Are the physical comics going to be phased out during the new norm?

[osakafanz]

What do u think

[Rimmer]

What do u think

Seems like lower selling titles could all go to digital only for 'monthlies' - DC is doing that now, and Marvel is doing that for a few.
Will they then move onto larger titles like X-men or Spider-Man or Bat-Man? I think that's unlikely.

And as far as collections, I think even if they shift some titles to 'digital only' for monthlies, they'll still release them in physical collections (they already have solicited the Ant-Man trade as an example) - as they know a lot of folks still like physical collections. I would guess the shift from monthlies to collections has been steadily happening for many years, and this is just one more step. I think they've also got a pretty good handle on what books will sell at what levels, so like the aforementioned Ant-Man trade has only 5 issues, sells for cheap, they know it's not for 'everybody', so they probably don't print a mountain of them, that way they can still make some money (a little anyways), keep their IPO in the market, etc...

My personal take is the "death of the monthly/floppy" is closer then we've ever seen, but the "death of the physical collections" is still not here anytime soon.
*I do not work in publishing or anything like that, this is just my opinions.

[Ascended]

I don't think so, no.

I mean, we'll see what the world looks like when the dust has settled but I wouldn't bet on it.

Trades are still the biggest growth market for comics (or were before the pandemic) and I don't see any reason for publishers to want to pull back on that right now. I don't know how the rest of the nation is doing, but my local bookstore chain (Books A Million) has re-opened and seem to be doing fine; if anything they're busier than usual right now since everyone was stuck inside for months and only recently began leaving the house again.

Floppies are still the main source of revenue for publishers, so even if publishers want to pull back from the format they don't have the infrastructure to take that loss.

There's been a lot of talk about DC abandoning the direct market, but that's not happening. Even if the rumors of AT&T wanting DC to focus on bookstore OGN's over floppies is legit (and it wouldn't surprise me if that's true) they'll still ride the direct market into the ground. At worst DC will just publish fewer floppies and make more OGN's, but their presence in the direct market won't disappear.

[captchuck]

I don't see DC paying people a lot of money to create books that they aren't willing to release in print.