If you pay estimated income taxes on a quarterly schedule, your third-quarter payment must be mailed today.
For more on the subject, go here.
There seems to be some misinformation going around about whether it’s legal to ship comics using the Media Mail service of the U.S. Postal Service.
Since misunderstanding this could cost you thousands, let’s get it straightened out now.
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This is a re-post from the Webcomics.com archive. If you’ve ever been curious about the kind of information, tutorials and advice that you’ll get as part of your subscription to Webcomics.com, this is a good example.
If you’d like to join the site, you can get a 12-month subscription for $30 — or you can get a one-month Trial for $5 … with no obligation after your 30 days expire. For less than three bucks a month, you can get a steady flow of information, tutorials and advice targeted towards your webcomic business — plus a private forum to discuss issues with other professionally minded cartoonists.
Since switching to Comic Easel, I’ve become a big fan of character tags. Using character tags, I can give readers more information about the characters that appear in a specific update. You can see it in action below.
When the user hovers the cursor over the headshot, they get a brief intro to the character.
And clicking the headshot takes the user to an archive thumbnail page containing all of the tagged appearances of that charater.
Here’s how to set it up in Comic Easel. I’m assuming that the updated version of ComicsPress has a similar functionality.
Under the Comics menu (on the left-hand side of your WordPress dashboard), click Comics and then Characters. Here, you can input as many characters as you’d like. Give each character a name, a slug and a short description.
The “slug” that you give the character will be the name of the image file that you upload to display when the character is tagged for a comic update. You don’t need to include the suffix (.jpg, .png, etc). But you do need to follow an all-lowercase / no spaces convention.
Next, create a headshot for each character. The default size is 150×150 pixels. Give each headshot file a name that coincides with the proper character-tag slug.
You will upload these to your site’s Web server, in the “images” folder.
Don’t panic. It’s easy.
In your WP dashboard, click on Appearance and then Editor.
Open your style.css file.
For each character you will add the following code
.character-slug {
background: url('http://evil-inc.com/images/slug.jpg') top center no-repeat;
}
Where I have the word “slug” bolded above, you will enter the slug you created for the character in the first step.
Now it’s a simple matter of noting which characters are present when you upload each new update. You’ll find the proper field near the bottom of the right-hand column of the “Add Comic” interface. Remember, you can click and drag that field to place it higher in the column.
When you’re finished, don’t forget to click Update.
Go to Appearance -> Widgets in your WP dashboard and drag Comic Easel Cast Hover to the appropriate sidebar.
Updating your archive needn’t be overly stressful. Remember, when you’re looking at your archive in WordPress, there’s a Bulk Actions button. (It’s in the left-hand corner right under the title “Comics”.)
This is a good way to tag multiple updates at once.
Note that you can select an update that already has character tags listed and add additional names through a bulk action.
So, I’ve been making my way, page by page, through the Evil Inc archive by selecting all of the strips that feature a certain character and adding the names via bulk edit. I try to catch as many as possible through bulk edits. Then, I’ll add any necessary characters in individual entries via Quick Edit.
Depositing funds into my bank account always pisses me off.
See… when I go to the corner pizzeria to buy a slice, that money has left my bank account before I reach the crust. I can see it right on my online banking app. Boom. Money gone.
But if I want to access funds that are rightfully mine, I have to wait 3 to 5 business days.
Do they really expect that we don’t realize that it’s the exact same transaction?
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The most recent update of Comic Easel includes the ability to incorporate Jetpack’s mobile-device functionality. Here’s a quick start-up guide.
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I wanted to be sure to note this here, since I know that many of you are Mac users. If you bought MacKeeper, you may be entitled to a portion of a class-action lawsuit.
Released in 2010, MacKeeper has been dogged by accusations that it exaggerates security threats in order to convince customers to buy. Its aggressive marketing has splashed MacKeeper pop-up ads all over the web.
The class-action suit, filed in May 2014 on behalf of Pennsylvania resident Holly Yencha, contends that MacKeeper falsely flagged security and performance problems in order to coax consumers into paying $39.95 for the full version. The suit sought $5 million in damages.
Under the settlement terms, ZeoBIT would put $2 million into a fund for those who want a refund, but admit no fault, which is customary in such settlements. It has yet to be approved by a judge.
The case is now settled. If you purchased MacKeeper on or before July 8, 2015, you may be entitled to $39.95 from the $2 million fund. Here’s what you need to know to get your piece of the settlement.
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You don’t need a subscription to read today’s post!
This is a re-post from the Webcomics.com archive. If you’ve ever been curious about the kind of information, tutorials and advice that you’ll get as part of your subscription to Webcomics.com, this is a good example.
If you’d like to join the site, you can get a 12-month subscription for $30 — or you can get a one-month Trial for $5 … with no obligation after your 30 days expire. For less than three bucks a month, you can get a steady flow of information, tutorials and advice targeted towards your webcomic business — plus a private forum to discuss issues with other professionally minded cartoonists.
