Kleefeld on Comics: A New Era!

For the past several years, I've been blogging away here on the broad topic of comics. Whatever struck my fancy. One day it'd be thoughtful commentary on the economics of the business, another might be a silly bit of Photoshopping, and another might be a review of some obscure book no one's heard of. And while all of that was naturally centered around my personal interests, it's always been a bit of a crapshoot for readers, never knowing what to expect or whether it might be something worth their while.

My first revelation was a few weeks ago when I learned that I was one of the VERY few people actually writing about webcomics. (Or at least I was when I was writing my column over at the recently-defunct MTV Geek.) There's a couple of decent group podcasts out there, but those are more discussion-centered pieces, not really written out/edited/cohesive essays. And while Brad Guigar has written a fair amount -- from a position of authority as a decade-plus veteran of webcomics -- it's largely behind a paywall, inaccessible to most people. I hardly considered myself an expert on the subject, but it would seem that I managed to generate some clout on the topic in that vacuum.

My second revelation came while reading, interestingly enough, How To Make Webcomics by Brad Guigar, Scott Kurtz, Dave Kellett and Kris Straub. I don't recall where exactly in the book this hit me, but I realized that my "brand" isn't very cohesive precisely because of how I blog. That haphazard, anything in comics approach I've been using as an oeuvre for years. It dawned on me that, if I want to really be recognized for my writing about comics, I'll need to narrow my focus a bit and work on more professional type pieces.

So what does that mean for the blog? It means I'm going to change up the format here. I'm setting up a schedule for myself to write about specific topics within comics on specific days so that A) readers know what to expect, and B) I can provide myself with a stronger framework to begin my writing each day. Further, I'm looking at topics that have been a little more interest to me personally of late and, ones that I think I can provide poignant commentary on.

Monday. On Webcomics. Starting tomorrow, I'm going to use Mondays to talk about webcomics. This will basically be a continuation of my Kleefeld on Webcomics column that I did at MTVG.

Tuesday. On History. Another interest of mine is sort-of obscure comics history. You all know about earlier comics pioneers like Jerry Siegel and Alex Raymond, but I'm hoping to highlight some lesser known comics and creators. The people and places and things that perhaps weren't significant in the overall tapestry of comics history, but deserve more than the footnote that only occasionally get.

Wednesday. Links. I'm going to continue my ritual of using this day for links. Not the ones you've already seen from Tom or Brigid or whomever, but stuff that's, again, a little off the beaten path.

Thursday. On -isms. On Thursdays, I'll be focusing on issues of equality and egalitarianism in comics. There are plenty of reports about racism, sexism, bigotry, etc. in comics, but they're often (understandably) wrought with emotion, which I thinks provides some folks with a reason to dismiss the subject. Sitting here as a white heterosexual male, I'm interested to see/hear other voices and points of view and to try to present those views in a fair, but somewhat removed by way of my own privledged, perspective. I'm not looking to be some hero who solves all the problems, but just to talk about them. In part just so I can better understand the issues myself.

Friday. On Fans. Friday is Fan Day, where I focus on another aspect of comics which gets overlooked. This will also be something of a continuation of my work over at MTVG, picking up old Kleefeld's Fanthropology column.

Saturday/Sunday. In my effort to write better, more thoughtful pieces to run throughout the week, I'm going to drop trying to maintain blog posts on Saturdays and Sundays. I might post the occasional odd bit of shareable ephemera I run across if it doesn't neatly fit into one of the above categories, I think forcing myself to continue daily updates is going to hinder the overall quality of my work. And, like many sites I'm sure, my traffic drops off pretty radically over the weekend anyway, so I don't think this will have much of an impact.

Although I'm not really intending as such, the overall affect will be not unlike a magazine, I should think. Four regular columns, one "feature" and the occasional errata.

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