As of January, the following titles standard length ongoing titles, previously priced at $3.99 for 32 pages/22 story pages, will be priced at $2.99 with 32 pages/20 story pages:
Did you see that? That subtle change from 22 pages of story to 20 pages. You just LOST 10% of story/content in this price reduction. But here is the sad point, do you notice the cover of the Teen Titans issue # 1 (November 1980) right here. That is right! They say 25 Pages for 50 CENTS!!!! So in the last 30 years, the 32 page comic books have lost 5 pages of content so now you have a comic book with 37.5% full of it with paid ads. In 1980, it was 21.8% full of paid ads and it cost 1/6 the price. I have said is over and over, comic books need to be 99 cents printed on color newsprint. Forget the slick fancy paper, it cost TOO much. If it is good enough for Diamond's Previews it is good enough for the comics they sell. Well at least DC kind of got it right.
Now they need to work on the 50 cent digital comic instead of the silly subscription. Talk to you later...
I buy Sonic the Hedgehog for my friends' kids, and those are printed on newsprint and sell for $2.99. Paper isn't the issue. Writers and artists are the issue. American creators scrape by even on what any comic company pays (see commentary on Dave Cockrum's death out on the web; he was *lucky* he had at least VA benefits, since most comic creator's don't have that).
ReplyDeleteI think you price point on digital is a little low, but not by much. I thin 99 cents would be better. I don't know what anyone outside of those who sell on DriveThruComics sell their stuff for, but I've read that Marvel doesn't quite get the iTunes/micro-payment model, charging nearly the same for digital as print. Maybe someone else will get it.
@Craig: I think writers and art get paid "well" but due to the nature of the business, they like many freelancer, are not or due not plan for their futures after their freelancing days are over. Writers who came up until 1995 had to worry about this very much. But now I think this is a known and understood factor of the modern artist and writer.
ReplyDelete