Finishing off your comic....

[Komiyan]

I see I have asked the unanswerable question!

[Rkolter]

I see I have asked the unanswerable question!

Don't expect me to answer it on RC.

[Dr Legostar]

I see I have asked the unanswerable question!

i can answer it.... i just don't wanna.

[The Neko]

He wants to have his cake and eat it, too. He wants to put up his opinions and theories then never hear the negative replies, be contradicted, or held accountable for his arguments in any way.

[Rcmonroe]

OR he wants to have an argument that he can't possibly lose—because nobody's going to be able to effectively argue that they know more about his motivations than he does.

He's come to the right place for that.

[Dr Legostar]

OR he wants to have an argument that he can't possibly lose—because nobody's going to be able to effectively argue that they know more about his motivations than he does.

He's come to the right place for that.

i think we can all agree that anyone involved in such an arguement comes out as a loser.

[McDuffies]

I ain't a loser! Because, what I basically want, is a social validation.

[Dutch!]

Um... why is his opinion about how he handles his comic wrong?

[Komiyan]

It's not 'wrong', it's 'logically inconsistant'.

[Rcmonroe]

It's not 'wrong', it's 'logically inconsistant'.

But so is "arguing with him about it."

[NakedElf]

Ultimately, arguing with people about their motivations or reasons is probably going to be pointless. Even if they are logically inconsistent (say, irrational fear of spiders,) rational discussion isn't going to change anything--at the end of the day, even if they know intellectually that their fears are unfounded, they're still afraid of spiders.

[Keffria]

I don't see how it's illogical or inconsistent to argue with someone who expresses a viewpoint that differs from your own. As far as "INTERNET DRAMA" goes, this has been a very restrained debate, and I don't see any reason to tell people to stop arguing with OBS (even if I agree that it's kind of unwinnable).

Honestly, is self-fulfillment misunderstood?

See the repeated quotation. It's more that people just don't understand why you draw the comic for self-fulfillment but then choose to put it in a public domain. If I draw only for myself, I can just as easily sketch out some pages and keep them in a drawer. You post a comic on the internet knowing that there's the off chance that someone will come and see it, even if you don't actually market it to anyone, which leads people to the pretty logical conclusion that you actually want to communicate a story of some sort to an audience. Sure, it's an accomplishment to follow a schedule, preparing a page and putting it up on a given day - goal-setting and all that - but you can do that without actually making it public.

As a bit of an aside, the thing about your comic itself (which can be found pretty easily - Keenlace links to it, oddly enough) is that whatever you might say about comics just being lines on a page, I didn't find the bits I read to be different from your average webcomic. I was expecting to be horribly alienated or something, but there's a gap between theory and practice, here. :/

[Rcmonroe]

I don't see how it's illogical or inconsistent to argue with someone who expresses a viewpoint that differs from your own.

Didn't say that.

(even if I agree that it's kind of unwinnable).

DID say that.

There comes a time when you have to realize your argument is falling on deaf ears. That's a good time to give it up, no matter how positive you are that you're right. Continuing the argument past that point is what I was objecting to.

[McDuffies]

Didn't say that.

Actually, that's exactly what you said.

It's not 'wrong', it's 'logically inconsistant'.

But so is "arguing with him about it."

But seriously, such arguement has certain benefits:
1. The rest of chatroom hears agruements from both sides. Those who do agree with me, find more arguements to agree. Those who are breaking, might be convinced into what I claim, or maybe even to what he claims.
2. OBS hears it. I find that it's good that he hears other opinions, if nothing then for awareness that other people think different. Also, agruements don't reach him now, but that doesn't mean that with time, he won't slowly accept them, or alter his attitudes to less extreme. I do think that he read most of them, if nothing then to know what he's quoting.
3. Dialectics. Exchange of opinions may bring to new ideas and to verbalising, articulating existing ideas. Even if OBS replies to my points by restating his, that still pushes me to make new ones and think further.
4. I think that it's important that some thoughts just aren't left lingering unfinished. If OBS, for instance, states that there is no "personified" content in comics, and noone bothers to contradics that, the impression might be that majority of people agree with that. It might be OBS's impression, impression of other forumites (I don't know what you think until you speak up), by someone who reads this thread two years from now, for whatever reason... or simply because people normally ask for some kind of closure.
I agree that after some time, discussion becames pointless. I usually try to leave it as soon as I've said everything I could without repeating myself too much. But it's in no way pointless generally speaking.

Um... why is his opinion about how he handles his comic wrong?

How he handles his comic is the least of my concern.
My concern is that he runs into discussion with some opinions that I consider wrong to say the least and counter-productive to say more accurate, and that he gives nothing to back those opinions up. His arguments seem feeble to me so naturally I ask him to confirm them in practice, which he denies. I like when a man can stand behind what he says. I don't like when he doesn't.
My concern is also that he seems to be trying to get attention in various backhanded ways, all while he's claiming that he doesn't care for attention.
I'm trying to turn attention to a curious fact that he's trying to wipe away all responsibility for what he creates, for what he says, to escape any kind of judgement of his comic. Though I think that a man has to eat what he's cooked up, this wouldn't be any of my concern if there wasn't for upper point that he always turns attention to himself which is inconsistent with desire to escape public's eye.
Simply said, the overall wibe I'm getting from him is that he's trying to BS us, and noone likes being BS-ed.
Does that explain well enough?

