“In the next five to ten years, your ____________ will be as commonly used as your phone number.”

Here’s a few suggestions off the top of my head:

1. AOL screen name
2. MySpace ID
3. Facebook URL
4. Skype ID
5. LinkedIn Profile
6. Twitter ID

If you answered any of the above – or any other service like them – you’re wrong. The only thing that will be as ubiquitous in five to ten years as your phone number is your phone number.

Realism, FTW.

Every time a new social service pops up and gets moderately popular, we get a prediction about how mainstream it will get and how it will revolutionize modern communication. It hasn’t been true yet. As much as I love Twitter, and I do, the truth is that to the vast majority of humans, it’s nothing – they’ve never even heard of it. To the majority of people who have heard of it, it’s nothing more than a fad. To its active users, Twitter is anything from a nifty communication tool to the digital equivalent of the next coming of Christ. Considering we’re nearing seven billion people on this planet, having a user base of a few million isn’t very impressive in a as-common-as-a-phone-number kind of way.

The only thing that has given the telephone a run for its money in the modern age is email – a non-proprietary, open method of communication that is not under the control or regulation of any single company. It has many, many faults – not the least of which is that it’s a method of written communication.

My parents still prefer to talk to my daughter over the phone.

Realism, FTW.

Look up in the title bar of your browser – see that? Apparently, I’m an affiliate marketer. Just in case you’re unfamiliar, an affiliate marketer simply links to products or services using a special link, and when someone buys that product or service, the affiliate marketer earns a commission. That’s the boil-it-down bottom line, although the billion-dollar industry surrounding this simple concept has evolved significantly over time by introducing variations of this basic premise.

Brian Clark of Copyblogger has written an excellent piece about the Federal Trade Commission’s new position regarding bloggers and how affiliates and other online marketers can roll with the new. While I agree with Brian’s thoughts regarding methods of disclosure, I have some conflicting thoughts and opinions regarding disclosure in general. Maybe you, dear reader, can help me sort through it.

Old Media vs. New Media

We are told that we must disclose compensation for everything on our sites. If a site runs a banner ad, it must be stated that the banner is an advertisement. If a site owner links to a product using an affiliate link, that must be disclosed. Anything that a blogger or site owner receives from any company must be disclosed if the blogger or site owner is seen to be endorsing, reviewing or affiliate linking to it.

Nowhere else in the media do you see this – not really. Go to your local bookstore. Pick up a magazine. Turn to any random advertisement. Does it say in or near the ad that the magazine has been compensated for running that ad? In the vast majority of cases, no. Turn on your television, if you still use one. Every 7 or 8 minutes, you’ll get a few minutes of advertisements – roughly 8 minutes of ad per half hour of programming. Do any of those ads specify that the network you’re watching was paid to run those ads? To the best of my knowledge, that never happens (late night infomercials excepted). Radio is the same way.

The FTC is holding internet sites to a different standard than other media if it is insisting that everything from the loftiest full-page in-depth review to the lowliest Amazon text link needs to have full disclosure. That, in and of itself, is not the problem, though. As a rule, I’m perfectly okay with having different rules for different situations.

Endorsement

The problem is that the main argument seems to be that people are too dumb to recognize that running an advertisement does not equal endorsement. When I listen to the radio and hear an ad for a service or product, I never think that the radio station endorses the product or service. When I see an ad in a magazine, it never even crosses my mind that the magazine is endorsing the product. The only thing that I, or any other rational person, should think is that the advertiser paid the appropriate sum of money to the publisher and that the ad passed the review process (to make sure the ad wasn’t inappropriate for the audience). If people don’t think of websites or blogs in the same way, that’s their problem.

What about Reviews?

What about them? On my desk, as I write this, is a copy of Mac|Life magazine – the July 2009 issue. On page 56 is a review of FileMaker Pro 10, a database application that retails for $299. The reviewer, Zack Stern, gave the software 4 out of 5 marks, or “Great”, on the Mac|Life scale.

Were this review to appear online, the FTC would require disclosure – no such disclosure is required in-article in print form. We are not told whether or not Zack Stern was given the software for free, whether he was paid to write the review (I know, that’s kind of a “duh” thing, but that’s kinda the whole point of all this) or whether he has ever been compensated by the makers of FileMaker Pro in the past. The FTC rules could require all of that, for every article online, because relationships with different companies will vary.

