@Tim Wellman: I guess this is for me rather than for you, since you've announced you've made your last post.

I respect and even admire your passion about your grievances, but, frankly, I don't understand it. You sound betrayed, and I don't know what agreement was made that you feel was so horribly defaulted. Maybe you did go to the feedback site - I wouldn't know one way or another. But if you didn't, how did you help the problem? With your threats and fist-waving prognostications about all the “good” comic creators leaving, too?

I'm sorry to see any one go. DD is a community created by a fantastically diverse group, and each contributes in an irreplaceable way.

But people Do go, and the organic process of healing a loss and welcoming a new contribution will continue.

best wishes

@everyone else: if you care, say so by leaving feedback.

Tim Wellman
I do know people running torrent seed boxes with 10 times the traffic DD gets

Um, no. Comic account userbase is 10k.
Daily traffic is much, much, much more Tim. Torrents work in a very different way. Sorry, but you're talking about amazingly different things here. A website like DD has loads in orders of magnitude larger than a torrent system.

As to this thread- Of course different Wowio people are aware of this. But they are NOT sifting through here for issues, bug reports and problems.
I wouldn't even do that, it'd be a fricken nightmare, and I collate stuff from threads ALL the time for all sorts of things as part of my admin duties.

It takes a lot of time and thought to write replies and explanations Tim. When you just ignore and dismiss them it utterly devalues all of that. I'm very disappointed with your reply.

Hippie Van
Hey, maybe we could just change a few things around while he's gone. He'll never even notice! ; )

Great plan… except that the creative director's still here :)

Hippie Van
Edit: P.S. This is Izzy's response to the name change, by the way. He has generously taken it upon himself to replace our newly sober duck.

That's so cool :)

@Tim Wellman: Alright, we get it, Tim! You're pissed and you're leaving, and yet you keep coming back and ranting on and on and on!

I don't know if you've checked, but if you've actually bothered to look at the get satisfaction forums (here specifically) concerning the raw html, you'd see that Wowio employees are, in fact, responding to the complaints, and they are talking about trying to accomidate some form of html editing and possibly even user-based adds. And frankly, they don't read like “lawyer-scripted” responses to me.

At this point you're doing nothing but lash out at EVERYONE who tries to make a valid counter-argument with you, and quite frankly, you're coming off as an egocentric jerk. If you want to actually HELP the DD community, quit making threats and complaining about how you're going to leave and maybe take 5 minutes of your time to make a gs account and post your concerns (your CONCERNS, NOT some hate-filled, angry rant where you're constantly accusing every member of Wowio of being some corporate fatcat whom you seem to think have some personal agenda of outright destroying DD, which if you stop a think for a minute, is really a bad business policy to begin with!).

And for god's sake, quit villifying the admins! I've actually been PQ'ing with one of them back and forth with my concerns, and THEY ARE working on them, and I'm going to see about sending a personal e-mail to the people at Wowio over my concerns. These are the people that REPRESENT us to Wowio. They've been around before DD was even owned by Platinum. Frankly, I think they have a lot more invested in the well-being off this site than they do as employees of Wowio.

So if you're going to leave, fine. You're more thank welcome to come back, but frankly I won't miss you. Enjoy your time at ComicFury.

Oz… Are you and Skool actually being paid by Wowio? If not, I don't regard you as their employees. I mentioned this a while back, but got no response. Why take heat for them if you're not being paid?

I also asked if the stats and ranking page was staying. That's 60% of the reason why I chose DD in the first place. Most other umbrella sites are just page dumps to those of us not tech savvy enough to upload hit counters onto our pages. DD's stats and ranking system was the only way I could tell how well/poorly my comic was doing. If it goes, I'm screwed.

And once more, in your view Oz, who/what is Wowio, anyway? Licensors? An advertising outfit? An intellectual property speculation firm? What? Sure, I could Google ‘em, but I’d wind up with a PR page…

ozoneocean
As to this thread- Of course different Wowio people are aware of this. But they are NOT sifting through here for issues, bug reports and problems.

