Tragic Rants or
who is John Galt?

I ran across a post on the Canada Blogs by James Burns that is worthy of a rant.

James writes:

No matter how much personal genius is at the root of an idea or service that makes someone wealthy, whether it be a book (the Harry Potter series and the wealth it has generated for Rowling come to mind) or some other invention; that wealth is largely made possible not by that genius, but by the whole structure of society. The distribution of the ideas, the manufacture of the products or services that result; all these things come about due to the labour of countless souls and the existence of a private and public commons of transportation and communications systems, whose interconnection and interdependence is next to incalculable.

The rich should pay their fair share of that boon, because it society's recognition of their genius that provides them their largesse, not their genius in and of itself. They owe an enormous debt, because they have received a reward that far outweighs their contribution.

According to James, those who produce and add to society are deserving of a greater burden. They owe us, according to James, because we ... didn't produce or add anything?

Now I'm just an office schlep with a hobby of making comics. David Cronenberg is a world reknowned director of films. In James' scheme of things, if I ride public transit I should only pay $2 whereas Cronenberg should have to pay $100. See I've gone and watched Cronenberg's films and spoken favourably about them. I'm a contributor to his wealth. Without me, Cronenberg is nothing. Besides, he's got lots of money. A hundred bucks is nothing to him. Why shouldn't he pay more?

James' way would have it that it is only by society's recognization of Cronenberg's films that he is wealthy and that it took an army of others to bring those films to fruition - Cronenberg's contribution being no more integral than anyone else.

Listen, Cronenberg's films will remain genius whether I or anyone else in society view them or not. Any wealth that Cronenberg has made is the result of my willingness to pay for his films. There are no victims here. I gave the theater my ten bucks. That money went to pay the ticket person, the projectionist, the people who delivered the film to the theatre, the people who processed the film, the cast and crew of the film, and to Cronenberg.

Does the projectionist plays an integral role in the delivery of the film from Cronenburg to myself? Well yes. But you know, we can always get another projectionist. Anyone could drive the truck that delivers the film. Heck - we don't even need the ticket person, a machine could do the job just as well. But there's only one David Cronenberg and he's the only one that can create a David Cronenburg film.

So when Cronenberg is paid, and paid very well, I don't shed any tears for the minimum wage earning ticket collector. He got what was due to him and so did Cronenberg.

James has it backwards. It's not the producers who owe society, but society who owes the producers. We enjoy what we have only because of their innovations. They are giants whose backs we ride upon.

Tragic Blogs or
Year One...

Well it's been a year now since my little nook of the internet opened up. Time to do the obligitory navel gazing and number crunching.

The Comics
Number of new comics: Seven (31 if you consider each installment of The Drawing Board/Bunny & the Cantelope a seperate comic)
Total number of panels: 304
Number of entries in the blog: 60

In all, I produced much more than I expected, averaging almost six panels of art a week. But still far under what I know I can produce. If I had nothing but the comics to work on, I would have an output of six panels a day or more. That's the difference between a comic a day versus a comic every other week or so. Overall, I like the quality of the work I've been putting out - it's more the rate of delivery that I want to work on.

The blog is what surprised me the most. I didn't think I'd made nearly half that many entries. And while I was more prolific with the blog than I thought, I'm not as happy with the quality. Read it as a whole and it's disjointed and unfocused. I'll have to work on that.

Visitors
Number of visits to the site over a year:

Webalizer shows 16,625 visits
Extreme Tracking shows 4,508 unique visitors

While both those numbers seem pretty good for my little hyped and barely promoted site, I guestimate that I really only have about 30 regular visitors. That number's impossible to verify, but it's what my gut feeling is. What I'd really like is for there to be an audience of a thousand or more - but at this point I'm at a loss to figure out how to achieve that other than getting my stuff out more regularly.

Money Money Money
Of the 40+ comic strips on my site, 20 require payment via BitPass.

Sales made via BitPass:

77 The Letter O
15 LoL :P - There were these two nuns...
15 Just an Ordinary Day - Peanuts
10 I used to Draw
3 The Drawing Board (16 strips exclusive to subscribers)
Total Sales: $6.30

Donations via BitPass: 31 for a total of $12.82
Donations via PayPal: 2 for a total of $11.00
Amazon.ca Revenue: $36.65^*
Google Ads Revenue: $6.07
Total Revenue: $72.84

^* To be fair, though, 90% of the orders through Amazon were my own.

