The Proposition.

[IVstudios]

Also, how very shocking to learn how much more integrity I have than all of you fuckers.

I think a large part of it is how vague the phrasing is. Like Rkolter said, a big sticking point would be what rights/freedoms you would have to give up. You didn't specify that you give up anything by doing a commercial, not even integrity really. Even assuming it's a commercial for a product you don't like, letting your characters be used to market it isn't necessarily hypocritical (unless you though there was something truly bad or dangerous about the product). There is lot's of stuff I don't like, but if other people like it good for them. I don't mind telling them about it.

My characters already say stuff I don't necessarily agree with all the time anyway, as I'm sure many people's do.

[Yeahduff]

Don't think there's anything vague about it at all.

Your characters are now part of a national campaign that will be seen by millions who now and forever will associate them with this product. Implied in the question are the natural consequences of that. You really think your comic can ever be anything besides "that Vanilla Death cartoon?" How will your readers feel about something they've supported being used to sell sugary products?

And let's not be silly. If you're allowing your character to endorse something outside of the world of your comic, you're endorsing it too.

[KWill]

Don't think there's anything vague about it at all.

Your characters are now part of a national campaign that will be seen by millions who now and forever will associate them with this product. Implied in the question are the natural consequences of that. You really think your comic can ever be anything besides "that Vanilla Death cartoon?" How will your readers feel about something they've supported being used to sell sugary products?

And let's not be silly. If you're allowing your character to endorse something outside of the world of your comic, you're endorsing it too.

Honestly, I can't even remember the brand of car that the Simpson's are making commercials for over here. Not that a webcomic is comparable to one of the longest running cartoons of all time, but the fears that that's all your characters will be associated with could prove unfounded.

[Fabio Ciccone]

1 million dollars is a life-changing amount of money. Well, at least when you live in South America.

[KWill]

It's life-changing even if you live in Europe... at least for a student like me.

[IVstudios]

My point is that it doesn't have anything to do with integrity. You can sell something you don't like without losing your integrity as long as you don't honestly believe it to be bad on a fundamental level, just on a level of personal taste.

And yes, I do think the comic could be something other than "That Vanilla Death" cartoon. Yes it will influence how people think about it, but they can also be influenced the comic itself. Not everything that has gets used as part of a marketing campaign is doomed to forever be viewed only as a tool of the company that made it, unless all it's incarnations are used solely for purposes of advertising. There is a difference between using something as a corporate mascot and simply using something as part of an ad. For example, if you saw something with Tony the Tiger you would immediately think it's an ad for Frosted Flakes, but if you see a something with Superman you don't automatically think it's an ad for Direct TV (Or whatever it was he was selling in those ads with Seinfeld a few years back) As an ad it remains as an independent entity form the product and the company.

Superman does have the advantage of being famous before the ad came out, but just because the comic is unknown before the ad doesn't mean it can never escape from under it's shadow.

Edit: KWill beat me too it, but yes.

[KWill]

Edit: KWill beat me too it, but yes.

>=D Cuz I am the goddamn Gingerbread Man!

[Parables]

As it happens, I'm not in corporate branding, and don't claim to be. I was just making what I thought was an amusing observation.

As far as integrity goes, I think the key part of it is consistency. I'm a fan of your webcomic, and honestly, based on the subject matter and the style, I'd be very disappointed to see your characters gushing on about flavoured sugar water. But my comic is just fun sci-fi with flashy robots. None of them really make comments on consumerism or the struggle of artists in a society where the bottom line is the ultimate measure of something's worth. Using them in an ad wouldn't be inconsistent.

C'mon, give us the benefit of a doubt. Each of us is in a different situation with a different webcomic handling different themes. What's selling out for some of us might not be for others.

[Cuendolin]

Maybe you could afford to update everyday, just because you don't need a job, so your readers will be pleased.

I'd hope that the readers will decide based on their tastes, no based on the advertisment and I'm sure If VD tastes awful, nobody will be buying it, even if a famous webcomic character tells them to do so.
About the integrity, I think that sometimes the end justify the means, that is gaining exposure and enough money to work without economical worries.

[Yeahduff]

1 million dollars is a life-changing amount of money. Well, at least when you live in South America.

Oh, absolutely, and I've stated such in this thread. I certainly don't begrudge people who would take the money, because it is a whole hell of a lot, and we all have to eat. That's why I find it to be an interesting question.

My point is that it doesn't have anything to do with integrity. You can sell something you don't like without losing your integrity as long as you don't honestly believe it to be bad on a fundamental level, just on a level of personal taste.

Well, you may be placing too much seriousness to a sarcastic comment. Though it would be nice if not everything out there was just an ad campaign waiting to happen.

And come on, people, there's a world of difference (even that's putting it mildly) between putting your nothing little webcomic as the face of a popular product and using The Simpsons. Superman? What's it been? 80 years since he was created? And some national campaign for a cable network is really going to divorce an American icon from it's source material? On the flipside, let's break this down. To be generous, we'll say your comic has 1000 people worldwide who have heard of it. Then all of a sudden 30 million people are seeing it in a new context several times a day. Do the math.

[KWill]

And come on, people, there's a world of difference (even that's putting it mildly) between putting your nothing little webcomic as the face of a popular product and using The Simpsons. Superman? What's it been? 80 years since he was created? And some national campaign for a cable network is really going to divorce an American icon from it's source material? On the flipside, let's break this down. To be generous, we'll say your comic has 1000 people worldwide who have heard of it. Then all of a sudden 30 million people are seeing it in a new context several times a day. Do the math.

