T Campbell's Blog

Forgot yesterday that we've started a new short piece at Penny and Aggie. We developed "Parent's Nightmare" for the travel-themed Keenspot Spotlight 2006 (you can see Aggie hitchhiking on Chris Daily's cover... I think that's cute).

WARNING: Next graf's link contains a bit of a spoiler.

As ever, I have no idea whether anyone will like this one or not, but it relates to an event that struck quite a chord with me, so I feel good for tryin' at least. Hope it works for you. Check it out.

There's a bit of sound and fury over the issue of Marvel and DC's jointly held trademark of the term "super hero." Boing Boing stewed over the little "TM" in a science museum exhibit featuring Marvel "super heroes." Scott Kurtz responded with this strip, in which Francis stands in for Boing Boing and Brent apparently stands in for Scott's own viewpoint.

Brent has some fair points. This is not a new issue. The trademark was issued in 1979 and it's had a direct impact on the comic-book marketplace as recently as 2004.

Brent is also correct that "stealing your language" (Cory Doctorow's term) is a bit of an exaggeration-- you can SAY "superhero," you can use the word in certain contexts, you just can't use it to market certain products: comic books first and foremost, but also cardboard stand-up figures, playing cards, paper iron-on transfers, erasers, pencil sharpeners, pencils, notebooks, stamp albums, and costumes. Thanks to lawyer Brian Cronin for this and other insights.

Cronin makes the best argument I can find for the trademark... the notion that if you surveyed a large group of people at random about "super heroes," they would most likely think of a property of Marvel or DC's. Trademarks exist to prevent "confusion in the marketplace," or the selling of an inferior product off the good name of an existing brand. In 1979 this made sense. Parents buying comics might not have known the essential difference between Spider-Man and Archie Comics' The Fly when buying comics for their kids.

Unfortunately, the rules of comic books and superherodom have changed dramatically since 1979. First of all, the mere existence of Image Comics and Dark Horse Comics means that if DC and Marvel hadn't already acquired this trademark, they almost certainly couldn't get it. Second, everybody and his grandmother recognizes by now that the real money is in licenses for TV and movies, which the trademark doesn't cover... nor does it cover webcomics, which have a way of turning into print comics at the darnedest times.

But the biggest argument against the continued existence of the trademark is contained in the last panel of the PvP strip. Francis unconsciously rattles off four trademarks that have essentially fallen into public use, despite a well-publicized effort by Xerox to protect its own. Naturally, Xerox and Google and Coke and Frigidaire are only going to get REALLY uptight about this if they see a "confusion in the marketplace" issue. Okay, fine. But as Neil Purcell, author of a self-described "superhero webcomic," points out:

"...that's apples and oranges. Xerox and Google are very specific brand names. 'Superhero' is not used in the same context."

In other words, there is a Coca-Cola Company and a Xerox Corporation, but there is no Superhero Publishers, Ltd. The term is not synonymous with either or both companies.

The notion of a jointly held trademark has some precedent but it's a woolly one regardless. The notion that a generic term can become specific under set circumstances is likewise woolly but likewise not entirely without precedent. The notion that "superhero comics" are somehow only a quality product when they're published by DC or Marvel is a charming little relic of the late seventies, and it wouldn't stand up to twenty minutes of cross-examination in a federal court. Today's comic-book readers usually buy their OWN comics, and they can pretty much tell the difference between Teen Titans and Invincible all by themselves.

The trademark is frontier justice, a reflection of the little microverse in which comic books existed for most of the last twenty years, but with the sea change in the bookstores and the theaters, I don't think it's sustainable. DC and Marvel would be wise to quietly renounce the trademark. Otherwise, sooner or later, Image or someone will challenge them on it-- and then we'll see some fireworks-- and then we'll see a wave of publicity for non-Marvel, non-DC superhero books. That can't be what Marvel or DC want.

Ever have one of those days where you know you have things to say but you can't quite get your thoughts together in time, and then it's suddenly time to go to work?

Yeah. That's me today.

