You dont live vicariously through Spider-man, you dont NEED Spider-man. Its a book…read something else and get on with your life already. Get a god damn grip people.

Maybe Ron Lim isn’t as popular as Brett Booth?

Anyways, the argument against obtaining stuff without paying its “price” in dollars should be based within context and considered together with its consequences. I should mention that i am extremely against comics pirating and i have never done it. [well, i did download the formerly know as justice league, but i bought the following volume and i am going to buy that in a trade too whenever i find it; just that i have been putting it off for years, choosing something other instead and i know its a disgrace. Man, i should really buy that ]. So does this contradict what i just say and how can i argue against such a practice if i am heavily pro-stealing?

I think that the strongest argument against comics pirating is the fragile economics of comic book publishing. Sure the big two ought to make a hell of a profit but the companies still need to be sound economically so that they can continue to publish these adventures i so enjoy. I mean even its the top sellers like civil war or crisis du jour, i need to pay them so they can be around to publish blue beetle or spider-girl, do you know what i mean? Besides, i need to support my local comics shop so that it does not go down and stop providing a new opportunity for a chance new blood coming in through door.

I don’t know, if i just download latest madonna album, or indy movie or the lost episode, do we really think they will suffer? the pop stars and celebrities make hell of a money in concerts, commercials, film offers, etc. And people still go to movies for the big screen experience and pop corn and just for a day out.. lost, well, i don’t know, i still watch it on tv too, so i do get the ratings up, if that counts for anything.. they should just broadcast it on the net with lots of compulsory advertisement, rather than pushing dvds, in my opinion.

Anyways, when the economy is hard for me, i just pick up groceries and what not from the chain store and steal a couple of book from the book chain, and keep on paying comics instead. do you really thing these conglomerates will hurt over couple of lost material? and even if they do, should i really care? do you know how great share of the profit the chains eat up? (like the coffee producers get like a couple of cents of every 10 dollar pack, and the workers in the processing, transportation and retail get around a dollar in total with another dollar at most for the expenses like energy, packaging material etc. the retail gets 80% of the price you pay..)

Anyways, sorry for the rant. I just wanna say yay for stealing, support your comics, pay nasty Marvel and DC every cent of your pocket money and lets crush this dumb system of profit maximizing conglomerates so that everybody can develop their free comics with their favorite heroes and distribute over the net how about that, than?

oh and brett, just get over it, geez.. it’s only a fictional character, leave quesada alone, man.. he deserves to be happy like any of us. you can stick with spider-girl if your “not life’s mission” but “observation” non-obsession with the marriage ret-con annoys you this much.

On The Beat blog’s latest sales analysis of Marvel’s monthly sales, they tell something interesting about what’s being done with unsold copies of Spider-Man’s Brand New Day:…

Maybe you should stop preaching to others and start listening to your voice and…

‘Get over it already.’

Agreed. He has attained the ultimate level of corporate-dom.
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Parker only seems to be here to attack anybody who says anything bad about Marvel.

Hey, Parker, Marvel smells of old man.

I haven’t made it my life’s work to get a job in comics to correct anything I perceived as wrong about the direction of these imaginary characters.

I’m just a reader and as a reader, we’re entitled to make observations, then comment about it and this one’s as clear as day.

Many of us have been listening to Joe Q rant and rave in public about the marriage for a very, very long time, long before he got the job as EIC. It only got worse when he became EIC.

And yes, Stan Lee is also cool with the reversal. It doesn’t change the fact that Joe Q was so obsessed that he made it a full time day job to undo that decision, because in his arrogance, he thought he knew better than Spidey’s own creator.

Being able to see the irony and point out how art imitates life doesn’t make one obsessed, it makes them observent.

And just because you can’t see the sky as blue doesn’t make the sky any less blue either.

I’m just pointing out, to all the many people obsessed with watching the numbers to prove whether or not Joe made a good decision is that you’re all wasting your time because Joe Q doesn’t care what anyone thinks. He does what he wants so all of YOU, get over it and stop harping on the numbers.

And all you cats whining and moaning about OMD/BND…get over it already, sheesh.

No, it’s definately an obsession.

And yes, it is his job… today. It wasn’t his job before he became EIC.

