Hiatus

We may go on hiatus, just for a little while. Could be as late as Monday. Have fun with the free form comments in the meantime. I expect to continue to update the Twitter feed.

The Next Ten Days: twitter beats blog

With the wedding ten days away, I expect my substantial contributions to be as the have been the past few days: light to non-existent. Due to Free Form Comments and diligent guest bloggers -- including Jill Duffy Girl Reporter who WILL be doing more than one post on Twin Peaks, as requested -- we should still be updated around here on all the weekdays at least. 

If you are looking to keep track of me I seem to be becoming deeply addicted to Twitter, which, of course, you can see from the top part of the toolbar on this page. Blogging is amazing because it gives a place to a lot of remarkable things that would be unworthy of a print publication; twitter is amazing because it gives a place to a lot of remarkable things that would be unworthy of a blog post. Micro-blogging, I think is the term. When I blog I feel like I am writing an email about the latest comic book or whatever. When I twitter I feel like I am just talking as I would to someone I bumped into on the street. I can do it from my cell phone, which I love, and which is very handy now. 

Flickr is on my November Things to Do list. 

Blog Sidebar Update

In an effort to improve things around here I have been messing with the sidebar. It is going to continue to change over the next couple of days as I try different gadgets and different arrangements of links and so on.

This is an excellent way to alert me to a home page you want me to link to or a blog that you would like made part of my new, advanced blogroll (having a blog roll arranged by most recent update was the main reason I made all these changes, which, because this blog was already customized, took longer than it should have).

I am also looking for suggestions, if there is a gadget you would like to see on the sidebar. I already tried a youtube one that was too ugly and a weather one that did not work.

UPDATE: thanks to Sara for helping with the colors.

UPDATE 2: Here are the changes:

Twitter Updates

My published work is now shown in the form of an Amazon widget

Jason and Scott have bios

Best of the Blog has been updated

It used to be that only 20 posts would be posted when you clicked on a label, with no link to older posts with the same label. Now we have that option, so series of posts that had to be linked in parts (e.g. New X-Men part one), now only appear with one link.

Best of the blog: comment threads has been updated, but I think I need to take another look at that.

The blog list has been updated, and is now in the order of most recently updated, and includes clips of the newest posts.

AV Club and Newsarama RSS feeds have been added.

I have a think called followers now. It sounds kind of cultish, but there you go.

RSS Feeds have been updated

The Blog archive is more fancy, and now unfolds like a mac finder window and includes stats on how often we publish around here (and it is A LOT)

UPDATE: Also I added a digg window

UPDATE: I got rid of the weekly posts (since you will always be able to find a comics out or free form label on the main page)

I added a Rottentomato widget

I folded the favorites list into Best of the Blog and now there is one link to the whole favorites list rather then separate links to comics and tv and so on.

My posting this week has been light...

... but I have three Maxx posts in the can for next week. 

Hiatus

Sorry about disappearing without warning for three days. I kept thinking I would blog something, then kept realizing it was a holiday weekend, and I also had a hard time getting to my computer.

Missing How to Read Superhero Comics and Why Pages

I know there were copies of my first book that ran with a printing error in which a dozen pages were blank. I have gotten two emails about it, and in the past just photocopied and mailed the pages to folks who contacted me. I got another one this week and realized -- scanner! So here are the missing pages, if you have a copy with missing pages. I assume regular readers would have mentioned this before, but I want to keep this page on the blog so I can easily link to it, if someone does go looking for it. Click the thumbnails for larger, readable versions.

Blog Format Questions

A few housekeeping questions, designed to make your experience here better. Remember that you can always answer anonymously (though there is surely no reason to).

Is the toolbar too busy? I was thinking about taking some of the categories of links, like Best of the Blog for example, and creating a single button that would take you to a page which would display all the links in that category.

Is the post frequency good? Should we only post weekdays? I put up posts weekends because I always want to read stuff on the weekends and places like Slate never have anything up then. But our numbers dip on the weekends -- Favorite Books, for example, was a post that got no attention because of when I put it up. Would as many as three posts a day be better if we had no posts on weekends?

Does Free Form Comments need to go up twice a week because it gets buried so fast? I feel like the speed at which good posts get buried is maybe a problem, but then I think frequent posts is a really good thing too.

Other suggestions?

Links Fixed

Eamonn Clarke let me know the Comic Geek Speak links on the toolbar went bad after they updated their site. Those links have now been fixed.

This is Post #600

We are also only a little more than a week away from the two year anniversary of my first post. Thanks to all my readers, commenters, and guest bloggers, especially Jason Powell, who, including draft blogs, has us halfway to 700.

