Talk:Business of webcomics

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Webcomics and income/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Jclemens (talk · contribs) 09:22, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

Rate	Attribute	Review Comment
1. Well-written:
	1a. the prose is clear, concise, and understandable to an appropriately broad audience; spelling and grammar are correct.	No issues noted.
	1b. it complies with the Manual of Style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation.	The lead section seems to be a bit more loosely following the article structure than I normally see, for example, the second paragraph in the lead targets syndication and micropayments, while the article body brings up the topics in the other order. I'm not sure the article is optimally named. You're talking about the whole economic ecosystem of webcomic development, publication, and the like. The current title seems almost too limited in comparison to the scope of the material you've assembled.
2. Verifiable with no original research:
	2a. it contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline.	References appear fine when they exist.
	2b. reliable sources are cited inline. All content that could reasonably be challenged, except for plot summaries and that which summarizes cited content elsewhere in the article, must be cited no later than the end of the paragraph (or line if the content is not in prose).	No unreliable sources identified.
	2c. it contains no original research.	A few specific fact assertions could be cited better. I can read through it with you specifically if desired.
	2d. it contains no copyright violations or plagiarism.	None identified with Earwig's tool.
3. Broad in its coverage:
	3a. it addresses the main aspects of the topic.	See my comments on scope and naming.
	3b. it stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style).	Fine.
	4. Neutral: it represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each.	No issues noted. Now disputed.
	5. Stable: it does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute.	No edit wars. Dispute over POV has arisen during review process.
6. Illustrated, if possible, by media such as images, video, or audio:
	6a. media are tagged with their copyright statuses, and valid non-free use rationales are provided for non-free content.	All OK
	6b. media are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions.	Appropriate
	7. Overall assessment.	Not ready to pass at this time. Please feel free to renominate when all concerns have been addressed to the satisfaction of all editors.

Other comments

• Have you any interest in recreating the Something Positive article? It appears referenced a couple of times as a red link, and I suspect that if it's discussed in RS'es to this extent that it would be a candidate for an appropriately written article, as the 2015 AfD seems pretty weak. Jclemens (talk) 01:36, 5 March 2017 (UTC)
  • I've been thinking about creating an article on Something Positive for a while now. I may do that in the near future. It's technically not relevant to this GA process, but it's something I'm definitely interested in doing. ~Mable (chat) 09:54, 5 March 2017 (UTC)

• As for the other comments: an alternative title, namely "Business of webcomics" (currently a redirect) is also an option. This article exclusively documents the business of webcartoonists themselves, however, and doesn't discuss businesses surrounding it. The question "how does a webcartoonist make an income?" is a popular one. I'm fine with either title, however. Furthermore, now I think about it, the paragraph on newspaper syndication fits better before the paragraphs on micropayments than after it. This fixes the issue you had with the lead section (though I did find the issue you described rather nitpicky, if I may say so ^_^;) - Lastly, I would love to know which references you would like to see improved upon. Personally, I think the weakest source I've used is T Campbell's A History of Webcomics, which has had some controversy surrounding it. I had a lot of difficulty finding any sources on online advertisement, though (weirdly enough), and I have no reason to doubt the numbers Campbell gave in his book. I'd also like to note that the SKTCHD study was picked up by Comics Alliance; see also this file. ~Mable (chat) 09:54, 5 March 2017 (UTC)

Sure, no problem. Here are some verbatim statements that I would like to see with inline cites:

"Many webcomic artists make a good living on selling T-shirts, prints, and toys on their website."

"In 2011, Scott Kurtz started a multi-part storyline in his webcomic PvP featuring Magic the Gathering-creators Wizards of the Coast, as a form of product placement. Inspired by the paid integration of real brands in the television series Mad Men, Kurtz reasoned that his video game webcomic was already advertising various established brands anyway. Through this deal, Wizards of the Coast became an official sponsor of the webcomic for that period. "

"According to Jeph Jacques (Questionable Content), "there's no real money" in syndication for webcomic artists." (direct quote, should be cited even if it's in the ref at the end of the paragraph)

"Such services no longer exist."

Nothing terrible enough to say "wow, that's OR", but I'd really like to see things tightened up a bit, even if just by adding a few more citations to the existing references at key points. Cheers, Jclemens (talk) 03:40, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

The "make a good living on selling T-shirts, prints, and toys" line is cited to The Huffington Post. The product placement deal is entirely described in the source at the end of its paragraph. I just fixed the "no real money" quote by copying the citation. The "such services no longer exist" line is a pain to deal with. Looking at the articles on Modern Tales and Serializer, this is really clear, but I would have to find a source that directly makes this observation (something I will hopefully be able to do one day). ~Mable (chat) 08:11, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

