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Thursday, April 7, 2011

Media / Books Comics Don't Pay

Posted by Paul Constant on Thu, Apr 7, 2011 at 4:05 PM

Comics Alliance points out something very interesting about the Village Voice's feature story about cartoons this week:

In anticipation of this weekend's MoCCA Festival, The Village Voice published its Cartoon Issue, featuring an exhaustive and fascinating article on the grim financial realities of cartoonists. Among the many depressing facts reported were that Fantagraphics makes only $6 million in sales a year; the Diamond Comic Distributor's total sales figures for 2009 were only $428 million; and that The Village Voice itself doesn't pay many cartoonists whose work it publishes.

It's an interesting piece about how depressing it is to be a cartoonist, even if it is illustrated with a bunch of cartoons that may or may not have been drawn by cartoonists who get nothing but "exposure" for their hard work. Let's hope the recent news that Daily Kos hired Tom Tomorrow as their comics editor will lead to a new financial model for comics, because the current model is totally bullshit.

Comments (9) RSS

Oldest First Unregistered On Registered On Add a comment

Kind of strange, cause I used to pick up weeklies specifically because they had comics.

You'd think something that brings in readers would be worth something.

Then again, most poets will always be very very broke, so there's at least one upside to doing comix.

Posted by Will in Seattle

on April 7, 2011 at 4:29 PM

You either read "Life in Hell" or your watched "The Simpsons".

I for one did the former.

Posted by Supreme Ruler Of The Universe

on April 7, 2011 at 5:01 PM

blah blah blah, print comics dying out, blah blah blah, webcomics, blah, merchandising, blah blah, artists are t-shirt salespeople, blah

Posted by eptified on April 7, 2011 at 5:15 PM

my prison wing filled with 'cartoonists' is an especially bitter place, and i hope to keep it that way.

Posted by SweetDarkLord on April 7, 2011 at 7:05 PM

Thanks for passing this on.

Posted by Cory on April 7, 2011 at 11:18 PM

Maybe he should look into other outlets for his stuff. If these papers/mags/whatever aren't paying then maybe he should look to other markets. My son draws anime and at 21 he's gotten a lot of this "exposure" already and he's gaining quite the name and following in that genre. This month a website showcasing his stuff (and others) goes live and he's anticipating more than just "exposure." There's some serious money there too. Perhaps the papers aren't paying much (if at all) for cartoons any more, but that doesn't mean that there isn't a market for it anywhere. It's just moved somewhere else.

Eh. His mileage may vary, but if he's moaning about not making any money then maybe he should move to where the money *IS* these days.

Posted by bobbelieu on April 8, 2011 at 5:55 AM

Yeah, those dumb cartoonists should just be like #6's son. Retards.

Posted by I'm 85 Years Old on April 8, 2011 at 8:12 AM

@7: Well, if their issue is making money. Otherwise you just have a hobby. If you want to do it for the sake of "your art" that's fine, just don't quit your day job.

Posted by bobbelieu on April 8, 2011 at 9:15 AM

I'm not exactly sure what Paul thinks is "total bullshit" or what is wrong with the approach described @6. The article makes it pretty clear that writing comics alone has almost never been lucrative for anyone but a lucky few; how is that different from just about every other endeavor in life, artistic or otherwise?

Posted by laterite on April 8, 2011 at 11:32 AM