Heidi MacDonald reports that news and commentary website ComicMix is scaling back, ending its editorial columns and leaving just online comics and pop-culture news.
Launched in February 2007, ComicMix was founded by former DC Comics editor Mike Gold, writer Glenn Hauman and Weblogs co-founder Brian Alvey. Eight months later, the site added webcomics.
In September, ComicMix announced it would offer print-on-demand collections of some those comics at Baltimore Comic-Con. However, Johanna Draper Carlson notes those volumes “didn’t come near to selling out at the one convention they were offered.”
In the comments section of his final column on Monday, Gold noted that, “the columns didn’t reach as big an audience as some of us had hoped for. Really, it’s that simple. We need to put our attention elsewhere.”
Other columnists included Denny O’Neil, Elayne Riggs, John Ostrander, Michael Davis, Martha Thomases, Michael H. Price, Ric Meyers.
Todd Allen, author of The Economics of Webcomics and a columnist for Comic Book Resources, questions the source of ComicMix’s revenue: “No ads, no merchandise, no collected edition. Those are standard revenue streams and without any of them (100 print copies in Baltimore doesn’t count), I cannot call ComicMix serious about monetizing their comics.”
November 5th, 2008 at 2:41 pm
As a regular commenter and infrequent contributor to ComicMix, I have to say dropping the columnists was at best a questionable move. It’s one of the reasons most people hit the site in the first place.
Don’t get me wrong, some of the comics they’re hosting are wonderful. Trevor Von Eeden has just started a biocomic about legendary black boxer Jack Johnson, and is it stellar, well worth a look. Also check out Mark Wheatley’s “Frankenstein Mobster”. But the columns were as much a part of the site as the blog@ section is here.
The site’s textual component is now a series of news stories, usually posted a good day and change after being reported on other sites like Newsarama, and as of late, rife with typos and coding errors, like when attaching video. Since the last column was posted on Friday, almost no new articles since have been commented on. The last column (Michael Davis’ “Straight no Chaser”), in comparison, has over 70 comments and and climbing.
Milstone co-founder and Master Of The Universe Michael Davis will be moving his column back to his blog site http://www.michaeldavisworld.com which will also, ironically, host ComicMix editor Mike Gold’s column, “Brainiac on Banjo”
November 6th, 2008 at 10:34 am
Wow, I never ever even heard of this site … too bad.
November 14th, 2008 at 4:51 pm
Matches, we aren’t dead yet. In fact, we just launched a new graphic novel today:
http://www.comicmix.com/news/2008/11/14/the-pilgrim-by-mark-ryan-and-mike-grell-debuts-on-comicmix/