I’m going to be short, sweet and blunt. Dirk Deppy called out a request.
…fangirls want female-friendly superhero comics, they’re going to have to prove that this time an audience is ready and willing to buy them, and to do that, one is basically going to have to be built from scratch.
Spiderman 1, Spiderman 2, Spiderman 3. I believe money talks, and that money says the world is ready for Spiderman. There’s your female fan base Dirk, right there in the cinema audience. Now pony the reason why they shouldn’t be given a quality product that meets their needs since they like the character, and paid the admission price to see the show.
But I’ll go one better, I’ll give you ten good reasons why comic books should ditch the whiny boy brat base and go mainstream
- Spider-Man (2002) ($806,700,000) [Marvel]
- Spider-Man 2 (2004) ($783,577,893) [Marvel]
- The Incredibles (2004) ($624,037,578)
- Men in Black (1997) ($587,200,000) [Marvel]
- Spider-Man 3 (2007) ($474,829,653) [Marvel]
- X-Men: The Last Stand (2006) ($455,260,014) [Marvel]
- 300 (2006) ($436,723,517) [Dark Horse]
- Batman (1989) ($413,200,000) [DC]
- X2 (2003) ($406,400,000) [Marvel]
- Superman Returns (2006) ($389,569,408) [DC]
Actually, make that USD $5,377,498,063 in cinema revenues worth of reasons for mainstreaming comics. After all…
So why the fuck are Marvel and DC bothering with the pathetic little bottom grazer market of male comic fans? They’re a small little perverted niche that smell bad and hang around tiny little shops that don’t like expanding their market. They whine, they hate new people coming in, and apparently, they buy comics and statues as sex aids.
That’s creepy. Really. Fucking. Creepy.
Dirk thinks that “pictures of nekkid chicks and post-coital lesbians sell comic books”. (BTW the word is naked. It’s not that hard to spell). Well, that’s lovely Dirk. How many post-coital lesbians can you spot in Hasbro‘s line up? In fact, Dirk, I have a challenge for you – go through the Top 100 IMDB films, and bring me the financial value of the naked women.
Maybe economic rationalisation is what we need – the industry might just wise up to the fact that the “traditional” comic book market shares suck when you compare them to the sales from movie licences. After all, there’s no moral argument to support servicing the fanboy market when you put the mass market dollar up against it.
The Spiderman movie franchise opened the door to the Spiderman franchise to a new range of minds, wallets and income. A new set of markets to pour financial support into the industry.
We should be out there welcoming these new arrivals. The people who saw the movie, and wanted more. Instead, newcomers to the Spiderman franchise, potential and would be comic book fans were treated to another round of cliched cheesecake crap when they were looking for the Mary Jane that was portrayed by Kirsten Dunst . The Mary Jane Watson of the $2,065,107,546 Spiderman movie money machine. Instead, they were met with Sideshow’s cheesecake and a bunch of male bloggers complaining. (Oh hai blogger boys, why don’t you just shut with ur whining? If you don’t like an internet with women with opinions, go make ur own BBS clubhouses.)
If this new market of wallets and minds was repelled at the doors by the gatekeeper cheesecake and misogyny, Marvel’s losing market share. So if we want to play economics here, Marvel’s best economic interests are not being served by Sideshow Collectibles if Sideshow is producing material out of touch with the movie going Marvel target audience. They could dump Sideshow Collectibles in heart beat and still afford to fund a new Hulk movie, Captain America, Iron Man, Fantastic Four and a Magento film.
Come to think of it, they are funding a bunch of new films for these markets. Great thing about cinema? Women and men go to the movies. Market shares for women are rather equal to market shares for males. Just imagine how much more money DC, Dark Horse and Marvel could make if they had female readership levels around cinema’s female viewerships? After all, we know that women watch comic book movies. Can’t be that hard to get them to read comic book movie stories.
Unless something was stopping them – gee, I wonder what that could be.
go home Sam, we want Guillermo del Toro (pan’s labyrinth) directing Spiderman 4
Oh, you’re so mean when you get all financial-fundamentals on their arses :)
Re: “nekkid”– I once heard an old Southern comedian say that “naked” meant you had no clothes on, while “nekkid” meant you had no clothes on and were up to something. Certainly seems to be what they’re getting at here…
I guess my point is that there are so many OTHER reasons to criticize what’s being said, without bashing a fairly common Americanism.