But…. This doesn't make sense. There's a section of the forum DEVOTED to bug reports. They won't even read the forum for those? Are they scared they'll get Platinum cooties on them? “Brr, we didn't create this shit, leave us alone.”

Ayesinback
and looking at Ally Haert who joined 2 months ago, she was the 108,590th

Fun fact: I've been around for several years on a seperate account, however I never posted in the forums with it (as far as I can remember).


Poor Lawrence. Poor Skool and Ozone and Ayes.

Lawrence seems to be catching a lot of heat for things that appear way out of his control, while Ozone, Skool, and Ayes all seem to be babysitting users who are having temper tantrums. In the end though, most of the larger problems (the new name, the loss of user customizations, and the color schemes to name a few) keep falling into the realm of “out of their control”.

But my question is this: Who are we supposed to be taking all this discontent to? Is there anyone designated as “the face” of Wowio at this point?

Leaving feedback feels a bit….nebulous, right now. Like we're just shooting complaints and suggestions into void without any reply. I've read that “these complaints will be passed on” and that “people at wowio WILL be reading through this”, but it's all very vague.

I'm not trying to call Shenanigans here. I do believe that people from wowio will see some of this feedback - but only because I'm trusting the word of Ozone, Skool, and the others who've said so. But it'd be so much more comforting if Wowio would just prove they're listening by responding. Even if all they reply with is “You'll need to wait a while.”

I'm under no delusions that change will come immediately. Wowio is large, and decisions won't be made frivilously (or quickly). But in the meantime? It sure would be nice to have WoWio hire or appoint someone as the “official” go between.

Or should we be taking responses from Lawrence and the admins as Wowio's responses?

Someone
Leaving feedback feels a bit….nebulous, right now. Like we're just shooting complaints and suggestions into void without any reply. I've read that “these complaints will be passed on” and that “people at wowio WILL be reading through this”, but it's all very vague.

Lawrence leach has been responding to stuff on the get satisfaction thing and that has helped somewhat. I can't say it has erased concerns but it shows that they ARE paying attention and are looking to fix some of the issues.

Ally Haert

Ayesinback
and looking at Ally Haert who joined 2 months ago, she was the 108,590th

Fun fact: I've been around for several years on a seperate account, however I never posted in the forums with it (as far as I can remember).


Poor Lawrence. Poor Skool and Ozone and Ayes.

Lawrence seems to be catching a lot of heat for things that appear way out of his control, while Ozone, Skool, and Ayes all seem to be babysitting users who are having temper tantrums. In the end though, most of the larger problems (the new name, the loss of user customizations, and the color schemes to name a few) keep falling into the realm of “out of their control”.

But my question is this: Who are we supposed to be taking all this discontent to? Is there anyone designated as “the face” of Wowio at this point?

Leaving feedback feels a bit….nebulous, right now. Like we're just shooting complaints and suggestions into void without any reply. I've read that “these complaints will be passed on” and that “people at wowio WILL be reading through this”, but it's all very vague.

I'm not trying to call Shenanigans here. I do believe that people from wowio will see some of this feedback - but only because I'm trusting the word of Ozone, Skool, and the others who've said so. But it'd be so much more comforting if Wowio would just prove they're listening by responding. Even if all they reply with is “You'll need to wait a while.”

I'm under no delusions that change will come immediately. Wowio is large, and decisions won't be made frivilously (or quickly). But in the meantime? It sure would be nice to have WoWio hire or appoint someone as the “official” go between.

Or should we be taking responses from Lawrence and the admins as Wowio's responses?

