TWCL

[BKO_Monkey]

In my spare time (when I'm not drawing) I update my blog, Bible College Dropout. This week, I'm talking about The Oatmeal and other popular webcomics with relation to the venom they receive on the internet. It's not so much to do with the comments from regular people, but from other creators(in many case the popular ones)/bloggers who are out to prove how much they suck:

http://www.biblecollegedropout.com/?p=131

This doesn't just apply to popular comics, but all comics. As creators, I think we should stick to building each other up instead of tearing each other down. I know that sounds cliche, but maybe we should hold ourselves to a higher standard. Thoughts?

[rocketpig]

I'm all for calling it as you see it but I usually don't see the point in going after specific creators and/or comics most of the time. What, bash them because they're popular? Whatever.

The Oatmeal is an occasionally funny strip aimed at the lowest common denominator. It succeeds and does quite well for itself (both in number of fans and quality of strips) in that regard. So be it. Piling on the comic for not being the greatest thing ever sounds like a bunch of sour grapes to me.

Not everything is for everyone. Hey, I think comics like Dresden Codak are brilliantly drawn but overwrought messes with scripts that come off as pretentious and annoying. The comic isn't for me, so be it. I still check it out occasionally and appreciate it for what it IS, not what it ISN'T.
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[TBROtomo]

Yeah, I don't like ripping on indie creators. It's not fair when most of us have day jobs and are doing this out of love or as a hobby.
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A hero and villain in love. Updates Wednesdays.

[4LS]

Ooooo, difficult one.

Obviously, everyone should be allowed to have, and indeed state, their opinions about others work. The worst thing is when there's someone who you simply cannot complain about without getting lynched (though that happens frequently as well). But on the other hand, there are certainly people who it's 'okay to hate', and it gets bit wearing to hear yet another person listing exactly why they're crap.

The thing I find most obnoxious, is not when people say 'I don't think this comic is any good, because of x, y and z', but when they say 'you shouldn't like this comic'. The first is a review, and can be accepted or ignored llike any other review. The second is just a stupid statement. You can't order people to not like something. If thousands of people are flocking to read something, no amount of standing on the sidelines and screaming 'you're all idiots!' is going to change that.

But to be honest, I think the most important thing to remember is that this is not in any way a 'webcomics only' thing. Take a look at ... well ... the film industry, novels, and the art world, pretty much any other artistic group in fact - and compare the things that sell really, really well, and the things that critics and creators bitch about ... and you'll find the two lists match up pretty well.

This always happens. Everywhere. I think it's probably a combination of, yes, sour grapes and jealously ... but also the fact that these people actually do take [insert artistic thing] seriously, and are looking for something challanging and accomplished in said thing, rather than something that's an easy read because they're tired and they fancy a bit of light entertainment.
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[smbhax.com]

BKO_Monkey wrote:

Thoughts?

The end of the linked blog entry wrote:

But instead of bitching about it, maybe you should just say nothing and accept it for what it is? Just a thought.

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[Casual Notice]

Before I address the sentiment of your post/blog, I'm going to address the mechanics. This is not because I disliked it, I liked it very much indeed. It is because you could be better and you should be.

First, read everything you write out loud before posting, and have a dictionary available for spell checking (software spellcheckers actually increase the number of errors missed by editors). You had a few minor typos and one homophone error that would easily have been spotted had you simply taken a few second to read it through (the reason you read out loud is because that forces you to read the actual writing instead of just skimming).

Second, in blogs and other on-line opinion/non-fiction writing endeavors, it is expected practice that one link the first use of a reference (this can be compared to the use of footnotes in a paper article). In this case, links to Oatmeal, Cyanide and Happiness, and xkcd, as well as links to the bands you referred (particularly Nickelback), and possibly some of the reviews you were decrying, would have been appropriate. Always assume that your reader is not as hip, as smart, and as well-informed as you are, and you will generally do well in the sense of not losing anyone to specialized allusions.

