Wowie (not so much)

[Drowemos]

Other factors:

A) My parterner was unreachable (very ill). I would have had to sign the contract with out his consent.

B) The contract is confusing. It looked like I was giving up my intellectual property rights. I did read it but I did not understand it. I had to go to a lawyer friend to find out what the heck was going on. The lawyer friend was unavailable in those two days. (He was in Cancun the bastard.)

C) My site has a successful members section. It was unclear if this would be affected negatively by the contract. (again confusing contract)

D) The comic was having problems at the time. It was uncertain if it was going to continue. (See A The artist was very sick)

E) Consultation with the only other comic creator I could reach at the time said that he though Wowio was disreputable. And I could not argue with that given the way things were being done.

Over last month these factors were resolved but by then "So sorry to late". It is highly annoying.

As for Union in their letter Wowio mad it perfectly clear that they are successfully now and do not need my business.

I could probably convince:
The Wotch
Crossworlds
Sailor Sun
Angel of Saint Thomas
Cheer
Troop 37
Wayfarer’s Moon
A yet unname comic by Jimmy Brimstone

To join Wowio based on closes friendships I have with them.

Through friend of friends I could have influence over:
Misfile
Accidental Centaurs
Sins

I will not advice them to join in fact I will strongly counsel against Wowio to all these comics. However money is usually a stronger motivation that friendship. I could probably have a positive influence but I my negative effect would be much less.

If anyone else wants to join this union just let me know. We can go to Wowio in a block an perhaps they will take notice. Unlikely but it beats just taking a rate half that of other creators.

None of this matters though. Wowio has a monopoly and really doesn't care anymore. They made it perfectly clear in there letter that they did not need my business so I should just take the rate offered. I am just tilting at windmills. I am partially at fault Wowio partially at fault but the upshot is I am stuck with a situation that just sucks.

My only real hope is a competitor of Wowio comes along. Then suddenly I will mater again. That's really the problem here. I hate being told I don't matter. It is a personal hot button that send me into an irrational rage.

[War]

None of this matters though. Wowio has a monopoly and really doesn't care anymore.

A monopoly on what? A crappy distribution system with limited financial returns? That's not a very good monopoly.

[Joel Fagin]

A monopoly on what? A crappy distribution system with limited financial returns? That's not a very good monopoly.

It's a higher percentage than royalties for novels, music, games, movies, television programs, paper comics, software, patents, non-fiction books and, let's face it, pretty much every webcomic not on WOWIO.

- Joel Fagin

[Datachasers]

Dude.. heres some advice - STOP EXPECTING MONEY!


if your doing this for money ( ie hireing your art , whatever ) then you are simply trying to be a comics company -
you are not big enough to compeate with marvel / DC whatever - YOU like most of us are lucky to see ONE red CENT!

so my point is this - if you are doing this for money STOP! just stop!
if you are doing it for fun and for itself then fine - ( slams on the brakes ) i could go on but i wont-
basicly stop the whineing and be glad you get anything ...

[Td501]

Right – expectation is everything. When you’re expecting one thing, but something else well beneath your expectations happens, you’re going to be frustrated and disappointed. That’s just how we’re wired.

So your reaction is completely understandable – you’re just preaching to the wrong crowd. Most of us have way different expectations.

[Drowemos]

Fair. I missed the bus. Wowio is not so good a deal now. I make more on my own that I would with the new rate. It just looked like one of those Ugandian lottery letter when I got it at the last minute like that. To my chagrin the lottery was real this time.

Joel your examples are not really being fair with your examples. With all your examples physical equipment and a major investment is required in development on behalf of the publisher. When you compare to digital formats Wowio does not really offer a great deal anymore. Compare to the rate on a project wonderful ad for example. Or to the rated of a for pay pdf publisher. Wowio is taking a much larger chunk of the profits now. All Wowio has is numbers so they can negotiate more lucrative advertising contracts.