Thoughts on the word "superhero" as well as Oxford to come soon, but first, I gotta hop on the bike and get to the office.

My laptop performance is a bit spotty, so I'll make this quick...

Fleen notes Sylvan Migdal's triumphant conclusion of Ascent on Graphic Smash, and asks when the new wave of Graphic Smash and Modern Tales contributors is due to come in. Answer: as soon as the code is ready. Eric and I are certainly champing at the bit.

Also, if you like working out, Scott Kenobi has an interesting riff on a quote from Penny and Aggie.

I'm still assimilating Oxford. More to come tomorrow.

Saw V for Vendetta yesterday, and now I really have to get to England in time for the bio-warf attack! Fascism and terrorism, here I come!

The book is better, but the film is still quite good, especially the short story at its center. It's SUPPOSED to be morally questionable.

Also had a nice chat with Charles G on a variety of issues, picked up a new digital camera, and ate a delicious last supper with the 'rents.

I've read Achewood before, but to my everlasting shame, I didn't really "get it" until recently. Going back and rediscovering it, in between life-altering decisions.

Only hours till I have to get to the airport now. The grand adventure begins.

Clickwheel faced a denial of service attack today (Friday), and came out okay. (Sniff) The little site is all growed up.

Also, one of the paid Clickwheel cartoonists asked when the next payday was. March 30, that's when!

Between these minor crises, spent a good chunk of the day talking with William about my arrival in Oxford and getting all my stuff into the new storage unit.

My fellow alumnus has gotten caught in a huge plagiarism scandal. I have a smidge of sympathy after my History of Webcomics cover blunder, but only a smidge... after Jason Blair, dude COULDN'T have POSSIBLY thought this was okay. And copying from Salon.com is just BEGGING to get caught.

People ask me what I think of the MegaTokyo DC Comics deal. Not much to think about as far as I can see. DC recognized its CMX line was stumbling badly and was looking for a magic bullet. For MegaTokyo, getting published with Dark Horse is good, but spearheading a major division of DC Comics is even better. And like Fred keeps saying, he's interested in life after MT, and DC's probably the best single publisher to ensure that sort of thing. It ain't rocket science. As one of my contacts (anonymous unless she wishes otherwise) says, the only thing that seems a little odd is how smart a move this is for DC. I don't know who approached Fred about the deal, but I wouldn't be surprised if whoever it was goes on to much bigger things.

Much to do tomorrow!

Today I'm driving up to Leesburg (quite a ways) to pack up what I can from my old storage unit, and toss the rest. I'll be away all day... call me if the Internet breaks.

"Done" in the sense of "I won't be working on this edition any more." There are a couple of formatting issues to sort out and I have to write the book-jacket description, but the manuscript is now officially out of my hands.

We'll see what you think.

"Onward through the fog," as my mother says.

...and have been since Friday, in between a bout of food poisoning, some nice Penny and Aggie kibbitzing with Greg, a little Sledge Hammer marathon with same, lots of online and phone time with my honey, preparations for Oxford, and, oh yes, wrestling with crippling self-doubt.

Part of me wants the book to be done forever so that I never ever ever have to deal with this again, and part of me wants it to be unpublished forever so that I can always imagine it will be perfect tomorrow. Usually I get through the self-doubt phase pretty soon and move on to the "just give it your best shot and see what happens" phase, but nothing about this project has been usual.

Rodney Caston got me a few notes which I integrated. That was surprisingly easy, all things considered. Lots of others have weighed in. A few notes I disagreed with and a few big ones I just can't act upon (and a couple are in direct conflict!), but all in all, I think we've got a better book here.

If it ever gets done.

I never tire of good reviews. I just don't.

Tickets reserved, place to live still uncertain. I'm gonna have to step that up.

So today I take the notes and the new interviews and assimilate 'em. Tomorrow it's final polish. Most of this doesn't look too hard, really. Of course, we'll see how much I'm drooling by midnight.

"Just because you're rude doesn't mean you're wrong... but just because you're rude doesn't mean you're NOT wrong."