I wanted to make sure it was okay if I made some edits to the intro section. I wanted to try and clean up some of the sentences and help with readability a little more. It seems that a few of the sentences make assertions that are not backed up in the sources so I wanted to try and either attribute those to a source or change up the wording. Thank you. Nickole B. (talk) 02:37, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

@Nickole B.: That's completely alright. This kind of question is generally best done on the talk page of course, rather than a very old GA review page, btw :p — But regardless, you're completely free to improve the article ^_^ ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 15:04, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

POV tag

I note that the article has garnered a POV tag in the middle of the review. Pinging LittleLilith to come discuss such concerns and how they relate to the GA review in progress. Jclemens (talk) 04:17, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

• I added the POV tag because this article is innaccurate in many places, and very strongly and strangely weighted towards mainstream straight white male webcomic artists. For example, when describing book publishing, the article emphasized only straight white male webcomics artists who only "sell tens of thousands of copies" of their books. I have improved the article by adding the example of female webcomic artist Raina Telgemeir who has had one of her books (Smile) on the New York Times bestseller list for almost four years and has over 1.5 million copies of that book in print. It looks like I have a lot more work similar to this that I need to do to improve this article in that specific area as well as in several other areas. LittleLilith (talk) 05:31, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

  So the issue is weighting? If the RS'es predominantly cover "straight white male webcomics artists", then that's the proportion we need to cover in the article, even if there are other perspectives that don't make it into reliable sources. I love the approach of balancing the article by adding more diverse examples--keep doing that. Cheers, Jclemens (talk) 05:39, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

  I agree with Lilith in that a better balance should be struck, and I am very willing to look into the topic more closely. This is the first I hear about inaccuracies in the article, though, and I really want to know what needs to be fixed in that regard. ~Mable (chat) 08:14, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

  Hi Jclemens. The issue is not that reliable sources only cover mainstream straight white male webcomics artists. There are plenty of reliable sources that have done a better job of covering the wide range of webcomic artists. For example, the sources I used for Raina Telgemeir were the New York Times and Heidi MacDonald of Publishers Weekly. This is a very fixable problem. LittleLilith (talk) 14:33, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

  Well, as I noted on the talk page, I particularly focused on those sources that discuss the business of webcomics specifically, like the Observer Publishers Weekly, and Boston Globe articles, which all awkwardly focus nearly exclusively on male webcartoonists. Even the io9 article has a clear imbalance towards male webcartoonists. The issue with picking an interview with Kate Beaton or an article about the success of Telgemeier is that you end up cherrypicking your sources. This is fine to some degree, but really shouldn't be done too much. There's also the issue that examples aren't the best sources. Telgemeier's success in particular could easily be a one-time success that is not realistic for any webcartoonist. I'm completely fine with having her in there, as the section up to that point didn't make clear how much success someone can have with printed books (and now it does), but I don't think it's the best way to think about it. As I said on the talk page, it feels very uncomfortable to search for sources by looking at interviews with specific webcartoonists. ~Mable (chat) 15:14, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

• Oh, Lilith, you never answered my question about inaccuracies in the article. Please expand on that if you can ^_^; ~Mable (chat) 15:15, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

  If you follow my edits to the article, you should be able to see the many inaccuracies as I correct them. For example, there was an inaccurate portrayal of book publishing as a thing that only mainstream straight white male webcartoonists are doing, when in fact one of the most successful is a woman. I have corrected that inaccuracy. As another example, there was a section titled "Merchandise and syndication" which didn't describe syndication at all, but instead described printed books. So, I've also fixed that. There are still many other issues and inaccuracies that I will be fixing. LittleLilith (talk) 15:31, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

  I guess we'll keep this review on hold for longer then while you go do that... or you could just tell me > ~ < ~Mable (chat) 18:19, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

• It may be beyond the scope of this article, but David Harper wrote a piece that discusses the disparity of coverage between male and female creators. Argento Surfer (talk) 18:00, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

  We're getting downright off-topic here, but I'll definitely give it a read. I like how it focuses on Smile, though, which also popped up here :p ~Mable (chat) 18:19, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

  It may be relevant to the Gender and webcomics article, but I brought it up because I don't think this article should be held down for reflecting broad bias in the sources available. Since most comic-centric media and business media choose to focus on work done by men, seeking out sources with the intent to provide 50/50 coverage for men and women goes against the letter of WP:NPOV. Argento Surfer (talk) 18:41, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

  That was the point I was making with the "cherrypicking" issue above. Thanks for the input, though - I'm really worried about what kind of changes Lilith has in store for this article, to be honest. The addition of Telgemeier worked out really well, though, so I'll just wait and see. ~Mable (chat) 18:53, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

