Dear Zuda, your system sucks.
No, I’m not talking about what people generally would talk about when it comes to Zuda, how they select comics to run on the site, the current rotation of comics seeking attention, or any of those types of things. No. I am going to rant about the technical aspects of the site and why their comic-browser is killing my interest in their site.
I don’t think there is nearly enough criticism of Zuda’s method for displaying comics. The flash player is absolutely terrible and kind of implies that the people behind it have no idea how important usability and simple navigation is to a webcomic site. Why is the webcomic site model virtually unchanged across so many webcomics? It’s because it’s a good model, functional, and the best we have. Zuda’s method is totally against what webcomics should be.
C|Net News: The other problem with Flash-for-webcomics is that it runs slower than loading a simple JPG image. “I’m on a three megabit cable connection, I shouldn’t have to sit through LOADING LOADING LOADING screens between comics pages. This isn’t Commodore 64,” complains Stevens. Kaja and Phil Foglio, having made their comic Girl Genius into a print-to-web success story, agree. “As most webcomic readers are very sensitive to load times, I can’t help but think that they will have a fairly restricted readership.”
The above is a pretty good summary of my gripes, and it’s definitely put in a more calm manner than anything I’d do. But I’m not just going to quote a better writer and call this entry quits. No, I’m going to go further into why the player is terrible.
It’s obvious speed is an issue; their system is damn slow. Part of what makes webcomics unique is a large archive of comics to read, all a simple button click away. Read a page, click and then instantly your new page is available. It’s not quite as fast as thumbing through a page in a comicbook, but it’s the next best thing in a digital format. Webcomics are well-known time-killers. Nobody wants to wait continually to load a page and nine times out of ten, if a site loads too slowly for the typical Internet user, they either change their mind and go elsewhere, or hammer on refresh until they get what they want. Not very user-friendly is it?
I can read five Penny-Arcade comics from their archive in the time it takes the damn viewer to load. I’m not the only person who is having this issue either, google search “Zuda flash viewer” and click around, you’re bound to see some less than stellar impressions of it. To make matters worse, the system is a resource-hog due to the loading of multiple super-high-resolution images. This not only explains why it’s so slow to load but it also causes my primary browser, Opera, to crash. Now, I’m not telling people what browser to use, (though I do suggest Opera), but I do always stress to designers that they need to keep all web-browsers in mind. I don’t want to be forced to boot up Internet Explorer to read High Moon (who would?). Zuda’s apparent unwillingness to fix this rather huge flaw in their delivery system reeks of a certain arrogance.
I partially appreciate DC’s attempts to “legitimize” the small club known as Webcomics. I do think their methods are rather ham-fisted and a little late to make the splash they were hoping to make, but I can dig what their attempting. What I can’t abide by how terribly they’re going at it. It’s like listening to the typical puka-shell-wearing-jock-douchebag trying to explain why their favorite film is great. It’s embarrassing. “Hey Brah, The Fast and the Furious 3 is fukkin’ tight. That shit was so cash.” What makes things worse is that with Zuda’s backing of the eternally #2 Comics Publisher they don’t really see themselves as having an obligation to change their methods, or provide alternatives.
All Zuda would need to do is provide the alternate (and better) method to their “enhanced” comic viewer. From there they can focus on making the comic viewer special enough to the point where people will start migrating to it. Instead of forcing us to choke down the overly complex controls and key-strokes in order to get the comic to even be readable in the first place, why not do a fixed size version with the typical page-by-page navigation 99.9% of other webcomic sites offer? Once again, arrogance comes into play. Why would DC need to change their ways for webcomic readers who were around before they decided to toss their corporate-hat in? DC is sadly viewing webcomics as a new market, and a new market alone. While business is typically about innovation, Webcomics are not. Why do you think we have so many similar comics out there? Webcomics don’t reward innovation just yet, and are a poor thing to try and apply a business model to (this will be another rant for another time, I’m sure). DC’s attempt at doing so clashes so damn hard with the current environment, it’s putting people off. Not only from it being a disruptive and out of the norm technique, but from how cumbersome this new method is.
