But anyway, I wanted to post my findings on this J.Stache animation. J.G. Moore may have been right when he said the future is in limited animated content.

The animators of the J.Stache show were at MetroCon this past weekend and this show was FUNNY. Very different. Not standard crappy Adult Swim animation either (although it could flourish on that network). It had John Oates playing himself, and he was a good voice actor! Dave Attell was as dirty and raunchy as ever, it’s a combination that was quite strange. But it worked.

As I was saying the animation was a bit limited, but the animators, a group called “Fates” I think, were first to admit it. They seemed to be humble guys, like most of us cartoonists, that had a great time being given an opportunity to do something different. This animation style still, to the average viewer will be welcomed- actually I can see critics probably calling it “groundbreaking” just because it embraced some Japanimation style elements without looking like Americans trying to copy it.

All in all, it was funny. Period. They didn’t say which network is going to carry this show, I don’t believe it has a sponsor yet, but whoever does greenlight it is going to have a hit.

I’m not much of a Hall&Oates fan, I hate 80′s music honestly, but after seeing this show this weekend I’m going to try out at least a greatest hits disc. :-)

..and that’s coming from a Sox fan!

Thanks so much for weighing in here. You mentioned the feedback option on Sherpa, which is probably one of it’s best assets. But it’s also one of it’s LEAST used assets. I’m only a 1x weeker, but I definately get traffic through Sherpa and one glance at my Sherpa strip stats confirms that, plus a good number of email subscriptions. However, all that being said, in my time on Sherpa I’ve gotten a grand total of ONE user feedback notice. I think more interactivity and promotion of the feedback option would go a long way for authors like myself wondering just what people are thinking out there.

Sherpa is a lot of things, and only one of them is an “incubator” hoping to attract and encourage strips that Universal may pick up for print syndication.

It is also something in and off itself, a unique crossroads out in the cartoon universe where a wide and unpredictable variety of creators cross paths, sharing their work for a while before (often) moving on to other vectors. I read every strip on the site (not daily, but I do) and it was interesting how, as the site got going, I realized that I had come to enjoy reading Sherpa more than reading the comics page. I was surprised more often. I found myself caught up in each creator’s struggle to manifest their vision — whether they were successful or not. I find the process itself compelling. (But then, I’m an editor — 20 years in trade book publishing, ten with uclick/sherpa — so that’s what interests me.)

I do think the discipline of the deadline (even when self-imposed) is one of the best things we offer. Whether you are committing to 2x or 5x weekly, once you strap on that harness and pull the big plow, you quickly know a whole lot more of what syndication entails. And I think for a lot of people who have “I want to do a strip” burning in their blood, this is very useful.

In terms of quality, in an essay on the fellowship of writers, Ken Kesey pointed out that it’s just as hard to write a bad book as it is to write a good book, and that all work honors all writers and the common enterprise. For me, that’s the spirit in which Sherpa was created, and explains perhaps the pleasure I take in it.

Yes, I love it when really strong work shows up (and Universal making a print deal for ARGYLE SWEATER was a kind of circle-completer to be sure) but I personally enjoy reading work that is not yet at a professional level, and may never make it to that point, with an attitude of “What is this person trying to achieve, and how can they do it better?” I always hope that others are reading with that same mindset, as a way to learn from other people’s work and even to have some hand in helping them. The feedback option lets you weigh in when you see a way for someone to try something different or improve their work. When somebody does get better, either gradually or in some sudden shift, it’s a pleasure to see.

Getting strips into print is not the be-all of Sherpa. We have made online syndication deals with creators that Universal did not feel strongly enough to pursue. As John Glynn noted above, he follows a certain number of strips closely — the ones that he thinks are most likely to possibly evolve to interest him for print. I know that other syndicates keep the same eye out on Sherpa. But Sherpa and uclick (the larger online company, also part of AMU, as is Universal) are pursuing other ends as well. We can make an online syndication deal with a feature that has an eccentric or oversized format, for example, which at this point would be hard for a print syndicate to touch. And Sherpa itself, this odd and ever-changing collection of wildly-differing strips, is just there to be Sherpa, to be one of zillions of places you can read cartoons and comics.

The web has blown open the universe of possibilities for cartoonists way beyond what xeroxed zines ever offered. On the other hand (as someone above pointed out) running a web site oneself entails a lot of effort, a good deal of which includes the hard work of getting people to come to it. Sherpa is an easier way for creators to put their work in front of an online audience. It’s completely self-run. You post your work as often or as seldom as you want. Some people just use the site as a somewhat static showcase with which to solicit commercial work. Some post constantly and consistently. Others sporadically. Even rarely. And whatever works for the creator is fine with us. If putting a drawing up once in a while is what you do, that’s AOK. Why wouldn’t it be?

I admit that I don’t really understand the hostility of some to Sherpa, and surmise that it may be based on a critique of what it is not. It is what it is. It isn’t claiming that it’s going to get your work syndicated. And it isn’t a big moneymaker, that’s for sure. But a lot of good has spun off of it, in a wide variety of ways.

Yes, some Creators that have found it a stepping stone: The list of features that have been picked up for online syndication is longer than anyone mentioned here, but if I try to do it from memory I’ll goof it up and forget someone. It’s clear that Sherpa is on the radar of syndicate editors, and not just the ones down the hall from us.

But aside from that aspect there’s a lot of other stuff going on via the site — for instance personal connections and feedback and friendships among Sherpa creators. And I have certainly benefited personally from many email friendships with toonists. Has there always been a long list of site features we’d like to add, and ways we’d like to improve? Of course. Don’t get me started.

Okay, I’ve written more than I meant to, yet barely begun. I’ll be on Comics Coast to Coast soon and will have a chance to ponder Sherpa further in conversation with those worthy guys — who, by the way, I only got to know thanks to Sherpa.

I haven’t submitted to the syndies in 4 years, but my last submission got a very kind and encouraging personally written letter from Amy that I still have. I was thrilled that an editor took the time to actually read and respond to my submission, which I can now admit years later, was probably not worth the time it took her to read. But I’m glad she did. She kept me going. Jay Kennedy did the same thing…and that submission was even worse!

Credit to them. Good people…

Nice idea, but when you think of the ramifications, not feasible. Two syndicates wanted a loose “development” relationship, whereas I felt I had taken a lot of time to develop the strip already and wanted to go right away.

Not that I was against change or further development (which would be inevitable), but I wanted to do it as part of an ongoing operation, not nannied along like a five year-old, and coerced into making changes I disagreed with.

I’m pretty sure that supplying names of potential buyers to justify having my strip picked up and sold immediately would be seen as insolence by an exec who had previously (a) rejected it or (b) proposed changes .

The only thing that CS can’t teach the would-be full-time pro’ is how cat-lady crazy the job makes you over time. And doesn’t really introduce anyone to the sort of cartoon-think that cartoonists develop (you can read about that creative process in the excellent review of Lynda Barry’s book ‘What it is’ on the Forbidden Planet International Blog, by Rod McKie – plug, plug). I think whenever we had big debates about the model we focused on everything except the strange psychology of people who turn up at Wakes with a pencil and a notepad in case the muse whispers in their lughole during the Eulogy.

For instance, I’ve been secretly working on a strip for, I don’t know, 10 years. What I like to do to scupper its progress is to have some great ideas for other strips while I’m working on it, so I have to put it away -that way it can never be rejected by anyone and it can never dissapoint me.