The Economist writes about the rise of the web comic:
In 2012 he is finally getting his way. As the newspaper industry continues its decline, the funnies pages have decoupled from print. Instead of working for huge syndicates, or for censored newspapers with touchy editors, cartoonists are now free to create whatever they want. Whether it is cutting satire about Chinese politics, or a simple joke about being a dog, everything can win an audience on the internet.
This burst of new life comes as cartoons seemed to be in terminal decline. Punch, once a fierce political satire magazine whose cartoons feature in almost every British history textbook, finally closed its doors in 2002. The edgier Viz magazine, which sold a million copies an issue in the early 1990s, now sells 65,000. In the United States, of the sprawling EC Comics stable, only Mad magazine remains, its circulation down from 2.1m in 1974 to 180,000. Meanwhile, the American newspaper industry, home of the cartoon strip, now makes less in advertising revenue than at any time since the 1950s.
It tracks the rise and fall of the newspaper strip, to the rise of the web comic. It has all the trappings of an unconvincing web-bang-bam piece, but is actually a quite good article and makes a good case that the web truly does provide a better outlet for cartoonists rather than just acting as a farm system (as blogging often does).
I don’t read any comics, web or otherwise, on a daily basis. The only one I’ve read thoroughly is Something Positive, and at times Real Life. which I will get to in a minute. I’ve heard a lot of good things about MegaTokyo, though it is (like the article says) hard to get into if you didn’t start… a long time ago. XKCD is iconic, of course, but I mostly go there only when someone links to it. It seems that most webcomics are either one-offs like XKCD, in which case I have a hard time getting really into them, or they’re involved like MegaTokyo or Something Positive, which require a lot of investment.
It’s kind of difficult to read the latter on a computer. They sell merchandise, but what I really want is an ebook or ecomic so that I can devote some time and sit down and read it conveniently. Even though they’re free online, I would actually pay – and possibly pay well – for the convenience of being able to read them on a Kindle or tablet. Because I’m bad about reading comics daily, I tend to read Something Positive in spurts. Years at a time. Often, actually, starting from the very beginning and getting up to the new stuff that I haven’t read. I’ve read about 10 years worth of SP, and have about three years left to read, but I’d easily pay $10/yr, or maybe even $20, for every year he’s got.
It’s not entirely unlike how some CD prices have fallen to the price of MP3s, but I’d spend a couple extra dollars on MP3s just to save myself the trouble of ripping the CDs.
XKCD is by now the king, but a discussion of comics on the web without mentioning http://www.qwantz.com, Dinosaur Comics, is incomplete. Consistently the funniest Webcomix out there. My Webcomix reading list also includes Jesus & Mo, Questionable Content, and Wondermark. Of these, only QC requires a more than cursory accumulation of background mythology. It’s always going to be hit or miss, but these five offer many more hits than misses, IMO.Report
Trudy’s comic (Oglaf) is way funnier than Dinosaur Comics. NSFW, though… (yes, we mean it. Even if you’re self-employed).Report
Oglaf is A-MA-ZING!Report
I checked it out. Very very not safe for work. As in, seriously. Wait.Report
Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal also deserves mention.Report
Two other awesome ones I read – Hark, A Vagrant (http://harkavagrant.com/), and Subnormality (http://www.viruscomix.com/subnormality.html) . I can’t say I read them regularly only because they’re not published on a regular schedule.Report
I am a gamer so I still enjoy Penny-arcade. For more esoteric writing and amazing but slow posting speeds I am engrossed in Killsixbilliondemons. For absolutely stunning are and equally stunningly slow posting rates there’s the cat themed prohibition era comic Lackadaisycats.Report
Gabe and Tycho are such trolls, though (I mean that as a compliment, they learned from the best).
I was going to review The Stanley Parable, and then I saw their take on it…
http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2013/10/28Report
They sit somewhat perplexed atop a media empire for a reason; they’re quite good at what they do.Report
Ooh, I haven’t read Lackadaisy Cats in a while. It’s amazing, though it takes forever to update.Report
Word.Report
Girl Genius, if for no other reason than how impossible it seems that people have turned out something that lavish three days each week, for more than 14 years now.Report
One of my favorites, although I haven’t looked at in almost a year.