I get your point: don't trash people just because they're popular. Fairly simple point and one everyone can agree with, even those you appear to be "calling out". As 4LS says, it happens in all the arts, and many of the people so doing often feel fully justified in their opinions because they feel that the artistic quality of the piece is undeserving of the popularity. In my experience, the harshest critics of "bubblegum" art are those artists who fail to rise above the mid-level of popularity or success despite obeying all of the "rules of the art" their college professors taught them. (For the record, I'd be more likely to compare xkcd to the Dead Kennedys than to Weezer.)

In music, you see a lot of people trashing the latest pop sensation (Nickelback, an adaptive and versatile band that produces music in every genre that suits the lead singer's voice, is an exception) because they're empty pap. Katy Perry takes a lot of undeserved heat because her songs are most often uplifting and bear an enjoyable, danceable beat (a lot of her critics forget the loss-filled ballad "Thinking of You" for some reason). They can show no valid reason for their criticisms other than that she's upbeat and seems to enjoy life (also she's pretty, which is a crime in the art world, where pretty people are objects to be staged and utilized by their smart-but-plain betters).

Anyway, it can be agravating, but it's not going to stop.
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What I lack in sincerity, I make up for in sarcasm.
S*P*Q*R

[munkymu]

smbhax.com wrote:

BKO_Monkey wrote: Thoughts? The end of the linked blog entry wrote: But instead of bitching about it, maybe you should just say nothing and accept it for what it is? Just a thought.

Yes, this is a bit hypocritical innit? If you really believed in your own advice you'd never have written your post.
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[BKO_Monkey]

munkymu wrote:

smbhax.com wrote: BKO_Monkey wrote: Thoughts? The end of the linked blog entry wrote: But instead of bitching about it, maybe you should just say nothing and accept it for what it is? Just a thought. Yes, this is a bit hypocritical innit? If you really believed in your own advice you'd never have written your post.

Lol, I think both of you (smbhax and munkymu) are missing the point. I'm commenting on those within webcomics that bitch about webcomics simply because they're popular or they don't like/understand them. I'm saying maybe we should avoid this practice as fellow cartoonists and accept those comics for what they are. If you want to get meta, I'm bitching about the bitching :p. But it's for the purpose of thinking about what we say about each other and it's not meant to tear anyone down. So no, I don't think it's hypocritical :p


Casual Notice, thanks for the advice, I'll keep that in mind. I admit to being an artist first and a writer somewhere down around 20th, but I'm working on it . What's a homophone?

Casual Notice wrote:

Anyway, it can be aggravating, but it's not going to stop.

I'm not saying it will stop, I'm just saying maybe we should be better when it comes to dealing with other creators.

Hmmmmm, xkcd as the Dead Kennedys, I hadn't thought about it like that. I spent a morning going back and forth with a friend over all the different parallels you can draw between comics and bands. We're still trying to figure out which one is Madonna...

[LukeSurl]

I'll consider the question "Should one publish/post negative reviews of webcomics?"

The world of webcomics criticism is pretty sparse to be honest - creators will generally tell each other they're wonderful (a pretty common trait in any artistic field, levels of sincerity vary on a case-by-case basis), and you can follow trails of recommendation across the internet. What you are less likely to find are creators criticising each other. This may be because people have asked themselves the above question and come to the conclusion "no", but a significant contributing factor is probably that its a fairly small community and you don't want to look like a jerk. "External" reviewers (I'm mainly thinking blogs) are fairly rare as far as I know.

In one sense, negative reviews aren't necessary. Unlike, for example, film, one does not need to make a time or money commitment prior to reading a webcomic. If it's not for you, you can probably discover that quicker by reading it directly than by reading someone else's opinion. A review that tells me a comic I wouldn't have come across normally is worth checking out is useful; if it tells me it is poor, then what's the point?

