Updated: MARVEL TO LAUNCH ONLINE COMICS INITIATIVE

[MattBrady]

UPDATED: 10:30pm EST Monday, November 12th: In a story published at USA Today.com Monday evening, the apparently official word of Marvel’s new online publishing initiative has been revealed.

Called the comic book industry’s “first online archive of more than 2,500 back issues, including the first appearances of Spider-Man, the X-Men and the Incredible Hulk.”, Marvel Digital Comics Unlimited will offer the archive in a high-resolution format on computer screens for $59.88 a year, or at a monthly rate of $9.99, at Marvel’s website...

Click here for the fully story...

[dairydead]

interesting. I know there is a lot more to say about this, but at the time, i dont quite know.

[Nobody]

Seems pricey for not being able to download them.

[Marvel Man]

I like it!

[Scarlet Mage]

Originally Posted by MattBrady

The article quotes Marvel's Buckley as saying, "You don't have that spinner rack of comic books sitting in the local five-and-dime any more. We don't have our product intersecting kids in their lifestyle space as much as we used to."


The story quotes store owner Michael Ring of Portland, OR who called Marvel's plan a "feeder system" noting that the plan will give people the "initial taste" of Marvel Comics and make them want to buy more.

It'll be interesting to see if this works. I discoverd comics way back when by them intersecting my lifestyle space (even if that does sound as tho' it hurts) and I've wondered from time to time where the next gen of reader will come from.

[Batbob71]

That much & no downloads? I'll pass. It's probably just a rehashing of what GitCorp has released of their so far anyway.

[RDuarte]

Originally Posted by Nobody

Seems pricey for not being able to download them.

Doesn't the current Napster use the same kind of system? Pay 10 bucks a month, download and listen to as many songs as you want, but when you cancel your subscription with them, the songs will no longer play. It's not unheard of...

[FlipNite]

Hey, no love? I posted this a few hours ago in the Talk section! The AP story was supposed to be embargoed until 12:01 AM. Oops!

[LungerTony]

This is pretty cool.
I don't find the price too high, and honestly I might even subscribe to it for a month once [if] I get some free time.

[Edogawa1983]

I think they do that so people just don't download everything and cancel in a month.
you know people are gonna do that.

[jonjesper]

No interest, as Marvel will eventually try and take monthly titles over to online sales only, cutting out the middle man (your local comic shop). We all know it is coming...

[jaredgood1]

Nifty, but I buy comics, I don't rent them.

[JimShelley]

Originally Posted by Nobody

Seems pricey for not being able to download them.

Still missing the point on the whole *People like to own things* concept aren't they?

I just don't get why they (or DC) can't make their comics available for download to offset some of the theoretical loss of profit they might be suffering from the comic downloaders?

Here's a stat for you, since July over 250,000 people have downloaded the UK version of the transformers series

How many of those 250,000 would have been happy to pay for the series to legally download it? iTunes suggests the market for legal downloads is extremely viable. Why can't the big two comic companies realize this.

- Jim

[ichorskeeter]

Wayyyy too pricey if the object here is to attract "kiddies". Free or bust.

[Darth Tigris]

I have no problem at all not being able to download them. None.

My problem is that this is all old stuff. Do this with current comics being available and I'll pay DOUBLE.

[ArchonComics]

Sounds interesting. I'm curious if other publishers will follow suit ... or wait to see if Marvel is successful first.

[DrunkJack]

Uhm...no downloads? How, exactly, is this different from the free ones they were giving away a while back? I better not have to deal with ads.

If I can't take it off line, I don't pay. I don't pay for streaming audio, why would I pay for streaming comics? I don't pay for radio, either.

Besides, flash and I don't get along.

I would pay for downloads subscription or per issue, even in a proprietary DRM'd format I don't plan on printing these things, I don't need them to be fully accessible JPGs.

But I want to be able to read offline. I want to be able to organize and backup my purchases.

I currently subscribe to Emusic.com. Legal DRM free MP3 downloads. I can even redownload my downloads if I somehow lose them(though, once a label leaves so do the redownloads of their albums, but a number have gone and come back). I would gladly do this with comics. I would love to. I don't need any more pamphlets.

That said, I might do this, if the $4.99 subscription is worth it, I might. I need details.

BUT, I would like some incentive, a TPB a quarter or a year or something, pick one and get it as part of your subscription. Give me something I can lay claim to.