Also worth talking about Schlock Mercenary.Report
Schlock Mercenary was among the first webcomics I read, and I still read it for nostalgia’s sake, but I don’t really recommend it to others anymore. It’s notable for being a 7-day-a-week comic that’s been running since 2000, but the story has basically stopped moving forward.Report
I used to read Something Positive (among others), but I’m generally horrible at remembering to keep up with webcomics, so it fell by the wayside. About the only thing I read on a somewhat regular basis is SMBC, and that’s because I see the author on social media.
Based on this post, I’ve been inspired to give Comic Rocket a shot, to try and keep up tabs on various comics.Report
SMBC is hit or miss too, but when it hits, it’s really funny.
Archaeopetryx.Report
ere’s what I use:
http://www.thewebcomiclist.com/latest/
Now, I don’t check them all (I’m not that crazy).Report
https://www.comic-rocket.com/ does keep individual bookmarks for each comic, which is very nice for reading in spurts (I’m not a paid shill, I promise, only found the site yesterday). I spent too much time last night catching up on stuff I hadn’t read in a long time, Buttersafe, O Human Star, Cyanide & Happiness, Perry Bible Fellowship (I hadn’t realized they were sill being made, however infrequently.) It’s too bad the creator of Pictures for Sad Children may or may not have had issues and decided to pull the entire archive.Report
Order of the Stick is the only one I’ve really followed, although I’m currently somewhat behind. 🙂Report
Dammit, morat, I had things I was supposed to do today… besides reading 400+ pages of OotS.Report
Not my fault. 🙂 Pretty fun, although I liked it even better once it veered out of straight D&D jokes.
Although “I prepared explosive runes this morning” never gets old.Report
…I liked it even better once it veered out of straight D&D jokes.
Since I’m in the process of rewriting a draft of a “small fantasy” novel, and trying to plot out a not-too-distant-future political thriller, I particularly enjoyed the implicit “breaking the fourth wall” arguments about whether certain sub-plots should be allowed, or admiring dialog that wrapped up loose ends. Perhaps the best of the lot was Haley moving the plot along by announcing — and you could just hear the tone of voice — “Ahem. ‘Later that evening…'”Report
I’ve been reading Shlock Mercenary for a long time now, and I also got into Freefall recently. I’ve been following Romantically Apocalyptic on occasion. I read through all of Achewood a while back; it seems to have stopped updating, though. And I got into Three Panel Soul when someone linked to the comic where the guy gets fired for talking about guns at work.
One of the things I’ve found is that “storyline” webcomics seem to work better for me when I can just sit down and read a whole bunch of them at once, which is what I think Will is asking for when he says that he wants his comics as e-books.Report
Romantically Apocalyptic is so… so… itself.
The art is eyeball melting, the story can be amazing but it’s very… very… odd. Now perhaps it’s genius, portraying an interesting post apocalyptic situation through the view and skewed minds of the protagonists thus producing nonsensical, sometimes funny sometimes macabre sometimes merely bizarre twists.
Their biggest problem is they post irregularily and the text portion of their posts comes much later than the comic. It throws one off their stride.Report
I see RA as having the sensibilities of the “Fallout” video games with art that combines postapocalyptic cosplay and urban exploration.
I don’t get the sense that it’s meant to be taken seriously.Report
Agreed, but they gesture at plot now and then.Report
achewood was truly great. i have some small hopes for a cartoon one day.Report
Freefall is usually good, and often just belly-achingly funny, if you like your humor dry.Report
I’d spend a couple extra dollars on MP3s just to save myself the trouble of ripping the CDs.
This makes absolutely no sense to me. I’m not so snobby that I don’t ever download MP3s, but I only do so if they are substantially cheaper (at least a couple dollars) than a physical copy would be. If I get a physical copy, I can make a lossless copy for home listening, a lossy copy for portable listening, and then either shelve/throw in the car/sell/gift the physical copy.Report
My hearing isn’t great. When I rip, I rip to 128 or at most 196. Beyond that, the auditory nuance is lost on me.Report
No, I get that, I’m not all THAT picky myself, believe it or not (I’m a GbV fan, and many of those records sound like they were recorded on a boombox in a toilet).