For the purpose of creators acquiring advice on how to improve their comic (i.e. someone pointing out the flaws) there isn't much need for this to be done in public, as the advice is just for the creator. It's also probably best done only when solicited. If egos are fragile then things can get ugly here.

However there are some arguments for the prosecution. Mostly this applies to reviews of well-known comics.

• Occasionally webcomics can produce content that is (almost always debatably) odious. It's worth calling people out on those, or at least having some form of discussion. The most prominent example of this I can think of is allegations of sexism in Least I Could Do called out at least once by Kate Beaton.
  
• Reviews can be interesting to read! I listen to a film review podcast far more often than I watch films because I enjoy the clever deconstruction and thought-provoking examination of the subject matter. If webcomic reviews are well-thought out, informed, and free or personal attacks or other nastiness then one cannot restrict the ones which aren't 100% positive else its not going to be so entertaining.
  
• In many artistic fields critical success and a popular success are not necessarily mutually inclusive. Do we want there to be such a distinction in webcomics? If hits and dollars are the only yardstick we measure things by then The Oatmeal is a paradigm of virtue and we should encourage young artists to create comics in a similar fashion. Personally (and all such views are inherently subjective) I don't really want this to be the shape of webcomics to come. Now the discussion of what is good and bad in webcomics can be done just with positive comments (measuring the quantity and sources of these recommendations), but is it a good idea to have the other half of the discussion, for people to be able to talk about which popular successes they believe are not (in their opinions) so strong?

Webcomics are a young field, and webcomics criticism is very much in its infancy. I think it's useful that we, as a community, have this discussion and ask what we want webcomics criticism to be.
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[Casual Notice]

Homophones are words that sound the same regardless of spelling or meaning (i.e. to, two, too). They're often confused (even, tragically, by teachers) with homonyms (words that are spelled the same regardless of pronunciation or meaning--wind, wind).

Madonna = Cute Wendy (innovative and a little sexy, but not very much of either when exposed to scrutiny).
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What I lack in sincerity, I make up for in sarcasm.
S*P*Q*R

[Clint Wolf]

LukeSurl wrote:

In one sense, negative reviews aren't necessary. Unlike, for example, film, one does not need to make a time or money commitment prior to reading a webcomic. If it's not for you, you can probably discover that quicker by reading it directly than by reading someone else's opinion. A review that tells me a comic I wouldn't have come across normally is worth checking out is useful; if it tells me it is poor, then what's the point?

I know I had some thoughts about this topic a few months back where I was pondering if webcomics needed "pro" or at least semi-pro critics willing to do reviews before it would reach the next stage of maturity as an art form. Casual Notice had some very good counterpoints to that, but your paragraph here may be the most important thing to consider.

How would these theoretical critics be spending their time? Do we really need another xkcdsucks, where the idea isn't to draw attention to something worthy, but just tear down something you personally don't find worthy of your (or anyone else's attention)?

Considering the contrast to film, yes, there's more webcomics out there flopping in the stream than anyone could possibly hope to catch. Why focus on the big ones everyone's already aware of and scream "DON'T LOOK!", which given human nature likely just means even more people look at what you're carrying on about? Why not instead spend your time pointing out those offerings you think are being neglected and seeing if you can raise awareness of them?

I think that's what I could imagine as a worthy mode of webcomic criticism. Perhaps it doesn't actually fit the definition of criticism so much as "recommendations", but if you're being thoughtful in telling your readers *why* you feel a given comic is worthy of a look, that's getting into the mode of critique, isn't it?

At a webcomics panel I attended this year, it was opened up to the audience to stand up and promote a webcomic they liked. I clearly remember one guy who recommended his friend's comic, and when asked what it was about, he quite literally said this:

"It's like Penny Arcade, but it's actually funny."

