Today I continue our rundown of the remaining five digital distributors of our comic IN MAPS & LEGENDS, published by UnWrecked Press.
(Check out the other seven here.)
This distributor is also quite new, but they appear to be on the cusp of some big things — they just signed on as a partner with Boom Studios to distribute their comics as well. Very easy team of folks to work with, and the uploading of files was a breeze. I like the options available for readers at this site — you can read comics online with their reader, download as PDF, and also download as the comic-friendly CBZ format. I just wish they could take PayPal as well as credit cards at their site. I seem to make more impulse buys with PayPal than a credit card. Something about grabbing my card and typing all those numbers makes me start to reconsider my purchase, I think. But I’ll still keep an eye on this site. I have a good feeling about them.
Get MAPS as a PDF or CBZ, or use the Online Reader at MyDigitalComics
We just recently found out about the awkwardly named Myebook, which also sells books and magazines as well as comics. We liked the quick set-up and tools for setting up a PDF on their site that we couldn’t help but sign up. There was no agreement to read, no chain of emails back and forth agreeing to terms. Just log in, set up the PayPal system for purchases, and upload issues of our comic. You can only read comics in their online reader, but they have some nice features, like the ability to share a link to a book with a friend, who may want to buy it as well, plus you can leave comments in the book, similar to the Graphic.ly approach. We haven’t seen a lot of sales yet, but we’ve only been live at Myebook for a couple weeks with issue 1, and less than a week with issue 2.
Get MAPS and read with the Online Reader at Myebook.
UPDATED 1/27/11: We’re no longer distributing our comics at Myebook, as we’ve gotten lots of views but no actual purchases. It just wasn’t a good fit.
DriveThru has a been a very pleasant surprise for us — we’d never heard of it back in July, but this fun site focused just on PDF versions of comics has been a consistent source of sales for us from the start. You can download a PDF or read it with their online reader. Their range of comics tends a bit toward the mature range of comics, including a surprising number of erotic comics (hello!), but the first issue of MAPS has been consistently in their top 20 sellers from the start. I have to commend DriveThru for their easy-to-use publisher tools, which let me set up special ads on the site and, best of all, let me track sales as soon as they’re processed. No waiting for the end of the quarter here! Very nice.
Also — DriveThruComics is now selling a special bundle of comics worth over $170 for only $10, with all proceeds going to flood relief in Pakistan. Definitely cool. Order by 10/25.
Get MAPS as a PDF Download from DriveThruComics
This is a pretty up-and-coming publisher of not just comics, but ebooks in all genres, both fiction and non-fiction. The site’s easy to use and slick-looking, and you can buy a comic for downloading to your hard drive or for reading onscreen with their online reader. I have a good feeling about Wowio — they seem to be in it for the long haul. My only complaint is that setting up the PDF for them was a labor-intensive process that Niki (fortunately!) handled. I’d get some of my own novels on Wowio myself if the process wasn’t so extensive. Maybe someday I’ll get ambitious and do that… Sales have been a bit slow at Wowio (they’re a relatively new company), but picking up lately.
Get MAPS as a PDF Download from Wowio
This site used to have a bad rep as a pirating site, but they’ve cleaned up their act in the past year or three, I think. Very easy to upload a PDF of your comic here, and they allow readers to download the PDF as well as read onscreen — they’ve upgraded their reader to make for a pretty nice reading experience on your computer. We haven’t made many sales here, though. — I guess folks are still used to getting stuff for free here.
UPDATED 11/22/10: We’ve removed our comic from Scribd, as well as all of my ebooks from Scribd (well, actually, Scribd did that for us — their recent site renovations ate our digital presence there, and I gave up on the site).
And that’s it! At least for now. I don’t plan on adding any more distributors to our list, but you never know who or what may show up in this ever-changing publishing scene.
As before, if you have any questions at all, feel free to leave a comment, below, or shoot me an email (click the link in the right-hand nav up there). And thanks for reading along!
Michael Jasper 