pages in good enough detail, but this technology doesn't exist at the moment.....the field of photography will evove further, however.

It'd still be a time consuming task and I doubt many people would have enough time or inclination to carry it through.

Nice idea, but who has the time to do it?

That guy from html comics managed to scan in 600,000 pages. But he might have gone off the idea now.

There's no way he did all that himself. People must have sent him their files.

Er, aren't we just suggesting doing exactly what he just did?

Absolutely not Kev. Rab's idea implied it'd all be above board with the copyright holder's consent.

[babington]

What do you all think about the Grand Comics Database? Does this contravene the copyright law, or is it "fair use" as the homepage suggests? It's certainly a very useful site, though British comics are very under-represented (plenty of 2000AD but no Buster, for example).

http://www.comics.org/

[felneymike]

That site only has cover scans not complete issue scans, and simply says what stories are in an issue and other information - it's more of an index than piracy! My own British Comics Wiki (very under-updated, i might just get rid of it actually XD. I don't have the time i once did to dedicate to it) was going to go further and have small story synopsis's's's, though it was also not going to have cover scans of all but significant issue... though something went wrong with the software installation so it actually has no images at all.

[Lew Stringer]

What do you all think about the Grand Comics Database? Does this contravene the copyright law, or is it "fair use" as the homepage suggests? It's certainly a very useful site, though British comics are very under-represented (plenty of 2000AD but no Buster, for example).

http://www.comics.org/

They're just covers aren't they?

Publishers tend to be ok with covers or occasional pages being shown in the context of an article, or in this case an index. The difference with HTML Comics is it was making the entire contents available.

Here's a couple more excellent index sites that only use covers or sample pages:

http://www.dcindexes.com/marvel/

http://www.atlastales.com/

Lew

[ISPYSHHHGUY]

In reterospect, it would probably be a full-time job for a team of archivists just to upload the millions of pages from DCT/IPC/ODHAMS/TV 21 etc archives........and would there be enough fans out there to sustain a viable subscription service?

I' m not too sure....it's an idea I would love to see, however, as there's no other way we can see most of UK comics history, [i have a fair few of the old-style large-scale BEEZER/TOPPERS, but I doubt if I' ll ever be able to afford the entire runs] unless you're kashgar, who seems to have a limitless personal archive!

[kevf]

I would suggest, in all seriousness, that an online Comics Library is something that deserves lottery funding. I think the British Library is supposed to have every published comic in its archives somewhere. If so I shudder to think of how much space must be take up with so much dross. Is there really an aircraft hangar somewhere with every issue of Cheeky, Playhour and Robin, Radio Fun, and Mighty World Of Marvel? If there is, we the British people should, technically, be allowed to have a look at them.

In which case why not put them online? You could charge a small bit for a "library card" and this vault would become accessible for future generations.

I believe old comics are a special case. Unlike books and novels, or anything that exists as text only, they are prohibitively expensive to reprint and in 99.99% of cases will never ever be reprinted. But they are of historic interest and should be archived and made visible at least.

Let's start the campaign for the British Online Comics Library here, and discuss it at next weekend's Bristol Comic Expo. Then forget all about it. That's what usually happens.