I’m just amazed that you find the physical copy not only not to be a bonus (shoot, use the CD as a coaster or to level out the sofa leg), but actively find it an impediment to what you want.Report
The existing supply of physical CDs already exceeds demand greatly.Report
I can’t argue with that; but still, wishing to pay *extra* for *less* just blows my little mind.
Also and unrelatedly…you are getting called out (in the nicest possible way) in next Wed’s music post. Fair warning!Report
Remember my post on the TV? Some things are actually worth less than nothing!
In this case, it’s the forgone labor of ripping the CD.Report
the forgone labor of ripping the CD
But you are sitting at the computer a huge chunk of the day anyway! That’s like paying a couple bucks per paragraph, just to save three keystrokes on each one!
You are a mysterious man, Will Truman.Report
I wish I did! Lain makes being at the computer console inconvenient.
Or laptops,for that matter.
Man, I’m glad I had kids in the era of smartphones!Report
I can’t argue with that; but still, wishing to pay *extra* for *less* just blows my little mind.
By that logic, wouldn’t it be better to get an album on five 45 RPM vinyl records rather than one CD? They’re so much bigger, have so much more matter, than a CD.
A CD is a non-reusable, scratch-prone, storage medium for bits. The good is not the storage medium, it’s the data the bits represent. For any physical good I’m carrying home from the store, I want the smallest package that will hold it, so I have a less unwieldy parcel or shopping bag to carry home (potato chip bags full of air, I’m looking at you!). The smallest package that will hold some bits for transportation to my home is no package at all – I already have a bit-delivery service connected to my house – so any physical package for bit delivery is infinitely bigger and considerably less efficient than necessary.Report
@dragonfrog – but again, MP3’s are *less* – not only are they lossy (which Will may not care about) but the physical object cannot be thrown in the car / handed to a friend / used to level the sofa / have its pictures looked at. And I can make my own MP3s.
If MP3s and the CDs are *equally* expensive, and you don’t care about those additional things, I totally understand going MP3. Where you lose me is when you say you would pay MORE for the MP3s than the CD, just to not get those additional utilities. At that point I would just get the CD, in the hopes that one or more of these additional utilities may be of use to me (not to mention my TWO DOLLARS!).Report
IOW, I think the CD is *slightly* more useful than a longbox – and if you tried to sell me a longboxed CD for $10 and one without a longbox for $12, I’ll take the one with.Report
I might prefer a lossless format to an MP3. But frankly, as long as the MP3 is of a high enough quality that it’s not the limiting factor in audio quality, it’s good enough. Any improvement above that would be as wasted as serving me fancy wine.
I typically listen to music in less-than-favourable conditions – at home on our decent but not excellent stereo from the next room while I work in the kitchen or dancing in the living room, background noise at least that of a four-year-old playing, out for a walk listening on my phone and so-so headpones.
As for the other utility you mention – those are all dis-utilities to me. I’d rather click a mouse a few times and have the files on my computer and phone in minutes, than go to a store, obtain a CD, bring it home, rip it to my computer, debate whether to give or throw away the CD, and end up sticking it on a shelf somewhere to take up space and gather dust. Only when I finally dispose of the CD do I have back the utility of the shelf space, and I’m never getting back the travel time.Report
Personally, I like having the physical CD as the master copy that I store away in a cabinet after ripping. Really, they take up so little space that it seems silly not to have that backup. If your space is really that precious you can get one of those storage albums and toss the jewel cases.Report
Personally, I like having the physical CD as the master copy that I store away in a cabinet after ripping.
Or as a starting point for ripping with modifications. I often run content through sox in order to compress the dynamic range for playing in the car.Report
I’m a big fan of A Softer World. It’s like Ashleigh Brilliant’s “Pot Shots” for the 21st Century.Report
When A Softer World is on, it’s a beautiful thing.