They are listening, but the only real place you can get direct feedback from them (besides Ozone and skool, I mean), is at the “get satisfaction” site here. From what I've read on there, Lawrence HAS been keeping up with the html issue lately and he is talking to Wowio's ad agency about things, and according to him, they're trying to find some form of editing that'll satisfy both people who prefer coding and people who prefer to use templates. They're just trying to figure out the best way to go about that. Apparently, Wowio's apprehension towards raw html is more of a security issue than anything else, which I think is understandible since they're a major publisher. Again, I only know this from what's been posted on there, and I don't know exactly what's being done, but as Genejoke just said, the important point here is that, yes, people at Wowio ARE paying attention.


Oh and to Tim Wellman, regarding my previous post, sorry if I kind of attacked you there. I understand you're upset (I think everyone is, including the admins), but please, if you want to argue you're point, you should do so without blatantly villainizing everyone.

But in all seriousness, if you want to help and want to be heard, please, click the link.

ozoneocean
Responding to Tim

Just stop, he's going to dismiss whatever you say as Wowio fatcat puppeteering or whatever. I don't think you need to defend against whatever he's saying for anyone else's sake either. He's just lashing out now.

'The Duck' makes no sense to me as a name, logo or whatever… That said, neither did Drunk Duck. I certainly wouldn't be bothered if there was a total name change and/or rebranding. I cannot understand people's attachment to it.

various people
Why isn't wowio collecting bug reports/feedback from everywhere

We're encouraging the use of the Get Satisfaction thing because:

A. It's a built-in organized system which lets commenters ‘agree’ with reports, which in turn can help determine frequency/importance of issues in a simple way

B. Its format encourages reporting issues singly, in granular pieces- which is the most useful from a bug-fixing point of view

C. It's centralized - the feedback tab is on EVERY page on the preview site, which means users don't have to browse to another location to report things. And if almost everyone is using it, it's also very efficient on wowio's end, because they only have to look in one place to see what needs to be done.

What always happens when we have stuff like this going on is that there's a main thread in General (like this one), but people also start reporting things in the bug, help, and other random forums, often making duplicate threads, sometimes PQing myself and/or oz, sending emails to the info@drunkduck one, etc. Oz and I start tearing our hair out trying to keep up with all that. Now add in a whole other site with its own forums which people may or may not decide to start reporting bugs in…

and D. Because it allows people at wowio like Lawrence to respond directly to issues in an easy (time-saving!) and public way, as others have already talked about here.


OK? So- the way the feedback and bug reporting is going now, is:

1. Hopefully people are posting bugs/feedback/whatever on Get Satisfaction (which does let you report ‘feelings’ and positive feedback too, not just bugs), as a centralized location for the reasons posted above

2. Kinh is tasked with sifting through those and inputting most of them (not ones like the skoolmunkee one, haha) into the more advanced bug backend system that all the Wowio developers use. (there's about… 4 people? All with different roles and responsible for different stuff.)

3. People are posting stuff in this thread, and sending things to me and Oz privately, on a range of topics- from bug reports to feelings, complaints, etc. Kinh is reading this thread and pulling the bugs out and getting a general sense of the user response. Oz and I are also reading this thread and doing most of our responding/explanations here, since we're best placed to communicate with users directly. We're also watching the general user responses/feeling to determine which are the biggest issues (like the html). It's our role to organize the issues and come up with a more official response that can be ‘worked with’ at Wowio- we're your advocates there so we use your discussions as evidence in arguments, etc. We draft various documents (to create a record, and as something that can be passed around if needed rather than just verbal discussions), talk to/chase up the people we can get hold of (or put Kinh on the task), and try and do stuff like the upcoming Quackcast where we talk to the developers directly in public.

4. Oz and I are also feeding back bugs, site-wide issues, etc either personally or via the advanced bug tracking system.

5. Kinh and Lawrence will also be doing some official responding/information releases periodically, (like in the quackcast, newsposts, etc) although some of what they can respond to is moderated by ‘Wowio’ because that's what businesses do.


I don't think I've missed anything there…

vwyler
Oz… Are you and Skool actually being paid by Wowio? If not, I don't regard you as their employees. I mentioned this a while back, but got no response. Why take heat for them if you're not being paid?