Or in simple (symbol) terms, where "∩" means "set intersection:"

R ∩ W

I wonder if this is too geeky to become a meme.

Twenty-two-ish, actually, by the time this post was finished. That's the time before my official deadline to receive notes on the book from anyone (8 am EST tomorrow). I've gotten some news last evening which means that even if I didn't need to meet this deadline before, I'd really need to meet it now.

In the last 24 hours, some lengthy conversations with Eric Burns, Wednesday White and Amber Greenlee, all of whom have been EXTREMELY helpful. Conducted some additional interviews.

Also, a man who has always been very kind to me, whose identity I won't disclose unless he wants to claim credit, called me up to say, essentially, "You don't owe anyone any special consideration. Just write your book." Thanks, man. That's the plan.

Right now, I'm pretty much waiting to hear anything else, putting the finishing touches on Gaming Guardians: Systems Failure, and looking into a few days' crash space and a month's lodging.

I'm going to Oxford.

Clickwheel just happens to be in Oxford.

And that's really all I have to say about that, right now. More later.

A dear friend told me last night that she'd run into a couple of people who knew about me, but only from the Scott Kurtz essay. It does still kinda nag at me that, at least for a while, that essay will be the only thing certain people know about me. But I'm not gonna keep on correcting and correcting-- I expect longtime readers are ready to move on to more productive subjects, like them Knicks.

So I'm gonna use this space to get out my all-purpose response to Scott's essay. For longer last words, go to the Meanwhile Podcast 55. I don't plan to refer to it again after this, Murphy willing.

Scott's right that the "world-renowned web comics historian" thing was over the top. Antarctic defends it as hyperbole. I sent them different ad copy which they didn't use. You can pretty much tell it's not mine, because I don't spell my name with a period or "web comics" as two words.

I actually DIDN'T know the proper way to go about doing things when it came to cover permissions in this particular case. That was my call, not Antarctic's. Seemed simple to me-- I had permission to use the art on the interior, so why couldn't I commission a cover piece that represented it? Yeah, I was dumb. But when Scott alerted me to the problem, I fixed it promptly. Nobody's going on that cover who doesn't want to be, and the five characters you can see in Scott's image link haven't budged.

The "Horsemen" concept is going away anyway, so it's kind of a moot point now. Scott doesn't seem to understand it, but neither did most people who read the book, so it probably wasn't clear.

When it comes to who deserves more space than who, you can make arguments but ultimately it boils down to opinions. My opinion is that Scott McCloud had a great influence on the scene, even though he didn't travel in the same sphere as the most popular webcomics. Even the terminology we use to describe webcomics often comes from him.

Chris Crosby is covered pretty extensively in Chapter 4.

It wasn't my intent to marginalize Rodney Caston or to treat him unfairly. The quote Rodney complains about was on the Megatokyo site for more than a year before this, and I also read Caston's account of matters on his own blog and the early Megatokyo site. Since Caston and Gallgher were bound by an NDA about Megatokyo and since both they and others have spoken at length online, and since a number of interviews I had already conducted with other creators had been extremely unproductive, I elected not to interview them (which may have been an error)... but once I heard Caston's concerns, I sent him the relevant chapter for review. I should get his notes in the next couple days at this writing. He probably feels the squeaky wheel is getting the grease, but I also offered the manuscript to Scott Kurtz in order to request more specific corrections than "take this space from Scott McCloud and give it to Rodney." Scott declined.

Finally, when Scott talks about "the new webcomics cognoscenti crowd," I feel like we're at the real heart of his complaint. (Let's ignore that I've been writing comics since 1999.) All of the above is just ammunition-- really, it's the book itself that sets Scott's teeth on edge, and it'd set his teeth on edge no matter how it was done. I understand that to a degree. No one wants someone else to sum up their life for them, unless they can be sure it will be done in glowing terms. But if no one even tries to sum up the astonishingly rapid development of webcomics, if no one weighs one account against another and tries to dig out the facts, we're going to end up blundering around in the dark, making bad, uninformed choices. All of us-- creators and readers.