It may not be enough to simply put on your About page, “Sometimes we use affiliate links and sometimes we get paid to run ads, and sometimes companies give us free software to evaluate”. If it were as simple as that, people wouldn’t be freaking out over the future of the affiliate marketing industry right now. Even if having a dedicated Disclaimers and Disclosures page were good enough to satisfy the new FTC rules, would it solve anything? Would having yet another mile-long page full of legal mumbo-jumbo attached to our sites really improve matters? When was the last time you read a company’s Privacy Policy? The Terms of Service? No? Not lately?

Zack Stern wrote a review of an article for a magazine that I enjoy and trust. I could not care less if he – or more likely, the magazine – were given the software for free for the purposes of writing the review. I hope that he was compensated for his time and effort in writing the review – nobody wants to work for free, after all. What else matters?

New Media, Millions of Sources

But what about people that actually do take money in exchange for favorable reviews? Sure, there are those that will take bribes. Let’s call these things what they are – they’re bribes. They’re not “paid reviews” or “compensated posts”. They’re bribes. The problem is that it is impossible to tell when someone has taken payment for an honest favorable review or payment for a dishonest favorable review. This is where new media saves the day. With billions of blogs, social networking pages and Twitter updates that a review might appear on, it is nearly impossible for a company to control all the reviews of a product. If a blogger takes money to write a favorable review, but every other website on the planet is trashing the product… what’s the problem?

The FTC should not exist to ease the burden on the consumer to do due diligence and research when considering the purchase of a product or service.

Consumers should not assume that the first – or the tenth – thing they read about a product is the final word. People should be specifically seeking out both good and bad reviews before making a decision.

Random Linkage

I’ve been focusing on reviews because those have a far greater potential for abuse – but the FTC wants to regulate simple links in any context. Consider this: I mentioned Mac|Life magazine a little while ago. The only reason I haven’t linked out to it with an affiliate link is that I’ve got a three-year-old fighting for my attention and I’m not part of any affiliate programs that include that magazine. It’s a time and effort issue. If I had linked to it with an affiliate link, though, it wouldn’t have been part of any review. It wouldn’t have been part of any commentary about the magazine itself – in fact, I could have randomly picked any magazine that I happen to have laying around in order to make my point. There would be no endorsement other than the implied endorsement that comes with the fact that I own it – but that’s a bit of a stretch. According to the rationale behind the FTC rules though, I would be scrutinized.

Maybe the problem is with me.

Maybe my assumption that everything has been bought and paid for in some way is the problem. One of the earliest lessons I learned about affiliate marketing (one that has relaxed considerably in recent years) is that every outgoing link should be an affiliate link whenever possible. I fully expect that any link I click on any site will result in a commission – tangible or otherwise – for someone. I linked to Copyblogger at the top of this article, and while there are no monetary commissions in such a link, Brian benefits (um, a little… I guess…) from my link to his article, and I benefit from having my trackback listed at the end of his comments section.

There is a value of some sort in almost every link, but for some reason, the government wants us to disclose that value. I don’t see the point, in most cases.

The worst part about all this though, is that it’s not just linking practices that will arouse the suspecion of the FTC. Simply writing an article about a product or service is all it takes. If the FTC feels that something was inaccurately written about, you can be on the hook for severe penalties.

Welcome to Web 3.0.

Going forward, this is what I’m up to online:

• This site will focus on a bit of everything that interests me, with an emphasis on comics, being a stay-at-home Dad, movies, music… general life stuff.
• The Geek Dads @ Home podcast is alive and kicking, despite our missing a week here or there. We’re up to episode #19 now! The podcast is me, Scott Jangro and Joe Magennis. Sam Harrelson is gearing up for a teaching job and has bowed out, but we look forward to him joining us periodically as his schedule allows.
• The Big Book of Spam is no more. Sufficient interest in the project couldn’t be generated.
• Kids and Comics remains open, and will be updated in the near future. Kid-friendly comics were listed there as far as 5 months in advance, so I don’t have too much catching up to do. Next month, I will finally publish Comic Book Movies: Not For Kids?, a series of articles reviewing and recommending kid-friendly movies based on comic books. You won’t believe what I’ve had to go through… subjecting myself to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 3? Yeah, done it. I’ll never be the same.
• Mediocre Web Comic was an interesting little project, but ultimately, not for me – not regularly, anyway. That site will stay up, but updates will be very infrequent.
• I have a few minor affiliate sites that will remain open, and I will continue to spend time learning the ins and outs of the affiliate marketing industry. Regretfully, I can’t make it to Affiliate Summit in New York this year, but I’m hopeful that I’ll be able to swing the West conference in 2010.
• I’m on Twitter and Facebook, but I will be limiting Facebook to only close friends and family in coming weeks.