I also asked if the stats and ranking page was staying. That's 60% of the reason why I chose DD in the first place. Most other umbrella sites are just page dumps to those of us not tech savvy enough to upload hit counters onto our pages. DD's stats and ranking system was the only way I could tell how well/poorly my comic was doing. If it goes, I'm screwed.

And once more, in your view Oz, who/what is Wowio, anyway? Licensors? An advertising outfit? An intellectual property speculation firm? What? Sure, I could Google ‘em, but I’d wind up with a PR page…

Sorry, I didn't mean to ignore you before. I think I just missed it.

1. In the interest of full disclosure, we spend about 40-60 hours a month doing admin stuff (the last 2 months have been about 60), so Wowio does pay us to acknowledge that, let's call it a stipend. :] (A consultation fee would be far too grand.) It's not much and certainly not enough to buy our loyalty, but it does make us much happier to do the icky work like bug reporting on a glorius Sunday, or spend time developing high-level stuff like the Quackcasts. This was actually something Platinum did way back (which didn't prevent some admins from quitting!) and Wowio has just continued. I know I just gave our detractors some ammunition there. :O It wasn't something we publicised, mostly because we didn't think it was a big deal (and most of the time, nobody's business).

I guess you just have to trust me when I say it really isn't a factor in how we deal with Wowio, except when I tweet something really grumpy to the big boss and someone says “yeah you probably shouldn't do that” and I go “what are they gonna do, fire me hahahahaha” but then delete it anyway because I am a baby. Actually if we did work MORE for wowio then maybe we would have been included at earlier stages or higher levels with some decisions and we wouldn't have had to fight battles later. I've been on DD since 2002 and oz since 2004, so DD and you guys are always first with us. We'd be fighting the battles for you anyway, it's just easier for us to do so since Wowio officially acknowledges that we are consultants and has ensured we have direct, frequent communication to people like Kinh and Lawrence who are on ‘team duck’ there. Although you guys don't see it, they do take our advice very seriously and have done various things based on our input, either directly or working within the company. Unfortunately it is a business and sometimes their hands are tied too. This is why the advocating oz and I do is better because it's official, because rather than being passionate but ignorable, it's a case of ‘they’re consultants, so they know what they're talking about.' Although you can't see this either, the working relationship with Wowio is a vast, vast, harkoVAST improvement over the noncommunication with Platinum.

blahblahblah, I think I got on a tangent there.

2. They do plan to have some form of improved stats tracking. I've suggested google analytics but I'm not sure what requirements might exist for that, perhaps it's not possible with DD's url structure or something, I dunno. But they do want to have actually useful stats.

3. Wowio is a ‘digital publishing’ company. They started out publishing ebooks (and still do), and they now manage a suite of sites- Wowio's ebooks, DD and WEvolt (webcomics sites), and PopGalaxy, which is like videos and stuff and is still pretty new.

Tim Wellman
Dumb shit

My last post seemed ot get over looked (possibly because I was not screaming with hate for wowio when I posted it.)

Let me ask again…

Will there, or will there not, still be user made subforums on the new duck?

Will my old forum still be accessible?

Will I be able to link to it?

If the answer to any of those questions is “No” then my time at Drunk Duck will be coming to an end.
The loss or disruption of my forum is an absolute deal breaker.

BffSatan
Mario

I'm not sure I'd call that constructive. :]

harkovast
My last post seemed ot get over looked (possibly because I was not screaming with hate for wowio when I posted it.)

Sorry, we are finding out about that. :] We can ask them specifically on the quackcast tomorrow and get back to you, if we don't find out sooner.

The comic forums will still be there. Lawerence Leach has made it known on the site feedback page.

I don't see why the old forum would not be accessible. But, that is something I don't know because it hasn't truly been addressed.

Link to it where? On you comic page? Cause in the HTML discussion part of site feedback they are talking about revamping it, but the actual changes that will be made has not been fully announced. From what I understand from my lurking, they are trying to find a happy medium between what they have to make layouts in the preview and custom HTML. And user links like those little banner links you have in your comic has been addressed.