Although I like Scott's idea for a set of interviews, that's not a history, that's a bunch of people talking. Which is just a slightly more permanent version of what we have now.

Well, this was pretty wordy too. But it's this blog's last word.

Up next: the process of corrections!

To all whom it concerns:

I'm contacting a number of additional people to make as sure as I can that I have my facts straight for the upcoming book, The History of Webcomics. We're going to have to do e-mail interviews due to time constraints... I really need to gather any new material for this book by Saturday, 8 am EST. But feel free to expound upon the questions I send you, or send me additional suggestions.

ALSO, if you have a copy of the manuscript, I need to get any notes on it by Saturday, 8 am EST. Deadline looms.

Many thanks to anyone who types a syllable that may make this book better. I'm saving a spot in the acknowledgements for you... for what that's worth. :-)

I'm reliably informed that Clickwheel had a nice presentation at the Apple Store. I wasn't there, but those who were seem to feel it went pretty smoothly, except for a few minor glitches that, had *I* been there, I could have stood around and frowned knowingly at.

Man, that Apple Store facade looks like some wild parties go on in there, after hours.

My Web access was spotty for a few days there, hence the long gap in posts. Let's start with the least important things and work our way up...

From CBR:

AP Comics is publishing THE HISTORY OF WEBCOMICS. Sure, it's a relatively short history, but there are enough colorful characters and stories prospective comic artists can learn from that I don't think it's too soon. The thing that made me chuckle was the reference to the author, "world-renowned web comic historian T. Campbell." I'm not sure if the concept is overblown, or if having a historian for something less then a decade old is weird, or what. But it made me laugh.

I hope that in a while, I can look back on the "world-renowned" thing and laugh too. It's actually thirteen years old now, but that's why I wrote the book, so people find these things out. And hey, you spelled my name wrong. ;-)

No, this has nothing to do with my love life. I've left OhNoRobot, mostly because I could no longer figure out what I was contributing there in the first place. Ryan and I are parting on quite friendly terms. Full story and a statement from me here.

In other detentes, Jon Rosenberg and I have more or less mended fences. He's a man of principle, which I understand, and there were some misunderstandings between us, which I hope have been cleared up.

No word yet from Rodney, no further suggestions from Scott Kurtz, but the door's open there for as long as I'm revising, which'll be a little while longer. Assimilating feedback from others.

YOU MAY ALL RESUME YOUR LIVES NOW.

With the exception of one or two pieces of correspondence, I took Friday through mid-Tuesday off from webcomics and spent time with my sweetheart. Both of our lives are in flux right now, so it'll be some time before we can really be together, so we made the most of every moment. It was everything I could have hoped for. She's amazing. I love her, and she loves me.

You're not going to meet her for a while. Even if this weren't a, um, POLITICAL time for me, I'd still feel like blogging about each other is one of those Relationship Steps, somewhere between meeting the parents (Step #14) and taking out a mortgage together (Step #107). So some of my life will be more private than it used to be until we reach that step. Hope you understand.

All you need to know right now: I'm as happy as I've ever been.

So here's the thing. I was taught that a man admits when he's wrong and sometimes even when he might be wrong. Certainly if a specific wrong is called to my attention, I may be a bit confused, but I'll do what I can to set matters straight. Just because someone is rude to me doesn't mean they can't also be right, or partly right.

The only person I've really gotten upset with since this whole thing started is Jonathan Rosenberg, who seems to feel that I don't care about the quality of my own work. That's too much to take in stride-- you can call me a talentless mouth-breather, but don't tell me I don't care. I mean, unless you're by my side as I work at 3 in the morning, don't tell me I don't care.

I almost hate to link to my response, because I don't like losing my temper, but I stand by what I say there. This notion that writing any fool thing about webcomics is an easy path to fame and fortune, paved over the heads of hardworking cartoonists, is a pretty silly one. At least Jon's friend Jeff Rowland seems to get that.

Things like falling in love.

I'm not going to have too much free time between now and Wednesday, anyway.

I have a great many things to do before tomorrow morning, so I'm going to have to stop talking about this now. Last round.