Here’s what I’m not up to online:

• I am not involved in any way with AffSpot.com or it’s owner. If you hear differently, please let me know so I can take action.
• I am not involved in any way with CafePress.com or the print-on-demand industry in general. I will no longer reply to emails regarding that company, that industry or the book that I published in 2006 about them.
• Review Builders is still live, but is no longer being maintained. As far as I’m aware, all the Builders are still functional. They will likely break sometime in the very near future, though I have assurances from Debbie Carney that the Loxly Gallery-based Builders will be just fine for quite some time to come.

Thanks for stopping by!

Earlier today I went to see Watchmen. It started at 3pm, so I paid matinee price, not full. It was seven bucks. Once inside, I got a small popcorn and a small Coke. The total was $10.25. That’s right, it cost me $17.25 to see a movie, by myself, on a Thursday afternoon. That’s not the worst part of the afternoon, though. No, I summed up the worst part on Twitter shortly after I got home:

back from seeing Watchmen… if i had to describe it in one word… boring… if i had to describe it in two words….&$^%ING BORING.

Spoilers from this point on. You’ve been warned.

The Highs

Two of the fight scenes were pretty good: Silk Spectre & Nite Owl in the prison and Rorschach & Nite Owl vs. Ozymandias. That’s… about it.

The Lows

For starters, it’s too long by about an hour. Clocking in just shy of three hours at 2:45, it’s a very long film. Many movies benefit from a length like that—Watchmen doesn’t. It just drags.

The acting was spotty at best. The casting was questionable, especially those actors chosen to portray real people like Nixon. The costumes were, for the most part, terrible. This, I attribute to the fact that you can’t put normal people in superhero costumes and expect them to look like they do in the comics. Comics are exaggerated, rather like Barbie dolls. That’s why the X-Men flicks had the characters all wearing black leather instead of their traditional garb. It’s why Batman in the movies wears body armor instead of what the character wears in the comics. It’s why Brandon Routh looks like a little twerp as Superman instead of the Man of Steel. The producers of Watchmen decided to put regular costumes on the real people, to the effect that most of them looked like your drunk uncle going to that Halloween party when you were seven.

The Rest

There are a few things that folks around the internet made a big deal out of with this flick. The first was the source material and how close the movie was to it. I’m not going to rehash all the arguments about it… it’s not completely faithful to the source, but that’s okay. You can’t take a 12-issue comic book series and turn it into a 2- or 3-hour movie. You just can’t.

A few people made something of a big deal about superhero sex in Watchmen. While it’s true that Nite Owl and Silk Spectre get naked, that’s what makes the sex completely un-superheroic. The problem, of course, is that when the costumes come off (and they do come completely off), the people underneath are just… people. You could just as well be looking at any random couple, which, given that these people are actors, was exactly the case.

Then there’s the violence. Oh, lord, the violence. While not the most violent film ever made (um, probably), this flick had more blood and guts flying around than any movie I’ve ever seen. I thought Reservoir Dogs was bloody until I saw Watchmen. I’ve never seen so many bodies explode before—literally explode, with blood and guts and bones on the walls and ceilings. I don’t mind violence in my cinema—even over the top violence—but here, it was unnecessarily over the top.

For heroes, these people sure kill a lot. I know, it’s supposed to be some grand statement that in the Watchmen universe, the heroes aren’t squeaky clean. The problem that I have is that the two characters that I thought were the closest to moral, Silk Spectre and Nite Owl, kill with smiles on their faces when faced with unpowered gang members—only one of which had a gun. Silk Spectre stabbed a guy in the neck. What the hell?

The movie couldn’t decide if these people were super powered or not. Only Dr. Manhattan has real super powers, the rest are regular people that put on costumes to fight crime—like Batman (only without the gadgets). None of them should be able to punch through walls (which happens), or take an explosion in the face with no burns (not even a singed hair on her head when Silk Spectre took the brunt of a fiery blast that knocked her into the ship).

The Bottom Line

I paid nearly twenty bucks to see this flick; twenty bucks that would have been better spent on… well, just about anything. Maybe a DVD. To put it in more simplistic terms: 1 out of 5 stars.

