As stated in the title, I'm trying to start a little webcomic with no intentions of printing or making money off of it, and I'm confused as to what I should be doing.
I'm a bit stuck on the whole publishing, legal protection process. I was talking with my father who said that publishing was was a part of the copyright process, but I never found such a thing during my independent research. For anyone who has experience with this: What would I have to do to be able to protect the content (characters, overall series)? Register each an every comic I create?
I would start with building a website. That's all I can give you though.
Make a website, then post watermarked comics on said website.
You should be fine if you watermark your content, and post it on the site. Watermarking it can protect it from people taking it and reuploading it as their own as your name will be over it.
Make a personal archive of your WIPs and finished work. Just in case something goes wrong.
I'm in a similar position, and this is my understanding: Once you give your webcomic a physical form it falls under copyright protection. Registering with the copyright office would provide you with additional legal benefits, such as the ability to sue for damages, but that is probably overkill in your case. If you're publishing independently (ie to your own website) you needn't worry about signing over all of your rights to a publisher or anything. A Creative Commons license can be acquired to forbid edits and commercial redistribution.
Alright, I do plan on this growing a bit more in the future, so I'll worry about the legal stuff later down the line.
About that website, what's the best method for someone who wants to make one for free? (Apologies, I'm very inexperienced)
I want to have flexibility in making the website, so I was considering building one from scratch in dreamweaver. Is there a better option?
Dreamweaver is an option, but there is one I was reading about earlier.
I couldn't find it, but here is a list of 4 of recommended ones people use.
edit
Out of the 4 Comic Fury seems to be a good option.
[URL="http://facepunch.com/editpost.php?p=48301812&do=editpost"]Sauce[/URL]
If you can host your own then you just need a template.
edit
From what was said below Disqus is definitly a good one.
Well, if you are capable of creating a website that is both reliable and practical for the viewer on your own, go for it! That's just about as flexible as you can be.
Otherwise, you should probably look into templates. I did a quick search and as an alternative a lot of people seem to use Wordpress as their base and then equipped it with various plug-ins but I don't know enough about it to recommend it, sorry. For all the webcomics I frequent, Disqus seems to be the norm for commenting.
You should definitely shell out for whatever domain you want and try to keep it consistent across whatever platforms you advertise on. Something like abiofleshscomic.com / twitter.com/abiofleshscomic / etc
[QUOTE=FLIPPY;48301812]Dreamweaver is an option, but there is one I was reading about earlier.
I couldn't find it, but here is a list of 4 of recommended ones people use.
edit
Out of the 4 Comic Fury seems to be a good option.
[URL="http://facepunch.com/editpost.php?p=48301812&do=editpost"]Sauce[/URL]
If you can host your own then you just need a template.
edit
From what was said below Disqus is definitly a good one.[/QUOTE]
Okay, I'll check it out.
I can't access the link, is it only for gold members?
[QUOTE=AbioFlesh;48301876]Okay, I'll check it out.
I can't access the link, is it only for gold members?[/QUOTE]
My source got messed up, not sure what happened.
There is 4, choose what will suit what you need, but from what I read I recommend Comic Fury.
[URL="http://cat-nine.net/top-4-best-free-webcomic-hosting-sites/"]Fixed source[/URL]
Comic Fury looks very promising, if things don't work out well with Dreamweaver I'll use that instead.
[QUOTE=Sojourner;48301816]Well, if you are capable of creating a website that is both reliable and practical for the viewer on your own, go for it! That's just about as flexible as you can be.
Otherwise, you should probably look into templates. I did a quick search and as an alternative a lot of people seem to use Wordpress as their base and then equipped it with various plug-ins but I don't know enough about it to recommend it, sorry. For all the webcomics I frequent, Disqus seems to be the norm for commenting.
You should definitely shell out for whatever domain you want and try to keep it consistent across whatever platforms you advertise on. Something like abiofleshscomic.com / twitter.com/abiofleshscomic / etc[/QUOTE]
I did look a bit into Wordpress, seems you have to pay for a decent, compatible host. There is also using Wordpress as a host itself but I read it wasn't that flexible.
And I already have a domain set, so I guess all I have to do is get everything else set. Thanks for the help, everyone!
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