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The Day The Comic Book Died

January 18, 2012 by 5 Comments

When I first was out raising money for Graphicly, I got to meet comic book publishers.

At each meeting, I asked the same question, “What do you think of digital?”

And each one answered the same.

“There are more people pirating my comic books than there are buying them. Perhaps as high as 5 to 10 times.”

The comic book industry, which saw its heyday in the 1990s, when highly successful books would sell in the hundreds of thousands, is now ecstatic if a book sells even fifty thousand.

Online piracy has absolutely decimated the industry.

How bad is it?

Comic books come out every Wednesday. By the time I wake up in California, I can already download most of the books that came out earlier that day on the East Coast.

Its not the big guys, Marvel and DC that get squeezed. It not even the little guys–although most will never see a publisher print their book–that are getting smashed, its the publishers in the middle like Image Comics and Archaia that are feeling the vast weight of piracy the most.

Piracy, on many levels, is helping to drive more market share to the top guys, Marvel and DC (both backed my billion dollar companies that aren’t as sensitive to the success of individual books or creative teams), and eliminating the necessary diversity required to ensure a healthy industry.

As Graphicly has grown, we have seen it time and time again. Small and mid-sized publishers struggling for consumer awareness and acceptance in a world dominated by Spiderman and Batman. As diversity dies, so does the ability for the industry to sustain growth.

Every once in awhile a great story like The Walking Dead will break out, but thats not the norm. Interestingly enough, I would say that the pressure piracy places on the mid-tier publisher has actually driven them to become more creative in order to rise out of the shadows of the big guys, but its not easy.

There is no other way to say it, but that piracy is probably the biggest single digital issue facing the comic book industry.

But SOPA and PIPA are not the saviors that “old media” companies hope it will be.

Giving the government carte blanche to censor sites and control the flow of information will cause more damage, deeper damage, long lasting damage to the industry that I have grown to love. The publishers and creators that Graphicly works to support will be hurt in ways that I personally, cannot be a part of.

There are better ways to end piracy. We can improve access. We can develop a platform that allows publishers and creators to be as creative with the distribution, pricing and promotion of their work as they are with the stories themselves. We can help fans discover great stories easily, simply — no more difficult than clicking on a link — removing the burden of surfacing great content.

We can help connect publishers and creators directly to their fans — and believe you me, pirates are some of the biggest fans in existence, as crazy as that might sound — so that those fans can show their support directly to the stories and creators they love.

On January 18, my blog will be censored. I personally am standing next to many of my friends, mentors and colleagues by doing this.

I have also decided to not blackout Graphicly.com.

I made this decision, because we have thousands of creators and publishers that are making real money distributing their stories in a “new media” style, that it would be wrong to deny that. And, more importantly, the access and discovery it provides to great stories are paramount in the fight against piracy, even if “old media” doesn’t understand it.

I am ardently apolitical, yet stopping SOPA and PIPA is exceedingly important, so important, that I have written about politics for the first time ever in the several years this blog has existed.

I want piracy to end.

I want all the story-tellers that should be discovered to be found. I want them to get paid, and I want their fans to get unending enjoyment out of supporting their work.

But, I won’t stand for censorship.

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I Hacked Focus

January 1, 2012 by 3 Comments

I only have 5 minutes to write this. But, I wanted to share something.

Focus is my enemy. We battle daily. Every time I think I’ve won, someone tells me that they wish I was better at being focused.

I hate Focus. Focus is for fools. I don’t understand its importance. I hate that its something I have trouble doing. Fuck focus in its stoopid head. I can’t write lists. GTD means nothing to me. I can’t use to-do lists, no matter how awesome they are designed.

But, I finally hacked focus. Ive won.

Here’s how I did it.

1) Using Merlin Mann’s (10+2)*5 hack (Figured if sprints could work in product development, then it can work in my battle with Focus.)