This counts, right?

My friend Jen Goode has been putting together a project called Tuesday’s Topic for over two years. More often than not, I haven’t participated—not because I think it’s an unworthy project, but because I have no discipline and I’m the worst procrastinator you’ll ever meet (this is posting after midnight, so technically, it’s Wednesday now). Every week, Jen posts the Topic and anyone who would like to write about it can do so and get linked to from the Facebook group and from the sites of other bloggers that are participating.

This week’s Topic is Finding Fair, which lends itself to a great many angles. Annie took on interpersonal relationships and cosmic balance. Judi wrote about fairness in business. Jen came from the angle of family, sharing and compromise. Jen’s husband, Dave, wrote a political piece. It’s Dave’s take on Finding Fair that really prompted me to fight my procrastination and participate this week. You see, I don’t think what he wrote was very fair.

Now, before I get into this, understand that I consider Dave a friend, and although I disagree with what he wrote, no insult is intended or should be inferred. Too often, when people talk politics things turn ugly. Dave’s a great guy, and we just have a difference of opinion.

Dave isn’t alone in his criticism of the so-called stimulus package. Some call it a bailout or a handout. Some say it isn’t fair that people are getting bailed out by the government after failing to run their businesses properly. Dave draws a line and calls it “personal responsibility”, which I don’t necessarily disagree with. People should be held accountable for their actions, but I differ with Dave on a few key points. I think we both draw a line, but we simply put it in different places.

Now then. I don’t think that the tale of the red hen, as modernized in Dave’s piece, is fair. Here’s why.

She baked five loaves and after they were finished she held them up for all of her neighbors to see. “Who shall help me eat this bread?” asked the little red hen.

The tale starts off with someone, a little red hen, who has created something that others desire. Good for her! Personally, I wrote a couple of books that I hope others will desire. Shameless plug, I know, but it’s for a reason. We’re talking about tangible goods.

“I will,” said the cow. “I need to eat to make good milk and I don’t have the time.”

“I will,” said the duck. “My welfare benefits don’t provide bread.”

“I will,” said the pig. “I learned to eat in school.”

“I will,” said the goose. “If you don’t give me any bread, that’s discrimination.”

Certainly, there are people in the world that take these stances. You may have noticed the first flaw in the retelling of the tale, though. It’s implied that none of these four characters offered to pay for the bread. It’s implied that they are simply demanding free bread, and while that is fine for the story, it’s not what happens in real life. The goose, for example, has a valid point – it would be discrimination if the hen refused him any bread if she were giving it to the other animals. That’s right, the goose uses the word “give”, but let’s back this up a step and acknowledge that no price has been set. Set a price, hen, then see what the goose has to say, because at this point, all you’ve done is asked who wants to help you eat it… and that makes it sound like you’re offering it for free.

I set a price for my books. If anyone were to demand that I give it away for free, I would refuse. My price is set. If you want to negotiate, we can talk. What does the hen inexplicably do next?

But the little red hen said, “No, I made the bread I shall eat all five loaves.” And she did.

Wait, what? The other four animals have expressed desire, but the hen, rather than negotiate a price just decides to keep all the bread for herself? Flaw number two: this makes no sense. If someone demanded I give away the books I wrote for free and I responded by hoarding them, how much sense would that make? Nobody would get to read them, and I already know all the words, so they don’t do me any good just sitting around my house.

“Excess profits!” cried the cow. (Nancy Pelosi)

“Capitalist leech!” screamed the duck. (Barbara Boxer)

“I demand equal rights!” yelled the goose. (Jesse Jackson)

The pig just grunted in disdain. (Ted Kennedy)

And they all painted ‘Unfair!’ picket signs and marched around and around the little red hen, shouting obscenities.

What profits? What capitalism? The hen isn’t selling anything and isn’t making any money! This is where things get weird[er]. Nevermind that each animal has been assigned to a person in a pretty stereotypical fashion (yes, we get it, Ted Kennedy is a pig, sheesh). The interesting thing here is that the reactions to the hen’s actions have absolutely nothing to do with said actions. The hen has decided to hoard the bread, remember. The reaction from the goose is a plea for equal rights? How does that fit? After they each made their statement, they picketed the hen, shouting obscenities. Obscenities? I’m honestly curious what part of real life that’s supposed to equate to, because I have never in my life seen elected officials – or Jesse Jackson – picket someone and shout obscenities.