[0bsessions]

I'm sorry, but it seems like people are outright looking for a reason to nitpick at this point. Five bucks a month for unlimited access. Who the Hell cares if you can't download them? More space available on your hard drive.

Let's put it in perspective.

A single issue of a comic nowadays costs $2.99 at about minimum. Only two dollars less than you'd pay a month for a year of this service.

Average high speed internet costs around $50 a month. Only ten dollars less than this service would cost you for a full year.

Your average MMO runs $15 a month, three times what this costs a month.

An Xbox Live account costs about the same amount of money a year for nothing more than the ability to play video games against your friends.

A single paperback book costs around $7 or $8 pre-tax. Two full dollars more than a month of this service.

NetFlix costs $5 a month, but you can only have one movie at a time and you have to wait between shipping times which is generally a full day.

Can someone who is not stingy and/or looking for a reason to nitpick tell me how this isn't both a step in the right direction AND a great deal? The general complaint I'm seeing is that you can't download them directly to your computer. Why would you REALLY need to? If they're building up an entire database, it's not particularly relevant as you can simply go back and read it on their database at any time.

At that price and with that sizable of a selection, I don't see how it would be justifiable or even fair to Marvel for them to allow people to permanently download them. Someone could pay their $10 for a single month and then just legally download every issue in the archive getting all of $0.004 an issue. $60 annually, folks. That is the price of about three TPBs. Even if you don't go annually, it's the price of about three comics a month. As it stands, if most of Newsarama's users are any indication, 80% of internet using comic book fans hate everything that's been released since 1988 anyway, so it's a win/win.

I say kudos to Marvel. If this is even half of what it sounds like, this is almost exactly what I said was my best case scenario in terms of what Marvel could do with an online archive (Though in my "best case," I was envisioning more along the lines of $15 to $20 a month. I'll try to remember to cry about it later). This is the kind of thing that could both stem piracy and bring in new readers hand over fist. Just imagine you go buy Spider-Man 3 on DVD and inside is a coupon for a free month of the service. If even 1% of the people who purchase said DVD get hooked on the service, that's a Hell of an addition to their user base.

Now I'm going to sit here and wait for the retailers to come in and complain about this inevitably ruining the collector market and their livelihood.

[RedRonin]

It's not a bad idea, but it's a bit pricey. And there's still no telling if the format as gotten better.

[FireLight]

Is it the iTunes of comics? No.

Is it the saving grace for comics in general, the direct market or whatever? No.

Is it a real attempt at reaching the online accessible - ready to grow with the digital only comics of the future? Yup.

And it's a legitamite way to read new and old stories without feeling dirty about it...

[SpaceButler]

Might give it a shot, depends on the browser. Marvel's current digital comics browser thing is nearly unreadable for me.

[novak]

This is a good first step. I agree that the price seems a little high, especially for kids, but hopefully it shows Marvel that they can make money off of online comics.

I wish they were downloadable. I have the 40 Years of X-Men and 40 years of Avengers DVD-Roms and used to read them while commuting to work on the train, so I've gotten rather use to reading comics on my laptop anytime I'm traveling. While it's nice to have access to other titles, I'd rather be able to save them and view them when I'm not online.

[Bearpod91]

But...how will i get my comics signed????

[CitC]

It would be great if there was some way to read them off line. Maybe limit the # of downloads per month so, as someone already said, people don't download everything first month and quit. Is there any way to move a temp file onto your computer to keep reading when offline?

Still, I like it a lot. I hope 6mnth-yr old content gets up sooner rather than later the newer stuff mentioned is at least 2 yrs old, right?.

I'll have to reread the article - can't remember what format they will be in. Liked pop-comics ok, but not a huge fan of their current model.

It would be good to offer school rates as well. Maybe a bundle of 35 that can be used by a school at any one time.

[Equinox]

My reaction? Meh.

I don't like that it's a monthly fee to view it. That seems a little odd, don'tcha think? Why not a fee per download? That makes a helluva lot more sense. What I don't give a flying hoot about viewing Young Avengers? What if all I want is some Ghost Rider on my computer, and that's it? Paying $4.99 just for some Ghost Rider is a bit much. I understand that the viewer would be able to view a number of different titles, possibly spurring them to buy more off the rack, but some readers, like myself, are only in it for a choice few.

Not for me. But, I doubt Marvel is trying to reach ME personally; if they get high numbers, good for them. People were saying the same thing about 52.