Time for change!

As from the New Year there'll be a few changes coming to this blog. Nothing that should really worry anyone I hope! I've been running Blimey! for 11 years now and I never planned on doing it forever, so most of the changes are to retain my own interest in it and hopefully those of the readers.

Here we go...

1: Anonymity a no-no. A change you may have noticed already is the block on anonymous comments was resumed recently. I'd lifted it a while ago but it still led to spamming and the occasional silly trolling, so I've changed the settings again to prevent abuse. I'm sorry if it inconveniences genuine visitors who don't have an account with Google etc., but it needed to be done.

2: Back to basics. My original intention for Blimey! was to focus on British comics of the past; to remind people of what they used to read, and introduce them to even earlier strips they may have never seen. Not out of some old fashioned patriotism but simply because not a lot of blogs were covering old British stuff and the material deserves to be remembered. In 2018 I'll be going back to that original intention to focus more on the classic comics and less on the new.

3: There will be less reviews and previews. Over the years, and especially in 2017, I've focused a lot on current comics. While I'm happy to review some comics I've liked, this blog isn't really the place for people to send me their comics out of the blue. (And people I've never heard of sending me PDF's demanding FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE with no social graces such as a please or thank you get their emails sent straight into the bin.) Some reviews and previews will continue, if I have time, but you'd be better off sending your comics to John Freeman for his excellent Down the Tubes blog or to the Forbidden Planet International blog. Both of which are far better at covering the current comics scene than I am. 

4: It's about time. Blogging can be very time consuming. Unlike some blogs that just take images from the Internet, I scan pages from my own collection. (Unless it's a press release from 2000AD or Commando etc of course.) Researching a subject takes time too, and I'm not getting paid for this. From now on I'm just going to focus on the stories I want to cover, and there'll be less postings. I'm sure I'll still post a few times a week though, but it's unlikely to be every day.

5: Work and life comes first. My work in mainstream comics has been steady in 2017 but I do need to prioritise it way above blogging. The drawback with running a blog is that some people consider that as being what defines you, and sometimes blogging, like journalism, can have negative connotations. (Anyone who knows me knows I never break anything told me in confidence, but some see a blog as akin to a redtop scandal sheet and it makes them wary.) In 2018 I'll be focusing more on my career and when I do have spare time it'll be more likely spent in the company of friends, or having a walk, than at a keyboard reviewing a comic. 

In a nutshell then, Blimey! will continue, but there'll be less posts, and more emphasis on the past, but not entirely to the exclusion of new comics. I hope you'll stick around. And if you do want more, remember that there are over 2,500 posts on this blog dating back to 2006, so have a rummage around and you might find some you've never seen or have forgotten.

Happy New Year!

(My other blog, which is solely about my own work, will also continue, and you can find that here:
http://lewstringercomics.blogspot.co.uk )