How ridiculous would it look if a bunch of people showed up at my house shouting obscenities because I wasn’t giving away free books? Hm. I just had an idea for a publicity stunt.

Then Farmer Obama came. He said to the little red hen, “You must not be so greedy.”

Good point, Mr. President. The hen shouldn’t be greedy, but that’s not exactly what has happened here. The hen, rather than negotiate a price for her bread, has instead decided to hoard it all for herself for some strange reason. Remember, nobody was demanding free bread. The hen isn’t being greedy, the hen is being stupid.

“But I worked hard and earned the bread,” protested the little red hen.

No, the hen didn’t earn the bread. The hen created the bread. This is another flaw in the story. Look, I get it, this is supposed to be a parable about unfair taxes and government handouts and *gasp* Socialism. The larger meaning of the story is obvious, but there’s no logic to it. If a simple story can’t be accurately crafted to describe a situation, maybe the situation isn’t quite what you think it is.

“Exactly,” said Barack the farmer. “That is what makes our free enterprise system so wonderful. Anyone in the barnyard can earn as much as he wants. But under our modern government system, the productive workers must divide the fruits of their labor with those who who are not productive. It is only fair.”

That’s not what Obama or any other elected official is suggesting. Here, we get to the point of the story. The writer – Dave was reprinting this from another site – is calling Obama and the Democrats socialists or communists. They are not. Acting like taxes are something new is disingenuous. The previous administration collected taxes, too – the only difference is that while the Bush white house and the Republican congress gave the revenues to the rich and the military contractors, the Obama white house and the Democractic congress (now that they don’t have a hostile president anymore) want to use the revenues for infrastructure, shoring up the economy and strengthening the middle class. Same money (basically), different focus.

Before anyone comes back with “but the government doesn’t create jobs!”, as RNC Chair Michael Steele famously believes, allow me to remind you that the government contracts out to private firms to build roads and bridges (indirectly creating jobs) and that they directly pay government employees, including teachers, police, fire, the military, and a host of other positions that most people don’t even realize are covered by the government. The government most certainly does create, and sustain, jobs.

The little red hen smiled and clucked, “I am grateful, for now I truly understand.”

No, she doesn’t.

The little red hen never again baked bread but signed up for all the free stimulus bread joining her friends the cow, the duck, the pig and the goose. And one by one all the bread bakers stopped baking bread, following the example of their friend, the little red hen. And soon there was no more bread and everyone was hungry.

This is another “wait, what???” moment. The hen is a producer, not merely a consumer in this tale. She bakes the bread. She didn’t set or negotiate a price, she decided on a whim to keep everything for herself, and now she decides to stop making the bread and… what? Get it from somewhere else? There are only six characters in this story; there is no other source of bread. All the other bakers followed the hen’s lead? Hang on, there were other bakers? Nobody mentioned them! What are they charging for their bread? Are they profitable? Are they the ones providing the bread for the… free stimulus… you know, this is too silly. Let’s wrap up.

And all the Democrats smiled. Fairness and equality had been established and ruled the land.

But… fairness and equality hadn’t been established. All the farmer said was that the hen mustn’t be so greedy. That’s a suggestion, and it’s a suggestion that, as a parent, I give to my children. Isn’t that standard, teaching kids how to share? Nowhere does it say the farmer took the bread and gave it to the other animals. Okay, assuming that’s implied, is that really what’s happening in America? Is the government going to Ford and taking a bunch of cars and handing them out to anyone who asks for one? Is Farmer Obama going to the Coca-Cola company and taking truckloads of soda and giving them to folks on the street? I don’t think that’s what’s going on… but just in case, could someone tell President Obama that I’m thirsty and I could use a new car? Just in case.

Pretty much sums it up…

That’s Dave’s closing to his blog entry. He agrees with the tale. In my opinion, you won’t find any fairness in the tale. I don’t think it is very fair to the Obama administration, Democrats or the people that voted for them. The worst part is that the recently passed legislation is structured in such a way that positive impacts will be felt slowly, rationally, and constructively. The legislation is creating a foundation for steady growth. As much of a solid idea as that is, the Republicans get to spend the next two years shouting, “Look, it ain’t fixed yet! The Democrats don’t know what they’re doing! Put us back in power!” – and a significant number of shortsighted people will probably believe them. The 2010 midterms are going to be fairly interesting.