So, I guess if anyone with Zuda is reading this, please give us an alternative page-by-page navigation system with fixed page sizes and a nice, simple archive page for each comic. Then you can continue to work on your new viewer. If you make it nice enough, I know people will try it out. But to thrust such a poorly designed product without any alternatives on readers is just plain bad form. Now if you excuse me, I’m going to force myself to open Internet Explorer to scope out some of the current comics. I should have enough time to get some coffee made while the newest pages are loading.
_________________________________________________________________
EDIT: Jason Causey Said: Just to clear up a common misconception about the Zuda viewer…The “viewer” is not slow because it is Flash-based. It’s slow because the images that Zuda uses are HUGE. On average, they tend to be around 1.2 MB per page. That compares to Penny Arcade, which averages less than 100Kb. In other words, the Zuda resolution is around 10x larger than a standard “webcomic” (if Penny Arcade is considered standard).
I’m very pleased that people are willing to discuss and share their thoughts on this. Jason brings up a good point that I failed to during the initial post. So I feel I should give him his due credit. I went ahead and edited this point in. My opinion is still unchanged, I do believe a more traditional alternative should be offered with the newer system. Anyway, expect the post to change if we get more thoughts or claims I wish to address. Once again, I appreciate what Zuda/DC are trying to do, but their methods are leaving me very cold.
April 10th, 2008 at 6:43 am
Interesting!
April 10th, 2008 at 10:11 am
None of Zuda’s original reasons for the site design make any kind of sense. Zuda pushed its horizontal page format because theoretically it seems to fit a computer screen better. But then they go and force you to enlarge the pages with Flash and move it around if you want to actually read anything.
The fact that I can’t quickly browse through a Zuda comic like I can on all the other sites means that I won’t even bother looking at an entry that doesn’t grab me with the description and thumbnail — that’s been pretty much all of them lately. I might be missing a lot of good stuff, but Zuda makes it easy not to care.
April 10th, 2008 at 10:30 am
With ComicCon crunch time approaching, I don’t have a lot of time to respond to this, so please forgive me, in advance if this sounds terse.
I like that the comic is formatted for the screen - and across 4 computers, on two different connections, over two operating systems, Zuda screens load pretty fast for me in *Full Screen Mode*. I think the viewer give your far more options than many webcomic viewers - and allows you to see the strip in far greater detail than most webcomics. I prefer the ‘widescreen format’ over the Marvel and ComicMix formats, which require you to either scroll around the pages, breaking your reading flow, or use that stupid little ‘hand’ to simulate page turning. Man, I hate that hand. I really do.
For a Beta site, I think it’s great. So, it’s not perfect, and my user experience might differ from yours and that’s cool. I encourage DC’s foray into webcomics from an editoral standpoint - and from a business stand point. And i like that you can print out the pages and read them to boot. I think that’s pretty neat.
But, if you have suggestions or solutions for the Zuda viewer, send them to: feedback@zudacomics.com. Be sure to mention you are from The Scienteers.
April 10th, 2008 at 3:09 pm
Just to clear up a common misconception about the Zuda viewer…The “viewer” is not slow because it is Flash-based. It’s slow because the images that Zuda uses are HUGE. On average, they tend to be around 1.2 MB per page. That compares to Penny Arcade, which averages less than 100Kb. In other words, the Zuda resolution is around 10x larger than a standard “webcomic” (if Penny Arcade is considered standard).
Your point that they should maybe initially show a reduced version of each image is still valid. But the Zuda people assumed that readers would want the highest quality artwork possible. This may have been a bad assumption based in the printed comics world versus the webcomics world.
Anyway, just wanted to point that out. A lot of the other reviews of the Zuda viewer have made the same mistake. But the load times are a content issue, not a technical one. It would take just as long to load the images if they were simply jpgs dumped in an html file.