O’ course, I’ve heard a grown man howl after reading a couple of those damn comics — not gales of laughter either.
Sometimes, it can hit just a little close to home.Report
Garfield without Garfield is great…..bent but great. The Oatmeal and Basic Instructions are both worth reading.Report
I always forget about Basic Instructions for a while, then go catch up in binges. That guy packs in more punchlines per panel than almost anybody.Report
This seems appropriate:
http://basicinstructions.net/basic-instructions/2015/1/4/how-to-have-a-worthwhile-discussion-about-politics.htmlReport
Comics mentioned above that I follow:
-Girl Genius: they’ve fallen off the update wagon in the last year or so and are no longer reliably on time. I think there’s also been a bit of a quality drop. Certainly still good, though.
-xkcd: a good joke-a-day comic.
-Oots: great fantasy comic, but probably not worth the first ~100 strips if you’re not into D&D.
-Oglaf: hilarious, but once a week is just not enough content for me. Also very NSFW. (If you’re binging, though, I find the safe strips to be the funniest in general)
-Questionable Content: honestly, not that great, but it updates every day.
Still unmentioned comics:
–Homestuck: I mentioned this once before; it is quite absorbing and expected to finish some time this year, but requires significant investment in time. It is best read on the internet; you need a flash enabled device to do so; be prepared for sound and long interactive segments. This is a comic with an extensive soundtrack.
–Gunnerkrigg Court: Pretty great comic. The early art is weird, but the story and later art is just awesome.
–Rice Boy (and related comics): Beautiful, imaginative, awesome. Lovely story, and well sized for reading on a tablet.
I follow some other stuff, but I don’t think they’re really worth talking about. Oh! and Digger was pretty awesome and is done.Report
Girl Genius updates on a pretty regular schedule, actually. It’s Order Of The Stick that seems to have trouble keeping the new stuff coming.Report
I’d also (longer comment in mod) like to note that some web “comics” out there require something like a full computer to view – there’s a bunch out there that are making use of animated .gifs (often poorly, but sometimes quite well), and I know of one that is partially animated. There’s also the potential for nonlinearity. I don’t know how popular it is (most webcomics are still page-per-interval or panel-per-interval traditional comics as yet), but the internet is a medium with a lot more potential than print and print substitutes.
Ah crap the parentheses are coming back.Report
I read several comics on this list–a few that I haven’t seen mentioned yet that are pretty good:
Dumbing of Age–Follows the lives of a bunch of college freshmen as they learn about themselves and the world.
Girls With Slingshots–Ditto for post-college twenty-somethings
Skin Horse–Secret Government Black Ops Social Services, featuring a talking dog, a zombie, and a transvestite.
El Goonish Shive–Anime action/comedy gender-swapping hijinx.
Thank god I had less discriminating tastes when I was younger, since so many webcomics start out bad and end up getting good as the artist improves. El Goonish Shive is a great example of this–not only was the art and writing bad in the beginning, but the whole premise of the comic was a bit pervy. But because the author recognizes and addresses the problematic aspects of the story he’s created, he gets to really interesting places that he never would have reached if he hadn’t started where he had. Plus, the newer strips are annotated with references to past events, so you can jump in later and still appreciate the story.Report
EGS’s author is a pervert. Nice guy, though — and there are tons weirder things to be interested in.Report
Cyanide and Happiness (www.explosm.net) – stick figures and toilet humor
Bug Martini (www.bugmartini.com) – narration-driven comic with “bug” stand-ins for humans
Buni (www.bunicomic.com) – mostly language-free comic about a not-very-smart bunny, constantly pining for a she-bunny (who is in a happy relationship with someone else), with a constantly-smoking alcoholic dad and a dog in a wheelchair who can kick your ass. Maybe half the time, the comic doesn’t even include any of the main characters (http://www.bunicomic.com/comic/buni-623/), or just has some bizarre situation happen out of nowhere (http://www.bunicomic.com/comic/buni-609/). It’s kinda brilliant.Report