this is what concerns me

mid-market has teeth

Susie — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:53:25 +0000

My story is finally finished! You can check it out at Spot.Us. 4,000 words!? In its hugeness, it looks like the graphic might be breaking their site though — if you can’t get it to work, try this mirror. And let me know what you think! The project is finished, but we’re still looking for the last $70 in funding if we can get it — donations will be open through Friday.

video killed the redneck star

Susie — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 20:59:02 +0000

I heard this Craig Morgan song for the first time a couple weeks ago in the car; I guess it’s a sensation. I played it for my roommate and she said it reminded her of this MGMT video. So, well, here you go — mashed for your pleasure. YouTube killed it immediately but maybe it will live on at Vimeo.

Bonfire mash-up — so appropriate from susie cagle on Vimeo.

mid-market update: almost fully funded

Susie — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 21:41:40 +0000

So far I’ve raised $600 for my story about Mid-Market blight and troubles, past and future, at California crowdfunding journalism site Spot.Us. I’m humbled and amazed by the generosity of my friends and strangers — and I’m surprised by the general interest in this topic. The story will be finished in two weeks (hey Newsom, call me back!) but in the meanwhile, I’ve been posting brief updates on the Spot.Us site. My most recent one concerned this little infographic seen here.

When McSweeney’s hired me to write this story for the Panorama, they also hired graphic designer Laura Foxgrover to work up an accompanying infographic that would include my reporting on the individual empty buildings plus a map of the Mid-Market area. I’m working with Laura to update the graphic for Spot.Us and I’ll be paying her 15% of whatever I raise. This is just an unreadable preview of Laura’s most recent draft — we’ll be adding a bunch more info to the map by the time the piece is out.

how low can you get?

Susie — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 06:21:44 +0000

I’ve been up to a lot in the last month or so, but none of it is currently up to blog snuff, so please accept this Tom Brosseau video in the meanwhile…

new gallons

Susie — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 00:37:16 +0000

I finally got my shit together and printed up a new batch of these suckers. These ones have slightly less awesome cover paper, and are a new black and white line art design instead of the old color painting… HOWEVER: I am hand-painting all of them. Still $5! And you can request colors on your order! Apologies for those of you who’ve ordered them in the last couple weeks — yours will be going out ASAP.

my new favorite thing

Susie — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 17:54:15 +0000

accolades? accolades!

Susie — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 19:38:13 +0000

Indie comics favorite John Isaacson and Henry Chamberlain at Newsarama both listed Nine Gallons on their Tops of 2009 lists. Chamberlain even called it “brilliant”! Whaaaat!?

nine gallons update

Susie — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 04:35:50 +0000

I think I’ll publish a second issue even though I swore I’d never do another legal-sized comic again (those things are expensive). This is causing some awkward rewriting but I think it’ll be worth it, as it’s more of the ethics and conflict chapter after the introduction. However! There won’t be a third issue, mainly because the first and second issues are taking a lot of things out of order and a third issue wouldn’t make any sense. Pro tip: don’t ever write slice-of-life comics with delicate, overwrought bell-curve narratives that sorely depend on delicate, overwrought senses of timing without clearly rendered chapter endings and then try to chop them up into self-publishable chunks. (Chances are you haven’t and won’t have this problem but just thought I’d share.) So I’m aiming for #2 to be done for Stumptown if not the Anarchist Book Fair in March! And if no one wants to publish the book then the continuation of the Great Recession into 2010 will have to be enough real-life first-person awful shit for you, I’m sorry.

Also, if you’ve ordered a copy of #1, I’m reprinting a new crop with a new hand-watercolored cover next week, along with a new This is What Concerns Me. I know I’ve been leading you on with promises of new comics these past weeks but they’re happening, they just haven’t become acquainted with my scanner just yet… Yet!

advice: give me some?

Susie — Sat, 26 Dec 2009 17:27:25 +0000

So I didn’t get the Xeric grant to publish Nine Gallons as the 96-page paperback book I’d like to. I’m not sure how I feel about the Kickstarter business plan (especially since I’ve already got a Spot.Us project in the works, and one should only have so many hats on the ground) — so I was wondering what my readers might suggest for a next step? Would you like to see the second chapter of Nine Gallons as a minicomic? (The story is kind of disjointed so this would require some storytelling finesse that I’m not sure I have.) Would you prefer to see the whole book by the end of 2010? And if the latter, um, know anyone with about $2500 they’d be willing to part with to publish it?

This seems like kind of an odd public request, but this book takes on some pretty odd subject matter, and I’d really like to get some feedback as to how salable it may or may not be. And FYI, spoiler alert, I don’t draw myself nude or in underwear at any point in the rest of the book, so take that fact into consideration in your answer.

And then I shall reward you all with some new downer This is What Concerns Mes!

panorama by the comments

Susie — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 01:33:41 +0000

A week and a half after its debut and the glittery halo has faded a bit on McSweeney’s 320-page full-color San Francisco Panorama newspaper. While most have been quick to point out how lush and lovely the thing is, Choire Sicha at the Awl breaks down the actual logistics of such a project — and with some devastating results on the financial (read: reality) side of things. Basically? Even when charging $16 and paying writers 12 cents per word or less, McSweeney’s more or less breaks even on the paper, in the event that they pay their in-house staffers less than minimum wage. Still, and this is what continues to baffle me, the common reaction is: So? It’s pretty! (The color infographics, that is — not the future of journalism, ha-ha!) So thank god for this commenter.

Sure, when you gather a bunch of amazingly talented people and don’t pay them and charge a premium price you will have a great product. Don’t you think we already know that? The challenge is to produce a product with a variety of talent and employees that need to eat. And need medical insurance. Also, you have to get advertisers. And subscriptions.

Dave KNOWS that it is almost impossible and that’s why he ain’t gonna do it. It’s easy to have all the most talented people working for no pay and then saying “look at me look what we made why can’t you be like us?”

Yes, why can’t you? Where’s your trust fund, little reporter?

For their part, D. Eggers’ public comments lately have been considerably more humble than they were back in June, when he announced the project. Plus I think it’s interesting that McSweeney’s started off calling the Panorama a “prototype” and lately refers to it more often as an “experiment” — more forgiving of these sorts of problems, and with no expectation of a follow-up.