Can I get an “a-MEN!”, brother? :)
The problem is the Big Two publishers, Diamond Comics Distributors and Direct Trade stores have their own “Triangle Trade” thing going, which pretty much stifles any changes taking place outside their narrow purview. None of the three are really doing THAT well with comics financially, but they’re surviving, just, so long as none of them seriously rocks the boat. If one side does, they’re all terrified the boat will sink and they’ll all drown. Marvel’s, in particular, inability to create a viable alternative market to Direct Trade (unlike, say, DC’s Vertigo line which can publish original graphic novels for bookstores), makes them stick w/the appeasing the only audience they can still count on, aging fanboyz, rather than growing their core audience.
I know it sounds crazy given the quoted Marvel/DC movie and television numbers, but without the comics as their base, there’s no properties for either of them to license. And as has been pointed out elsewhere, the comics that sell well outside the DT are digest-sized and 64 -128 pages in length – like manga or ARCHIE Comics, which is incredibly still going strong! So rather than taking a risk and seriously reaching out (which would mean marketing outside DT as well as publishing for outside markets) to audiences like bookstores or supermarkets, they stick w/the tried and true.
If this sounds like a defense of the Big Two’s tactics, it’s not. As one of the writers on a superhero comic meant to appeal to women as well as men, I’ve suffered from the DT’s and our publisher’s inability, and unwillingness, to convince anybody not ALREADY a comics fan to give it a look. (One online columnist recently pointed out that the only visible marketing for WHITE TIGER comes from my co-writer Tamora Pierce’s website!) More than anybody, I’d love to see superhero comics readily available outside of Direct Trade stores, and not just b/c it’d have helped us, but b/c as superhero comics fans we’d like to them be relevant to the mainstream again, rather than marginalized.
Best,
Tim Liebe
Morag Owl
I just checked – google for “nekkid women” Results about 273,000 pages. Googling for naked women results in about 7,260,000.
If they use the right terms, maybe they can get what they want (soft core porn, apparently) from somewhere other than comics.
DS
Well thats all nice and good.
But heres the thing your missing.
As big as the Spiderman, Xmen, and other frnachises were. They haven’t led to an increase in comic sales.
Neither Did batman 89, etc.
And while there is no reasont he marketplace could not support female friendsly or gender neutral comics, it currently doesn’t.
Like it or not, cheescake does seel.
And while ther may be many potential fans out there who might buy a different type of title, they aren’t.
Unless and untill people begin buying the comcis you want to see, and not buying those you find offensive, nothing will change.
The fan base is what it is, and arguing that “it doesn’t have to be that way” is compeltly valueless. Many things in life dont have to be the way they are. But they still are.
So unless and untill women become a substansial part of the market, the companies will not change what they do. Wehter its right or worng is irrelvant.
Tim
I’ll spot you two A-men, a Hallelujah and a “TESTIFY BROTHER!”
DS
tig tog
If there’s one thing that my business side finds so incredibly frustrating is that there are huge numbers of people in markets that have to be accessible to the resources (why for the love of eris did we not have an itunes for comics when the PSP first released? It was a device practically screaming out to be converted into a digital comics platform. Sony even owned it, and they licence off Marvel all the time)
Rational
Quit agreeing with me here – there’s a massive market of women watching these movies and the industry isn’t making the conversion. These top selling films are not monogender male domains.
The fact the industry isn’t getting people across is a problem it should be meeting head on with open wallets and market research minds. Spiderman3 just trashed all known box office records. Captain America 25 made mainstream newspapers. What the hell is wrong the picture here? Comic books are nose diving.
Then we get the Mary Jane statue, and the response of the market that went into the damn cinema and bought into the Spiderman 3 franchise went “What the hell is this?” and were told to stop complaining and leave.
Spiderman 3, box office record breaker can’t convert people to comics? Comics have to be putting barriers up. Hasbro is raking the money in on the connection to the cinema advert, and the comics book sales aren’t working?
