Joshua is looking for a job and funding updates
Hello all,
Like I said in the previous blog post, thank you for your support, I have more updates and changes to announce.
First are my two major personal announcements. I don’t normally make personal announcements, but when I do, it concerns Rational Comics. So here goes:
One, I am looking for a job now. Two, I signed up for the CFA level 1 exam, happening this December.
These two things are going to take up a large part of my time. I’m looking for a job now, so I am still not as busy; but once with a job, then you probably know how it’s going to be like. The CFA level 1 exam on the other hand, requires on average, 300 study hours to get through. Another big time sucker.
Secondly, Rational Comics will need funding to survive in the future.
I have always been funding Rational Comics out of my own pocket. And that’s not a long term solution. Our artists need to be paid for the good work that they do.
How getting the job going to effect Rational Comics?
I get pretty busy just running the site full-time. When I get a job, I will run Rational Comics part-time. If I’m running it part time, then it would be hard to commit to the ‘new comic every Monday schedule. Once every fortnight on Mondays seems a more realistic schedule for me to commit to.
I’m also quite likely to stop marketing efforts for the website. (Yes, I actually did this.) I will have to leave the ‘marketing’ up to you loyal readers, to share our comics on social media. Or better yet, if you know writers on blogs that cover topics similar to ours, you can recommend our comics to them.
And for the funding?
With any marketing costs gone, then the only costs for Rational Comics are the artists. I have mentioned before that I can’t draw, therefore, our art team does the work I can’t do. I don’t get paid for the work I do on the site, but they do. I’d like for the artists to have some form of employment and an income.
Initially, when I started Rational Comics, I didn’t intend it to be a week by week comic website. I wanted to convert whole business and personal success books into comics, and sell said comics. However, I decided to put up some comics to gauge the interest and to drum up interest for the comics that I would want to produce.
In the end, I haven’t gotten around to publishing a full non-fiction/self-help comic. In the end, I haven’t stopped publishing the weekly comics either. And as I said, I probably won’t ever stop. The weekly comics are fun to do even if I have to do fewer of them.
The idea of publishing a full comic will always be there, and I will execute it in the future. However, we need a short-term plan. To keep the site up till we publish bigger comics.
The plan for the future
Me getting a job is part of this short-term plan actually. With a job, I can continue to fund Rational Comics for the time being. In fact, I could fund Rational Comics forever. However, I don’t see that as a very strategic move. Without any external help, it will be hard for Rational Comics to grow.
For those of you out there who like our comics and our work, I wish you would to participate in our growth.
Funding will mostly go to our artists. However, with me only running things part-time, I’ll need to get a writer on-board to do the storyboarding for the panels. If there is ever a hope to return to a weekly schedule, we will need another storyboardist, other than me. That’s where part of the funding will go to.
Our current funding options are we getting a job and doing commission art for others. I have thought of other funding options, from Kickstarter to Patreon. I will let you know what I come up with.
That’s all for now
I will update you all on the my job-search and funding ideas. If you have any ideas or ways to help, do let me know in the comments below.
(P.S. I will never blatantly run ads on the site. That is something I swear I will never do. Please do not suggest I do that.)