Did I Say Dishonest?

So, Dirk Deppey had the following to say regarding Brian Michael Bendis' call to hard comic book journalism:

As anyone who’s ever worked for The Comics Journal will tell you, practicing real journalism will get you blackballed in no time. Specifically: It will get you blackballed by Brian Michael Bendis’ employer in no time.

The response from Bendis? "Paranoia. another excuse."

Really? C'mon. Someone from Marvel's offices have called to threaten sites over bad reviews, let alone unflattering reporting. Rumors say a well-known weekly feature (in a Cup) switched sites in part because they got mad that a creator independently offered up info in an interview (that was run) that the publisher had supplied previously under terms of an embargo.

Thing is: I'm 99.99% certain Bendis knows enough about the stuff that goes on between Marvel & the sites that profit from covering Marvel to know that what Deppey says is NOT paranoia. So he's crossed over into flat out lying.

He could have left it alone, but insisted on addressing it with a false accusation of paranoia. It just gives further support to this being about Bendis wanting long form praise of his work and less instances of snark about it. The way to go about it is putting more of an effort into his work than it appears he currently is, not decrying the work ethic and integrity of everyone else and supporting it with bullshit.

Dishonest, Hypocritical Bendis: Addendum

Bendis is breaking his hand patting himself on the back for the reaction he's gotten from "thin-skinned" reviewers and journalists.

Here's an example:

The un-ironic way in which thin-skinned reviewers got mad at me for wondering why reviewers are so thin skinned is probably my favorite thing ever

So...in calling for less snark and more thoughtful reviews and hard journalism, he's made broad, uninformed generalizations and focusing most of his effort on jabbing insults at his targets. He gave so little time and effort in composing his thoughts on the matter that he's having to spend a lot of time...criticizing others for not seeming to comprehend what he said. He knew so little about what is actually out there that it wasn't long into his starting the "discussion" that he was presented with a laundry list of examples that satisfied exactly what, in theory, he was looking for (only in theory, because, as previously stated, he's largely looking for long-form, verbal fellatio from reviewers).

When even the creators supposedly calling for deeper stuff from comic book "journalists" are doing so through trading in the same snark that the readership seems to respond to (as evidenced by hits and their own snarky comments that hurt the po' widdle feewings of big time writers), can you seriously expect a productive discourse? Or respect the creator who is essentially saying we should get off the momma jokes because he just got off of yours?

(1. Yes, I know that continuing to talk about this in aggravated fashion feeds what amounts to trolling from him. 2. I know that isn't Bendis in the picture. 3. I like a lot of his work and actually like HIM whenever I see him speak about the medium at conventions, rather than his online antics. 4. I'm sure there are people who know me that have said they like me more when we hang out than they like my online antics.)

Bendis Is Being A Dishonest Hypocrite

So...Bendis is lamenting the lack of more in-depth reviews & real journalism covering comic books.

Bendis fails to see the irony present in his statements, and that is that he probably wants HIS comics to be reviewed and dissected like the work of Alan Moore. Which they clearly aren't. And it pains me to say that, because the last thing I want to do is compliment the work of Alan Moore, in light of all his recent moaning.

It's laughable to see Bendis and, on occasion, Quesada, plead for more journalism because they'll shut down and cut off any site that writes something that doesn't conform to their agenda. Just ask . . . anybody with a site.

The man is exactly the fragile ego/high profile creator that sites have to treat with kid gloves in order to maintain access to. Hell, if readers can leave scathing comments right under an interview with him on your site, he's that much less likely to consent to speak with you if he has a choice.

That's a huge part of the problem.

"Comics journalism", as is commercially viable, hinges on access to creators. When some of those bigger names (companies or individuals) are divas who will punish a whole site for how they allow readers to participate or maybe the opinion of a single contributor, exactly where do you expect "hard journalism" to appear? The sites that have the resources and contacts to throw at such an undertaking would be blacklisted before you blink an eye.

Hard hitting journalism would have examined some of the accusations about the workplace environment that Valerie D'Orazio's memoirs detail...or even some of the stuff the DC Comics Insider said. Sure, the insider made some claims you wouldn't want to reprint without corroboration (and some that you wouldn't run even then). But 99% of sites that cover comic books pretended it didn't exist, going so far as to delete message board threads that linked to the claims.