  Hi Argento Surfer. I want to reiterate that the large POV problems with this article are largely with how we are using sources, not issues with sources themselves. For example, there was a passage about printed books that was sourced to a Publishers Weekly article, "Web Comics Send Readers Looking for Books." That source talks about women webcomic creators like Raina Telgemeier and Leah Hernandez, and Asian webcomic artists like Kazu Kibuishi and Derek Kirk Kim. It's a fairly well-balanced source in accurately depicting the wide range of people who create webcomics. But we ignored those people, and only focused on two straight white male mainstream webcomic creators mentioned in the source. I want to make clear this is a huge POV issue with how wikipedia editors have been writing this article, not a POV issue with the source material. Yes, there can be bias in source material, but the bias I am seeing in this wikipedia article is much worse than what I see in sources. Again, this is a very fixable problem and I am working on correcting this. For example, I just added information about Kazu Kibuishi based on the exact same source that was already being used solely to write about mainstream straight white males. LittleLilith (talk) 19:52, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

  FYI, when you say "Wikipedia editors who have been writing this article", you mean Maple. If you take a look at Maple's user page, past work, and explanations for why this page is the way it is, you may rethink some of your criticism. Argento Surfer (talk) 20:16, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

  Background sometimes doesn't matter when it comes to stuff like this. I failed to account for gender imbalance in reliable sources in general and may have messed up a bit. I don't believe the article is in as bad a quality as you make it out to be, but I'm practically its sole creator, so I'm leaving the judgments to you all. I nominated the article for GA in this state because I believed it was up to standards, and that means I have to take any criticism fairly ^_^; ~Mable (chat) 20:28, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

Resolution Timetable

So, I am willing to stick around and leave the GA review on hold for about a month more if people are willing to collaboratively expand it to cover the identified deficiencies. I know very little about the topic, so I will not be participating as any sort of a mediator... just popping back in to say "Are you guys ready for me to review it again yet?" periodically. Is everyone willing to make this enough of a priority so that happens? Jclemens (talk) 05:19, 7 March 2017 (UTC)

I don't have much of a choice. I don't know yet what other inaccuracies the article may have, but it's not like I'm gonna unfollow this page or anything. I hope it won't take a month, though! I personally do believe the article is of GA quality, and I don't think great changes are needed. ~Mable (chat) 08:34, 7 March 2017 (UTC)

I would say a month may be a little too soon. I am attempting to correct very basic facts, supported by sources, like when webcomics business started, but I am having my edits undone. So, if using basic facts from sources is going to be a big of a challenge, then I can see that the process of correcting the many deficiencies in this article is probably going to take quite a while. LittleLilith (talk) 00:31, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Without unanimity here, we're simply not ready to move forward with the GA process. Renominate once things are resolved, ping me about it on my talk page, and I will boost this to the top of my list to review. With regrets which I hope are only temporary, Jclemens (talk) 03:46, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

I am sad to hear this, as I do disagree with many of Lilith's criticisms. I really do hope to be able to get consensus as soon as possible, and I'll be sure to notify you when I do... ~Mable (chat) 10:15, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Neutral point of view

This article will need heavy rewriting. It is currently very biased and weighted towards mainstream straight white male webcomic artists. I have begun working on correcting this. LittleLilith (talk) 01:44, 6 March 2017 (UTC) For example, the article previously emphasized only straight white male webcomics artists who "sell tens of thousands of copies" of their books. I have improved the article by adding the example of female webomic artist Raina Telgemeir who has had one book on the New York Times bestseller list for years and has sold over a million copies. It looks like I have a lot more work like this that I need to do to improve this article. LittleLilith (talk) 01:54, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

Ah, I had not considered this, which is surprising in a field so dominated by women. Sources are good at skewing things, though. A few are listed, like Dorothy Campbell, Gigi DG, Tracy Butler, and Spike Trotman, but they are clearly in a minority here. I'm gonna look at how to improve this situation. I don't just want to mindlessly add examples, though, as that will just damage the thing overall. Hmm, I'm definitely gonna make work on this! Thanks for bringing my attention to the issue! ~Mable (chat) 08:03, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

Looking at List of webcartoonists, which should list about all webcartoonists who have an article, it seems like Wikipedia has a huge imbalance in general when it comes to gender balance on webcomics... which is really sad. I think this article specifically is actually doing surprisingly well in comparison >.> ~Mable (chat) 09:21, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

I managed to organically work in a mention of Kate Beaton. I feel really uncomfortable trying to find sources by webcartoonist rather than just looking for sources based on their relation to the topic at hand. I think this inclusion worked out well and of course I'm going to keep gender diversity in mind more from now on... The current ratio is 6 female by 17 male (counting C&H as 1), so it's still fairly awkward... ~Mable (chat) 11:32, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