April 10th, 2008 at 4:28 pm
John: Zuda’s current design philosophy does make it really hard to get interested in what they have available. I agree.
David: You bring up some good points. And true, Zuda is still very much in process, but I still believe they should have offered a more traditional approach to maximize their audience rather than isolate the people who aren’t quite ready to make the jump. I do admire some of the features they have in place, but it’s not enough to make up for how cumbersome reading comics can be.
Jason: Yeah, I was aware it was the size of the images that created the loading problem, I just neglected to mention that in my post. Thanks for reminding me about that. I am totally cool with seeing the highest quality artwork (I do like to see that), but I think that should be a supplemental feature to traditional, standard resolution comics. Hell, even using a feature like those on Flickr (document size buttons) could be an excellent compromise. It’s just an issue of Zuda actually acknowledging and changing these things. I’ve not noticed this yet. If they have mentioned any future changes or tweaks to solve these problems. I’d be glad to take back some of my complaints.
April 10th, 2008 at 11:25 pm
your brain is sexy
/end epic contribution
April 10th, 2008 at 11:29 pm
It’s stupid to send a 1 meg file per page unless you intend the reader to print each and every page to view it at “highest quality.” The computer screen is only capable of showing a fraction of that quality. 72 “dpi” versus “300″ or higher for print media.
April 11th, 2008 at 4:39 am
It’s stupid to send a 1 meg file per page unless you intend the reader to print each and every page to view it at “highest quality.” The computer screen is only capable of showing a fraction of that quality. 72 “dpi” versus “300″ or higher for print media.
Well, you can print the pages out - and they do look pretty beautiful.
April 11th, 2008 at 5:35 am
[...] I would have just moved on with my life). With that in mind, I discovered a write-up over on The Scienteers website (via Journalista) where blogger hpkomic (don’t you just love the Internet?) lays into [...]
April 11th, 2008 at 7:45 am
It’s good to read this - I am put off visiting Zuda due to its terrible display system. Every now and then I’ll get interested in a link and go back to Zuda, only to leave within 10 minutes or so, frustrated. It takes soooo loooong to load in, and while things are loading, there’s nothing to look at - it all goes blurry. My lunch time is limited, Zuda takes too long.
April 11th, 2008 at 8:01 am
This was a good piece, and it reminded me I have never once had a reason to go to Zuda.
April 11th, 2008 at 8:19 am
HPK,
I agree with you on the Zuda flashviewer. I’ve been interested in looking at all kinds of new work on the web and I don’t have enough free time to check the strips there. I’ve been doing a strip in a similar format for a year plus now and I think you could read my whole archive in the time it takes to read ten Zuda pages.
web version- http://www.graphicsmash.com/comics/sidechicks.php
pseudo print version- http://www.wowio.com/users/product.asp?BookId=3494
The guy who is doing the ‘Super Seed’ strip advertised on my page and that was the only reason I had to go to their site. Unfortunately, due to the size of their patron, Zuda will not have to adapt to survive.
Bill
April 11th, 2008 at 10:57 am
[...] now, enjoy a random doodle, and be sure to read my rant on Zuda comics over at The [...]
April 11th, 2008 at 11:37 am
Thanks for this rant. I’ve always felt that Flash interfaces and other kludged-together contrivances to hinder image leeching are more trouble than they’re worth. I’m reading a comic strip, not playing a flight simulator. I don’t want to learn how to zoom and rotate and flip pages.
And why are the pages 1.2 MB? AND why are they depending on Flash’s god-awful raster image resizing? It’s a 200 DPI file that ends up looking like it’s 40 DPI.
It has all the earmarks of groupthink. No artist designed that viewer, and it’s a good barometer for why Zuda fails in general. They don’t care about the comics, they care about the medium, the interface, the connectivity, the metric.