Hard hitting journalism would have gotten even the biggest sites shut off from DC Comics access. Quite honestly, it would probably have resulted in even Marvel shrinking away from the site, rather than feed the popularity of a site that is sure to focus the same attention on them when the time comes.

If even one blogger did that kind of "hard hitting journalism", it'd probably be the one and only major story they ever had. Most pros that work with the Big Two wouldn't be prone to interview with them for fear of it hurting their ability to get work. This isn't a big enough industry that you can count on another story within six months that could be culled from "confidential sources". This industry has secrets, but not enough really gripping ones to generate regular material from. Well, not that I'm aware of...and if I was aware of 'em, I guess they wouldn't be secrets.

As far as more in-depth reviews? Let's be honest: Bendis (nor most other creators) wants more detailed reviews that pick apart their work, just longer verbal fellatio (ala the Alan Moore treatment). Never mind that, as long as serialization is the norm, in-depth reviewing is going to be rare. Twenty-two pages can only be poured over so much and going back to review a six issue arc will lose out to reviewing new material nine times out of ten.

But, you know, let's blame the quality of people covering the material. Clearly, there aren't enough people with the quality of writing about the industry exactly the way Bendis wants and never the way he doesn't. Wouldn't we all be better off if that wasn't the case?

I wish there was more hard journalism in comic book coverage. But I can say that, because I'm not someone who would turn around and refuse to talk to a site because the company I work for doesn't like them anymore or because I don't like something they published. And if I was that sort of person, I wouldn't call for that coverage, pretending that I've never given shit to anyone over what has been written on their site (even by a reader in their comments section).

Why? Because, on this subject, at least, I'm not a dishonest hypocrite.

Since They Like Copy & Paste So Much...

Over on the Bendis Boards, Brian is apparently very happy with the regime change at Blog@Newsarama. Calls the old guard "self important whiners of the cut and paste", which I think is more than a little unfair.

One of his fans isn't as enthusiastically behind the new blogging gang:

I think the blog's off to a great start, but at the same time, those Best Shots reviewers who are part of the new crew kind of lower the bar when it comes to writing about comics. Those Best Shots reviews are generally poorly written, full of unsubstantiated opinions, and in need of a spellchecker.

Temporarily forgetting the fact that he did little to substantiate his own opinion of the Best Shots crew, I really find that particular complaint (unsubstantiated opinion) incredibly unlikely to have much basis in fact. I think too many people slough off the opinions of others as wrong or unfounded when they're just simply different.

I Feel Honored...

...to have the Jinx World regulars discussing my redacted spoilers rather than cursing my name on their boards.

Well...they could be cursing me somewhere over there, but since I didn't see it, I'll remain blissfully ignorant. ;)

For Those Waiting For Mr. Anonymous Info...

I had a crisis of conscience about revealing the new spoilers that I had been given. I had decided to hold off on direct spoilers, but it became moot because Mr. Anonymous had asked me to hold off on revealing them until he was ready and fairly certain there was no chance at things getting changed last second.

One of those things came out at the Retailer Summit today.

DARK REIGN

Our boy had this nugget and at least one more. That other one? I promised someone that I would only go so far as to run it with asterisks if my source gave me the go ahead to run it. But I can't control whether Mr. Anonymous goes to another source to have this info shared directly with the world.

Mr. A is still out there. I know be cause he popped by to link me to the retailer summit report on the 'Rama. So, if you're reading this, I can possibly tease that other spoiler for you, but not outright reveal it to teh interwebz. Which way you go on that, sir, is your choice...and I'll respect that choice whatever it may be. Do feel free to hit me with an IM every now and then to BS, regardless.

Oh...and to any of the Bendis Board posters who read the first batch way back and then ran to bash me over on 606studios.com, do tell Mr. Bendis that I apologize for any frustration that first batch caused him and hope that having held off on Dark Reign all this time demonstrates the sincerity of that apology.

So I've been listening the the Bendis Tapes...sue me.

SCHWAPP!!! Is Proud To Sponsor The Bendis Boards

So I started advertising on the Bendis Boards earlier today...