I don't know if the discussion was brought over here, but the reason why HTML was scrapped at first was for security. To keep malware from being uploaded onto the site (whether intentionally or accidentally) and what not. So they are trying to find a safe way for people to make custom layouts.

References:
Comic Forums
HTML editing

I understand the security thing with the HTML, but it's difficult when every other webcomic host out there allows it. Unless they DO manage something pretty brilliant, which would turn it into a competetive feature. But we're still hoping there's various compromises we can make. It's quite easy to scrub html of specific codes, and withhold live changes until approvals, or things like that.

If Lawrence says the user forums will stay then they will. I'd also imagine that the data could just be migrated over, but that and the ‘if not, will I be able to link to the old forum’ we'd have to specifically ask about I think.

And yeah they intend to release a page today with a list of all the intended features at rollout, which is why we've so far not been asking them about features individually.

Edit: boop-bee-dee-boo-boop twitter news update, comics will have their own forums, data will be migrated. Also the Feedback tab will be put onto the current DD site too. That's new!

Someone
but it's difficult when every other webcomic host out there allows it.

And, you know, every blog site out there too.

skoolmunkee
boop-bee-dee-boo-boop twitter news update

skoolmunkee! I've been getting queries about how the radio play might incorporate sound FX, and now I see yet another talent you have :)

btw: thanks Very much for mentioning the voice/radio thing on the Quackcast!

I am still hopefully optimistic that in the end this will all turn out great and the new site will be just as wonderful as what we have now. Things seem to be headed in the right direction with the actual feedback that we've been getting. I am curious now though as to why Wowio wanted to buy DD when they already had WeVolt which if I recall correctly only just came out this year if not last year. I know that it's a relatively new site and hasn't been around that long because I've been a member of Wowio's main e-books site in order to read some of their free comics that they have on there for about a year now, and I know that WeVolt didn't exist until recently. So why own two different web comics sites? It almost seems to me now that perhaps they were looking to merge the two, because perhaps WeVolt isn't working out like they had hoped? I stated in a previous post that while I still have no intention of leaving, and remain optimistic and willing to give the new site a go, I've been looking into the other hosting sites for at least “mirrors” and trying to compare and contrast what functions they have compared to ours here. I haven't really had much time to actually get beyond the registration stage, but from what I could see from just browsing around on the other hosting sites most of them do allow for customization, but WeVolt's seemed to be the most limited. Not very many comics on there had even the bare minimum of custom headers and navigation buttons, and those that do still have the default navigation buttons that the templates on that site put on every comic page which makes it redundant. Now, this could be an issue of those users not knowing how to code it to remove the default navigation buttons, but it was on more than one comic that I saw this issue, and it doesn't seem like something that can be changed in the coding on that site. So, when they said that not allowing coding is a security issue, it just makes me wonder if they were trying to make DD here just a variation on the comic site they already had which was working for them without realizing that that isn't going to work for our user base.

*whispers* I think the new design is quite nice *whispers*

Runs away

skreem
*whispers* I think the new design is quite nice *whispers*

Runs away

XDDDD

ok i honestly can tollerate a name like “the duck” for the longest time i couldnt read dd online because my workplace has a ton of surfsafe filters on it. about the html, wouldnt it be easier to put together a reporting system where people who do cram stuff like malaware into the codeing out there CAN be banned?

skreem
*whispers* I think the new design is quite nice *whispers*

Runs away

No speak up man.

There is good stuff and it isn't getting a mention as the internet tends to lean to negativity in general.


I was going to mention some bad stuff but that would be counter to what I just said.

the way the site functions (when it functions properly) is really good. A lot of peoples design suggestions would greatly help it though.