April 11th, 2008 at 11:47 am
Came your way via Comics Reporter. Whether Zuda’s issues are technical or editorial, your experience was exactly my experience and is the exact reason I went to Zuda once and have never returned. I like wasting time on the internet as much as the next comics aficionado, but don’t need to have my time wasting time wasted.
April 11th, 2008 at 12:34 pm
It’s like listening to the typical puka-shell-wearing-jock-douchebag trying to explain why their favorite film is great. It’s embarrassing. “Hey Brah, The Fast and the Furious 3 is fukkin’ tight. That shit was so cash.”
HPK, have I ever told you how awesome you are? The answer is very awesome. Great article and really insightful views. Zuda is a corporate gimmick disguised with feeble imitations of the very do-it-yourself ideals that made webcomics great in the first place, and their infrastructure is a very large part of their problem. I’m glad to see most of the webcomic community is sharp enough to pick up on this.
Gallagher: I guess the hi-res pages look better if you print them out. But then, besides wasting paper and ink, wouldn’t that be entirely contrary to the fundamental concept of webcomics?
April 11th, 2008 at 1:21 pm
“Well, you can print the pages out - and they do look pretty beautiful.”
David,
Printing pages from the Zuda viewer is a real bear. I wanted to read High Moon and Bayou, both of which I still plan on buying in print form, btw. Anyway, there’s no easy way to print out each page. You have to load each page in that wretched Flash viewer and print out each page that way. On the same day I was trying to print out a Zuda comic, I also printed out Warren Ellis’s Freak Angels. Freak Angels was easy as pie to print out. I just opened each page in a new window and did a batch print. For the Zuda comics, I was going to have to load each page individually in the Flash viewer, which is just silly.
I’m sticking by my prediction of Zuda being over by the end of the year.
Speaking of the demise of Zuda, the page view numbers are a lie. Each time a page is reloaded, the count increases by one. So, those aren’t unique page views they’re posting, it’s each time a page is reloaded. Even going by Alexa, the page views are horrendous.
Now, the xkcd guy? He’s killing webpage views! Damn, is that guy ever popular.
April 11th, 2008 at 1:35 pm
>>It has all the earmarks of groupthink. No artist designed that viewer, and it’s a good barometer for why Zuda fails in general. They don’t care about the comics, they care about the medium, the interface, the connectivity, the metric.>>
I’m glad you can read minds, Kris. I think that’s rather shortsighted insight on your part. You don’t know these people or their motivations. The last time I was hanging out with the Zuda crew, I don’t remember them rubbing their greedy hands togther talking about metrics - we we talking about comics and content!
I like the work you do, but I think you are being a little wrong headed about this part of the issue.
>> I’m reading a comic strip, not playing a flight simulator. I don’t want to learn how to zoom and rotate and flip pages.>>
Having worked on the Marvel Digital Comics reader back in the 90s, and having a pretty solid grasp on webcomic readers. In my decade of experience with webcomics, I feel Zuda’s player is the best. It doesn’t have ’smart panels’ or that damn page-turning hand. The site isn’t cluttered with Paypal buttons, Google Ads or Project Wonferful ads. Full screen mode is fantastic and I don’t have to scroll down. I’m going though your site as I type this Kris, and it doesn’t really load all that fast for me when I’m going through the archive. I’m a fan of your work on Webcomics Weekly, have been following your strip, and have a copy of HOW TO MAKE WEBCOMICS, but I don’t think anyone has the type of viewer that works for all people. I think the Zuda interface is one of the better ones, with far more potential that the DrunkDuck, ComicMix, Marvel DCU, or that CrossGen format from years ago. If I didn’t like it, I wouldn’t have bought my project to Zuda. I like what they are doing.