I think a major issue with the gender imbalance in this article is caused by The Boston Globe and The New York Observer contacting zero female webcartoonists, save for Dorothy Gambrell. Add to that the theory of Scott McCloud, Topatoco by David Malki, Randal Milholland early crowdfunding success, Scott Kurtz' sponsership deal, and Andrew Hussie's Kickstarter success, and everything went completely off-balance. Does anyone have any ideas of female webcartoonists who affected the industry in notable ways? People like Lea Hernandez, Shaenon K. Garrity, or Pénélope Bagieu all used revenue channels already well-described in the article, like online advertisement, books sales, or even online syndication. There are just no sources... > ~ < ~Mable (chat) 12:06, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

I'm not seeing a huge cause for this POV tag to remain. Multiple examples have been added, and this article isn't really discussing gender either way, but income sources for web comics. Sourcing is going to play a part in that, and with multiple examples added, I think the tag can be removed. More importantly, the GA should continue, as it seemed well on its way to moving forward. GA doesn't preclude further improvements and expansion of the article, and it's meant to be a relatively light weight process. -- ferret (talk) 19:21, 7 March 2017 (UTC)

Among other problems, this article is still very strangely and unnecessarily weighted towards mainstream straight white male webcomic artists in many areas. For example, the idea that we need to list half a dozen examples of mainstream straight white male artists who have been unsuccessful at newspaper syndication is very strange. Also strange is that when I add a single example of a successful LGBT woman in over 100 newspapers, someone else thinks she needs to be moved to the back of the paragraph, with the reasoning that "[male] unsuccessful attempt is more interesting than a [LGBT female] successful one anyway". That is very strange, and very wrong. This article is going to need a lot of work. LittleLilith (talk) 00:49, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

• LL, what other sources are missing from this article? The "POV" tag is for slanted prose, when it reads with an obvious bias. If the article is lacking a {{globalize}}d perspective, that's a different issue. But if the latter is the case, what kind of sources do you propose should make up the difference? Because WP cannot cover that for which there are no reliable, secondary sources czar 03:31, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

  Hi, Czar, thanks for asking. I believe I've already said this a few times, but I'll repeat it: The issue is not that there are no sources. The issue is with sources not being used correctly. For example, we were using a source (the Publishers Weekly article, "Web Comics Send Readers Looking for Books") that talked about multiple female webcomics artists, webcomics artists of color, and alternative webcomics including the comics of Raina Telgemeier, Leah Hernandez, Kazu Kibuishi and Derek Kirk Kim. However, we only used the source to write about mainstream straight white male webcomic artists! We didn't include Raina Telgemeier in this article, even though she was in sources we were already using, when she has had at times 5 of the top 10 graphic novels on the New York Times bestseller list, including all of the top three, including books that have sold 1.5 million copies ... because we instead used the source to write about more "mainstream" webcomics by straight white males who sold only "thousands of books." That is just a very strange issue with this article, not with available sources. Note that those aren't the only POV issues. For example, we currently have a section on webcomics in newspapers under the heading "unsuccessful" ... which describes an LBGT woman (I had to add her to the long list of straight white males) who is syndicated in over 100 newspapers. I'm not sure what more she needs to do before wikipedia editors will consider her successful, but my attempt to make that heading more neutral was undone. I think we'd be more neutral just calling it "syndication" or "newspapers," no need for us to put "unsuccessful" in front of it. I don't think wikipedia editors should be labeling a woman who has syndicated her comic to 100 newspapers as "unsuccessful." That just seems like a very strange point of view. So, there are many POV issues to fix here, issues with every section of this article, plenty of good sources to use, but unfortunately my work resolving these strange POV issues is currently being undone, so it looks like this will take a while to fix. LittleLilith (talk) 04:14, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Yes, I think it's worth mentioning Telgemeier's book for Scholastic's Graphix. What other facts need to be added and which of your edits were reverted and need to be discussed?

I suggest revising the article to be much less about individual cases and more about trends. For instance, when publishing books became popular, what some major deals were, what commentators said about the trend, etc. but the ideas should be connected and written for a general audience. This isn't the place for the details of the deal or even necessarily the names of the books. I'd also recommend turning the "unsuccessful models" section into "other models" with a discussion of how they work in the industry. czar 05:36, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

My edits that were recently undone include my removal of the POV "unsuccessful" label I described above and also undone was my correcting when the reliable sources say that webcomics business started, which I describe below in the "Recentism" section. LittleLilith (talk) 05:50, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

About me moving back Dana Simpson: the sources you showed say nothing about money. It simply shows that newspaper syndication is still a goal that webcartoonists pursue. Clearly, the sources that actually discuss webcomics in newspapers claim that syndication is rarely as profitable as other revenue streams. Do you argue against that? If so, what are your sources? ~Mable (chat) 10:27, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