I know the prime “voice of dissent” is leaving. But for anyone else who sees the Wowio staff as some kind of uncaring evil entity, I'd like to add this:

I took my feedback here and posted it on GetSatisfaction. It was reasonable, even-tempered and constructive feedback. Not long afterward I got a very nice, personal email from Lawrence himself that not only thanked me for the feedback, but assured me that the staff was carefully considering all the things I said. It wasn't any kind of a scripted response. I went away from the experience feeling very positive. I get the impression that they're trying to make something good out of Drunk Duck, not the corporate fatcats they're being painted as by some people.

We haven't had this kind of support in a long time. Certainly not from Platinum. I think if Tim Wellman would have just gone GetSatisfaction and voiced his concerns with a productive attitude, not only would he have realized things are going to be okay, he might have actually been able to help shape the upcoming site to be a bit more like he wants it.

I'm now looking forward to this transition quite a bit and excited to see what features make it into the final version.

darth_paul
I am curious now though as to why Wowio wanted to buy DD when they already had WeVolt which if I recall correctly only just came out this year if not last year.

They've teased here and there that they have some plan that will tie everything they own together. Another “surprise” for us to look forward to. :D

Genejoke
There is good stuff and it isn't getting a mention as the internet tends to lean to negativity in general.

There are some things about the new site that I LOVE - the ‘like’ stuff, the ability to comment on newsposts and quackcasts and tutorials and stuff, improved admin functionality, the speed(!), and even the basic ability to change the template colors and nav buttons is a lovely addition, just seems sucky in comparison to losing raw html… but the custom colors is something EVERYONE can use easily, and in fact was used on DD in the early days but got lost in the big crash.

If I were a developer I would consider “no news is good news” on stuff like that, if people think it ain't broke then they won't tell me to fix it. But I'm sure they like people telling them they like stuff too. :]

darth_paul
I am curious now though as to why Wowio wanted to buy DD when they already had WeVolt which if I recall correctly only just came out this year if not last year.

I'm a little hesitant to answer this only because I might be wrong (it's a good quackcast question really), but I believe they bought them at the same time. WeVolt was still under development and wowio felt like the two sites would complement each other. Also the WeV programmers are a clever duo and there is some neat stuff over there to use, but it's not straightforward. I think wowio may have been hoping they could borrow from each other and pick up each others' best features. I know the new DD site will be using functionality introduced on WeV, but with improved user-friendliness.

ksteak
They've teased here and there that they have some plan that will tie everything they own together. Another “surprise” for us to look forward to. :D

This is complete speculation on my part, but it would make sense if it was a series of monetization tools. Wowio is already an e-book publisher and you can sell your e-comic and stuff through them. They also bought the DD Store (which will be getting attention and, I believe, increased integration with DD now) which is good for mugs and prints and whatever. WeVolt has got a subscription/donation programme (superfan?) which I wouldn't be surprised if it showed up here. PopGalaxy is… I'm not really sure, it's a portal for the blogs/videos/promotions they want to push, and draws in stuff like interviews with Media/Comics People and such.

ksteak

darth_paul
I am curious now though as to why Wowio wanted to buy DD when they already had WeVolt which if I recall correctly only just came out this year if not last year.

They've teased here and there that they have some plan that will tie everything they own together. Another “surprise” for us to look forward to. :D

Hmm, I sure hope that they are not trying to go the route of Whiskey Media which owns various forum sites Comic Vine (comic books), Giant Bomb (video games), Anime Vice (anime and manga), Screened (movies and tv), and Tested (technology) because that would be a shame. I've not nothing against WM and their sites, since I'm a avid member of all of them, but if that is indeed their business plan it's just more of the same, except that they'll have more than just forum sites. I'm sure Wowio will be just fine, but now that I bring this up it's kind of funny and a shame that it was them and not Whiskey Media that ended up purchasing DD, since then perhaps the name didn't have to be changed since a “Drunk Duck” and “Whiskey” go hand in hand. LOL!

skoolmunkee
Sorry, I didn't mean to ignore you before. I think I just missed it.