[Dutch!]

Um... sort of. From what I've read of him over the months or so, he does stand behind what he says and doesn't back away from what he thinks is an acceptable way to work in regards to how he holds his comic relatively private. He hasn't backed down and while he may be repeating the same arguments, it seems that he's satisfied with those arguments in himself and probably doesn't understand why a different reason behind putting his strip up privately is seen in such a different light that it takes five pages or debate.

He doesn't advertise his strip. Good luck to him. He's doing it for himself and doesn't care if nobody sees it. He's doing it for different reasons than most of us. I can live with that.

Honestly, is self-fulfillment misunderstood?

See the repeated quotation. It's more that people just don't understand why you draw the comic for self-fulfillment but then choose to put it in a public domain. If I draw only for myself, I can just as easily sketch out some pages and keep them in a drawer.

Putting it on a webpage is another form of storage, isn't it? And possibly a safe one. I know my hard drive shat itself early this year and I lost a big chunk of my original files. But the finished products were safe to be retrieved from their archive on the net. There's a useful reason to store them on the internet, whether or not they are there for public viewing or not.

[Shishio]

If I go any further I'll end up a broken record pissing everyone off (more), so instead I'll just say that all autobiographies end by necessity before the author dies. When the time comes, it shouldn't be hard to write in how you're moving on from your comic, especially since you apparently don't have loose ends to tie up.

Well yes, but those are traditional autobiographies. Mine is different in that it's a bunch of gag strips, it's just that most of them are true and presented in non-linear order. Anyway, it's not really important.

And to relax: Fans are not obligated to contact you.

I realize this, and it was not my intent to say or imply otherwise.

Also, it occured to me Shishio, when you finally stop your comic it would be rather appropriate to do so with a "happy ending" if you catch my meaning.

I'll have to call in a few favours, but provided I'm in a generous mood when and if the time comies, I'm sure I can arrange for plenty of bombs to be dropped over Baghdad.

But you have an artist, and they could (and probably would) make up a concluding strip in the event of your death.

Hell, if you die in any particularly hilarious way, I'll volunteer to draw it for you.

Well, if I have my way, I will be able to preserve my anonymity throughout my "career," so you won't know for sure when I do die. Also, you may not outlive me.

Uh, what?
That's kind of like second time I hear you making a parallel that makes no sence. If this is gonna be a trend, someone better start a wiki page about it.

I was only trying to illustrate how ridiculous Yeahduff's argument was. (At least in the way he was phrasing it.)

I think he meant a word other than "articulated." Pretty sure he was just saying I was speaking in extreme terms, which most people seem to agree with.

Yes.

I don't think I brought the word "obligation" to the discussion, but I could be wrong. In either case, I do doubt my failure to be "reasonable" is what sparked his passions.

I just utterly fucking despise the idea that a comic creator should be beholden to their fans. If you get something from them, especially if making comics is your job, yes, there is some obligation, if not, the only obligation you have is to yourself.

If you want to see it as a matter of "respect," that's your business. Personally, I think it makes more sense to prioritize yourself above others, but that's me.

[Rcmonroe]

Actually, that's exactly what you said.

What I said was it was illogical to argue with him, not that arguing with anybody is illogical.

I believe that for an argument to be beneficial, each side must have respect for the other; if they don't, they won't hear each other's arguments. I can argue with you, mcDuffies, because I do respect you; you almost always present your arguments intelligently and thoughtfully, and I often agree with them.

What I'm sensing here, though, is that some of the people who are arguing with OBS do not respect him, so they're not really hearing what he's saying. It seems more that they're taking this opportunity to publicly berate him, rather than show him the error of his ways. He's not going to see the error of his ways (if indeed he is in error); I think he's made that abundantly clear. Continuing the argument is therefore pointless, unless the goal is to antagonize. Which I tend to think it is, for at least some people.

And if I had to choose a side here, I'd choose the side that's arguing that OBS is full of shit. But I don't have to choose a side, and neither does anybody else. I can have my opinion, and still acknowledge that however illogical OBS' arguments seem, I still can't know his motivations better than he can.

[Neb]

A Koan:

The venerable master mcDuffies sat beneath the shade of a pear tree beside a road, resting on a long journey.

mcDuffies' meditation was interrupted when another traveler passed by carrying a large clay jar.

"Stop!" cried the master. "What is it you conceal within your clay jar? Do you not desire for others to see it?"

"The content of this jar is a mystery to all but myself," proclaimed the traveler. "It is to be seen only by my own eyes."

In the instant in which the traveler finished speaking mcDuffies plucked out both their eyes.

"It is now truly a mystery," the master pronounced.

[Dutch!]

Nice philosophising, but... if it was already a mystery to all but himself, then taking out his eyes would still make it a mystery to all but himself... because if it was a mystery to all but himself, then that implies he already knew what was in the jar. Otherwise it would have been a mystery to all, including himself.

Nice little story though. I like meditative little morals like that

[McDuffies]

I'm a master?
And what's Dawg got to do with this?

Anyways, I think you guys do take arguements sacred a bit. Even five page arguement should be taken as exercise for thought rather than reason to be upset about. So in a way, arguement can be fulfilling in itself, it's just another mode of communicating, and the subject is as pointless as you don't have anything to say about it.