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Terry Hooper-Scharf

Sunday 5 August 2018

Line Crossed

Today I made the following blogs Private.  You can no longer access them.

Alan Class Blog

UK Golden Age Comics

British Golden Age Comics

The reasons for this are quite simple.  Blogger can be useless when it comes to looking for a post.  I can type the exact title I want but "No such post found".  If I type the post name into Google...voila! So, on Friday I had to do this again -it's easier then searching images for my posts. I clicked on several...

Not my posts.  Using the images I had used though.  I then read, practically word-for-word things I had written many years ago.  No, in fact, this was 'new' work of the blogger or site owner -if you believed them.  On Alan Class and British Golden Age comics -things that when I announced them had everyone stumped because they had never heard of the characters or stories before and some had been collecting comics for 30+ years.  Yet, here was Johnny-come-lately who "Got into comics three years ago now" who had, it seems, access to these rare finds.

I put a specific mark into images I use.  No one is going to see it but I know exactly where it is and it shows me the item in question was purloined from my sites. Also these people discovered these items but cannot even credit where the characters originated -I have found three who repeated something I had written that included my giving the wrong comic title.

Scans I offered ONLY for my Yahoo groups have appeared on comic download sites.  Contributed by one particular member who always adds "scanner unknown".  Bull-shit.  He knows where he took the scans from. I think it clearly identifies who has been taking scans from other groups of old Silver Age comics and selling them on CDs on Ebay.  He's being deleted from my groups.

I work long and hard on my projects and books and to be honest I have had enough.  A "complete history of UK comic fandom and zines" -which does not include a single mention of Zine Zone (later ZZ International) that created an upsurge of interest in small press books in the early 1980s and also spearheaded the UK Small Press Invasion of the US in the late 1980s and early 1990s -incidentally, Comics FX, Amazing Heroes and other US publications gave me a lot of credit over this.

Oh...Wikipedia entry on Zine Zone? Couple lines.  Anyone adds to it the entry gets deleted. My wikipedia entry -deleted (a couple people kept editing the entry but) deleted.  My work in UK comics? Nothing. Reason? "Made no significant contributions to the field". I could list the number of artists working in US comics from the UK who I worked hard to get them that work after they failed themselves for years. But they are dead to me.

How many people are really interested in the subjects of the blogs, though?

Alan Class...................................24,206
UK Golden Age Comics..............7, 930
British Golden Age Comics........28, 978

How many copies of the Class publication have I sold?  Two (2)

How many copies of the Golden Age Collections 1-6 have sold?  Zero

How many copies of the Ultimate Gold Collection have sold? 5 in just as many years.

My web sites and blog posts have quite literally been pilfered. I would not mind if one of these thieves actually credited me or CBO or one of the other blogs but, no.  That would be honesty and these people are as bad as illegal downloaders.

278, 914 total views and support -buying books or even commenting? Same as here on CBO: nothing...oh, I sold 7 books out of which 5 got me no money as the US IRS got that.

Time to draw the line and say enough is enough.  I must seem like a real dumb ass-hole allowing this to go on but, as I wrote, until last Friday and everytrhing tumbling like a line of dominoes I had no idea how bad it all was.

Recently I was told by two different people about a comic to be published this month. The details I was given, if correct, are the final straw. In interviews I have always stated that I bought  my first comics as a youngster at Jarman's in Mina Road, St Werburgh's also, as most people know, I am a published naturalist (people mistakenly refer to me as a "zoologists"). Look out for Jarman's and zoology and a few other 'jabs' at me.

I am hoping this is just groundless rubbish but if true then, as far as I am concerned, I have finished with UK comics other than promoting Black Tower. Promises to continue book reviews will be honoured but do not expect much else.

Any new discoveries concerning the UK Golden Age will/may go into future books.

If you will not support or buy books understand this: I need to eat and pay bills like everyone else and like my wildlife research -people want details they have to buy the publications.

addenda

To add extra emphasis, all of my Blogger (only stats) blogs have attracted 4,294,026 views. Now look at the total number of books sold.

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