1. In the interest of full disclosure, we spend about 40-60 hours a month doing admin stuff (the last 2 months have been about 60), so Wowio does pay us to acknowledge that, let's call it a stipend. :] (A consultation fee would be far too grand.) It's not much and certainly not enough to buy our loyalty, but it does make us much happier to do the icky work like bug reporting on a glorius Sunday, or spend time developing high-level stuff like the Quackcasts. This was actually something Platinum did way back (which didn't prevent some admins from quitting!) and Wowio has just continued. I know I just gave our detractors some ammunition there. :O It wasn't something we publicised, mostly because we didn't think it was a big deal (and most of the time, nobody's business).

I guess you just have to trust me when I say it really isn't a factor in how we deal with Wowio, except when I tweet something really grumpy to the big boss and someone says “yeah you probably shouldn't do that” and I go “what are they gonna do, fire me hahahahaha” but then delete it anyway because I am a baby. Actually if we did work MORE for wowio then maybe we would have been included at earlier stages or higher levels with some decisions and we wouldn't have had to fight battles later. I've been on DD since 2002 and oz since 2004, so DD and you guys are always first with us. We'd be fighting the battles for you anyway, it's just easier for us to do so since Wowio officially acknowledges that we are consultants and has ensured we have direct, frequent communication to people like Kinh and Lawrence who are on ‘team duck’ there. Although you guys don't see it, they do take our advice very seriously and have done various things based on our input, either directly or working within the company. Unfortunately it is a business and sometimes their hands are tied too. This is why the advocating oz and I do is better because it's official, because rather than being passionate but ignorable, it's a case of ‘they’re consultants, so they know what they're talking about.' Although you can't see this either, the working relationship with Wowio is a vast, vast, harkoVAST improvement over the noncommunication with Platinum.

blahblahblah, I think I got on a tangent there.

2. They do plan to have some form of improved stats tracking. I've suggested google analytics but I'm not sure what requirements might exist for that, perhaps it's not possible with DD's url structure or something, I dunno. But they do want to have actually useful stats.

3. Wowio is a ‘digital publishing’ company. They started out publishing ebooks (and still do), and they now manage a suite of sites- Wowio's ebooks, DD and WEvolt (webcomics sites), and PopGalaxy, which is like videos and stuff and is still pretty new.

Thanks, Skool. I didn't mean to pry into your personal affairs, I was just wondering why you two were taking so much flack for Wowio if you were not paid staffers.

As to Wowio… I'm undecided. I'm always dubious about corporations, especially those that like to use the products of people who own intellectual property (like cartoonists) and not pay them for it. The argument that it's a privillege to have a place to show off your work work doesn't fly with an old union man like me. It's a bit like telling an accountant that it's a privillege for him/her to do tax returns for companies (for free). Cartooning is a business, not a hobby. Platinum was clearly looking to milk artists for salable products, and perhaps Wowio is, too. At this point, I can't say.

As to Lawerence and Kinh… they're simply employees doing a job. I don't hold them accountable for anything, even if Wowio isn't on the level, so-to-speak.

Charles Schulz made 12 million dollars a year in the mid 60s with Peanuts. Merchandising IP can be immensely profitable, even today, for the right people. Wowio surely knows this. Trouble is, most artists don't, or at least dismiss it as unlikely. It's my theory that almost any decent IP could become a big money maker, if it has enough backing and press (media for you youngsters).

Finally, I don't hate Wowio. I'm suspisious of the motives of all corporations, but, essentially, I'm indifferent. Still, I see no reason to develop an advarsarial relationship with Wowio this early in the game. I'll give them a shot. The ball is in their court, now. ;)

I don't feel like I'm taking flack for Wowio. :] I'm just seeing there's some stuff that I can maybe clear up with information I have.