It's been mentioned before that that kind of ad campaign is like being paid for advertising. While there will be 30 million people seeing it in new context, how many of them will ever have seen it anyway, and how many of those that never would have are going to be curious enough to look up the original comic? And, as some people pointed out, if the comic is over or ending soon, any extra traffic without any real advertising effort involved isn't all that bad either.

[Yeahduff]

You think Pepsico is gonna give you a link? Put your URL in the commercial? It's just gonna be your drawings, and people might be talking about it in our little world here, but this isn't gonna make your comic famous, just your characters in the context of the ad. No one will even know your characters' names, let alone yours.

[KWill]

You think Pepsico is gonna give you a link? Put your URL in the commercial? It's just gonna be your drawings, and people might be talking about it in our little world here, but this isn't gonna make your comic famous, just your characters in the context of the ad. No one will even know your characters' names, let alone yours.

Undoubtedly. I'm referring to people that are interested in the characters and do independent research or stumble on the background via wiki or whatnot. People that wouldn't have stumbled on it without said ad campaign.

[TheSuburbanLetdown]

Didn't the "Rejected" guy (my spoon is too big) do the art for Pop-Tarts not long ago? Most people I talk to say, "What the hell is 'Rejected?'"

[Yeahduff]

Didn't the "Rejected" guy (my spoon is too big) do the art for Pop-Tarts not long ago? Most people I talk to say, "What the hell is 'Rejected?'"

Yeah. Though if I were that guy I'd've done it too, because it's not like he has characters, and he's still doing free association, it just isn't ending in bloody death as often. He'd about style, not content, anyway.

[KWill]

Didn't the "Rejected" guy (my spoon is too big) do the art for Pop-Tarts not long ago? Most people I talk to say, "What the hell is 'Rejected?'"

Yeah. Though if I were that guy I'd've done it too, because it's not like he has characters, and he's still doing free association, it just isn't ending in bloody death as often. He'd about style, not content, anyway.

Yeah, it sounds more like option 3, anyway.

[IVstudios]

You think Pepsico is gonna give you a link? Put your URL in the commercial? It's just gonna be your drawings, and people might be talking about it in our little world here, but this isn't gonna make your comic famous, just your characters in the context of the ad. No one will even know your characters' names, let alone yours.

If you are using someone else's characters/creation as part of an ad, it is common business practice to give them credit. No self respecting designer is going to allow his/her stuff to be used without getting there name in tiny letters underneath it. Hard to see, but still there for anyone who might care to look. Not giving them credit is just asking for a lawsuit.

Edit: for example there is a little ©DC Comic that appears at the very beginning of the aforementioned superman commercials. As long as the company making the commercial does not hold the copyright to the characters used in it, they must give credit.

[McDuffies]

Also, how very shocking to learn how much more integrity I have than all of you fuckers.

Big surprise, you were the one having qualms about drawing your characters in underwear.

You think Pepsico is gonna give you a link? Put your URL in the commercial? It's just gonna be your drawings, and people might be talking about it in our little world here, but this isn't gonna make your comic famous, just your characters in the context of the ad. No one will even know your characters' names, let alone yours.

No matter whether your product was promoted in the add or not, it will still show your work to a larger audience, with a number of those who would track the source down - which with this internet world, is not a hard task. I've listened to Blue King Brown lately, a piece of whose song I've tracked down in a mobile phone operator add, later searching for "telenor add" in google and youtube which is how I found the name of the band. So never fancying myself exceptional, one-and-only case, I believe that even an uncredited add can bring you some level of publicity.
Sure, for some people I'd always be the "Vanilla death" guy, but those would be the folks who never bothered to read my comics, so I wouldn't be concerned about what they think anyways. This kind of things happens anyway, for some people Blur are still "that woo-hoo band", and some people I know still remember Radiohead as "they sing 'Creep'" band. But you can't account for what everyone in the world thinks.

I seem to have a different view of integrity. Every man chooses his own code of what's right or wrong. If someone's getting into the game with the notion of eventually earning money from licencing their characters, I'm not sure that we can say they have no integrity since they have their system of beliefs and they've been sticking to it the whole time.

On the other hand, I am despising nearly everything about the institution of marketing and advertisement, which makes us live in the world where presentation is more inportant than the content. Leasing my characters to an add would crush my heart a little bit. But for that matter, if I was a tv-show author, having that show interrupted with three blocks of commercials would also crush my heart a little bit.
But I would live with that because I choose to be pragmatic. If three blocks of commercial are the reason my show is produced at all, then so be it. If commercials are what's keeping my show on public tv where everyone can see it, instead of being on some cable channel where you have to pay to watch it, I'd bear with commercials. If million dollars would allow me to quit my day job and dedicate all my time to comics, I'd figure it's worth it.

Other matter is, though, how much I'd be involved in making actual commercial. Whether I would have a right to vetto the script if I thought it was so shameful that I wouldn't want to be associated with it. If I thought that the commercial would be decent, or at least ignorable, I'd go for it. If I thought it'd make shameful and irritating commercial, maybe not.

Finally, I'd never support any political option or social cause for money. I would support one I believe in if neccesary, but not for money. There are other kinds of campaigns I wouldn't participate in. But I find that soft drinks are rather benign by-products of consumerism society, and I personally enjoy a number of those, to the point of being a coke addict. So with supporting a soft drink, I wouldn't be selling out to something I'm strongly opposed to.

[Kisai]

In the same line of thinking, how much screen real estate are you willing to giveup with ads? Particularly ones that pay more? At what point do you think a site has "sold out" to the advertisers?

[Bustertheclown]

I don't see it as selling out. I see it as buying in. If selling one property down the river frees me up to create what I want, how I want, without the need to worry ever again about taking day jobs to feed myself, then you're damned right I'd do it! Money may be common, but ain't too easy to come by where I'm at.