The source you are using for webcomics in newspapers is incredibly poor. That source interviewed a very small number of straight white male creators of mainstream wewbcomics, only one of whom has even the tiniest experience working with newspapers at all, and so now this article focuses on several webcomics with no newspaper experience at all to describe all webcomic artists' experience with the newspaper industry. That's like writing about the music business, and saying there is no money in major label pop music based on interviews with people who have no experience in that area at all. There are far better sources about webcomics that have actually been in newspapers, and so I am going to use those rather than sources. LittleLilith (talk) 14:42, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Do you have better sources on webcomic syndication in newspapers in general? These are all considered reliable sources and I don't know any other ones. Also, I was unaware that gender and sexuality were relevant for newspaper deals. This sounds like POV-pushing moreso than actual criticism, discrediting sources because of the gender of the people interviewed. ~Mable (chat) 16:39, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

No, pointing out that a small group of homogeneous people is not representative of the wider group of diverse people is not POV pushing. However, trying to cherry-pick from the opinions of that small sample and trying to present those opinions as facts about a much wider group is POV pushing. LittleLilith (talk) 16:49, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Lilith, I've stated multiple times that cherrypicking sources is the thing I'm worried about the most. You can't just point at one or two successful artists and say they represent the group. I put way more weight on sources that discuss trends in general than sources that give examples, because the news will only cover extreme examples. Unless you can find a source that clearly states that newspaper syndication is a popular or successful strategy of webcartoonists, I can't let you spin it that way, because none of the Dana Simpson sources make such a broad statement. ~Mable (chat) 17:03, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Could you give me an example where I've said that one or two successful artists represent that everyone in the group is successful? You seem to be the one using unsuccessful artists to say that everyone in the group in successful. You have literally created a section and labeled it "unsuccessful."LittleLilith (talk) 17:07, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

I've taken sources that are about webcomics and how people handle its business. You've taken news articles and interviews with specific webcomic creators about their success or their experiences. We need articles about the large scale trends of the industry because primarily using "examples" and news messages will only skew the information in the article. ~Mable (chat) 17:12, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Let me see if I understand this: You've taken a Boston Globe source that interviews just a few specific local webcartoonists from the Boston area, and you are trying to use that as if it is an "article about the large scale trends of the industry"? And meanwhile you are warning me about the dangers of using "news articles and interviews with specific webcomic creators about their success or their experiences"? LittleLilith (talk) 17:33, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

You're cherrypicking one specific success story and want to use that to claim that newspaper syndication is broadly considered a profitable endeavor among webcartoonists. ~Mable (chat) 18:02, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

No, I have not claimed that newspaper syndication is going to be a profitable endeavor for most webcartoonists. Can you pont to any instance where I have? Of course it won't be. It is a very competitive industry for cartoonists, just like getting a major label recording contract is for musicians. If this were an article on the music business, it would be similarly ridiculous for you to use an article about a handful of local bands from Boston who haven't landed recording contracts to try to label the entire major recording industry as "unsuccessful." That's what we have here. LittleLilith (talk) 18:15, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Except the webcartoonists whose opinions are listed in that source are all professionals and considered highly successful. Newspaper syndication is nothing like reaching a record deal: Stevenson got into the business and found that he made more money without it. You argue that the "unsuccessful" label should be removed over one example of someone using syndication in 2015. That is frankly absurd. I am sure that you can find more examples of webcartoonists going for syndication in the 2010s, but that doesn't mean that it is a major revenue stream for webcomic creators, which this article is about. ~Mable (chat) 18:22, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

OK, I think you have repeatedly stated your fringe opinion that someone who is syndicated in 100 newspapers belongs under an "unsuccessful" label, but you have not convinced me of this, I don't see anyone agreeing with you, and Czar agrees with me that it should be changed to something more neutral and less obviously biased. So, I will be making that change. LittleLilith (talk) 18:44, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

@Czar: I would like to have your opinion on the past half hour of discussion, when you have the time ^_^; ~Mable (chat) 18:55, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

• I think it would be helpful to only discuss sources from here on out (and not each other, "you" statements, etc.) If there are perspectives missing re: webcomics and newspaper syndication, I recommend discussing what sources would solve that. If no other sources exist, I recommend tempering the ones that do to be as fair as possible to the subject matter. It should be possible to continue editing the section until it is mutually satisfactory. If you cannot agree on an edit, bring the specific edit to the talk page for discussion rather than reverting back and forth.

Specifically regarding the Syndication section, I'd remove all mention of other models (t-shirts, etc.), which are covered elsewhere. The paragraph should be focused on what experts have said about syndication and perhaps the most prominent examples of attempts at syndication. I would also be wary of sourcing broad statements to individuals. If a reliable source reports that syndication does not work for web comics, then fine to add a direct ref for that, but if that statement is sourced to several artists who say it didn't work for them, all we can do is report several case studies. That's the difference between "Several prominent webcomics artists have made unsuccessful attempts at publishing in newspaper syndication" and "Newspaper syndication is not viable for webcomics artists". Also caught up in this, I imagine (though I'm unfamiliar with the source material), is what would separate a webcomics artist from a regular comic artist apart from starting their publication on the web first. czar 21:13, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