I Am on the Facebook Now

I am not sure how much I will be using it, but it is another way to get a hold of me.

Our Weekly Format

The format around here has gotten very confused in the last few weeks. It started back when I wanted to switch out Free Form Comments for Comics Out posts. When the holidays hit I got the idea that Free Form Comments should come out on the day comics come out and that the Comics Out posts should go two days later -- New Year's and Christmas moved comics out day twice in two weeks, and I forgot about the commonplace book, and I had guest bloggers to post, and I did not want to post anything substantial, especially the work of guests, on a day when no one would be reading, like Christmas day, or New Years eve. Next Week I hope to resume our regular schedule of

Monday: Post
Tuesday: Commonplace Book
Wednesday: Free Form Comments
Thursday: Post
Friday: Comics Out
Saturday: Claremont's X-Men series
Sunday: Comment Pull Quote

with a guest blogger posts appearing on days when the other post is not too big, or when there is no other post. I do not want to post more than twice a day right now.

Site Update

I have added a few more links to the tool bar on the right, including a link to THE BEAT (how did I forget that?). I have moved my Will and Grace post to the Best of the Blog because I think the point is surprising enough to justify it being there. I have also added our conversation that started with the Dark Knight Trailer because, well, it got to 51 posts.

Site traffic usually goes down during the holidays. I am still going to post regularly through New Years, but it is likely to be more unsubstantial stuff, links and stray observations, and questions and whatnot. Don't expect a 3000 word essay on the Black Dossier.

If you ever wanted to see anything on the blog template change, now is the time to say it, because I now have time to work on it -- broken links, you want to be on the blog-roll, you think a conversation that got lost should be in the conversation links, you think I should be wearing a suit in that photo, whatever.

New Publication Link: House Unauthorized

The tool bar on the right has been updated with an image of BenBella's new essay collection on House, which contains a short essay by me on Hugh Laurie's career, and how his odd history as a comedy buffoon informs his portrayal of Gregory House in surprising ways.

Unlike all the other images of books in the right tool bar, I put this one up myself instead of having Sara do it. As you can see, as a result, one of these things is not like the other. The point is -- that's my fault and not Sara's.

The Best of the Blog: Comment Threads

One of the things that makes this blog stand out is the discussions. Good comment threads became comment pull quotes which became guest blogging. But I did not want to forget about those original comment threads. So, after scanning through the comments to nearly 500 posts, I have added links to the best comment threads we have done around here. Many of these would have been forgotten about -- buried in a distant Comics Out post, or a Free Form Comment post, forever. If you think of any more, let me know.

I would like to say that this is the last time I am going to add something to the tool-bar on the right, but I am sure that I will think of something else soon.

Geoff Klock on Comic Geek Speak Episode 319

Comic Geek Speak episode 319 is up today and I do a short bit. This episode they are just catching up with past guests. If you are a regular reader here there is nothing discussed in the interview you do not already know: I have a D.Phil. now, I have a stock of jokes about being a Doctor (Dokkktor Klockhammer, Dr. Dre., Dr. Doom, Doctor Perfect), I like Umbrella Academy and Sugar Shock, I have been updating the blog like crazy and we now have lots of useful links and guest bloggers. Maybe the only thing I discussed there that I have not covered here is how much I love the Venture Bros., but I am planning on doing a blog on that soon in any case. Anyway, if you want to check it out, Click Here for CGS episode 319.

Guest Blogger of the Future: Jim Roeg of Double Articulation

Jim Roeg writes a great blog over at Double Articulation. If you want an example of him being one of the smartest comics bloggers on the internet, I recommend his post on All Star Superman #1. Roeg has recently become a first time father, and that, in combination with other things, has caused him to neglect his own blog for a while -- he just posted again a few days ago after a four month hiatus, talking about why he has not blogged in a while. This is what he wrote:

As for Double Articulation? I don’t know. I’m not one to give up on things once I’ve started, but the days of painfully long and tortured pseudo-academic essays in which I project my fantasy life and romantic values onto contemporary comics and Marvel of the seventies are probably over—at least for the time being. If you’re still out there, dear readers, you can expect to see some changes around here. What those changes will entail, well... We’ll both find out soon.

So naturally I wrote him, and said if he is not sure about the future of his blog and if he thinks he may only be going at it irregularly, he should write for us over here. He agreed. I do not know when we will be getting our first Jim Roeg post -- there is a reason he backed off of his own blog. But I look forward to his contributions to the little project I am putting together here.

