Will Amazon's buyout of Comixology really change the industry?
Business Insider wrote about Amazon's aquisition of Comixology. I'm sure it'll help in some ways, but, there are certain sources for whom it may not help, or it's too late to do wonders at this point because they've failed to make their comics appealing to the right crowds:
I wonder if Amazon thought of buying an ownership of the major publishers as well as another website, they might actually make serious changes for the better? The answer for now is only a maybe.
...comic book publishers will need to give their product a second thought. In recent years, major publishers have abandoned all hope of attracting young new audiences, focusing instead on providing byzantine plot convolutions and adult-themed takes on iconic characters for their core demographic of 18 – 45 year-old men.Unless Marvel and DC can change their management and formatting for print - that is, find people with better manners than Dan Buckley and Dan DiDio, there's no chance any second thoughts will be given at major publishers.
Women 17 – 26 have risen to comprise over 20% of ComiXology’s users, and that’s certain to rise after Amazon’s acquisition. The books will now be exposed to millions of newcomers, so it will behoove major publishers to make their stories more female-friendly, streamlined, and accessible. With comiXology’s new aim to make “every person on the planet a comics fan,” publishers will need to consider new genres, greater variety, and more varied age groups.Despite what the majors might have you believe, they're not being very welcoming to women, or they're foisting bad ideas upon the books supposedly geared at the girls crowd, and even women in the audience don't take kindly to having a shambled continuity coming from Marvel and DC. Nor are they bound to find the direction Spider-Man took since late 2007 appealing, and come to think of it, not even the direction taken with Superman. It's the smaller publishers who've been gaining over the years, as more people came to realize the majors don't want them anymore, now that they're dominated by mental adolescents with the full approval of the conglomerates who own them.
I wonder if Amazon thought of buying an ownership of the major publishers as well as another website, they might actually make serious changes for the better? The answer for now is only a maybe.
Labels: dc comics, indie publishers, marvel comics, technology
