Wiley Miller shakes his fist at EN Publishing!

[Acquana]

For a long time I've been a big fan of Wiley Miller's Non Sequitor in ways I've never been so lenient on a political cartoonist. It's just one of those things, if you get to the point as an artist where your art is there soley to metaphorically stand in front of your audience and tell them how to think, then I lose interest in what you have to say. Which is why I can say I love Alex Ross's technical work, but sometimes his storytelling is FAR too heavy-handed.

To get back to the topic at hand, Wiley Miller is letting the world know just what he thinks of those uppity online publishers. He's become near-infamous for his thinly veild stab at Scott Kurtz of PVP ... after all, imagine it! One of those bastard-children online comic artists offering to let newspapers run his strip for free! Making all of those syndicated corporate, content-castrated newspaper comic strips like Garfield look bad! Shame on you!

But he's also got a thing or two to say about online publishers. I mean, they don't get their books printed. My god! I didn't realize that those of us at RPG Now, EN Pusblishing, and all those who visit the e-publishing boards are just delusional! Oh! Duh!

It amazes me that someone can simply point down at the little people at laugh at their efforts to reach the top. You don't see Marvel or DC running stories about all the jerks at the Small Press Expo. Heck, Wizards of the Coast encourages d20 publishes.

But that is simply far too piddly for Mr. Miller. And quite frankly, I find the stupidity of his rationalizations to be absolutely astrounding.

 

[barsoomcore]

It's pretty uncool to bash anyone for trying, says I.

 

[barsoomcore]

Oh, and the strip's not funny, so far as I can tell.

 

[JoeGKushner]

I think you're reading too deeply into the whole comic. It's not like the character is selling the book as opposed to having a free download of material she's written.

 

[KaintheSeeker]

Okay some of the backstory to the whole farce has to do with Scott Kurtz's attempts to get into the newpaper funnys WITHOUT dealing with the sydication people. So, long story short after talking to one of them (forget which) which ended with the syndicated folks wanting ALL the rights to his comic (PvP Online) basically he came up with this offer.

He can provide literally YEARS of content, most of it acceptable to new paper standards for Free. Hey, it is like getting free advertising in his opinion. And to a large extent for folks like him, the dudes who run Penny Arcade and Sluggy Freelance, it would be. I mean they aren't hurting online.

Well for some reason Wiley seems to take this stance as Kurtz saying he can do it better because 'he has X number of hits a day on his site.' Don't know why.. don't really care. I find the 'Panda attack' a LOT funnier than I ever found Whiley's stuff.

 

[Umbran]

It amazes me that someone can simply point down at the little people at laugh at their efforts to reach the top. You don't see Marvel or DC running stories about all the jerks at the Small Press Expo. Heck, Wizards of the Coast encourages d20 publishes.

Assuming, for a moment, that "Scotty" does in fact refer to who you think it does...

It shouldn't amaze you at all - as the essay says, Coke never mentions Pepsi, and Marvel and DC don't run stories about the small presses. But they have marketing people who are well-paid to keep their image shiny. But the fact you never see it in print or ads does not mean the corporate execs don't think it. They are only human, and humans tend to be petty. Including us - looking down on Wiley for being human!

Wiley, not having the resources, didn't have someone watching his butt as well. Nothing amazing about it.