I don’t see this same level of vitriol with Marvel’s viewer - or any other viewer for that matter. And I find several of these viewers fail on such a dramatic level that it’s not even tolerable. But rather than be snotty or snide about it, I go the extra effort and send feedback to the people responsible for those browsers. Zuda’s e-mail address is plainly visible: feedback@zudacomics.com
>>Gallaher: I guess the hi-res pages look better if you print them out. But then, besides wasting paper and ink, wouldn’t that be entirely contrary to the fundamental concept of webcomics? >>
You could ask the same thing of Scott Kurtz, who has how many printed collections of PVP available right now?
When I worked in an office, people where still printing out strips of Foxtrot, Peanuts, Cathy, and Dilbert from the web and putting them in their cubicles and on their office doors.
Go figure.
April 11th, 2008 at 1:47 pm
Wow, this feels like a real blog now!
David Gallaher: As for comparisons to other systems. I’ll go ahead and do a write-up comparing all the existing distribution methods for webcomics. You’ve inspired another post out of me, bravo sir. I also sent Zuda an e-mail with suggestions. I’ll likely post that eventually with any sort of reply I get.
I don’t mind Zuda putting emphasis on print-viewing myself, but I am still very, very unhappy with being forced to use a flash-applet that feels bulky and unfinished. If they were to offer a system similar to what I (and many others) are used to, as well as their flash-method, then there’d be fewer complaints on my end.
Once again, I hope they read my message and assuage these concerns.
April 11th, 2008 at 1:52 pm
David,
Whoa. Kris’s site is absolutely demolishing Zuda in page views. As Jim Rome would say, “Scoreboard!”
“I’m a fan of your work on Webcomics Weekly, have been following your strip, and have a copy of HOW TO MAKE WEBCOMICS, but I don’t think anyone has the type of viewer that works for all people. I think the Zuda interface is one of the better ones, with far more potential that the DrunkDuck, ComicMix, Marvel DCU, or that CrossGen format from years ago.”
That’s bringing a straw man into the discussion. You switch mid-paragraph from talking about Kris’s work to web viewers used by other, far less successful, webcomic sites. (Well, Drunk Duck is trumping Kris’s viewer numbers, but xkcd is making a mockery of Drunk Duck.)
There’s nothing wrong with printing webcomics out, but by their very nature, they shouldn’t be difficult to read on the web. Zuda comics are a very real challenge to read on the web, to say nothing of how cumbersome they are to print out. I’ve printed out comics from Perry Bible Fellowship and xkcd and put them on my cubicle walls. It was a *lot* easier than printing out Zuda comic pages.
April 11th, 2008 at 1:54 pm
hp,
“I also sent Zuda an e-mail with suggestions. I’ll likely post that eventually with any sort of reply I get.”
Good luck there. Zuda doesn’t respond to *anything*. I’ve sent them a few e-mails asking for easier to read pages and easier printing and I’ve got nothing. I hope you get something back!
April 11th, 2008 at 2:07 pm
Speaking of the demise of Zuda, the page view numbers are a lie. Each time a page is reloaded, the count increases by one. So, those aren’t unique page views they’re posting, it’s each time a page is reloaded. Even going by Alexa, the page views are horrendous.
It says views, not unique views. It’s no different than a stat counter on websites.
Webcomics take a while to build steam. xkcd wasn’t huge overnight sucess, nor was PVP, heck, Scott has whole pages dedicated to that in HOW TO MAKE WEBCOMICS. It’s a long-term model of thinking. You don’t put your webcomic up and suddenly become an overnight sensation. My friend Danielle Corsetto had been doing comics for many years before she recieved the level of attention that she got for GIRLS WITH SLINGSHOTS and even that wasn’t an overnight hit. She has been going to shows, doing conventions, and building her following for quite a while.
April 11th, 2008 at 2:15 pm
Whoa. Kris’s site is absolutely demolishing Zuda in page views. As Jim Rome would say, “Scoreboard!”
Kris’ site has also been around since 2005, I believe. So … that’s 3 years vs. 5 months?