[Drowemos]

Does anyone know why my last post was invisible?

[Datachasers]

Does anyone know why my last post was invisible?

wackyness with the board - set your "online status" to invisable that seems to be the temp fix -

[Datachasers]

Fair. I missed the bus. Wowio is not so good a deal now. I make more on my own that I would with the new rate. It just looked like one of those Ugandian lottery letter when I got it at the last minute like that. To my chagrin the lottery was real this time.

Joel your examples are not really being fair with your examples. With all your examples physical equipment and a major investment is required in development on behalf of the publisher. When you compare to digital formats Wowio does not really offer a great deal anymore. Compare to the rate on a project wonderful ad for example. Or to the rated of a for pay pdf publisher. Wowio is taking a much larger chunk of the profits now. All Wowio has is numbers so they can negotiate more lucrative advertising contracts.

again - i ask the question of why does it matter what they give or dont give -
99.99 of webcomics out there make nada - i repeat . nada - if someone makes 1.00 they are doing 1000% better than anyone else
and yeah you say you get heated over wowios actions - i feel the same way about this -

but the question remains - why. why does it matter .. did they do this to you spicificly ? no. do you need the cash from the comic to pay for rent ? food? your pet aliens exotic life support???
like TD501 said its all about expectation - yours seems pretty high - if i were you , and this is friendly advice - i would reset it back to zero - you will have far less stress and probably have more fun with it.

[Joel Fagin]

Joel your examples are not really being fair with your examples. With all your examples physical equipment and a major investment is required in development on behalf of the publisher. When you compare to digital formats Wowio does not really offer a great deal anymore. Compare to the rate on a project wonderful ad for example. Or to the rated of a for pay pdf publisher. Wowio is taking a much larger chunk of the profits now. All Wowio has is numbers so they can negotiate more lucrative advertising contracts.

That just makes it a win-win. We get more royalties than any other medium and WOWIO gets more too.

I don't think they're being greedy. Advertising models are always a bit dodgy - just ask Google. However, irresepctive of whether they're greedy or not, the point is that with WOWIO you are, in percentages, better off than any other creative industry. You are, also, getting money for something which is notoriously hard to make money with. By the standards of webcomics today you are, in fact, getting paid for a hobby.

I just find it hard to justifiably complain about.

- Joel Fagin

[Bustertheclown]

It's a higher percentage than royalties for novels, music, games, movies, television programs, paper comics, software, patents, non-fiction books and, let's face it, pretty much every webcomic not on WOWIO.

- Joel Fagin

Out of curiosity, what percentage, and where are you coming up with the comparative data to make that statement?

EDIT:

Dude.. heres some advice - STOP EXPECTING MONEY!

Please excuse me for being so blunt, but that's stupid advice.

[Joel Fagin]

It's a higher percentage than royalties for novels, music, games, movies, television programs, paper comics, software, patents, non-fiction books and, let's face it, pretty much every webcomic not on WOWIO.

Out of curiosity, what percentage, and where are you coming up with the comparative data to make that statement?

Some are guestimated, I admitt, but I know how much TV writers get (thanks to the strike), how much novel writers get (thanks to trying to be one), how much musicians get (thanks to them complaining about how much the labels don't give them from iTunes), paper comics (from a guest of honour speech by Neil Gaimen), patents (don't know where I got that from but I do know), non-fiction books (from a writer I know in my writing group) and... Nope. That's it. The rest are guesses based on the ones I do know. In fact, I doubt you get royalties for games at all. It's probably salaried or waged.

At any rate,* they're all less than twenty five cents per sale. Most are less than five. Some are less than one.

- Joel Fagin

* Pun unintended.

[Phact0rri]

Dude.. heres some advice - STOP EXPECTING MONEY!

Please excuse me for being so blunt, but that's stupid advice.