I thought that was a particularly useless, not to mention mean-spirited statement. If your comic's only identity can be boiled down to "It's just like this other really popular comic, only it doesn't suck!", you've got problems, and Penny Arcade/xkcd/etc. aren't to blame for them.
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[Fat Bunny]

It's rough because I feel like there is a lot of value in having 'critics'....but much like the internet makes it possible for everybody to think they are qualified to write their own comics (or blogs or slasher fanfics or whatever), it also opens us up to a world of people who all think they're qualified to voice their criticisms, whether or not they're worthwhile. It's not specific to comics -- most blogs I've read for music or movie reviews are just atrocious.


------
Love,
http://www.theFatBunny.com

[Casual Notice]

Hehehe...Slasher Fanfics...

Slasher Fanfic wrote:

Jacob was restless as he sat in the basement office of Professor Snape. He was new to this English School of Hogwarts, an exchange student from his All-American home town.... Snape touched his nose lightly. "You are a good puppy, aren't you?" the smokily dark man murmured. Suddenly, his eyes flew wide and a thin red line appeared at his throat and widened quickly. Jacob watched in horror as his favorite teacher's head slowly slid off his neck and onto the floor. The tall, thin body slumped against the wall and slid down, slowly. Jacob's doey brown eyes glanced everywhere, seeking the source of the attack...

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What I lack in sincerity, I make up for in sarcasm.
S*P*Q*R

[munkymu]

BKO_Monkey wrote:

I'm saying maybe we should avoid this practice as fellow cartoonists and accept those comics for what they are. If you want to get meta, I'm bitching about the bitching :p.

I think that really you're doing the same thing that the people you are complaining about are doing -- telling people what not to do. Your motives may be better but the way you go about it still smacks of hypocrisy.

Having re-read your post I think that it's less bad than I first thought from the opinion standpoint, but that's because it's so content-free and empty that you might as well not have written it. You could have said much the same thing in a couple of sentences: "We are professionals, fellow comic creators. Let's act like professionals and not be dicks to other bigger professionals like The Oatmeal and xkcd." And then you could have used those other eight pagaraphs to write something interesting like "What are the consequences of being a dick? Let's ask a dick and find out!" or "What does it mean to be a professional and why should the average hobbyist comic creator care?" or even "Are there any legitimate reasons for disliking The Oatmeal and xkcd?" But you didn't. You stopped just short of the meaty bits so all we get is a big of soggy crust and a desire to send you a dictionary.

Clint Wolf wrote:

At a webcomics panel I attended this year, it was opened up to the audience to stand up and promote a webcomic they liked. I clearly remember one guy who recommended his friend's comic, and when asked what it was about, he quite literally said this: "It's like Penny Arcade, but it's actually funny." I thought that was a particularly useless, not to mention mean-spirited statement. If your comic's only identity can be boiled down to "It's just like this other really popular comic, only it doesn't suck!", you've got problems, and Penny Arcade/xkcd/etc. aren't to blame for them.

Actually I think that this is great. It's exactly why I think that people should be free to give their opinions. We now have a really good idea of what kind of people these comic guys are. They put it out there and now they're going to have to live up to that to all the frothing Penny Arcade fans who go to their site (who, by the way, don't mind assholes in the least). If they don't those fans will rip them a new one. It's the perfect example of giving your opinion and then having to take the consequences. Also, with one comment they have managed to drive away all the people who likely wouldn't enjoy their work. I like it.
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[Clint Wolf]

munkymu wrote:

Actually I think that this is great. It's exactly why I think that people should be free to give their opinions. We now have a really good idea of what kind of people these comic guys are. They put it out there and now they're going to have to live up to that to all the frothing Penny Arcade fans who go to their site (who, by the way, don't mind assholes in the least). If they don't those fans will rip them a new one. It's the perfect example of giving your opinion and then having to take the consequences. Also, with one comment they have managed to drive away all the people who likely wouldn't enjoy their work. I like it.

So all right, I'll retract my opinion of the statement as being useless. However, although I remember the statement clearly, I can't for the life of me remember what the comic was.

Can anyone help me find it? You see, it's like Penny Arcade... that's a short list, right?
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