Digital era, the end of comic book stores?
One weekend each year comic book lovers from all over the world gather to San Diego to talk and enjoy superheroes, villains and comic stuff.
This is the Comic Con, a convention that has turned from being a gathering for the comic book fans to an important event, known by fans all over the world. This year, one of the stars attending the Comic Con was Angelina Jolie, who took the opportunity to promote “Salt”, her new spy thriller. Other personalities that dropped by were the stars from “Harry Potter” and “Twilight”. This year was dedicated to a serious debate: the comic books seem to take the same path as taken by books and music and get digital. Ira Rubenstein, the vice president of Marvel Entertainment, considers this a step forward because it will bring along audience that have not had access to comic books until now. The iPad from Apple has come out with an application that is supposed to give readers the same feel of reading a full size comic book. Jonah Weiland, the executive producer of Comic Book Resources, which is an online community for comic book fans containing reviews, blogs and videos, says that the iPad can fulfill the comic book fans’ feeling, even enhance them. The question is what will happen to the print market and the comic book shops from the United States. Jonah Weiland says that the best shops will resist together with the online sites.
The paper comics will not disappear any time soon and the comic book retail market will always exist. The digital branch will be much larger, but there will always be classics lovers.
The digital comics will be provided with motion comics, similar to videos that will bring superheroes to life. In some opinions, the market is expanding, because not anyone has time or access to comic books stores, but everyone has access to the internet. Until now, only 5 percent of the total sales are represented by digital sales, but the market is growing rapidly. Many of the comic book fans have grown up and are now technology and computer compelling, so digital comic books seem like a natural course. Though, there are still people that believe digital comics will be the end of the comic book stores and communities. Some of them can be found wandering the Forbidden Planet comic book store in New York City and argue that the comic book industry is all about collecting, trading and selling comic books, things that will disappear together with the digital area.
