General Category > Comic Related Discussion
Archie goes digital with 'New Crusaders'
John C:
I haven't heard back, but giving things another look and taking a few minutes to experiment, it's not too bad. They should still fix the problems, but:
- The screen-size problem is partly overcome by, as I guessed, zooming and panning. It's ugly, though, especially considering that there's no keyboard control AND you can't page back and forth on the page while zoomed. So it's double-click to zoom, drag to pan, double-click to un-zoom, drag to turn the page. Carpal tunnel rules!
- The comic viewer is being blocked for me by AdBlock Plus, so it can be disabled for the page. Also not a great solution. Why is it classified as an ad?
- The SSL certificate is for archiedigital.com, whereas all their links are for www.archiedigital.com. So, the warning is benign, but I can't help think it's going to cost them business if they don't fix it.
- The Terms of Use are also linked at the very bottom of the page correctly.
In the Terms of Service, things I see that I don't like are:
- No refund for cancellation, especially when there's no indication of what books can be read, is kind of creepy. Cancelling also needs to be "confirmed," and isn't complete until they send an e-mail notice (and it's the customer's responsibility to know if it hasn't happened), so I worry that there's an intent to scam money from people who didn't jump through all the hoops.
- It's implied that agreeing to the terms accepts that Archie has a copyright over all their content and there's a further agreement not to "provide access" to the material to anyone. This may be signing away the ability to invoke Fair Use and may preclude using this to borrow public domain scans. I don't know if it'd hold up in court, but I don't like the implication.
- The Privacy Policy is extremely vague. Granted, the only information they can possibly have is a user name, password, e-mail address, and which comics you read (hardly something a Mubarek could use to imprison you, say), but there's a lot of "we use it for business purposes," and "may enter into alliances." They do allow requests to the information they've collected, but I don't like that there's no opt-out for passing your contact information to others.
So, ignoring the newer concerns, which are minor since I don't feel that they're binding beyond the law (i.e., I believe the courts frown upon contracts that restrict your rights), I made it through registration.
Inside, it's...weird. Specifically, their browsing capabilities are very incomplete. There are logos for a handful of books they probably assumed would be popular (or eyecatching, like Pureheart or Cosmo the Merry Martian), but that Blue Ribbon issue? Not anywhere to be seen in the menus. But you can find it through a search.
Side note: The Blue Ribbon page makes reference to "Way-Back Wednesday," so it looks like that's when the Golden Age books get posted.
Interestingly, inside the site, the comic reader is overwhelmingly better. The comic fits the screen size, has a full-screen option, keyboard controls, thumbnails, bookmarks, and a sound volume (ha! for page-turning). They're doing themselves a disservice with the free sample.
As for the book itself, I believe it's the same scan--the interior front cover is cocked at the same angle and there's the same hint of a spine-roll on the fourth page. Someone definitely went at it with Photoshop, though. It looks a lot cleaner (and the cover has lost all the nicks), and they did a much better job than, say, the DC Archives with the bold colors, but...I don't know, it's hard to say how good a job they've done. I see a lot of the colors looking right (on what ends up looking like whiter paper), but it seems off, somehow, and I also suspect they've down-sampled the scans a bit, maybe to save bandwidth.
And, oh! The interior view isn't Flash, or at least not purely so. Interestingly, that means that the browser back/forward buttons work for your paging through, zooming, and so forth. Interesting, but I'm not sure how useful it is. But it also brings up a downside: They haven't put links back to the system on the individual pages, so you end up paging ALL the way back.
(No, wait. That only applies to SOME of the books. Others use the lousy interface on the front page. Argh!)
Yoc:
Sounds like a work in progress.
I tell you those terms of service things are a big turn off to me. Especially their cancellation process or non-process from the sounds of it. Antagonistic from the get-go.
So you think they are tweaking the Blue Ribbon 3 that's being shared here eh? Ok, I'd assume then that they will have the same incomplete issues we do. I'm glad they aren't going with the mega BOLD colouring at least.
Thanks for the info John, let us know if you develop anymore thoughts on the site.
-Yoc
John C:
Ah, OK. Cancelling isn't quite so bad. Yes, you're paying up front with no chance of a refund (probably to avoid people taking the annual term and then bailing after a month, though there are smarter ways to handle that), but more carefully re-reading (or maybe they rewrote it in the last few hours), it's laid out in a bunch of steps, most of which are irrelevant.
Basically, you go to the site (duh), log in (seriously?), go to your subscription information, cancel, then (we're back to Blatantly Obvious Land) look for the confirmation that it happened. Then, if you don't get an e-mail confirmation as well, bug them to make sure you're not being charged.
So, not bad, just confusing for all their painstaking clarity.
The other thing suggesting that it's copied-out boilerplate is in the Privacy Policy. I didn't bring it up because it's not relevant to the site's purpose (as far as I know), but they mention in polite language that they'll protect your privacy, but may also sell you out in a heartbeat if it protects their business or a third party.
I got a chuckle out of that mostly because the last time I saw similar phrasing was on the Wall Street Journal's new WikiLeaks-competing whistleblower site, where it's obviously the very worst policy to have.
Back to the site, right now, my only real objection (other than the schizophrenic comic viewing software--it looks like the brain-damaged software is behind all the covers with a "Read Now!" banner--hopefully, that means they're older) is that there's apparently no way to just get a full list of all the comics posted. It seems like they think they've got it, though, so I'm guessing it's just a maintenance issue.
Yoc:
Thanks for the clarifications John.
When I visited a few days back the first thing I went looking for was a list of what they had. One hopes they clue in on that soon. We customers like to have a clue what to expect should we commit money to them.
John C:
Especially since they're so new (and judging by a lot of things, new to pretty much everything about the digital business), it'd probably be a good idea for interested parties to drop them a constructive line listing problems they see. Having been on the other side, I know there's a world of difference between the frustrated employee saying there's a better way to do things and a bunch of e-mails suggesting there's more money to be made if things are improved.
I think "I can't commit to a subscription without any idea of what I'm getting for it" goes a pretty long way.
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