Thursday, 25 March 2010
Posters. Again.
For whatever reason, there seems to have been a resurgence of interest in my A-Z of Awesomeness lately, with posts about it appearing in places like io9, buzzfeed, wired.com, and all sorts of others. This has led to a surge of people getting in touch to express their dismay at the A-Z posters being sold out and asking if I could please print some more. I hadn't planned to, but it was just starting to seem kind of stupid, so last night I ended up caving, printing off a bunch more posters and putting them up for sale.
Here's the thing, though. I never drew the A-Z in the first place with a view to making money from it. It was just supposed to be a fun thing, a creative exercise rather than a commercial one. I only printed the first lot of posters after initial reluctance because I'd ended up losing a lot of money paying out on bandwidth charges when it all first blew up so much bigger than I'd expected. Having sold all the posters and recouped my costs, the idea of making more money off it - well, it was just making me weirdly uncomfortable.
It's not that I have an actual aversion to making money, although I can see how it may be starting to appear that way. The point is: all the characters featured in the A to Z are not my characters. I don't own copyright on Spider-Man, Doctor Who, Gundam, etc. etc. They all belong to other people, and I do take that sort of thing somewhat seriously. If someone started making a bunch of money selling their own posters of Mo-Bot High, I wouldn't like it, right? (Well actually, I would probably be all geekily excited if that happened, but I risk diluting the force of my argument here.)
Anyway, I woke up this morning with an idea which, for me, solves the whole problem and restores the project to it's original unsullied state of pure awesomeness. So here it is: all profits from this second batch of posters, and any subsequent printings, will be donated to SSNAP (Support for the Sick Newborn And their Parents), a charity which supports the Intensive Special Care Nurseries (Neonatal Unit) at the John Radcliffe Hospital, Oxford. It's a place and a team of people to which I owe more than I could ever hope to repay in this lifetime, but maybe a few quid from selling some silly posters will make a start.
So there you go. Buy as many posters as you like, in the knowledge that by doing so you are increasing the sum total of awesomeness in this world.
And I'm back to not making any money, and can relax again. If you would like to support me financially as an artist, and believe me I have no desire to stop people from doing so, you can buy some of my comics - I will try and add them to the shop page soon - or why not go and pre-order my book? It is entirely full of awesomeness, I can assure you.
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A-Z of Awesomeness
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What a fantastic idea - power to the posters!
ReplyDeleteI found your site through Presurfer. So glad I did! I will definitely check your stuff out more!
ReplyDeleteOh my, you are so internet famous right now! I have you on three feeds. THREE! You're going to have to print some more posters. Seriously, though -- congratulations on being awesome x
ReplyDeleteFound out about this via a link in the Telegraph a mate sent, so you may see another surge... Poster ordered, and having just discovered you, will be ordering something else which will contribute to your income. At the very least the A-Z has raised your profile and hopefully others will similarly discover your work.
ReplyDeleteis it wrong I find something Erotic about Lori Lemaris tail?
ReplyDelete-David
You could improve the Y... Yodel at the YMCA, Yoda yearns to. ;)
ReplyDeleteYour solution is great, but i can´t see the (i´m sure) awesome drawings, the link is broken :(
ReplyDeleteIf you change your mind about making this a more commercial venture or want to raise more money for SSNAP (which is awesome, btw), I would recommend publishing these in a book. The ABCs haven't been this cool since Shel Silverstein's ABZs, and I am certain I am not the only one who would buy it.
ReplyDeletei found you on digg.com, and ordered the poster from there. i think that may be what got you so many orders. the 'digg effect' is fairly substantial. im in the states. already have a place on the wall for it picked out!
ReplyDelete