About the “using the products of people who have intellectual property” thing, I'm not quite sure I get. Wowio doesn't make any claim to ownership of people's comics or whatever. I mean, I guess they're profiting by people visiting the site by getting ad hits or something. And if they run various stores (for merch) they'd be taking a cut of that profit. Is that what you meant?

skoolmunkee
I don't feel like I'm taking flack for Wowio. :] I'm just seeing there's some stuff that I can maybe clear up with information I have.

About the “using the products of people who have intellectual property” thing, I'm not quite sure I get. Wowio doesn't make any claim to ownership of people's comics or whatever. I mean, I guess they're profiting by people visiting the site by getting ad hits or something. And if they run various stores (for merch) they'd be taking a cut of that profit. Is that what you meant?

As I understand it, Platinum was actively trying to sell IP to Hollywood execs for a profit. That was their business. If it had worked out, it might have been a bonanza for a lot of us. Lord knows, Sin Town needs some fresh ideas. They've been recycling junk for years, now. Plus, I don't think too many of us would turn down a chance to cash in if some studio offered us big bucks for the movie/TV rights to our stuff.

But, as far as I know, only Coboys Vs. Aliens , a Platinum Studios manufactured product, ever made good. I understand one or two other comics were sold to buyers in Hollywood, but I don't know if anything ever came of it.

What I'm not clear on is whether Wowio has similar plans. It's all good if they do, as long as they don't try to shaft anybody in the trenches when negotiating for their rights. Platinum, as I understand it, did try this. By that I mean attempt to buy someone's rights for a song, then sell them for a mint. Happens all the time in the entertainment biz. And webcomics are part of the entertainment biz.

There's a lot of commercial potential on DD, if it were properly promoted. Many Cartoons here could translate into a TV property, or even a film property, if handled right. Merchandising would naturally follow any such deal. This means big-time cha-ching for whoever gets this deal. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are a key example.

If all Wowio is looking for is a little advertising cash, they are selling DD short. There's a gold mine here if they're willing to invest and treat the creators as equal partners. ;)

As to the re-design… I'm not terribly worried about what the site looks like, as long as it works.

vwyler
As I understand it, Platinum was actively trying to sell IP to Hollywood execs for a profit. That was their business. If it had worked out, it might have been a bonanza for a lot of us. Lord knows, Sin Town needs some fresh ideas. They've been recycling junk for years, now. Plus, I don't think too many of us would turn down a chance to cash in if some studio offered us big bucks for the movie/TV rights to our stuff.

But, as far as I know, only Coboys Vs. Aliens , a Platinum Studios manufactured product, ever made good. I understand one or two other comics were sold to buyers in Hollywood, but I don't know if anything ever came of it.

Ummm.
Not quite right…

First up- Platinum was always a media company with a focus on Hollywood in TV and movies. Their thing with DD was about developing a grass roots fanbase for their existing products by paid, contracted artists. Secondary to that was the thing they had with the Comic Book Challenge competition- all that was about was a comp for getting a new paid and contracted product going.
Further to that Plat did approach some super popular DD artists for various things- Amelius and EENick for another comic project and Chuck and Steve Rowles (Spang and Ronson) to talk about possible movie rights, but that was as far as it went.

Wowio are completely different. They're an e-book publisher for mainly comic type stuff. With DD they're just expanding their digital media business portfolio… Their strategy with DD is to take an existing, successful comic hosting community and grow it by investing in it so that it becomes a more viable media outlet as one of the Wowio family of sites.
DD offers a related service to wowio (online comics) and so could be good for more cross promotional stuff with other Wowio products in future- Maybe DD artists will be able to easily sell Wowio e-book versions of their comics (has been very profitable for authors in the past), there's the popgalaxy TV thing, etc.

DD for Wowio is more of a long term investment though: it's a strong sort of thing on its own, but it's not a viable money making or even self supporting thing. With Wowio money coming in to fix and grow the site they'll first make it self sustaining. Later on It can work more profitably with their other sites etc…

I've no access to the Wowio business plan- but I know their objectives are more along those lines than IP speculation, which is far more prickly and fraught.