I removed mentions of other revenue channels in the discussed section as suggested. I haven't been able to find any other sources that discuss newspaper syndication among webcartoonists in the general, though. Looking this article over after a good night's sleep (which was highly needed after the discussion got heated yesterday ^_^;), I agree that the "other models" heading works fine. I'm sorry for getting as worked up over it as I did... ~Mable (chat) 10:49, 9 March 2017 (UTC)

Recentism

This article has a very strange and heavy bias towards webcomics of roughly the past ten years. I have attempted to begin correcting this, but I am meeting resistance. The Observer source "The Webcomics Business Is Moving on From Webcomics" says "webcomics, the business of posting strips online for free and monetizing once an audience formed. It started in the 80s, with Witches and Stitches and T.H.E. Fox." When I added that information, it was removed with the edit summary "Irrelevant. People didn't make money off of webcomics in the 80s and early 90s." That edit summary is the exact opposite of what the sources say, is the exact opposite of my experience of following webcomics, and without this fact we currently have a wikipedia article that says "When webcomics started out, the primary way for people to make money through them was by selling merchandise, which prompted what John Allison called the 't-shirt economy'. In 2004 ..." which makes us sound like we think webcomic business started out in 2004, 20 years after it actually did. That is wrong. So, let's have a discussion about whether we should have an article that says what the sources say, that the webcomics business started in the 1980s, or maybe stick with the current version of this article with its novel theory that the webcomics business started in 2004. LittleLilith (talk) 00:22, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Other than this throwaway line in the Observer article (which I read to mean "webcomics as a medium has existed since 1985"), I have rarely seen a source say what the first profitable webcomic was. This seems a hard thing to confirm. I do have one source that lists Penny Arcade (2000) as the first professional webcomic, which I am very inclined to believe, though I don't want to put my money on that unless I find more sources. I should note that the article currently describes the past 17 years of the business-side of webcomics. I have no good sources for the webcomic industry in the 1990s, and though I'm sure some people made money during the 1995-99 period, I just don't have any sources on it. ~Mable (chat) 10:22, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

The Observer article lists "Witches and Stitches" and "T.H.E. Fox" as the start of "the business of posting strips online for free and monetizing." Those examples fill in some huge gaps in this article and help correct the recentism bias. "Witches and Stitches" is the best example I see of early success, starting in the 1980s and with "one of the few, and first, webcomic creators successful enough to make a living as an artist" by 1999 according to Parade Magazine, and "T.H.E. Fox" cartoons also started in the 1980s, and were in the The San Bernardino Sun newspaper in the 1990s, but never achieved the goal of wider syndication. Those are both great examples of webcomic business from the 1985-1999 period, address to recentism bias, and fix the glaring error of this article saying that "webcomics started out" in about 2004. LittleLilith (talk) 15:50, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Eric Millikin didn't become a successful webcartoonists until the 1990s, when he started creating a webcomic on the World Wide Web. The 1980s webcomics were primarily experiments, though I'd be very interesting to read about any kind of monetization this far back (more on that on your talk page). As for the 2004 thing, I didn't intend to imply with the sentence that webcomics started to become profitable in that year (hell, other parts of the article go straightly against that, like how Serializer and Modern Tales launched in 2002). I'll look into how to improve that sentence. ~Mable (chat) 16:47, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Yes, now that I have corrected the launch dates of Modern Tales and Serializer and made them 2002 instead of 2005 as you had them, the correct facts the I have put in this article do indeed contradict the incorrect information that you have put in the article. This is not the only example of this article contradicting itself or being incorrect. I look forward to resolving this recentism issue so I can move on to some of this article's many other issues. So, do you still have an objection to me adding "Witches and Stitches" and "T.H.E. Fox" to this article? What is that objection? LittleLilith (talk) 16:58, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

I am still looking for answer to my question. The Observer article lists "Witches and Stitches" and "T.H.E. Fox" as the start of "the business of posting strips online for free and monetizing." "Witches and Stitches" is the best example I see of early success, starting in the 1980s and with "one of the few, and first, webcomic creators successful enough to make a living as an artist" by 1999 according to Parade Magazine, and "T.H.E. Fox" cartoons also started later in the 1980s, and were in The San Bernardino Sun newspaper in the 1990s, but never achieved the goal of wider syndication. Are there any objections to me adding "Witches and Stitches" and "T.H.E. Fox" to this article to help fill in the gaps in our history and correct the recentism bias? If so, what is that objection? LittleLilith (talk) 19:18, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