Update1: Well, my money is no good there. They've canceled my sponsoring of their site, but did it with humor this time. The current winning bid has alternative text that says, "go somewhere else why don'tcha?" Of course, it is paying considerably less than I was paying. C'est la vie.

Update2: HA. Apparently, whoever outbid my ad for no apparent reason is stalking my Project Wonderful ad buys. Right after the comment below about my money being welcome there, someone decided to outbid me with an ad that points to a YouTube video and alt text that says, "what was that again?" Oh...won't this be fun...

Update3: Out of respect for the man and his board that is giving me hours of entertainment with an ad-bidding war, might I suggest buying some of the best work from Brian Michael Bendis:

Personally, I highly recommend Torso and Fortune & Glory. I read Torso all in one sitting while flying to Barbados and F&G was a damn funny read.

Update 4: It is a little silly, at this point, that our mystery Bendis Board ad-bidder has followed me to three different sites to try to get rid of my advertising.

Final Update: It seems that my ad-stalker has had their fun and moved on. Could have had something to do with my backing off bids just enough for them to have the highest possible winning bid and didn't want to get stuck paying $60+/day just to keep me from advertising.

My sincerest apologies to our friends over Secret Society Wars for daily ad rates not staying up at their highest levels for just a little bit longer. It does seem that it just might have helped give a residual bump to your rates, though. And, hey, that ain't a bad thing.

Wait Just One Second Update: Genius is back with another animal flavored banner. The alt-text says "Still here." OK, now...anyone who wants to say no one cares is CLEARLY wrong. ;)

The Joke Isn't On Who They Think: My ad-sniping stalker's latest animal banner with a message says, "was it worth it?" Seeing as how this stalker's pockets don't seem deep enough to push on the more important and more expensive ads lately, I think the question should be pointed in their direction. They're failing to realize that many of their targets now aren't the ones with the best cost/click ratio, either. Which would be part of why I keep walking their bids up to the highest level and leaving them footing the bill.

David Mack Swiping Causes Mental Instability

Wow. Just Wow.

This guys says he was off his meds, leading him to decide to act like an anti-Mack troll in an effort to get Mack swiping threads locked so people wouldn't be able to keep going on about his recent swiping.

Apparently, my father was right: comic books do cause brain rot.

Ugh...One Last Time...

Just because I only found this item from Dan Slott that he added into one of my posts as he was working to get me banned from the Bendis Boards:

Edit (by Slott): Kevin's original post pointed out that before I was aware of ICV2.com's corrected estimates for January's sales, that I posted their earlier estimates on another message board. And, in that, he was correct.

I did NOT delete or edit Kevin's ORIGINAL post. What Kevin said was accurate. And I am NOT in the policy of removing a detractor's posts when they ARE accurate. I think that would be a cowardly form of censorship.

In later posts (which I DID delete) Kevin pointed to facts IN my favor. As these helped my cause, the ONLY downside to keeping them on my board was that they GAVE Kevin Huxford a voice ON my message board.

As someone who has watched Kevin hurl personal attacks against people I know and respect-- in one case, trying to hurt a friend's reputation in their union-- and in another case bringing up a woman's sexual history in order to win an internet argument-- I see NO reason for me to give such a person a voice on MY message board.

I won't debate the twists he's doing here, as they've been discussed ad infinitum on this blog already.

But since Dan loves to point to the smallest inconsistency as a lie when it comes to me, I'll point out one for him here.

He deleted a post of mine that, according to his definition, would have been cowardly for him to delete. It was in response to Tom Daylight saying the following:

Both estimates were wrong! Dan has the real numbers, and unless he elects to post them here, I don't think the discussion is particularly appropriate (or even relevant to anyone outside Marvel).

It was in my response to THAT post where I pointed out that Dan used the glitchy sales numbers on the Byrne board, so I believe he doesn't have any more accurate numbers than the rest of us. Kudos to Dan for remembering enough of it to put into his edit of a completely different post and all, but he did (by his definition) cowardly delete a post of mine that wasn't quite in agreement with him. ;)

By the way...it does call something into question: why don't professionals have accurate sales numbers provided to them by their publishers? Why do they have to rely on the same resources that fans on the internet do?