What defines it as an obsession is that for 10 years before it became his official job, he was so put off by the character getting married that he made it his life mission, his current life work — to correct what he perceived to be a terrible wrong about an imaginary character, something he’s been trying to do in his position as EIC since day one.

There’s a saying — the answer’s been right there all along and I never saw it. Well it is, all there in full glorious HALLELUJAH Marvel color:

The story of creation goes something like this, ‘God created the heavens and the angels and all was well. But when God wanted to create Man different, with free will, Lucifer got angry and told the creator it was a big mistake. Lucifer said Man would turn on him, betray the beloved creator.

He thought he knew better than the Creator about a decision he made, then made it his life’s work to prove the Creator wrong. Of course, he was doing this in the Creator’s best interests because he loved him and wanted only to protect him. Standing beside him, many others believed like Lucifer, making it their full time job to prove the creator wrong.

The road to hell was paved with good intentions.

Fast forward to 1987 when Spider Man’s creator decided, for better or worse (no pun intended) that he wanted to marry the character. I don’t know, the character flourished after the marriage, reaching sales that touched the heavens so a married PP didn’t appear to turn off many…

But the issue of whether or not it was a good long term decision could be debated until the end of time, kind of like the Creator’s decision to give Man free will.

There was of course, one person so outraged by the creator’s decision to marry this character, openly debating the issue at any available platform, that he made it his life work to prove the creator wrong, to undo what he perceived to be grave and harmful mistake. Of course, he meant the creator no harm for he truly loved the creator. He was only acting in the best interests of.

Mephisto told Peter a dumb, unbelievable story (a lie) to undo the marriage, kind of the way Joey Q told the audience a dumb, unbelievable story to undo the marriage. Because, for better or worse, he believed the creator was wrong in his decision all those years ago.

So yes, now its Joe Q’s full day time job.

Thankfully though, unlike Man, Peter Parker isn’t a real person. He’s imaginary.

And now we conclude with a quote from The Great Creator…

‘Nuff said.

I’d also like to comment about Joe’s “obsession” with Spider-Man being married. It’s not really an “obsession” its him, you know, doing his job and doing what he thinks is best for the character. I hardly think he is obsessed or has worried about it all that much over the past 20 years. Unlike us (yes me included) this stuff isn’t his life, this stuff is his job)

The only new comics I bought since returning to comics in early 2006 (after stopping in 1991) were “Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane” and Brubaker’s DD run from his first issue up to DD 100. Otherwise, I solely buy back issues from the 1980s a few times a year to fill gaps in my collection. That in mind, I wouldn’t consider myself a fanboy by any stretch, but I did pick up the “Captain America” and “Fantastic Four” Marvel Spotlight issues at the magazine/snack shop* in the building I worked at last year (at $5.00+ to boot because they weren’t the direct market printings), just because I wanted something to read at lunchtime, and interviews with older creators interests me. It works as an impulse buy.

* The only other comics that they ever seemed to carry were other books that don’t burn up these charts, such as “Spider-Girl”, “She Hulk” and the “Civil War” reprint comics.

Here was a guy tortured for 20 years over an imaginary character getting married — kind of like being haunted by the invisible March Hare, taunting his every waking moment.

But I’m not ‘outing’ anyone — his troubling little obsession is no secret to anyone — he’s used any open forum available to advertise his disdain of the imaginary character’s marriage since he got into the industry, lo all those many years ago.

Even if none of those next generation readers (you know, the one’s Joe say he did this for) decide to buy Accessible Spiderman, I’d say reversing the marriage was a success — for Joe — better than 2 decades of therapy.

Compare Joe Q pictures before and after OMD: Not quite the picture of perfect health for 20 yrs before but now, Joe Q is like the all smiles, like the happy divorcee - the weight (of marriage) is gone and he’s happy as a clam, all courtesy of those MARVELous Mental Health benefits.

That’s some health plan!

According to icv2.com the combined numbers for 2008 ASM perform better than the combined numbers for 2007 Spider-Man titles.

That’s a pretty simple statement that points towards Marvel having made a fiscally sound choice.

And you’re doing this to people, who are going to go the same lengths to prove you wrong the other way.

In the end, your efforts will only accomplish one thing — that you’re all very creative at mathematics.