I think listing them in some manner would be great, though none of the subsections would really be the right place for this information. Perhaps this information fits in the top level of popular business models section? If you cite those two sources, you can definitely say that in the late 1990s, Millikin (not with Witches and Stitches, obviously: that ended before the end of the 80s. Millikin started a new webcomic in 1995, which is probably what was profitable) and Ekaitis were among the first webcartoonists to go professional through their webcomic work. Millikin is somewhat in an awkward situation, as he was already a professional cartoonists, but I haven't seen those sources so I don't know about them. Again, I would absolutely love to get access to them, as I think they can be of amazing use in other articles as well. ~Mable (chat) 19:29, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Trying to solve the gender issue

Since Lilith brought the gender imbalance of this article to my attention, we have together added four female webcartoonists. These are Kate Beaton, Raina Telgemeier, Kazu Kibuishi, and Dana Simpson. This brought the total of female webcartoonists mentioned to 8, compared to 21 male webcartoonists (counting Explosm as one). This is definitely a considerable improvement and I am thankful for Lilith to bring this issue to my attention, but I am constantly worried about cherrypicking and example farms. Raina Telgemeier has a similar value to this article as Andrew Hussie does: giving the reader an idea of the largest amount of success a webcartoonist may have. Kazu Kibuishi replaced a different webcartoonist very elegantly. Kate Beaton described her experience of the profitability of webcomics, and this insight is useful, albeit perhaps somewhat repetitive. Dana Simpson seems to have the least point of being here, but showing that newspaper syndication is still something already successful webcartoonists go for definitely has value. As I've said, an issue with the sources we have, is that the ones that describe revenue streams (The Observer and The Boston Globe) disproportionately discuss male creators (I am unaware of the sexuality of any of these people, btw. I have no idea how to varify that aspect). This forces us to look for sources that discuss female creators directly (like Lilith has done), which can bring a different type of POV to the table. I think shows pretty well with Simpson; to compare, I know French webtoon website Delitoon has been experimenting with micropayments since 2015, but we simply don't know how successful this model is, so including it here to say that micropayments is successful would be original research. This leaves us to trying to find women we can work in elegantly. I would personally love to get ideas on the talk page before it is added to the article, as I have had a lot of experience with the article and have my own ideas of how its flow works. Lilith, I'd just really love to hear what your ideas are rather than having to worry about how you edit the article next... Sharing ideas can also help in finding more sources.I did write the article on gender and webcomics, after all... ~Mable (chat) 10:50, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

To start, I suppose I could use this source to mention Girlamatic and Shaenon Garrity among the subscription services, but I have no idea how to do so without making the example completely unrelated to what the section is actually saying. It does mention Joey Manley's Modern Tales collective and something Burns describes as the "Great Modern Tales Family Crash of 2005", but he doesn't go into detail, so I don't really know what Burns means by that. Is there anything this source tells us about the business of webcomics that our article doesn't already, or am I just chasing a lost cause with this one? ~Mable (chat) 10:59, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Kazu Kibuishi is not a woman. He has book publishing success and as a Japanese-American helps balance the overwhelming examples of white people -- including unsuccessful ones -- that were used from the source at the expense of others. Also, don't need to find another source to mention Girlamatic as a subscription site since Girlamatic is already in the source being used but was excluded from this article, until I added it. LittleLilith (talk) 15:20, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Oh no, I am so sorry about that error - I made assumptions based on what we're doing without actually looking it up. Kazu Kibuishi is a name I've read often, but I've never really looked into his work. Anyway, about Girlamatic: the reason not to add it is because it is a later Modern Tales spinoff, together with Graphic Smash. It doesn't really add anything to the article to list it here, and as you edited it in now, the article is saying that Girlamatic also launched in 2002. Just adding examples to the article is POV-pushing and only harms the actual information the article aims to give in the long run... ~Mable (chat) 16:58, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

References

Answering a question about whether newspaper syndication is paid work

Maplestrip has undone my work, this time with an edit summary saying that "My question was whether she [Dana Simpson] makes money off of the webcomic or off of newspaper syndication." I'm not sure what this question is. Dana Simpson created a webcomic about unicorns, is distributing that webcomic through a syndicate to over 100 newspapers, is "making a living drawing unicorns," and now there's question whether the newspaper syndicate is paying her for her work? LittleLilith (talk) 17:17, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

To compare, Richard Stevens made money off of his syndication work, but not nearly as much as through other revenue channels. The sources you have provided don't argue one way or another how newspaper syndication has impacted her income. All we know is that she has her webcomic syndicated as such (something she had wanted to do for a long time). Sure, she makes money of it, but based on the sources we have, I doubt she's doing syndication specifically for money. ~Mable (chat) 18:05, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