Cheesecake doesn’t sell. If it did, the top 10 money spinning movies of all time wouldn’t include boy wizards. Harry Potter is devastating any notion that cheescake is the money machine.
What the cheesecake is doing is blocking sales – if cheesecake was the sales success, there would be no Mary Jane statue story. As a barrier to bringing Spiderfans to the comics, it’s pretty bloody obvious to this marketer that the 900 statues were not worth the money. The money and the market support for superheros is there (hell, Heroes on NBC).
Oh, just one point. I teach social change marketing. “It doesn’t have to be that way” is valuable. After all, someone once said about death by drink driving “it doesn’t have to be that way”, and over time, death by road accident has declined while road usage has gone up. Change can and does happen when people step up and say “it doesn’t have to be this way”.
I’m not even going to argue right or wrong. I’m arguing greed. I’m arguing getting a cut of the market that watched Spiderman 3. There are fresh wallets, men and women who back this product at the cinema. Let’s get them into the market. If we have to put decent quality product on the table to do it, then let’s do it.
Cry profit, and let slip the dogs of market research. There’s market share in that there cinema audience.
Im not agreeing wiht you, far from it.
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The fact the industry isn’t getting people across is a problem it should be meeting head on with open wallets and market research minds. Spiderman3 just trashed all known box office records. Captain America 25 made mainstream newspapers. What the hell is wrong the picture here? Comic books are nose diving.
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People love the characters, they dont love comics. Nothing in other erntertainment has really had much of an impact on comics. Yes the original superman did, for a while biut thats the exception that proves the rule as it were.
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Then we get the Mary Jane statue, and the response of the market that went into the damn cinema and bought into the Spiderman 3 franchise went “What the hell is this?” and were told to stop complaining and leave
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I doubt 99% of the poeple who went to see the movie are even aware of it. It hasn’t arrived in stores now and a casual “just saw the movie figure ill check out the comic” fan is not going to even know about it.
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Spiderman 3, box office record breaker can’t convert people to comics? Comics have to be putting barriers up. Hasbro is raking the money in on the connection to the cinema advert, and the comics book sales aren’t working?
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The barriers are the direct market, not the content. People have to get to a LCS before the comic can put them off. that isn’t happening.
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Cheesecake doesn’t sell. If it did, the top 10 money spinning movies of all time wouldn’t include boy wizards. Harry Potter is devastating any notion that cheescake is the money machine
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Now thats just ignorant. Cheescake doesn’t sell?
I take it yourve never heard of american pie, porkys, skinimax, teen movies, slasher flicks etc.
No its not he best selling thing ever, it is however the most conistant. A good story may sell, it may not, but cheescake will always have a strong minimum audience.
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What the cheesecake is doing is blocking sales – if cheesecake was the sales success, there would be no Mary Jane statue story. As a barrier to bringing Spiderfans to the comics, it’s pretty bloody obvious to this marketer that the 900 statues were not worth the money. The money and the market support for superheros is there (hell, Heroes on NBC).
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really?
Explain All star batman and robin, BOP (which despite having a female writer had plenty of cheescake shots) danger girl, spidergirl, the ant, or any other mainstream comic title. Look at storm in Xmen, did they hire a average looking woman, or a gorgeous woman? What about jean grey?
You honestly think it wasnt a factor?
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Oh, just one point. I teach social change marketing. “It doesn’t have to be that way” is valuable. After all, someone once said about death by drink driving “it doesn’t have to be that way”, and over time, death by road accident has declined while road usage has gone up. Change can and does happen when people step up and say “it doesn’t have to be this way”.
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Social change marketing?
Oh dear god I dont even want to know.
Drunk driving was a cause that had a massive incentive for being reduced.
We knew there were people dying.
We do not know with any where near the same certainity that women will buy gender nuetral comics. IOf anything mass market entertainment seems to show that they don’t. or in the best cases that while some may, the entertainment then losses a fair share of its male audience. The diffrence is TV and movies are both mediums people can enjoy, as a result the loss of men from these types of portrayals is offset by the men accompanying women to a move they would never see on their own. The same dynamic doesnt hold true for comics. If you produce a comic version of “the bridges of madison county” you wont ge even close to the same percantage of men buying it as the movie did becasue they aren’t reading it wiht thier girlfriend or wife.