That’s like comparing apples to spaghetti
April 11th, 2008 at 2:18 pm
>>That’s bringing a straw man into the discussion. You switch mid-paragraph from talking about Kris’s work to web viewers used by other, far less successful, webcomic sites. (Well, Drunk Duck is trumping Kris’s viewer numbers, but xkcd is making a mockery of Drunk Duck.)>>
I forgot a sentence in there. I was typing too quickly.
April 11th, 2008 at 2:26 pm
Well, listen, I wasn’t trying to say that everyone at Zuda was a soulless, art-hating robot. But whatever team decided that the Flash interface was the way to go, I think, must have been disconnected from the art in some way. How many marketing/security decisions are made in creative companies that actually hinder creativity? Maybe the memo said that they wanted to shift webcomics into a full-screen affair and be progressive, but I think it’s too early in the internet’s history to start making everything “experiential.”
I don’t like viewers in general because they are similar to copy protection — they’re there to stop the thieves, but in the end, they inconvenience the good customers, and only present a moment’s difficulty to the thief, who will find a workaround very shortly (as long as there are Flash decompilers this will be the case for viewers). There really isn’t a reason for a Zuda viewer. If I want to print something out for my cube, I will suffer the 72 DPI version. Right now, I’m looking at it on a screen, and that’s where the attention to innovation should be anchored. By viewer-to-print-it logic, they should be 600 DPI images, in case I want to print the comic out on a shirt.
Furthermore the prevention of off-site linking, or the requirement of going through a unique user interface to do so, probably does more harm to virally marketing the work than it does to protect the work. I guess I never understood why companies want to fight the visual language users have gotten used to for the last twenty years. When I browse the internet, my hand is on my mouse. I don’t want to hit X or F7 or arrow keys. And I’m a young guy, too! I know I sound like a crotchety old guy afraid of the future, but I don’t feel like we’ve seen Flash viewers do anything but get in the way.
I’ve lost track of what Zuda is and isn’t, in spite of my anti-Zuda rhetoric when it was launching. Whatever Zuda may be, I think they need to rethink the viewer (or having one in the first place).
April 11th, 2008 at 2:28 pm
Also, guys, leave traffic out, it doesn’t matter. People are not running screaming from Zuda and arriving at Starslip because of a viewer. But if they want to, I’ll take them.
April 11th, 2008 at 2:34 pm
I suggest that people e-mail Zuda with their complaints. David says they’re quite keen on feedback. So how many of us have actually sent them a message?
Maybe a few well-written e-mails can get them to reconsider their approach?
April 11th, 2008 at 4:41 pm
hp,
“I suggest that people e-mail Zuda with their complaints. David says they’re quite keen on feedback. So how many of us have actually sent them a message?
Maybe a few well-written e-mails can get them to reconsider their approach?”
I wrote to the feedback link on Zuda a few times when the site first launched. I was polite and simply asked that an option for .jpg format be added in. Those e-mails were ignored. I asked Kwanza on the blog comments and was met with snark. I’m done with them.
I’ll buy Bayou and High Noon in print form because I think they’re good works that deserve financial support, and despite my giving David a hard time, I think he seems like a good guy. But I’m not going to that site anymore, it’s too much of a headache.
April 11th, 2008 at 4:47 pm
David,
“I forgot a sentence in there. I was typing too quickly.”
Fair enough. I do stuff like that often. Just today I sent an e-mail to someone with only half a sentence! lol
“Kris’ site has also been around since 2005, I believe. So … that’s 3 years vs. 5 months?
That’s like comparing apples to spaghetti”
Dammit! You’re right!
BTW - Don’t get me wrong. Just because I’m predicting demise for Zuda doesn’t mean I’m actively rooting against it. I’m just a moron with an internet connection and a day job that has no intersection with comics or the internet. So, my prediction means between jack and squat. That being said, I shouldn’t go around saying it because it could hurt your feelings. I’m sorry for saying that.
Regarding the webviews, I’ll concede the relevance of that point too. I think my logic was thar if we’re talking about how user-friendly a browser is, then the way I would think to measure it quantitatively is to look at the page views. It’s the engineer in me!