To compare, "Diesel Sweeties" launched in five newspapers and Richard Stevens complained that it would take years and years to build up a client list, while "Pheobe and Her Unicorn" launched in over 100 newspapers. So, unless Dana Simpson's other revenue sources are roughly twenty times more successful than Richard Stevens', then I see no reason for your doubts that Dana Simpson is making a far greater proportion of her income from newspaper syndication than Richard Stevens ever did. LittleLilith (talk) 18:32, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Ah, good point. I do still think this is the exception rather than the rule of course, but this makes Simpson a fair example of the best situation webcartoonists may find themselves in. Hmm, perhaps prefacing her with "some webcartoonists have proven more successful since; for instance ..." That could work alright, a bit like listing Andrew Hussie or his Kickstarter success and Telgemeier for her insane book success, but none of these depict a realistic trend, which still bothers me... ~Mable (chat) 18:37, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Oh, I should note that Jeffrey Rowland did say that he would "probably say no" to a syndication deal of 100 newspapers because he would make less money in that situation, but eh, I guess it works like it is now... ~Mable (chat) 18:40, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Title/scope

A passing thought: "Webcomics and income" might be better titled as "Webcomics industry" or "Business of webcomics" based on the scope of the sources. "X and Y" makes it more like an expository relationship between two different topics (e.g., Anarchism and Friedrich Nietzsche) rather than a presentation of the whole of the webcomics business.  czar 21:19, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

I've always considered Business of webcomics a fair alternative title, and would be fine with such a move, but I don't feel about it too strongly either way. I initially created this article to counter the misconception that webcartoonists making a livable income is rare (which was indirectly supported by Wikipedia and has worked its way into sources like this one), so that's why I settled on that title. As I said, though, either works. I'm less fond of Webcomics industry, as such a title may prove controversial among people active in webcomics. I don't have my A History of Webcomics book on me right now, but I remember some notable webcartoonists lashing out to the idea that a webcomics industry exists in the mid-2000s. There are other issues that come to mind as well. ~Mable (chat) 10:54, 9 March 2017 (UTC)

I've completed this move. LittleLilith (talk) 20:39, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

Crowdfunding vs subscriptions

@Clothanalyst: I don't understand why you put crowdfunding under a "subscriptions" header. As far as I know, these two models have very little to do with eachother. I suppose people use websites like Patreon to release special rewards to their supporters, but that's about it. It's not alike the classic subscription services at all, but I am curious to hear what you think about it. ~Mable (chat) 19:09, 18 February 2018 (UTC)

@Maplestrip: Hi. Yes, I combined the two different sections on subscriptions because it is not good to have two separate sections on that very narrow topic. Both sections covered the very same topic, which is the business where webcomic readers pay subscription fees to webcomic creators. Additionally, those two sections were not in chronological order, and were quite far apart from each other. I have also corrected those as well as other issues, so now this article is much better. Clothanalyst (talk) 18:12, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

@Clothanalyst: I don't see Patreon as a "subscription service" at all. In my personal experience, it's primarily used as a crowdfunding service, or "donation" service as you may put it. If you know of a source that connects modern crowdfunding with subscription services like Modern Tales, I would love to see it, of course. R. K. Milholland's use of crowdfunding is much more in line with modern use of Patreon, so I feel the way you feel right now: "it is not good to have two separate sections on that very narrow topic." Crowdfunding and donations are practically the same thing. ~Mable (chat) 20:57, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

@Maplestrip: I'm sorry, but you have a complete misunderstanding about Patreon. Patreon is a subscription platform. It's right there at the top of the home page, https://www.patreon.com/ : "Fans pay you a subscription amount of their choice in exchange for exclusive experiences & behind-the-scenes content." Thanks for checking, though. Clothanalyst (talk) 21:48, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

@Clothanalyst:

The idea of crowdfunding is being given money prior to release rather than financing later reimbursed by income ex post facto to infinity in beyond, or whenever they say copyright expires. Many will want to understand what is meant by authors of webcomics when they say they are switching to crowdfunding. Simply being a buzz word, doesn't invalidate its notability or the reliability of sources that talk about it. Cryptocurrency is very much a buzz word, but the article on cryptocurrency as of writing contains 119 cited sources. The article on Crowdfunding 120. All of those are supposed to be "reliable sources". Subscription business model contains 5.

A subscription is but one form of crowdfunding and perhaps the oldest since before the term was popularized. A subscription to a magazine funds its next release, or to an MMORPG the next update, or webcomic their next issue. Kickstarter is not a "subscription model" yet also falls under the umbrella. Many will argue if a creator (regardless of platform) who releases all their content to the general public is receiving subscriptions or donations. If we want to talk about the broader topic, merging them all into "Crowdfunding" is probably more appropriate, though a slightly more technical sounding. I would say using subscription for the header is more suited for [1], for a more digestable version skimping on details not for this. JMO. Eaterjolly (talk) 04:01, 22 February 2018 (UTC)

Transparency of funds raised is occasionally a defining characteristic setting crowdfunding and vanilla subscription apart. However I don't think that's reasonable, given the easy distinction between "crowdfunding" and "transparent crowdfunding". Eaterjolly (talk) 01:48, 23 February 2018 (UTC)