Some news from Wowio…
Hey Everyone…
I just had a nice long 2 and a half hour chat with Wowio president William Lidwell.
I got just about EVERY question I had answered and I must say…I’m feeling much better about things.
One thing I found out is that a lot of rumors and such that go around the web could NOT be rebutted due to the fact that Platinum is a publicly traded company. The red tape and dealing with the SEC makes it impossible to reply to every accusation and rumor.
That being said…while from what I hear of Platinum and their financial situation isn’t giving me a warm fuzzy feeling…what I heard from Will today set my mind at ease. I think this is a good thing for US.
Us being the publishers and their fans.
On to that…
For the last year…you guys who aren’t in the United States have been lamenting that you couldn’t download the animated versions of The Dreamland Chronicles, The Behind the Scenes, The Making of, etc.
Now…EVERYONE can read them. The new Wowio will be open to everyone.
Registration also no longer asks for a credit card or driver’s license. Just your email and a password.
Should be really easy.
Now…I’m not sure how the advertising will work. As you should all know…Wowio’s COOLEST feature (and what made them stand out above everyone else) was that the books were FREE to download. But…in a cool twist…we (the publishers) were paid $.50 for EVERY download.
This meant an incredible amount of money generated by your supporting us simply by registering and downloading our books.
Through your support last year we earned about $40,000 from Wowio. And it didn’t cost any of you a dime. Nothing.
The NEW Wowio will not have this option for every country. And maybe at the beginning not even for every person who wants a free download.
Not until they get more Sponsors.
But the new Wowio has a few new options.
1) there will be free viewing to all on the website. So in your browser you can read any book for free (no registration either).
The downside is…the animated pages (at this time) won’t work. But we’ll see how that eventually pans out.
2) There will be the ability to pay for these books too.
I’m thinking I like them free. And I’m told I can keep them free if I want to.
But maybe I’ll put up special BUNDLES for everyone to download for a couple bucks…if the mood hits them.
Anyways. I have to thank Will for taking the time to answer my questions and getting us into this next phase.
I want to thank all of you readers who supported me and encouraged me to produce the Animated issues and even experiment with the Behind the Scenes and Making of books too.
I was very surprised and flattered to find some teaches even using them in schools as lesson plans and such. Wow.
I’m really excited to be able to finally offer these additional books for all of you who couldn’t get them before. I hope you enjoy them.
Wowio should be ready to go in the next week or so.
I’ll let you know when and what the deal is as I learn more.
Thanks again!
Scott
YAY! I’m happy. I’ll have to see how exactly this turns out, but for now I’m beatific, cheerful, delighted, euphoric, felicitous, glad, jubilant, mirthful, overjoyed, pleased, radiant aaaand… sunny!
(Must go, buy new synonyms)
Wow…this IS sounding pretty good! ^,^
I’m almost crying! From happiness, let’s make it clear!!! WOWIO… Finally… 😀 😀 😀 😀
I would write more, but I will go there starting to download the books I’m willing to read.
Personally, in light of the fact that Wowio’s new owners are Platinum Studios, I will be reading my new contract with Wowio EXTREMELY carefully. Check out this article about them from Publisher’s Weekly, scary stuff:
http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA6578634.html?nid=2789
Read the rebuttal:
http://blog.platinumstudios.com/
So I hear Mike Miller is leaving Wowio… dancing in the streets, hey Scott? :p
Thanks for referring me to that rebuttal, Jake – interesting reading. Particularly the stuff about DJ Coffman. His seems to be the loudest dissenting voice, but I haven’t noticed any other actual creators or people who have had direct dealings with Platinum complaining. Does anyone know of any other creators with similar grounds for complaint?
I received my contract, and it looks like the rights to my property as a creator remain intact. The only thing I notice is that the creators share of the revenue streams does seem a little low, especially since the new contract essentially says that Wowio will have the right to create a webcomic out of my ebooks, and I would only get 20% of any advertising that they tell me they make off it. On the other hand, if this is revenue I would not have seen otherwise then something is better than nothing. I guess it all depends on whether I see it as cannibalizing my exisiting traffic or adding to it.
I honestly have mixed feelings about the Wowio change. See, I felt I was helping to contribute to the authors by downloading these books, and did it without putting me in dept (hey I’m broke!). I enjoyed being able to download a comic and then read it at my leasure. However, if I’m reading this correctly, the download version I’d have to pay for our of pocket, right? I can only read it online for free. Well, this isn’t that great for me. Perhaps better for you and the publisher – and I’m glad for that if it is. But as for me as a reader .. not so perfect.
Ah well. All great things end eventually I suppose. Viva la Sava!
hi, if anyone is having worries about wiwio please check out zap in space (23 of july post) he says that the content will be put up for online viewing so it will cut into all webcomics revenue anyways.. bad stuff.
i discovered the legal & other issues from a link from afterstrife, a comic i read regularly, and its author is thinking twice about wowio now. the dj coffman argument: http://www.djcoffman.com/tikibar/2008/07/22/passing-on-the-new-wowio-deal-heres-why/
Wowio back online today
Well, I checked out the new Wowio today for the first time. No free downloads unless a sponsor ‘gifts’ it to you, like the breastcancer people are doing for the “Articles and Essays” section.
If I want to read a webcomic online I’ll go to the author’s website to read it and click on some of his advertiser’s links to help out there. I see no benefit to ‘reading it free online’ at Wowio – how does that help the author?
Also, even though Scott said he was going to do this, I’m not seeing any Dreamland Chronicles books on the current site.
Did you change your mind about this, Scott? Or is there just something I’m missing – the books definitely are not under the Graphics Novels section as of Aug. 5.
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