So while in movies or Tv a lessening of cheescake or inclusion of beefcake in order to draw in a female demographic works, it wouldnt work as well in comics becasue the loss of male readership would be substanisally higher.
> Im not agreeing wiht you, far from it.
On the contrary, you are in agreement in so many ways. You should stop denying your concurrence, it’s unmanly.
>People love the characters, they dont love comics.
Maybe the fact that when ordinary people come across comics, and voice criticism, they’re told to go away. I’d point the judgemental hand of wrath at the people who tried to dig in and wall their comic book kingdoms away from people who saw Spiderman3 and reacted negatively to the MJ statue
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>I doubt 99% of the poeple who went to see the movie are even aware of it.
We can only hope so. Otherwise we’re never getting those people to buy into the franchise.
>The barriers are the direct market, not the content. People have to get to a LCS before the comic can put them off. that isn’t happening.
So, let’s spin this one out wide. What do you see as the LCS/direct market barriers?
>Now thats just ignorant. Cheescake doesn’t sell?
Starbucks sells. Microsoft sells. Star Wars sells. Cheesecake FAILS by comparison.
>I take it yourve never heard of american pie,
It loses when it’s outsold 19 to 1 on the dollar it makes by non cheesecake films of the same year based on the US Box Office subtotal on IMDB
>No its not he best selling thing ever, it is however the most conistant.
>A good story may sell, it may not, but cheescake will always have a strong minimum audience.
Demonstrate that to me – Here’s the playing field – http://imdb.com/boxoffice/alltimegross?region=world-wide
Show me the money.
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What the cheesecake is doing is blocking sales – if cheesecake was the sales success, there would be no Mary Jane statue story. As a barrier to bringing
>really?
YA RLY
>Explain All star batman and robin,
Frank Miller and Jim Lee are peak sales draws in comics. The fact that the comics are falling in sales figures, and having to use variant covers (10 covers for one of the issues) is showing that the cheesecake is failing to hold.
> You honestly think it wasnt a factor?
Given the resounding history associated with both creator and artist, I’d say the primary driver for the Issue#1 sale was the collectible nature of the product. That could explain the 100K difference between Issue 1 and 2. Also, if they’re using variant covers as a technique, that’ll increase sales to the collector markets, and from memory, Frank Miller was producing custom covers. Again, a collector market technique to increase numbers.
In fact, show me the sales figures for the cheesecake comics (where cheesecake is the priority) compared to the other comics.
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>Drunk driving was a cause that had a massive incentive for being reduced.
>We knew there were people dying.
BZZT! Here’s the bad news chuckles. Drink Driving was a formerly masculine ability to handle your liquor and be man enough to drive home safe when you were wasted because you were a guy and you were hardcore. Your response indicates you have been successfully recoded to accept the non-masculine world view of alcohol impaired driving as a bad thing. So, the macho male view point of drink driving wasn’t immutable. Neither’s anything to do with the portrayal of females in comics.
All views are to some extent from entirely to mostly moderated by social pressure.
>The diffrence is TV and movies are both mediums people can enjoy, as a result the loss of men from these types of portrayals is offset by the men accompanying women to a move they would never see on their own.
So, the appropriate response is to not make the medium something people can enjoy? I told you we’re in agreement here Rels. Making the medium enjoyable to male and female readers is a fabulous plan, and I’m glad you can see that TV has paved the way for us.
>The same dynamic doesnt hold true for comics. If you produce a comic version of “the bridges of madison county” you wont ge even close to the same percantage of men buying it as the movie did becasue they aren’t reading it wiht thier girlfriend or wife.
Again, I wonder what it is about the comic that’s putting the barrier into place here. Why wouldn’t a guy be comfortable reading a comic with a female companion?
>So while in movies or Tv a lessening of cheescake or inclusion of beefcake in order to draw in a female demographic works, it wouldnt work as well in comics
>becasue the loss of male readership would be substanisally higher.