One more point about finding fairness. Dave has nothing to do with this point, this is just my own observation related to the whole stimulus/recovery package drama. On the topic of fairness… let’s count how many Republican governors and other lawmakers complain – loudly – about how terrible the legislation is, then happily take the federal money to help bail out their states. They will happily (though not when there’s a camera pointed at them, then they’ll be resentful and dismissive) take the money for their states, bash the president and the Congress, then try to pretend like nothing good ever came of last year’s election when the midterms roll around. That, in a nutshell, isn’t fair.

I guess that’s the whole point of everything that I’ve written here. What it boils down to is that in politics, fairness is given a back seat to personal desires and opinions, right or wrong. It’s easy to come up with a story, even one that doesn’t make sense, that backs up your personal viewpoints when you don’t have to consider fairness. It’s easy to insult and belittle an elected official when you don’t have to worry about being fair. In politics, fairness is nothing but a concept that is paid a certain amount of lip service.

That’s not fair, either.

I was considering posting this list over at my comic book site, Kids and Comics. The more I thought about it, the more I felt that I want to keep the focus of that site specifically on kids items. While there are some kid-related points here, it speaks to the wider industry. Later this week I’m going to follow it up with a piece about pricing, collecting and why the publishers get away with charging exorbitant prices (see points one and two here). Dig in!

1. Cover prices of regular comics shall not exceed $2.99.
   …and that’s for special issues. I buy full color, ad-free technical books (mainly about Photoshop) for 10 cents per page. A 32-page comic should be $3.20 with no ads. With ads, cut the price in half. We’re getting gouged, people.
2. Cover prices of kids’ comics shall not exceed $1.49.
   It’s not that I resent publishers their right to make money, far from it. It’s just that every time there’s a price increase, we’re told “the cost of paper has gone up” or some such nonsense. It’s not true. Prices on comics have risen at a pace far exceeding similar formats like books and magazines. Cosmopolitan magazine had a cover price of $2.50 in 1988. Today, the cover price is $4.29, an increase of 71.6%. In 1985, Crisis on Infinite Earths #1 had a cover price of 75 cents. Final Crisis #1 had a cover price of $3.99. That’s a 439% increase. People wonder why kids aren’t buying comics like they did in previous generations?
3. Advertising in the comics must match the demographic of the readers.
   Publishers are generally good about this, but some things do get overlooked. Ads for teen- and adult-related things shouldn’t be showing up in books aimed at the under-10’s.
4. Anniversary or milestone issues may only be published every fifty issues.
   Your 25th issue isn’t a milestone. There’s nothing special about lasting two years and a month, unless your title was created by Jim Lee, in which case, getting past number two is a historical event. Your #50 is a big deal. Your #100 is a big deal. Publishing a book with ten extra pages and twice the cover price every 25 issues is wrong.
5. Rob Leifeld is not allowed to draw anymore.
6. Characters that are killed off must remain dead for a period of at least 20 real years.
   Killing off and bringing back Superman was hollow and silly. Bringing back Barry Allen is dodgy, but acceptable. Bringing back Bucky, though? Out of bounds. Next they’ll bring back Uncle Ben and really ruin things.
7. DC is not allowed to publish anything with the word “Crisis” in it ever again. Ever. Again.
   Honestly, Final Crisis was a bloody mess. Hard to follow, pointless, and ineffectual—not the words I want to use to describe a DC Crisis, but I must. Bruce Wayne will be back in a year, maybe two—count on it. He’s “trapped” in the past. Do you realize how easy it is to get out of that? Everything you do in the past affects the future. All he has to do is write “Hey, it’s me, Batman. I’m trapped in the past. Come get me.” on a few cave walls, and he’ll be back to the present in, um, no time… so to speak. Maybe I’m missing something, but this seems like a no-brainer.
8. No more variant covers.
   They’re insulting. The collectibility of comics is supposed to be a side-effect, not the purpose. I thought we learned our lesson back in the 90’s. Collectors and speculators, aided by the publishers with their silly variants, destroyed the industry. How much are those 50 copies of Jim Lee’s X-Men #1 (ten of each variant cover) in your closet worth these days? After a nice period of time with no variants, we’re starting to get them again, to the detriment of the industry.
9. Wolverine is limited to appearing in no more than two ongoing series and three limited series at any given time.
   Wolverine is a perfect example of a company believing its own hype. Marvel told everyone throughout the 80’s and 90’s how awesome Wolverine is, and people, for some reason, believed them. Now, Marvel seems unable to publish a book without Edward Pointyhands showing up at some point. It’s almost like they have no confidence in anything they’re publishing unless he makes an appearance or co-stars in the book.
10. No company-wide “This Changes EVERYTHING!!!” events for a period of 5 years.
    When there is no stability, when the company is CHANGING EVERYTHING!!! every year or two, the series have far less impact than they should have. Give us five years of stability. We don’t need to kill off major characters every summer because at this point, it just looks like they’re doing it out of habit and not because it’s the best way to tell the story.
11. Company-wide events must crossover into established series for as long as they are running.
    Nothing pulls the readers out of an event like the fact that while major events are happening in the limited series, it’s status quo in the regular titles. Final Crisis was published over the course of nearly one full year. In that span of time, there were two issues of Batman that tied into it and one issue of Justice League of America. That’s it. It is impossible to take an event seriously when it has zero impact on any of the regular titles. Marvel isn’t much better. Civil War tied into 16 regular series (major ones like She-Hulk, Blade and Moon Knight), but there were 13 side series, like Civil War: X-Men. Why weren’t those X-Men stories told in the regular X-Men series?
12. You have to finish your drink every time Alan Moore says he wants nothing to do with <insert movie based on his comic here> in an interview.
    Okay, that’s not really a rule for the industry, that’s a rule for people playing the Alan Moore drinking game. One more then:

