Sunday 1 June 2014

Bootlegging The Bootleggers


DAVE SIM:
(from the Kickstarter Q&A, 31 May 2014)
I thought it was a great idea that George had that for the "digital inside front cover" of each issue, he wanted me to write something and then fax it to him so he could run it as a fuzzy fax in each trade. What says 'Dave Sim In The Twenty-First Century' like a fuzzy fax? This is the culmination of the Bootlegging the Bootleggers program. Of course, the net effect might be just giving the Bootleggers cleaned up digital copies to resell!

Welcome To The Future!


ABOUT THE ON-GOING RESTORATION PROGRAM:
The intention is to make all 16 Cerebus volumes available in fully restored/remastered versions (currently only the CEREBUS and HIGH SOCIETY books have been converted -- highlighted in green at CerebusDownloads.com). If you buy an unrestored version now, you will be entitled to redownload the restored version as they become available AT NO EXTRA CHARGE.

RELATED ARTICLE:
Dave Sim: Unauthorised Online Availability Of Cerebus (Feb 2012)

REACTION:
Bleeding Cool: Dave Sim Pirates The Pirates

21 comments:

Scott said...

Thanks for keeping the blog running, and especially for notifying me that the Bootleg the Bootleggers project is live. I am delighted to be able to have the entire Cerebus collection digitally.

Anonymous said...

EXCELLENT.


... wait, a Cerebus ACTION FIGURE?! I.m not the only one seeing that over the downloads page, right? For the love of gawd, tell me this is in 1/10th scale, so it looks right at home next to my Mirage-style TMNT, Scud, Usagi Yojimbo, Savage Dragon, Maxx, Pitt, and Tick figures on my indy comic characters shelf...

-Wes Smith

George Peter Gatsis said...

>>>> Wes...

More like a 4.5 to 1 scale...

George


Ray Cornwall said...

*ahem* *ahem* *Cough* *cough* Glad that the files I sent to George were useful! (Okay, I'm patting my own back. But I'm sincerely glad that Dave can start monetizing this. Someone should send a shout-out to Bleeding Cool and CBR, BTW.

I mean, $100 for every Cerebus comic? That's a deal and a half (as long as it doesn't cut into the IDW release project of the High Society files).

George Peter Gatsis said...

>>> Ray,

You weren't the only one who emailed me Bootlegged Cerebus files...

BUT, you were the first.

Crossing fingers that Bootlegging the Bootleggers becomes news worthy out there...

So far, there ARE sales happening.

George


Jeff Seiler said...

Soon as I get a new computer that can actually handle Wi-Fi, the first thing I'm doing is getting those downloads. Re-bootleggers? You go, girls.

George Peter Gatsis said...

>>> Jeff,

You can buy now and download later... or one at a time...

George

Damin J. Toell, Esq. said...

So what does the Digital Book Club give us? Is it just a way to give a monthly donation to Dave, or does it actually give something?

George Peter Gatsis said...

>>>> Damin,

The DIGITAL BOOK CLUB is like the DONATION to DAVE SIM...

except it is a direct MONTHLY SUBSCRIPTION...

unlike PATREON which is a third party Monthly Subscription.


George

DuncanB said...

Digital editions! This is great news, I've been waiting for these... So what exactly are we getting there? Obviously Cerebus & High Society are completely remastered, but are the rest of the books just the bootleg CBRs (which, let's face it, anyone with a passing interest in digital Cerebus already has), or has anything been done to improve them? Dave mentions "cleaned up digital copies" in his comment... Presumably they've been combined into phone books rather than individual issues, which was how the bootlegs were originally - any word on extras (covers, letters pages etc)?

DuncanB said...

By the way, is there any interest in producing an 'extras' volume of issues that weren't in the main 16 books? I've got a big collection of that stuff as well which could be sent along, would be nice to have the entire Cerebus works under one roof.

DuncanB said...

By which I mean (can't you edit comments on here?) - not just the extra Number Zero issues, but the Epic Illustrated stories, Silverspoon, Swords backup stories, Cerebus Jam etc

George Peter Gatsis said...

>>>> DUNCAN...

All bootlegged'd volumes have been cleaned up and in a lot of cases, pages have been given an extra clean up...

These volumes are only the phonebooks... not the individual comics and letters, etc...

the extras will be an offering much later... when it all gets packaged properly, based on Dave Sim commandments. :)

George

George Peter Gatsis said...

and now featured on Bleeding Cool News...

http://www.bleedingcool.com/2014/06/03/dave-sim-bootlegs-the-bootleggers-on-cerebus-downloads/

DuncanB said...

Ah, great news that these are all cleaned up versions. That had my mouse hovering over that big $100 entire series purchase button...

But then Bleeding Cool said: "As the site grows, the pirate files will be replaced by the remastered versions" - which is even better news! The whole series will be remastered like the first 2 volumes have been?! Amazing. But it does make me want to wait for the remasters rather than buy the cleaned up bootlegs, so I don't have to buy the entire series again as they're done...

Either way, I'm incredibly happy that this remastering is being done, the world needs Cerebus in fine digital quality!

George Peter Gatsis said...

>>>>>DuncanB...

You can buy now....
The download links will be exact...
And once in a while you can come back to the site... And if you see more GREEN labelled volumes... All you have to do is go back to your links that I would have emailed you... And re-download just THAT volume.

Now extra purchase necessary.
Volume 1 and 2 are already included in the ALL offering...

George

George Peter Gatsis said...

Spelling correction in my previous posit...

NO EXTRA PURCHASE NESSESARY.


George

DuncanB said...

Wow. That's customer service right there! Will absolutely definitely be buying them up then, that's great.

This is just what I need to kick off a massive Cerebus re-read. Exciting!

DuncanB said...

Do you think maybe you should add some of this info to the cerebusdownloads site? Cos not knowing the above was making me hold off from purchasing, maybe other people might be wondering the same?

Also, those people who do purchase volumes which are made up of bootlegs - would be a good idea to add us to a mailing list. Then we can be informed when the volumes we've bought are upgraded to remasters, rather than having to remember to periodically check back at the site to see...

Eric Hoffman said...

When I received email links for the HS downloads, I was quite surprised to find that, should I want to, I could simply forward this email to any number of individuals, who could then, free of charge, also download the same files. There was literally no "ticket puncher" to assure I did not take more than my alloyed share. As it happens, I didn't do this, but certainly some unscrupulous Kickstarter contributors did. And thus unwarranted access increased exponentially. Of course, even with the ticket-punch, there is nothing to stop even a paying buyer from pirating. Yet certainly a more effective gatekeeper might have resulted in an appreciably larger number of sales?

George Peter Gatsis said...

>>>>Eric....

It's crazy to try and create a method to prevent copying... Why? ... Because billion dollar companies spend a lot trying... And they are still ineffective in their prevention... Their stuff is still copied and distributed.

The core nature and tech regarding the internet is copy and distribute... Heck, everytime you go to any page/site on the net, you are copying it to your hard drive so you can see it.


George