And using the word “lie” was too strong. I’m sorry there, too!
April 11th, 2008 at 5:14 pm
I wrote to the feedback link on Zuda a few times when the site first launched. I was polite and simply asked that an option for .jpg format be added in. Those e-mails were ignored. I asked Kwanza on the blog comments and was met with snark. I’m done with them.
But to address your comment about Feedback directly, take a look at this link, in specific this part:
http://www.zudacomics.com/node/246
Q: Why doesn’t Zuda reply to e-mail sent through the FEEDBACK link?
A: Well, honestly, the feedback link was never intended to create an ongoing dialogue between users and staff. That’s what the blog is for.
The feedback is a way for users to inform us about bugs and fixes, suggestions and advice. We read it daily. In the case where a specific user has a unique problem that requires Zuda to get in touch with them then we can (and do) contact that user directly.
Write to Zuda. State who you are and your experience. Offer them suggestions. Be polite. But, they are open to feedback about their system and they encourage discussion (and noted by their recent 20-Page thread about the Ideal Competition: http://tinyurl.com/4hqodc). You could also post on the Zuda message board to really get the dialogue going. Heck, maybe you can even score an interview with them for the site.
April 11th, 2008 at 6:02 pm
Good and refreshingly intelligent rant. I don’t understand how making things less user friendly is supposed to win Zuda Comics more readers. I think DC’s rationale boils down to content protection, and given the legal language the print comics are tied up in, they’re trapped in their own web of caution.
(From a purely business perspective, it reminds me of how old airliners have been trying for years to compete with an upstart like Southwest and failing under their own bureaucracies.)
I loved the puka-shell-wearing-jock-douchebag analogy, by the way. That pretty much sums up the entirety marketing as concisely as possible.
April 12th, 2008 at 9:35 am
David,
“Write to Zuda. State who you are and your experience. Offer them suggestions. Be polite. But, they are open to feedback about their system and they encourage discussion (and noted by their recent 20-Page thread about the Ideal Competition: http://tinyurl.com/4hqodc). You could also post on the Zuda message board to really get the dialogue going. Heck, maybe you can even score an interview with them for the site.”
Thank you, but no thank you, Kwanza already told me, and I’m going to paraphrase here, that they have no intent of changing their user interface and if I didn’t like that, I could go somewhere else for on-line comics. So, I did,
My whole beef with Zuda is that ever for comics I *want* to read, the format prevents me from doing that. I think they’re willingness to put comics on their sites from all different genres and styles is very nice, but I’d also like it if there was some option to read the comics that works with my reading habits. But oh well, I can just as easily wait for the collections to be printed and buy those. So, either way, I guess it works for me!
April 13th, 2008 at 8:13 am
I like the Zuda interface.
It’s not complex. I go to fullscreen mode; I go to the first page; I click on the page to advance to the next page. Since it’s shaped like my screen, I never need to scroll down. What’s complex about that?
Frankly, it’s a simpler and more transparent reading experience than the standard webcomic site model. The click-on-the-page-to-advance function should be the norm for all webcomics. Especially comics that are standard-comic-book-page shaped, where you have to hunt around with the mouse for the teeny, tiny “next page” link after reading every page. (Comics where you don’t have to scroll are easier, since you can just keep your mouse pointer on the right spot and not move it).
The reason the standard webcomic site model (which I use on my own webcomic) predominates isn’t that it provides the most transparent reading experience. It’s that it’s not very difficult to install, even for people who don’t know a ton about web programming; and that it provides a model that ads can be added to easily. But if neither of these factors are an issue, a comic that fills the whole screen, and which you can read by clicking anywhere on the screen to advance, is better.
April 17th, 2008 at 2:50 pm
Good article. You actually brought up some good points about Zuda that I hadn’t seen before. From my point of view as a web developer, the true problem with flash is that search engines can’t read them or the content inside of them. They try, but it doesn’t work.
