From: tmorgan@astro.as.arizona.edu (Tad Morgan)
Newsgroups: alt.fan.furry
Subject: Re: Where's the *discussion*?
Date: 14 Dec 92 09:21:46 GMT
Organization: University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ

In article <1ghap1INNso8@usenet.INS.CWRU.Edu> bn510@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Matthew L. High) writes:
>Why isn't it selling?  Well, I have a couple of thoughts on this:
>
>3)  Promotion.  IMHO, Antarctic needs to do some more promotion
>  of Albedo and its other titles.  Various methods have been 
>  tried before - notably full-page ads in assorted publications
>  (like Previews, Advance, CBG, etc), to no effect.  I think it's
>  time to hit the trade shows....

One thing I've been wondering is if they've ever tried some promotion
outside of comics circles?  I know I never would have come across 
Albedo if it weren't for hearing numerous interesting things about it
here on Usenet -- I'm not really a comics fan, my interests lie more
in sf and (as a result of more than healthy doses of animation) furries.
None of the standard comic ad/distribution means would have caught me.
On the other hand, some sort of review or interesting ad in one of the
sf/f magazines might have done the trick.  I'm probably being naive, but
I believe thinking along genre lines instead of medium ones may be what's
needed.

>4)  The one major problem I find with the book, though, is THE
>  WRITING.  It's almost all talking heads now.  Various characters
>  expostulating back and forth huge word balloons, advancing 
>  political intrigue and assorted woes in an emotionless, didactice
>  (er, make that didactic) manner is not my idea of a good book.
>  Yeah, I know I'm overgeneralizing, but not too much.

I don't have a problem with the verbrosity, but I can see what you're
saying.  My main problem is that with there being so much of it, I often
have difficulty sorting out just what the order of dialog should be (although
perhaps its just partly not having comic conventions ingrained in me).

>Albedo does have three things going for it:  a regular schedule
>  (probably *the* most important thing for sales, in terms of 
>  distributors), a long track record (back to 1983!), and good 
>  artwork (hey, I *like* Steve's unshaded artwork, moreso than
>  his washes.  Though, I was not too pleased with Taral Wayne's 
>  treatment of Steve's inks in teh Beatrix story).

Regular schedule is also quite important in terms of readers.
If the book doesn't come out often enough to keep readers interests, then
sales are bound to suffer and be limited only to the core readership.  In
my opinion this goes doubly for one that has such a diverse and (perhaps
even) convoluted storyline as Albedo does.  If they can go to bimonthly, as
I've read they're considering on GEnie, I think it would help greatly.

As for artwork, personally I still prefer the washed look; to me it gave
the characters and surroundings a greater sense of depth and form.  However
I quite understand the economics of it, and Steve's use of the shading has
improved over the last couple of issues.

Tad (who's only been reading the stuff for four months and probably shouldn't
     be babbling on about "What Should Be Done" 8-) 8-) )
:   Tad Morgan  --  "To baldly go where no one has gone before..." - ST:TNG   :
:   Internet: tmorgan@as.arizona.edu   CI$: 71650,471     GEnie: W.MORGAN12   :
:   "I was compelled to take the laws of physics into my own hands." - Opus   :