The Ames Lettering Guide is a little daunting when you begin to use it. For general use, I’m going to suggest ignoring the holes on the left-hand side of the tool as well as the metric measurements.
Before we get started, let’s cover some typography terms.
You can use the Ames tool to measure out Cap height, X-height and leading. It’s an ingenious little tool. Here’s how it works.
For cartoonists lettering in all-caps, that center row of dots is really useful. It allows you to measure out the Cap-height with an X-height that falls into dead center. Finally, it gives you leading that is exactly half the size of the Cap-height — which is also a typographical rule-of-thumb.
Even though you’re not using lowercase letters, that X-height rule is amazingly useful in helping you to place different components of uppercase letters, for example:
Now, more than ever, it’s easy to see what a subscription to Webcomics.com will get you.
Every Friday, you can read the entire Archive Dive post without a subscription. This is a post from the site’s archive that I pull out front again because it still has relevant information you can use today. This is especially nice for newer subscribers (or anyone else) who may have missed it when it originally ran.
Plus, at the beginning of every month, I do a wrap-up that highlights some of the best posts — from the site as well as the private forum — from the preceding month.
If you’re curious about joining, we’ve made it easier than ever with a $5 trial membership. You’ll get full access to the site for thirty days so you can see what you’ve been missing. At the end of the trial, you can choose to re-subscribe ($30 for 12 months of access) or walk away with no strings attached. You will not be re-billed unless you choose to subscribe.
Please note: The links below will lead you to content that is “subscription-only” content. Why do I do this? Simple. If you see something that intrigues you and decide to subscribe, you can come back here and use this post to jump right to the post that caught your attention. And once you do that, use the other Best Of posts to drill even deeper into the site!
Aggressive Advertising: A brief analysis on the inevitable outcome of advertising as it becomes more aggressive. Plus advice on whether you should allow aggressive ads on your site.
Check your Robots.txt file: A recent upgrade by Google makes it necessary to check your robots.txt file. We tell you what to look for and how to administer any changes.
Webcomics.com Poll: We asked our members how many times a week they update. The results were enlightening.
Hitch It / Ditch It: We launched a new round of critiques in which we identify one thing you’re doing well and one thing that you could improve. These critiques represent the best opportunities to really delve into the craft of comics.
Member Benefit — BannersNStands: At $50 off any order over $179, you stand to recoup almost twice your annual Webcomics.com subscription fee through buying a high-quality item that you’ll use at every convention appearance.
Ad Blockers Cost Web Publishers Big: Shortly after my essay on aggressive advertising, a report was released that estimated that ad blockers had cost Web publishers billions of dollars in 2015 — and the year isn’t over yet! We look at what the researchers found — and what it means to webcomics.
Update your PHP: We released an early warning to WordPress users that an upgrade was coming that would make it necessary for them to upgrade the PHP settings on their hosting. We talked about what that actually meant and offered some help in implementing it.
Dip the Chip — Or Else: Big changes are on the way if you use a credit-card reader (like Square) to run credit cards at conventions. You may be on the hook for any credit-card fraud perpetrated at your booth! We tell you how to make sure this never happens — and we give you a preview of the new Square chip reader that you won’t find anywhere else.
Stop Promoting to Other Cartoonists: It’s the quickest way to prove that you don’t know what you’re doing. Instead of posting an annoying self-promo on a Facebook group for webcartoonists, we give you some usable tips on doing promotion that works.
The Case Against Guest Comics: It’s one of my most unpopular opinions: I hate guest comics. I share my thoughts on that, and then open the discussion to the group. Some of them agreed wholeheartedly, and some had some very well-thought-out reasons that I should change my mind. At the end of the day, it’s the m0st informative conversation on the topic you’re likely to find anywhere.
Commissioned Sketches; Just Say NO To The Doodle: What do you do when a convention attendee tries to get around your prices for commissioned sketches by insisting that he or she wants, “just a doodle!” You say “no.” Politely, firmly, and (if necessary) repeatedly. We tell you why.
Convention Table Signage: Here’s a quick tip on making your convention table more fun and useful to the people who stop by your booth.
As the clash of ad blockers and aggressive advertising continues to deflate revenues for Web publishers, Google has stepped into the fray. According to Forbes magazine and the Wall Street Journal, Google AdSense will begin blocking ads that use Adobe Flash. This will effectively thwart “in-your-face video and animated ads, pop-ups, and other intrusive ads that plague our online existence,” according to Forbes.
Here’s how that’s going to effect Web publishers like us…
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This is the first installment in the current Hot Seat series. This one’s a Hitch it / Ditch it critique. In short: I go to participants’ sites and list something they could improve (and offer my thoughts on how they could do that), and then I talk about something they’re doing well.
As always, this is only the beginning of the discussion. Members are encouraged to share their thoughts on the matter in the comments below.
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