Marvel Comics is unveiling a fee-based online archive of more than 2,500 back issues. Marvel Digital Comics Unlimited will offer comics in a high-resolution format for $59.88 a year, or at a monthly rate of $9.99. If you subscribe for a full year, you will be billed $4.98 each month. Comics are read online. No download is required.
The service appears to be up and running along with free samples of various titles.
The biggest drawback is that new issues won’t be on the Marvel site until six months after they are published in the conventional dead tree format. Hopefully this policy clinging to an outdated way of thinking will change over time. When music is released on CD, I can go to the iTunes store and purchase it that same day. I don’t have to wait six months. I should be able to do the same with a comic book.
I just wrote up a blog entry on the same topic, since I’ve been thinking about it all day. Waiting a few months kind of sucks, but not as much as not getting paid for creating the comics. Are the artists being compensated? All signs point to “no,” though admittedly I haven’t searched very far.
I was thinking about the very same thing today. I’ve been trying to wrap my fieble brain around the whole WGA strike and the reasons for it. I’ve read conflicting stories involving the royalties for VHS compared to DVD sales. The one constant seems to be that they don’t get anything for downloads. That’s easier to understand.
Marvel picked a goofy time to get into the digital online business.
I’ve been reading Brian Wood’s posts about how wrong the top selling comic and graphic novel lists always are. He brings up the fact that he gets a royalty check based on what his books actually sell. They are always much higher then what gets published on ICV2 and elsewhere.
What’s going to happen now with royalties when it comes to what Marvel is doing? People don’t actually download content, they pay for a membership. Marvel cannot pay royalties from memberships.
True, but that’s just the same mentality the publishers had back in the 50s,60s,70s and half of the 80s. “The artist is not essential,” it’s the content that sells it. The content used to refer to the characters; now it’s the very comics themselves.
I can see both sides of the issue, but this really is exactly what the WGA is fighting for. The right to earn money from their work. At the very least, it will be interesting to see how both pan out. I know, for one, I am really going to miss LOST when it comes back for a shortened season (even shorter than before!).