Sunday, December 02, 2007

Wash Post does us another favor - Stop already!

Today's Zits was shrunk so the Post could inform us that it's shrinking the comics section as a favor to us. The following isn't online so I've typed it all (emphasis beyond the title is mine):

To Our Readers:

The Sunday comics will look a little different beginning next week. A new page design will allow us to combine the two comics sections into one convenient section with nearly all of our extensive offering of comics, puzzles and features.

To accommodate the more compact layout, "The Wizard of Id" strip and the "Hints From Heloise" column will no longer appear in the comics section, and the size of several of our larger comics as well as the Samurai Sudoku puzzle will be slightly reduced. Heloise can still be found in the Tuesday Style section, and "The Wizard of Id" appears on washingtonpost.com daily, including Sunday.

All of the other Sunday comics and features will remain, including the Mini Page, although some will be located on a different page than you're used to. We hope you'll find the combined section easier to navigate. We welcome your feedback. Write: Comics Editor, 1150 15th St. NW, Washington, DC 20071; email comics@washpost.com or call 202-334-4775.


So, if I'm reading this correctly, for our convenience, they've reduced the section, dropped Wizard of Id, and shrunk the rest. I don't understand why they just couldn't move the puzzles to say... the Magazine Section... and leave the comics, but that's why I'm just a blogger. Also, I don't really understand why editors think that actually offering you less in the paper you pay for will make you more inclined to buy one. Perhaps someone can explain this to me?

What a great week for comics in DC! As with Rob Ullman's situation, I'll be sending a letter to the Post, suggesting that Less is not actually More and that 1984 is well in the past. And it appears that Cul de Sac will not be moving to the Sunday section either, and presumably not appearing during the week.

2 comments:

Matt D. said...

Wonder if the "mini page" will now appear as a "mini mini-page?"

I think the Post is really doing this to save on paper costs, which increase every year and will especially this year cause of oil/gas prices. They won't say that, though; the spin is it's for your convenience!

Mark Fearing said...

And why doesn't this surprise me? Wow, papers are heading towards extinction. Doing away with the most popular features. But wait, aren't the ads the most popular features? When they start selling 25 copies a day the advertisers will really go away.