1. All publishers must keep the primary focus of comics on comics: dead tree material, roll-it-up, put-it-in-your-pocket, real comic books.
   Having digital comics is great, but kids don’t need yet another reason to sit in front of a computer. Comics are meant to be read laying on the floor surrounded by a pile with your friends. You know, you can survive (more or less) on fast food, but nothing beats a home-cooked meal. Keep comics real.

Papa Johns.
Fourth from the left, third from the right.
Unlimited toppings on any large pizza (up to 7 toppings).

Unless “unlimited” means something completely different than what everyone agreed upon, having a maximum of seven toppings on the pizza makes it pretty damn limited.

Incidentally, not only do they limit the toppings on their unlimited toppings pizza, they also disable extra cheese as a topping when ordering this special.

Do they really think we don’t notice this stuff?

In case the image is too small or too fuzzy (sorry about that), this is what it says in all of its spammy glory:

The front of the postcard was empty with the exception of a mailing label and stamp. No logos or anything. The creepy part is that I share a surname with the person on the address sticker shown here.

Earlier today I remembered a conversation about music that I had with my chiropractic provider. We had talked about music, and he said that he likes +44 better than Angels and Airwaves when considering the post-Blink-182 bands. I told him that I hadn’t heard +44, but I’d been meaning to.

Today, I finally checked them out. I have a subscription to Rhapsody which allows me to listen to whatever I want, whenever I want, without having to pay per track like at iTunes or Amazon. I listened to +44’s debut album, When Your Heart Stops Beating, and I liked it quite a lot. As I often do when investigating new music, I pulled up the band’s Wikipedia page—or tried to.

As a Firefox user, I simply type wikipedia whatever-I’m-looking-for into my browser’s address bar, and I usually end up on the right page. I typed in wikipedia +44, and was taken to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/44 – a page all about the year 44. I clicked the For other uses link, and was taken to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/44_(number). Getting closer. As I skimmed down looking for a reference to the band, I noticed the very first line after the Contents box. It reads thusly:

Forty-four is a tribonacci number, a happy number and an octahedral number.

A happy number? Numbers can be… happy? I opened that link in a new tab to come back to it later, found the link to the +44 page, and read up on the band. After that, I went back to the happy number page, and read this:

A happy number is defined by the following process. Starting with any positive integer, replace the number by the sum of the squares of its digits, and repeat the process until the number equals 1 (where it will stay), or it loops endlessly in a cycle which does not include 1. Those numbers for which this process ends in 1 are happy numbers, while those that do not end in 1 are unhappy numbers.

I remember learning about imaginary numbers in high school, so I wasn’t thrown too much when I first saw “a happy number”, though it did give me pause. What really got me, oddly enough, was the notion of a number being unhappy. For some reason, that made me laugh. I keep picturing little 2’s and 3’s running around with big frowns and sad eyes.

This is the time suck that Wikipedia is for me. I start out looking for something simple—a page that talks about the history of a band—and I end up reading about unhappy numbers. I do this for hours upon hours sometimes.

There can be only one conclusion. Wikipedia is evil.