1. I think that everyone involved is agreed on one point: that the history of webcomics should be done right. I have asked my publisher for a slight extension-- I will be finalizing the final draft at the end of next week. [UPDATE: At least that's the goal-- considering this book's complexity usually makes me blow deadlines, I may run over a bit.]

2. Once again I invite people to review and suggest revisions to the work, and this time I'll go further. If you are an established webcartoonist or blogger, want to suggest constructive changes and can promise me you will not redistribute the work, I'll send you a copy of the draft. If you already have a copy, go to work. Tell me what you think I've missed. And yes, Rodney, that means you, too. Scott, it's not too late. I cannot promise I will change things just because you say so, and we may disagree on how important something is, but it's very important to me to get the facts as right as possible. This offer's good until noon Wednesday EST. REVISED: This is the deadline to request the work-- the deadline to suggest changes is shifting; I'll update you privately. (Meantime, I'm already changing a few things that I know need correcting or updating.)

3. Some of Scott's readers seem a bit confused. I did ask permission to use all the artwork inside the History. The cover art is based on the work we had permission to use. I didn't realize I also had to ask additional permission to repurpose that work for the cover. That was my oversight, not Antarctic's, and one that I quickly corrected as soon as Scott made it clear to me. It was wrong for me to do it, and my intentions don't change the wrongness! But I think it's not quite the same as a remorseless punch to the face.

4. This book was hardly a get-rich-quick scheme. I've been working on this since 2003, first as a series of unpaid Comixpedia articles, then condensed as an unpaid essay in Steven Withrow's Webcomics, and then as a book. Antarctic did send me an advance, which just about covered rent for the three months I spent finishing it up. My percentage of the sales revenues for the book will be fair, but not huge. Until I see the sales figures, I can't say whether I'll have a profit margin. Word for word, nothing I have done has been more difficult than writing the History.

5. Scott says "I didn't feel it was needed to include Rodney" when I think he means "I didn't feel it was needed to include Rodney as a HORSEMAN." Bit of a difference there. Rodney is in the book.

6. If this is your first time here, I have done other stuff. See the homepage. Nothing as successful as PVP, but plenty of work of my own. I sort of wanted to be best known for Search Engine Funnies. We don't always get to plan these things.

Penny and Aggie in Italian. Molti ringraziamenti to Franco Bonalumi for his wonderful volunteer work.

It's funny. It bothers me that Scott Kurtz and Rodney Caston have a low opinion of the book (and that they apparently failed to read it thoroughly before coming to this conclusion). But Scott's recent post about it bothers me surprisingly little.

A few points of order. I invited Scott and a number of others to read my drafted manuscript and get back to me with comments or suggestions. Scott never replied, so I never sent him the manuscript. It's okay with me that he acquired it by other means-- I sort of expected it, really-- but he has had the opportunity to suggest specific changes.

I know that whatever "Seven Horsemen" (or four, six or eleven) I picked would end up controversial. Rodney Caston was indeed the co-creator of Megatokyo; you could even argue that he was the creator, since Fred only joined at his urging. I acknowledge the controversy between Caston's and Gallagher's Megatokyo and I know better than to think I can resolve it. But rightly or wrongly, Fred Gallagher has had far more influence on the webcomics world as a whole, and this becomes more true with every passing year. Jon Stewart wasn't the first host of The Daily Show and you may prefer Craig Kilborn or reflect that the show was actually created by Madeleine Smithberg and Lizz Winstead. But Stewart is the more influential.

The "world-reknowned webcomics historian" thing was definitely not my idea, and I would have laughed had anyone asked me before using it. I call myself a "historian" like I call myself a "writer," and I'll let others decide if I'm a good one. Blame Antarctic or PREVIEWS, I'm not sure.

Don't blame Antarctic for the cover thing, that was my screw-up, and I should have asked. Scott seems to mistake my stupidity for malice there, but that's his right. I'm GOING to make mistakes in this life, and all I can do is admit them and try to set them right. As it happened, everyone on the cover except Scott Kurtz got back to me that same morning and gave the okay, so we'll swap Scott's strip out with a volunteer's. My apologies.