When we take my own orders through Amazon out of the equation, the clear source of income for this site is BitPass donations. Paypal is a close second. Sales via BitPass are practically neck n' neck with ad revenue from Google. The revenue doesn't covers maybe half the expenses, so this is still hobby more than business. My eventual goal is to be able to make a living from the site, or through freelance jobs gained as a result of the site, but I'm a long long way from achieving that goal.

So that was Year One. On to Year Two.

Tragic Blogs or
A Matter of Confidence...

At the beginning of the month, one of Canada's larger banks had a systems error that resulted in updating of accounts being delayed by a few days. Deposit money into your account and it wouldn't appear for another few days. Pay a bill and the money would sit in limbo for a while before ending in the hands of the person you were paying.

Now money, whether in coinage, writs of paper or electronic bits, is only as good as the confidence one has in it's ability to be exchanged for goods and services. When if I go to an instant teller and try to withdraw $10 from yesterday's paycheque, only to be told 'insufficient funds'... I have to tell you that my confidence in said currency is very shaken.

Now, technical glitches are going to occur. It's unavoidable and a given. But could the bank have done anything different to better assure it's customers during the crisis, and to placate them after the fact?

A PR person from the bank sent an early version of a news release with a quote attributed to the bank's vice-chairman. The same quote appeared in a later release attributed to president & CEO. Was the quote mis-applied - or was the quote cooked up by the PR dept. and applied to whomever seemed appropriate at the time?

When the problem extended over a 48 hour period, why would they not make their chief technical staff member available for comment? The CEO assuring us that the money is all safe and secure is nice, but I'd be amazed if the CEO has the technical skill to reinstall Windows let alone know the ins and outs of what's going on with this system. Let's hear it from the guy who's working on the problem and knows what's what. The bank tells us that their tech staff were unavailable for comment as they were all working hard on correcting the problem. You know, if I were on the PR dept. of the bank, then I would have made sure to issue a photo or two of that tech staff, diligently working into the night to resolve the problem.

The problem has been resolved. The bank has promised to issue a refund for anyone who had service charges or fees associated with the glitch. Full page ads have been taken out in all of the major papers, apologizing for the inconvenience.

But the next time someone drops an envelope full of cash into an ATM, are they going to be confident that that currency will end up in their account?

Tragic Blogs or
Endorsements...

Sympatico, my ISP, is co-branding with MSN and are launching a marketing campaign that features testimonials from existing clients. I'm one of those clients who offered to sit in front of a camera and relate my experiences.

When the camera is suddenly shoved in your face and there's a dozen stagehands mulling about in front of you, it's easy to become distracted. If you aren't used to cameras, it's very easy to get overwhelmed and stop giving the answer you want to give and instead give the answer you think they want to hear. This is why they have a very in-depth interview with you prior to going on-camera. If you start expounding on the benefits of a broad-band connection when all you have is dial-up, that footage ends up on the cutting room floor. The director then needs to figure out if mentioning the discrepency is going to freak you out even more, rendering all future answers into a rambling mess.

Those of you in Canada are likely to run across the Sympatico infomercial at least once or twice. While I didn't say anything untrue, I think I was a bit of a rambling mess. So here's what I really want to say about my ISP...

I've been with Bell Sympatico for almost four years now and couldn't be happier.

Reliable? Let me tell you. In my opinion, the Internet should be like any other utility. You flick the switch and there's electricity. You turn on the faucet and there's water. With Sympatico I turn on my computer and I have Internet. I don't have to give it a second thought.

Good customer support? I have to admit, I can't really tell you whether their customer support is friendly or helpful as I've never had cause to use it other than the one time - and then I wasn't halfway through discribing the problem when the support rep had the answer for me.

Fast? I used to be on dialup with another company, and the difference between Bell Sympatico's High Speed and dialup is the difference between driving Queen and Spadina during rush hour vs driving down the 401 at two in the morning. There's no comparison and I'll never go back.

I use the Internet. A lot. Banking, shopping for groceries, filing taxes, paying bills, news, entertainment, communicating with family and friends. If I could be jacked into the net 24/7, I would be. For now, Bell Sympatico is the next best thing.