Demonstrate some support for that claim. I can show you that mainstreaming out the cheesecake sells 19 to 1 on the movie market figures. Show me that piling in the cheesecake moves units.
Wow, intentyional indiocy coupled with a complete inabillity to see your opwn points being invalidated by your own rebuttals. Ive rarely seen such a powerful copnfluence of stupidity. Congrats.
Lest start responding to your idiocy shall we?
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Maybe the fact that when ordinary people come across comics, and voice criticism, they’re told to go away. I’d point the judgemental hand of wrath at the people who tried to dig in and wall their comic book kingdoms away from people who saw Spiderman3 and reacted negatively to the MJ statue
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What “ordinary people” come across comics? Unles ytou know a comics fan, or are in a comic store, you will not “come across” comics. Maybe you might see some trades tucked away in a corner at Barnes and noble, maybe.
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So, let’s spin this one out wide. What do you see as the LCS/direct market barriers
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What you mean beyond the fact that you have to have enough interest in comics to actually go to a specially store in order to be exposed to them?
Beyond the fact that you have to be openminded enough to not assume thay are still meant for children, and to actually have an LCS in your area beofre the content can actully turn you away?
Not much.
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Starbucks sells. Microsoft sells. Star Wars sells. Cheesecake FAILS by comparison
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Wow, did you miss the short bus to school today?
Starbucks is an inanely invlaid comparison. They sell coffee, coffee is nto a form of visual entertainment. Neither is Microsoft. Star wars however, your only entertainment associated example had loads of cheesecake. And not just carrie fisher in a gold bikini. But hey never let tha fact that your acxtually rebutting your own arguments stop you. Im am getting way too much of a kick out of this.
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Demonstrate that to me – Here’s the playing field – http://imdb.com/boxoffice/alltimegross?region=world-wide
Show me the money.
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Again you completly missed an imprtant point. Movies, and TV are by and large “colelctive entertainment” meaning to those of you such as yourself who are cortically impaired, that it is a form of entertainment which can be enjoyed in a group.
Comics aren’t.
Why is this imprtant?
Well look at the top grossing film of all time on your linked list. “Titanic”
Titanic was without a doubt a “chick flick”.
However chicks were not thew only ones who wtched it, a large percentage of those who bought tickets were men.
This would seem to support your thesis, if your the type of person who doesnt think things through, you are Im not.
You see the men didn’t by and large go to see titanic becaus they wanted to, they went because thier mothers/girlfriends/wives/dates etc, wanted to see it.
Just as Action Movies which by and large appeal pirmarily to men, still draw women uninterested in the movie who attend wiht men who are.
This concept however is not applicable to comics.
WHy?
Becasue comics are an inherantly individual form of entertainment.
Lets assume for a moment a comic was published in which the portrayl of women was so enlightened that every female comic fan alive bought it. Would that correspond to an increase in male readership similar to that recived by ttianic?
No.
Because men and women even if dating and even if both comic fans, dont sit down and read the same comic at the same time. A woman cant “pull” or “drag” her man to read or buy the comic in the way she can when its a movie or tv show.
Even if she naggs him into reading it, chances are hes going to read her copy, and increase sales not a whit.
Now as to your second point that cheesecake doesnt sell. Lets look at the movies themselves.
Half of those listed in the top 100 are kids movies, which again demostrates the pull effect. Afterall children rarely see movies unaccmpanied.
Once you remove the kids movies, and those with a built in audience, such as The starwars sequels and the LOTR triology what are we left with?
2 categories.
chick flicks, and action movies.
Every one of whic proves my point.
Every single one of the action movies both contained, and advertised cheescake.
Every single one fo the “chick flicks” contained and marketed beefcake.
in fact numbers 123 6 &7 half of the top ten all conatined notbale cheese or beefcake.
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Frank Miller and Jim Lee are peak sales draws in comics. The fact that the comics are falling in sales figures, and having to use variant covers (10 covers for one of the issues) is showing that the cheesecake is failing to hold
Given the resounding history associated with both creator and artist, I’d say the primary driver for the Issue#1 sale was the collectible nature of the product. That could explain the 100K difference between Issue 1 and 2. Also, if they’re using variant covers as a technique, that’ll increase sales to the collector markets, and from memory, Frank Miller was producing custom covers. Again, a collector market technique to increase numbers.