Quoted fore truths. where as one does the webcomics because they want to have fun, who doesn't want to make a little money on the side if they can? Its not everyone who can granted. But if you are entering an agreement to make money, for a distribution deal. Then why not expect some of that money back? Thats like anything recording an album, or writing a novel. if the company is making some cash from your work, and people are paying for your work... you deserve a little kick back.

[Drowemos]

Ok look. It's just got a contract with the lower rate sent to me earlier this week and frankly I felt like the biggest freaking idiot in the world for not taking the higher rate when offered. The higher rate could have doubled my income and allowed me to do some work on the comic I have been wanted to do. I contract my artists so more money mean more comics. Unlike other comics I desperately need a steady income to keep the comic afloat. With the Wowio money I could have gone to 2 pages a week now I can't.

It sucks and I was upset. I took out my anger on Wowio even though that was undeserved. I have had a lot of other things going on in my life as well that have been putting me on edge and making me more of a jerk than I normal am.

This has been my second "These people are evil" post this month. It unbecoming and immature. I am sorry that I have been doing this and I promise not to do it anymore. Sorry to take you guys on my emotional roller coaster.

If anyone needs me I will be sobbing softly to myself in the corner.

[Datachasers]

- Joel Fagin

EDIT:

Dude.. heres some advice - STOP EXPECTING MONEY!

Please excuse me for being so blunt, but that's stupid advice.

ok... aside from being totally blunt- i dont think it is bad advice - Note i didnt say all money is bad.. or that you cant make money -
my point is that to go into this expecting to make money is a bad bad thing - because you will be disappointed - ( example present and accounted for - ) Wowio didnt do anything wrong - they could just as well said ok we will distribute comics and pay you 1cent per download ... they didnt - they gave a whopping 50cents now to them lets look at what they do - they package digital data to be downloaded and they pay the artist in question a small amount because ( in this case once the product is finished there is no more "manufacturing cost" ) just bandwith and in some cases these small amounts can quickly add up to a LOT say if 100.000 people download a copy thats 50.000 bucks - BUT on the avarage most people are not going to download it because they have already saved it read it , whatever - so your more likly looking at 20.00 to 50.00 per month now if say a comic like Shlock mercenary or PVP did this - wowio would be out of a job because EVERYone likes them but it still would "start" small and it "might" but the best that can be hoped for ( to keep your self from going nuts ) is zero - that way anything looks good sorry if i was being *too* blunt -

7 years of debt collection will do that - i dont like sugar coating things -
again sorry if there were any hurt feelings -

[Rkolter]

Ok look. It's just got a contract with the lower rate sent to me earlier this week and frankly I felt like the biggest freaking idiot in the world for not taking the higher rate when offered. The higher rate could have doubled my income and allowed me to do some work on the comic I have been wanted to do. I contract my artists so more money mean more comics. Unlike other comics I desperately need a steady income to keep the comic afloat. With the Wowio money I could have gone to 2 pages a week now I can't.

It sucks and I was upset. I took out my anger on Wowio even though that was undeserved. I have had a lot of other things going on in my life as well that have been putting me on edge and making me more of a jerk than I normal am.

This has been my second "These people are evil" post this month. It unbecoming and immature. I am sorry that I have been doing this and I promise not to do it anymore. Sorry to take you guys on my emotional roller coaster.

I have to say that I'm impressed that you responded this way; I'd pretty much expected you to go the "I will defend myself to the death of all logic" route. That's how these kinds of threads always seem to go. Kudos, seriously.

Just keep in mind that you're still making a quarter a download, which is still a fairly nice piece of change, and that there will be other opportunities.

[Kisai]

Ok look. It's just got a contract with the lower rate sent to me earlier this week and frankly I felt like the biggest freaking idiot in the world for not taking the higher rate when offered. The higher rate could have doubled my income and allowed me to do some work on the comic I have been wanted to do. I contract my artists so more money mean more comics. Unlike other comics I desperately need a steady income to keep the comic afloat. With the Wowio money I could have gone to 2 pages a week now I can't.