Picture Update

The picture in the right toolbar has been updated because I looked like I was balding in the earlier photo. Wow am I vain.

Blog Updates

I am pretty sure that my update of the toolbar on the right is done. It now features a new picture of me, links and images of all my print publications, the link to my updated MySpace page, and links to the best of the blog -- 18 of my favorite posts on poetry, books, children's literature, music, movies and comics as well as links to my extensive issue by issue treatments of Grant Morrison's New X-Men and Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men. I have created links to the works of guest bloggers -- that will be updated every time a submission to this site is accepted; if you want to know what I am looking for I have created a link to the initial post asking for guest bloggers. (Free Form Comments on Fridays will also feature specific requests for submissions). I have created links to my other online work; if the original site has gone down, I have cut and pasted from my final draft on Word into blogger. I have provided links to all my interviews on websites and on Comic Geek Speak, for your listening entertainment. Finally, the links and blogroll have been updated.

The Best of the Blog

A new feature has been added to the toolbar on the right -- links to the best posts I have done (in my opinion), including easy links to the issue-by-issue looks at Morrison's New X-Men and Whedon's Astonishing X-Men.

Let me know if you think it should be edited in any way: perhaps you have a favorite post that is not there, or you think I have overrated one of my old posts.

If guest bloggers become regulars, I will give them their own links on the right.

Geoff Klock's Blog: Expansion Pack

The comments threads on this blog are often great, especially in the Free Form Comments. We have a lot of smart, cool people around here. A few weeks ago I realized that these comments were being missed by incurious readers, and so I decided to pull one good one out a week and give it its own post, a Comment Pull Quote post. Now I want to expand again.

I want to start publishing blog posts by other people here. You can find my email address in my blogger profile page (click the link at the top right of the blog). If you think your Free Form Comment would be better as a post -- email it to me. If you have an idea for a post for this blog, email it to me -- an idea or a draft. You can also put your pitches in Free Form Comments, if you want your pitches public. On every post you write that is published here your name will be prominently displayed in the title and a tag with your name on it will be put at the bottom. Neil Shyminsky commented on a Slate article a few weeks ago. Under the new system that post would have been called "Neil Shyminsky: Slate on 300" and his writing would be the post, rather than merely a comment.

Why would you publish a post on a blog with my name at the top when you can open or create your own blogger account in seconds?

If you want to start a blog but you don't want to deal with the responsibility of updating frequently -- you can pitch blog posts here whenever you like, with no pressure to do any more. If you update your blog irregularly or rarely, your audience, who don't know to check in, may be small: consider sending your post to me for publication here; I update almost every day and you may find more readers through me. If lots of people do this we may get a lot more readers. If you are a regular commenter here, people may already know you, and like you. If you are advertising your blog on Free Form Comments, you are only reaching those readers who bother to check the comments. If you publish here you will reach the "lurkers." Keep in mind, there is no reason you cannot publish a post here, and immediately post it again on your blog. This is not a "real" magazine, and I do not "own" your posts or anything. Consider publishing an exciting first paragraph here that links to the rest of your post, which continues on your blog. Stephen Frug -- your blog could go all-politics if you published your comics and book reviews here. Jason Powell -- this is where you can do your Clairmont X-Men issue by issue analysis.

Posts have to be short (no longer than my longest blog post) and I would prefer posts that are focused on single, small things, such as individual songs. If you have read my posts you know what I am looking for -- but I would like this blog to expand into subjects outside my wheelhouse, such as the evaluation ofvideogames . What I am looking for is short appreciations of high culture and popular culture -- that means no politics unless it is part of a larger critical/evaluative point. Theory also, must be intrinsically interesting (e.g. Zizek ) or help in aesthetic evaluation. No jargon unless it is clearly explained. Reviews of all kinds -- TV, Movies, Comics, Albums, Games, Theatre -- are always welcome. I am not looking to publish creative writing. I am willing to consider pod-casts and video-blogging.

I will be the editor-in-chief. I may send your post back to you with revisions. I may reject posts if I think they are not appropriate. I think I would like to write short -- 3 to 5 sentence -- introductions to any post not by me, but we will see.

I do not know what this will actually be like. It may be that occasionally there is a post here by someone other than me. It may get to the point where a lot of the posts here are not by me. This may turn out to be too much trouble for me and I will have to drop it. It may turn out that we have far too many posts, and publishing them would exhaust readers. There is no way to know how many people will beinterested in writing here, or how many I will want to post.

I plan to continue publishing here as usual. These new posts would be posts in addition to my usual 5-7 a week.

Your reactions to this idea to expand are important, so if you have something to say, please put it in the comments.