In fact, show me the sales figures for the cheesecake comics (where cheesecake is the priority) compared to the other comics.
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Every comic experiences a drop off from number 1 to suggest otherwise is sheer duplicity. Number 2 contained copious amounts of cheescake,. yet the drop off in sales between number 2 and number 3 was minimal.
Comics where cheescake is the focus? There are none as you well know. at least none produced by mainstream comics companies (ie the big two) Comics where there are copious amounts of cheescake?
lets ee
JLA, JSA, Batman, Superman, WOnder WOman, etc etc etc.
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BZZT! Here’s the bad news chuckles. Drink Driving was a formerly masculine ability to handle your liquor and be man enough to drive home safe when you were wasted because you were a guy and you were hardcore. Your response indicates you have been successfully recoded to accept the non-masculine world view of alcohol impaired driving as a bad thing. So, the macho male view point of drink driving wasn’t immutable. Neither’s anything to do with the portrayal of females in comics.
All views are to some extent from entirely to mostly moderated by social pressure.
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Nice try mary sue.
Drunk driving was never a “masculiner trait” some men did attempt to justify it as such. But that was never more than a hollow attempot at justification which few if any took seriously. TYhe fact is the emphasis on DD rose and grew in line with the number of automobiles on the road. As more people got on the road, DD’s created more collateral damage until it became a important enough issue to tackle.
To claim that drunk driving is a “non masculine worldview” is one of the most ignorant, idiotic, undefensible and ironically sexist views I have ever seen expressed. Congrats not only are you not the sharpest knife in the drawer, you are a misandrist.
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So, the appropriate response is to not make the medium something people can enjoy? I told you we’re in agreement here Rels. Making the medium enjoyable to male and female readers is a fabulous plan, and I’m glad you can see that TV has paved the way for us.
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Well if men and women could enjoy comics toegether maybe.
Of course thats not possible in the same way as for TV, Radio, or Movies, which is why its also completly wrong.
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Again, I wonder what it is about the comic that’s putting the barrier into place here. Why wouldn’t a guy be comfortable reading a comic with a female companion?
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The same reason men and women dont sit down and read new york times best sellers at the same time.
Have you ever tried reading anything wiht someone else?
The only way which even comes close to working is reading to them. Which doesn’t work in a medium where the pictures are a huge part of the stoirytelling.
Lets make this easy for those of who you wore helmets to school.
At a movie, or at homoe watching tv, a man and a woman can sit side by side and enjoy a story together. The story unravels for them at the same pace, they see events at the same time, they hear dialogue spoken at the same time.
Now lets imagine the same two people reading a comic.
They read at different rates, admire thew pictures fdor different amounts of time, take different amounts of time to chew on story ideas, hear different “voices” for the characters in their heads.
In other words one is a shared ewxperience, one is a individual experience. Movies get a knock on effect from chickl flicks and kids movies becasue they are collective entertainemnt. WOmen take men to see them, children take thier parents to see them. Are comics a colelctive or idividual entertainment experience?
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Demonstrate some support for that claim. I can show you that mainstreaming out the cheesecake sells 19 to 1 on the movie market figures. Show me that piling in the cheesecake moves units.
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Just asking that question shows why “social change marketing” can not be considered marketing.
If you understood real marketing, you wouldn’t have to ask.
Firs of all you can demonstrate no such thing, since the two mediums and mroe imprtantly the experience of being entertained by them are not analogous.
Secoond of all as I have al;ready shown many of these movies you consider “cheescake free” had quite a bit of cheesecake.
Finally to look at the vast bulk of marketing done using cheescake, in america and elsewhere, and coclude that it doesnt move units can only be the result of willful ignorance.
Afterall its not like one of the most known and accurate of all marketing aphorism is “sex sells” or anything.
But I guess thats what happens when you study (snicker) “Social change Marketing” as opposed to, you know, real marketing.
