Annotated 22-7

on March 15, 2020
Chapter:

By this point in Guilded Age history, I may have started telling Phil, “I want out of the atoms business.” If not, I was close.

This might get me in trouble even now, but I always had low-key difficulty with even the concept of comic-adjacent “merchandise.” I don’t wear buttons, I don’t put up posters, I don’t send postcards. I buy some physical comics, but I increasingly see them as clutter I could just as easily enjoy digitally. T-shirts are probably the market I come closest to understanding; I’ve got a few based on Marvel properties or fellow indie cartoonists’ creations. But even there, the level of demand frankly mystifies me: who goes through so many clothes that they need to buy a new ironic shirt every warm month? I mean, I’m glad you guys liked this stuff, but if my tastes were our audience’s, we’d have even more trouble making conventions profitable than we did.

On the other hand, I love a good art room, and I have ever since the artists at one helped me discover the Waltrips, lo those many years ago.

(Changed the accompanying image after John pointed out a reference I missed!)

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