I love flash, I just try to find a javascript, DHTML or PHP solution to a problem before I use it on a site.
April 22nd, 2008 at 6:57 am
It still says ‘beta’ on the page, kids.
April 22nd, 2008 at 10:23 am
Beta or not, there are serious things which need to be addressed. If it’s just a beta, then hopefully that means the finished product will be just fine.
As of now no? Not even remotely useful for me. I would love to read the comics there, but I really can’t.
April 22nd, 2008 at 1:29 pm
I’m still waiting for the OTHER comic viewer reviews
April 22nd, 2008 at 5:40 pm
In my defense. I got burned pretty badly with this system, so I’m hesitant to try spending time on any others. I’ll try having some impressions up by the end of the week.
April 22nd, 2008 at 6:57 pm
In my defense. I got burned pretty badly with this system, so I’m hesitant to try spending time on any others. I’ll try having some impressions up by the end of the week.
Zuda has been under a lot of scrutiny, because it is an easy target. Marvel has a player, ComicMix has a player, as do several other sites (like those HEROES webcomics - talk about terrible) … and I think it is shortsighted to not take that all into consideration. I mean, I’m at a real loss here to understand how you got burned by Zuda, burned out on writing the review sure, I can see how that is exhausting, but burned by Zuda? Really? That really just doesn’t make sense to me. It’s so simple to use. And loads pretty darn fast for me in full screen mode - and it’s formatted to my screen. Maybe I’ll write a little retort and do a side-by-side player comparison of several different players, but others have done it for me, and I tend to agree.
Here’s a nice write up, if you haven’t read it yet:
http://weblogs.variety.com/bags_and_boards/2007/11/if-there-were-t.html
And another far more comprehensive:
http://webcomics.com/full_blog_story.php?id=109 (Part 1)
http://webcomics.com/full_blog_story.php?id=110 (Part 2)
As far as the use of Flash, take a look at this interview:
http://www.comixology.com/interviews/2/Interview-with-Ron-Perazza-of-Zuda-Comics
Cmxlgy: From a web technology point of view, using Adobe Flash to deliver your content is contradictory to other webcomic websites that use more traditional web-based technologies. What was the rationale for using Flash over JavaScript and HTML?
RP: I don’t think that a technology alone can be considered good or bad. For example, content aside, simply using a JPEG doesn’t necessarily make for a better or worse reading experience. For us, full screen mode was important - we wanted to offer readers the ability to shut out the whole site and just read comics, if they wanted to. We also wanted readers to be able to zoom in and out at their whim in order to check out the detail on a specific panel or area of the comic. There are other features to the viewer, but the point is that we made a technology decision based on functions we thought were important to the reading and evaluation experience. I understand some people are a bit ruffled about linking – one of the most obvious pro JPEG/HTML arguments. However, this too is entirely possible in Flash and has always been part of our development plan. Users can already link to the comic directly (for example, zudacomics.com/bayou). Also, using Deep Linking, users will also be able to link to a specific page within a comic.
And honestly, in this day and age, why would anybody be using InternetExplorer for anything where there is Flock and Firefox? I mean, seriously. And maybe we should time how fast it takes for me to load a Zuda screen in FullScreen Mode vs loading a screen from StarslipCrisis, becuase I can tell you right now which one loads faster for me … and it’s all Zuda baby. Are you still on dial-up?
Certainly, I’m not trying to be antagonistic, but when you start an article with a sensationalist headline, like ‘Zuda Sucks’ there are bound to be a few ruffled feathers. I like what Zuda is doing, or else I wouldn’t have sent HIGH MOON to them.
You are welcome to e-mail me privately too, I’ll send you my phone number and we can talk about this then too.
May 30th, 2008 at 11:34 am
[...] I found myself agreeing with a recently posted rant on the Scienteers website. Zuda Comics is slow. Really. Goddamn. Slow. I run on a home wireless system that runs off a cable [...]