Rational. Ha. Ha-ha. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
He calls himself rational! How funnier can you get?
rational, I just have to say, until you can produce *your* PhD in Marketing, I am going to spend the next little while laughing my fecking arse off.
morag owl
I take issue with the “nekkid” precisely because of the definitions you give. Saying “nekkid” rather than “naked” doesn’t exactly clarify what else the naked [whatever] is doing, it simply justifies the voyeur aspect of many of these pieces by saying it’s ok partly because “well, they’re up to something.” And excuses it the sentiment by making it all sound juvenile and harmless.
It bugs me because they don’t just say “pretty naked women!” – which I’d consider pretty damn harmless – they have to say “naughty naked girls!” which brings all kinds of nasty stuff into the mix.
Bullshit.
Since manga’s explosion, every single subsection within the overall graphic novels section in my BN has grown. We now have a GN section for kids as well as teens and our regular section is nearly twice as big now than it was a year ago. (btw, the kid’s GN section has no titles by DC or Marvel in it, yet the kid’s section is inundated with other publishers books making use of their characters.)
What mainstream bookstore still has only “some trades tucked away in a corner?” The only reason the GN section is still where it is is because it’s still a destination subject. Genre/subject placement in bookstores is determined by a combination of sales, how much effort people are willing to put into reaching that genre/subject, and the rate at which sales depends on browsers. If sales alone determined placement, fiction and kids would be at the front, not at the back and off to the side. Instead, it’s bargain, bestsellers, and business/travel/self-improvement because those have the highest browse to sales ratios and the lowest numbers of people willing to make an effort to find the section.
GN may be still in the back, but with the number of tables and displays we’ve had featuring GN of all kinds over the past year, it’s definitely shifting very much towards the role general fiction has. Hot items are placed at the front, but the regular stuff is at the back because people are willing to go to more of an effort to browse it than they are bargain or self-help books.
The real kicker, however, is that we’ve been getting and placing the new Dark Tower and Buffy comics in prominent positions – and they’ve been selling like crazy.
My actual point was that you can criticize this idea without actually insulting a region of the US (mine, to be precise, and the one my family have occupied for generations). I have spent the last two weeks trying in vain to give up this site for this very reason (and don’t give me the grammatical argument either; I proofread for a living, and even I can recognize a standard rhetorical/geographic usage rendered in print when I see one: as far as it goes, he even spelled “nekkid” right.
It’s very hard for me to be rational about this when I, and everyone around me as I sit here typing this, is being marked as a bit of a moron from the get-go.
Criticize the implications of the word if you like, but don’t take cheap shots.
And no, I didn’t proofread the above. I’m still pretty upset.
morag,
Being Australian, I wasn’t actually aware it was a regional expression, and everywhere I’ve heard/seen the word it’s carried a kind of ‘omgnaughty’ implication that I find discomfiting.
I’m not big on cheap shots on spelling and grammar myself, and I can’t speak for DS, but I suspect he was coming from a similar position.
Morag. Sorry. I didn’t know it was regional dialect.
Unfortunately, the dialect has been corrupted/coopted to be used as a means to downplay the seriousness of a complaint as a titillation/trivialization of the issue. It comes laden with the snickering behind the hands level of “hawt nekkid chix!” discussion, and generally used as a means to pre-emptively dismiss complaints.
That’s why I picked it in passing – because going “pictures of nekkid chicks” has been used as a derogatory way to describe naked women, since it has been used as a means to imply sexualised behaviour.
Hi just wanted to put my two cents in here. I’m a female gamer, I have been since I bribed my bother at age 12 with chocolate chip cookies to listen to his Champions and D&D games (when they came in boxes, which tells you how old I am). I play mmorpg games, and still get together with my friends and do table top gaming (though having a toddler trying to play with your dice and grab the buildings off the hex map make it more interesting). I used to collect comics back when I was in College but soon lost interest in all the crossovers. Then I found manga and fell in love. I’m a HUGE fan of manga but I’ve started to collect comics again. Things like Nodwick, PS 238, Girl Genius. I have recently been drawn back to Marvel and DC and was thinking of buying some of their comics and giving them a second chance. Now, however, forget it. I’m taking my money (and believe me I spend a LOT on books and comics) and Marvel and DC isn’t geting any of it. So here is a real life girl geek taking her money and spending it where I’m welcome.