It sucks and I was upset. I took out my anger on Wowio even though that was undeserved. I have had a lot of other things going on in my life as well that have been putting me on edge and making me more of a jerk than I normal am.

This has been my second "These people are evil" post this month. It unbecoming and immature. I am sorry that I have been doing this and I promise not to do it anymore. Sorry to take you guys on my emotional roller coaster.

I have to say that I'm impressed that you responded this way; I'd pretty much expected you to go the "I will defend myself to the death of all logic" route. That's how these kinds of threads always seem to go. Kudos, seriously.

Just keep in mind that you're still making a quarter a download, which is still a fairly nice piece of change, and that there will be other opportunities.

Just to chime in, since I (for whatever reason) have some propietary information on the subject.

- Intellectual property rights
Usually,as a publisher they are asking for exclusive rights to a certain distribution format. I have not seen the contract in question, and you can send it to me if you want a second opinion, but usually they ask that you do not sign up for other competing distribution formats. BIG companies are a bit heavier on the legalese and usually demand exclusive first rights.
- Costs changed
Did you know that you would make more money if it was in print? But colour comics are too damn expensive that nobody really wants to pay for it, and in order to make it affordable it has to be on low grade paper? Somewhere between 50 cents and 2 dollars a page. The Wowio format cuts out the printer and delivers directly (and unfortunately only in the US) So the only real costs Wowio has is bandwidth and some people time, their revenue is from advertisements. Just like CG.
(and in fact CG could start a Wowio-like business, but I can't say why.)
-- Did you know that you would probably make more money listing your comics as digital downloads on eBay and other auction/store sites? , again, I can't say why, but I can almost gaurantee that if the status quo remains the same, there will just be a lot of random people buying it for no reason.
- A contract is a contract
You usually are signing away all your rights if you choose to publish via someone else, this is no different than a band under EMI, a movie studio under Sony Pictures or any number of books. The author can have anywhere from no rights (your "work" becomes a work-for-hire) in the US, to most of the rights.

As that dude at the one convention I went to said, demand the stars and settle for the moon. If you don't like the contract, you are not being forced to sign it at gunpoint. You can always renegotiate a contract (except work-for-hire) in which you own a controlling interest. You can not renegotiate once you signed away those rights in perpetuity (work for hire.) Setup a 3 year contract, say you want X amont of money by Y date, else the contract is void. You can demand money up front, and/or residuals/royalties.

In the internet age, people are really fast to click through agreements without realizing what happens. Read the CG ToS, how many of you can remember what you agreed to? It's been changed slightly over time, but mostly to discourage copyright infringement.

This brings up an interesting point too.
You have a pretty comic, pretty sells. However how do you make your comic stand out when the publisher has dozens if not hundreds? I've read some of the other free comics that have stuff on Wowio and they are fairly pretty too. Have you tried finding a publisher or expanding your presence?

I do appreciate how mature, albeit a little on the blunt side everyone has been in this thread.

EDIT: * I do not work for Wowio, I do not represent comicgenesis or keenspot in this post*

[BradHeath]

I'm new here, but I just wanted to say, I've been tooning for over 20 years. I've done ad work for small papers, strip cartoons, even been an art director for one paper. All that didn't pay what you can get off wowio. I don't toon for the cash, but it's nice to get some now and again. When a friend of mine(KS Comics) offered to put me on wowio, I drew out a comic just for it. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.I didn't use anything that I would be in fear of losing. But now that I've dealt with them, and know several people who have books there, I'm thinking about doing a book of my old strips. If anyone is interested in my book, it's at:

http://www.wowio.com/users/product.asp?BookId=3557

It may be wowio isn't right for you. Either way, I wish you the best in all that you do. This business can be nerve racking at times. Just hang in there, and don't let it get you down. I know, sometimes it's just good to rave about it. Just ask my wife, she deals with my rants all the time.

Good luck to you.