2) Downloaded Concentrate – set up some solid actions around: writing, email, and other fun and exciting activities. (Its funny that music is included in all of my activities)

3) Downloaded Howler Pro – and looped two timers (one for 10min and another for 5min) and run them

BOOM goes the Focus.

Now I challenge myself to do 10min sprints with high degrees of focus. Will I skip breaks? Probably if I get into something fun, but so far, the forced need to take 5 min has been awesome.

Hope it helps.

Oh, and check this article out on structured procrastination. When you have 5 min.

Filed Under: hacks, Micah ·

My Last Post

December 31, 2011 by 9 Comments

Im dead.

Well, not right now.

Right now, I am doing what I have done every day since I was ten years old. Im sitting in front of a computer banging on the keyboard.

When I was twelve I started participating and hosting BBSes. Standard story of the early 1980s Silicon Valley. I was never a hacker. With or without a Z. I certainly wasn’t 1337, although I did text 80085 a lot.

When I was interviewing at ServiceMagic, I sat down with Rodney Rice (who is still one of the most important mentors I have ever had).

“Why is the internet important?” Rodney challenged me. (If you know Rodney, there was no other way to describe Rodney’s style than one of a constant state of challenge.)

I spent a long pause thinking about it. I thought about my time on the BBSes. The times I sat in front of the Main Frame in my Dad’s office at Stanford. I thought about being the first non-computer science major to have an email address at UCDavis.

“The internet…” I stalled. I thought about how amazed I was using Netscape for the first time and the world it opened up for me.

“The internet facilitates communication and speed information sharing.”

“Exactly,” Rodney smiled. “Exactly.”

Im actually not even close to dead. At least I hope not.

The past year has been an enormous one. For the world things have changed. Really, actually changed.

It feels that we have reached the point where communication and information can’t move faster. They can be optimized and the processes for communicating and information sending and retrieval can be simplified.

And, more amazingly, the breaking down of the communication/information barrier has driven up the demand for transparency. Be transparent; Be real. Its a responsibility, not a right!

That transparency has changed the world. And continues to change it.

But that transparency has also brought to light something that has always existed by like communication and information has been accelerated. Depression.

This year, we had the death of a young entrepreneur. My friend Ben wrote about his thoughts of suicide. Conversations were had, posts written, tweets sent.

But, as the amount of information and communication shared grows, our attention spans decrease. Our mental capacity for data hasn’t grown with the speed of the internet.

Earlier today I read a post my friend Jeffrey wrote in 2008, about how living with a potentially deadly condition has shaped how he looks at life, and tonight I read a post by my friend Dustin. He remarked about how he read a post written by a woman who died from cancer. Her last post.

So I walked in from outside, sat down at my computer as I had done every day for the past 10,950, and decided I would write my last post.

Im not dying of cancer. To the best of my knowledge, I am not dying.

But I wish I would every day.

Well, thats a bit harsh.

I think about what would happen if I died every day. Not in a responsible, how would I handle my affairs sort of way, but in a pros/cons live vs. dying kinda way.

Im not sick. Im not mentally unwell. Ive done it since as long as I can remember. Some days, the positive/negatives are pretty close; other days one truly wins out.

One would think that with those thoughts I would have a clear idea or believe about what happens after death. I don’t. I just don’t know. But the uncertainty of it has never scared me.

I also know I have enough friends and loved ones that if it ever got too bad (it never has) that I would be okay. This post is certainly not a cry for help. I just haven’t said anything because I worried about that potential/current employees, investors, customers, etc might take it incorrectly as instability. Its not, in fact is the complete opposite.

Its my way of saying, “I understand. I get it. Im available.” Its not that life is tough, its that believing in yourself is.

This year I am focused on putting caring at the center of my core (yes, I know that your core is usually your center, so think of it as the center of your center. The deepness of your being). Caring for me; caring for others. I am not sure how I will exactly enact it, but Ill do it.

It will certainly include the setting aside of time; and more importantly reducing my focus on extraneous stimulus.

I am not dead.

And this is only my last post of 2011.

Filed Under: Micah ·
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