Let’s Get Digital – Diamond Digital

A while back Diamond announced that they were going to launch some form of digital initiative and yesterday we got some of the details in a press release from them.

What Diamond are attempting to do is make hay from the digital marketplace without alienating their retailer customers. This is nigh-on impossible task and while I like to kick Diamond as much as the next man I don’t envy them in their desire to not ignore a burgeoning market whilst relying almost utterly on retailers for their revenue.

Diamond Digital seems to have three main strands:

1. Day & Date releases of digital titles priced at $1.99 by redeeming online a code you can only buy in an LCS with 30 day exclusivity
2. 99c digital copies of titles for those who buy the hard copy in an LCS with 30 day exclusivity
3. The ability for LCSs to run websites selling digital comics and making a cut

iVerse have stated that they don’t have to pay Apple a cut (from which I’ve inferred that you purchase your code for option 1 rather than being given it and then purchasing the comic) and that stores will be able to sell other collected digital editions. Given Apple’s recent efforts to ensure that all content viewed through iOS apps is purchased via the app store I’ll be interested to see how well iVerse do in being able to stick to this.

Day & Date is a powerful motivator for a lot of people and with publishers such as Top Cow, IDW and Tokyopop onboard you could see this being of interest, but…and this is a big but, are people really going to walk into a comic store in order to purchase a digital comic to then download once they’ve redeemed their code through the Comics+ app? I just can’t see it, to me this feels like a clunky attempt to golden handcuff customers to physical stores.

I’d love it to be a success, but this isn’t the Great Byte Hope that the digital marketplace has been looking for.

Let’s Get Digital – The Tablet Wars

It’s all about to kick off. My biggest disappointment for 2010 was that the promise of digital comics flourishing with the launch of the iPad didn’t seem to manifest. Yes, there are a lot more digital comics now than there were a year ago but it wasn’t the great leap forwards that I’d hoped for.

2011 kicked off with the Consumer Electronics Show in early January. If there was a theme for the event it was tablets…lots and lots of tablets. And today at an HP event they’ve announced their foray into the marketplace, the Touchpad.

This means that in the first half of 2011 if rumour and tradeshow promises are to be believed we’ll have four potentially significant tablets being released along with a slew of others.

iPad 2

It’s going to be the least surprising announcement of the year when it comes. Everyone knows Apple are working on a 2nd generation of the iPad and as things stand it’s the version I’ll be buying. I’m expecting evolution not revolution, faster, more memory, a camera, an updated iOS…not expecting anything from left field. Tech rumours made a lot of mention of a higher res display but the Wall Street Journal reported earlier this week that it’s for a later generation.

Motorola Xoom

This is the heavy hitter for the Android crowd. A Tegra dual-core processor, 1GB RAM, 32GB Storage, 10″ 1280×800 (up from the iPad’s 1024×768) resolution, 5MP camera, HD video recording and playback and running the tablet-focused Android 3.0 (AKA Honeycomb). Android is the area with the most number of tablets hitting the market, but the Xoom is at the top of the spec sheets at the moment. Comixology have an Android app already out there and with sales figures catching up with the iPad’s I’d expect more publishers heading to the Android Market soon. Did I forget to mention flash? Well this baby will run flash, meaning that the 9000+ comics on Marvel’s DCU service should all be readable if you’ve got a subscription. A hefty expected $799 pricetag though.

Blackberry Playbook

Where tablets meet business. This is a smaller 7″ 1024×600 tablet running an OS which has yet to be given its own snazzy name…so I’ll call it Geoff. While this is focused as a productivity tool for business folks it’s going to end up in the hands of a lot of people as while IT departments are typically a bit squirrelly about dishing out iPads the blackberry is practically part of the decor. I can’t see there being specific apps (who knows) but it it runs flash then it will potentially open some doors.

HP TouchPad

The new kid on the block. Running webOS 3.0 and having an equally spiffy dual-core 1GHz processor, a 9.7″ 1024×768 screen (same as iPad), 1GB RAM and also supporting flash this is a bit of an outsider’s choice. The UI certainly looks slick and the features list is on a par with even the Xoom. Pricing will be key, as will app support.

The tablet purchaser is going to be spoiled for choice in 2011, let’s just hope that the publishers have something truly compelling to offer.

Ultimate Spider-Man: Chameleons

Writer: Brian Michael Bendis
Artists: Takeshi Miyazawa & David Lafuente
Colourist: Justin Ponsor
Letterer: Cory Petit

Collects: Ultimate Comics Spider-Man #7-14

I doff my cap to Brian Michael Bendis and David Lafuente if only for one thing they do in this trade. When Marvel relaunched Ult. Spider-Man, Lafuente chose a very particular look for Spider-Man…I like to think of it as “Beachball Head Spidey”. I’m not the only one who found this to be a big barrier in enjoying the series and it got a sizeable mention in my review of the first volume of these Panini trades. But, to the matter at hand. Bendis finds a way to actually address this stylistic choice (and by extension fan reaction to it) directly in the story as a plot point and Lafuente has the balls to follow it through and have a bit of fun at his own artistic expense. I thought this was brilliant and showed great character on both their parts. Not only that but the slight modification to Lafuente’s design works a treat and I found myself getting into the story a lot more.

I can’t help but view this relaunched series as a separate continuity from the original run of USM…it just has a different feel to it, almost as if the clock has been rewound a couple of years. This arc is a little bogged down in Ultimate continuity but I think you could enjoy it without the preceding 20+ trades of material. The main characters are all pretty much household names and whilst some of the plot elements (especially around a certain smooching session a character has) won’t make sense I think the overall story will carry you through.

The story has a little bit of a twisted tone to it but retains its lightness as well, there’s a distinct absence of “woe is me!” and artistically the two issues by Miyazawa are solid, his characters seem a little short and stocky but this is probably just his style. Oh, and his Aunt May is more to my liking than Lafuente, who seems to have aged her 20 yrs since the Bagley work. A particular plot-point is left dangling at the end of the trade and I’m really interested to see how this pans out.

Much improved.

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