Like Marvel, people will try and spin the numbers to support their own points of view and it doesn’t make an ounce of difference because as said before…

Joe Q doesn’t care what any of you think… he sees the world the way he wants and he’s going to do what he wants with Spider Man regardless of how anybody spins the numbers.

http://www.icv2.com/articles/home/10404.html
March 2007
137,730 ASM
56,139 SSM
50,665 FNSM
For a total of 24,453

So, going by your calculations…
March ASM 2008: 265,204 > March Spider-Man titles of 2007: 24,453
And 2008 ASM has outsold the 2007 Spider-Man titles each and every time.

You also make this argument:
“Because of skip-months for one Spider-Man title each in the months of April and May last year, it’s probably impossible to draw any credible comparisons between those months’ sales last year versus this year…”

Personally, I don’t agree with that. Those skip months were caused by the previous ASM team not being able to get out 12 issues a year. The current team(s) are working towards getting out 36 issues a year, and so far they have kept to that schedule. If someone doesn’t show up for a match, that’s usually called a forfeit. If the other team is bringing it every time, shouldn’t they be rewarded for that? Or rather, why should the other team get a free pass?

You also say:
“…but anyone who thinks that “Brand New Day” hasn’t been an even more heavily promoted and extended “event” is a total fucking idiot…”

And I disagree. The way I see it, “Brand New Day” is less an event than it is a form of line branding (like “Decimation” banner was for the X-titles after House of M, or “The Initiative” banner was for books like Fantastic Four after Civil War). There’s been no big specific story event in the Brand New Day books, other than being the stories that have followed heavily promoted storyline “One More Day”. Both “Civil War” and “Back in Black” were story specific event books.

And if you believe that the “Brand New Day” line branding was more heavily promoted than the “Civil War” event, then you, IMO, have a very skewed take on things. (See? No need to curse.)

The whole purpose behind OMD and BND was not only to give Joe Q the therapy he so desperately needed (and he does look much healthier today than he has in the past 20 years — I’d say single life has done wonders for Joe, I mean, Peter.) but also, as Joe said, to make Peter more accessable for the next generation of readers, you know, all those new kids lining up at the comic shops who can now read Spider Man because he is single.

So to gage Amazing’s success, one shouldn’t look at the sales figures. Because if Spiderman lost 10 old time readers but gained even 2 or 3 new, next generation kid readers as Joe claimed he was doing this for, theny, it’s all worth it.

Really, anything to get a new generation to start buying comics.

So, to find out if this has really been successful, people need to ask how many shop owners are now selling Accessible Spiderman 3x a month to that new generation of readers?

Life according to Joe Q is that everyone loves BND and they get tons of praise about Spidey’s b(old) direction.

Then again, as wise old Ben Kenobi once said, “Many of the truths we cling to are dependent on one’s own point of view.”

Some see sales as going up, others see them as going down. Some see Joe Q as the hero who restored Peter Parker to his pathetic loser glory. Others see him as a metaphor for Mephisto, who, like Joey Q, wanted that marriage undone, no matter how stupid a story he had to tell to get it.

Now, that said: given the continuing decline, I *do* think it’s now virtually inevitable that they’re going to end up with a lower number, by any standard. Of course, as has been pointed out in this thread, there are a variety of factors potentially contributing to that - they’ve gone from an A-list creative team to a less prominent one, for example. And sales on AMAZING were inflated over the last couple of years by participation in major events and crossovers. So the decline won’t be due solely to the unpopularity of “One More Day.”

I’m at something of a loss about this project (Fairy Tales). Somebody at Marvel clearly likes it, but where on earth is it selling?

I buy it in quarter bins ; )

It’s also stated that Marvel Spotlight sells in other areas- WHERE? This is surely a book made exclusively for the direct market. If you have evidence that it sells in other markets please state what the evidence is and where those sales are occurring since I just can’t believe that book sells to anyone outside of Marvel fan boys.

Now I’m ignorant, am I?

I never once mentioned the other Spider-Man titles Marvel used to publish because I never made that comparison. I merely compared the sales level of today’s Amazing with the sales from past years. My point stands—Amazing is selling at its lowest level in 5 years IN APRIL. 77 thousand is less than 78 thousand.