The claim that Keenspot isn't mentioned in Chapter Three is true. It takes up a goodly part of Chapter Four, however.

Scott's suggestion for an approach to the book is an interesting one. This may surprise you all, but I would love to get some competition in chronicling the story of webcomics. I'd like to see The Webcartoonist Interviews by Scott Kurtz (or whoever, really) in a few years. Maybe it could use some of the controversy surrounding this book as a jumping-off point. And maybe its perspective can join the perspectives I researched and could lead to a better history, written by me or someone else. That would make me happy.

You know what else makes me happy?

She's flying in tomorrow.

Everything else is secondary.

Can't wait till the book comes out, then we'll *really* see some fireworks.

Rodney Caston doesn't like what he sees, or rather what he hasn't heard. My responses here and in the comments section of the previous post. Or, if you want the quick version...

I didn't interview Rodney. I didn't interview Fred Gallagher either. I wrote about a lot of people I didn't interview, or about topics I didn't interview people about.

I only did about 50 interviews for The History, in all. That sounds like a lot, but it goes fast and it pales next to the amount of reading research I did for the book.

I had reasons. I started distrusting the interview process after a while. When somebody's asking you to sum up five to ten years in comics for posterity the temptation to "spin" your answer has to be overwhelming. Some of my interview subjects seemed to resist the pull, but I still found myself preferring to consult the typed word, because:

a) there was no shortage of written words on ALMOST every topic that related to webcomics,
b) typed words were often composed in the past, not in the present about the past,
c) words in cyberspace could be contradicted by other interested parties or the general public and
d) if the words had been typed instead of spoken, there was a greater chance they were words the author stood by.

Yeah, okay, that version wasn't THAT quick. But it'll do.

My final revisions are this weekend and most of 'em are tomorrow. Last-minute notices are always appreciated.

See if you can find the error I made in this PREVIEWS ad.

Was it

a) Misspelling my own name? (There's no period in it.)
b) Miscapitalizing "internet?"
c) Misspelling my subject matter by calling the book The History of Webcomics but using the terms "web comics" and "web comic" to describe it?
d) Referring to myself as a "world-renowned historian?" (Scott Kurtz called BS on this to me and he's totally right. Generally, historians don't get that level of renown until they're dead, and they certainly don't get it from a baker's dozen articles on a decently popular niche website.)
e) Not covering all the IP bases?

If you said e), go to the head of the class. (The other four errors are the fault of whoever rewrote my original copy for the PREVIEWS ad.)

This is embarrassing. I generally acquired explicit permission for all the art I used in The History. I did, however, commission a few pieces, including the cover piece, that recast characters in a group setting. I meant this to serve a representational function and communicate that this was a story about personalities, not abstract pixelated panels or such. And I wanted to represent *some* of the personalities whom I felt played key roles.

So there were good reasons that had nothing to do with marketing. But I won't deny it certainly CROSSED MY MIND that showing two or four comics characters well-known to the comic-book-buying public might be good for sales.

A flip through Amazon's listings shows some precedent for this approach.

And all the artists represented on the cover design had given me artwork featuring their characters for publication.

Nevertheless, Scott feels that making this cover without asking additional permission from them was an ethical breach and after some deliberation, I've decided he's correct. Understand, this is an ethical issue and I'm agreeing with Scott. Don't flame him on my account or get into legal discussions of fair use. Scott is right.

I really don't want to lose that cover design (it looks way better, and gets the point across better, than my other ideas), so I'm asking permission now... if Gisele and I (or maybe someone else and I) turn in a revised cover it's gonna have to be really, really quick, so if I don't hear from these guys in the next couple days, it's gone.

If you're reading this and you know Fred Gallagher, Scott McCloud, Terry Colon, Mike Krahulik or Charley Parker, I'd appreciate your giving them a nudge. They're busy people.

UPDATE: I still should have asked, but all five artists promptly sent me back a note approving the use of their characters on the cover. What you see is pretty close to what you'll get!