Commentary on "How to Negotiate"

Here's a strip I wrote as part of "The Adams Experiment." There are a couple more like this, which I intend to dole out in the next couple of weeks while I ramp up to increase my output. One thing I've learned from this experience is that I'm capable of writing and producing these things much faster than I currently do and still being proud of the result.

This strip was meant as a sequel of sorts to How to Exhibit Good form. I hope you enjoyed it.

More Daily Tests

I've just posted more daily tests with commentary here.

If you'd like to leave any comments about these samples, or about the Adams Experiment as a whole, I'd welcome your opinions.

The Adams Experiment

Just to let you all know how things are going, Scott and I (HEY! I called him "Scott!" That's a breakthrough of some sort) have agreed that pushing the marriage angle was a mistake, and that breaking up a single subject into four daily strips seems to dilute the impact of the strip.

Many readers have expressed that Scott Adams is "ruining" my strip. I'm really touched that so many of you feel strongly enough about my strip to be concerned.

Think of Scott and me as two guys working on a car to see if they can get it to run better. We pop the hood, tinker with the carbeurator (It's an older car -- something with tail fins) then I drive it around the block a few times. If the change makes the car run better, we keep it. If not, we don't.

The point is this, I'm not going to let Scott do anything that will permenantly damage the car. I need to drive it to work tomorrow.

We've got another thing or two we want to try, but we are starting to change our focus from doing something new to making what I've been doing all along work better.

I'll keep you posted.

Life is a funny thing.

So, as you can imagine, it has been an interesting 3 days.

For those who aren’t already aware, Scott Adams (The creator of Dilbert) has taken an interest in my strip. He e-mailed me out of the blue a couple of months ago to tell me that he liked my work. I wrote back that if he turned out to be one of my comedian buddies jerking me around, “A river of bloody tears (would) flow.” He verified that it was indeed him, and I started groveling.

We traded e-mails back and fourth for the next couple of months, mostly discussing the prospect of me pursuing syndication for Basic Instructions. I decided to make a serious attempt and started sending him the sample strips in hopes of getting his opinion and a few pointers. He has been extremely generous with his advice, and it was his idea to post the whole process to his blog. I agreed (I’m not an idiot) and upgraded my hosting service. Then, I waited to see what would happen.

Wednesday morning he posted the first installment of our little experiment. My server bogged down to a standstill almost immediately and had crashed completely within the hour. Finally we got the server problem fixed and I had only a few minutes to skim the first comments on Adams’ blog before I had to go to work. The comments were very positive about everything but my server, which they all pointed out, sucked.

I went to work and found it very difficult to concentrate.

The next morning I checked my web stats. Over 17,000 unique visitors in 24 hours. That is a “substantial” increase from the day before.

In fairness to my web host, we did eventually get a tech support person who knew what she was talking about, and the server has been working like a champ ever since.

I haven’t had time to read all of the comments yet but they are skewing heavily toward the positive end of the spectrum. I read what comments I could yesterday until it was time to go to work.

Again, I had trouble concentrating.

This morning my web stats showed over 16,000 unique visitors, but 30,000 more page views than the day before. I find this encouraging.

In his most recent post about my strip, Scott Adams lays out what he sees as the choice before me. I will paraphrase it as a 50% chance at becoming the next Get Fuzzy vs. a 90% chance at becoming the next Red Meat. My reaction is that I’d be thrilled at either option. I’m just going to keep working and see what happens next.

This morning Mr. Adams (I have a really hard time calling him “Scott“) e-mailed me and asked how all this feels. My answer was "Fan-Freaking-Tastic!! And a little terrifying."

I’ll end with a couple of answers to frequently asked questions, then I’ll get out of your hair.

Yes, I am working on a book. Hopefully I’ll have some news about that soon. We’ll see.

Yes, I do have a plan for how to handle Sunday color strips. They’d just be the strip as it currently runs on the web, just shaped slightly different and in color. It would work as a good clearinghouse for strips that don’t break up into dailies well.

Yes, The strip is currently available in print. In fact I owe a huge apology to the Seattle Weekly and its editor, Mark Fefer. He was the first publishing professional to ever show any faith in me, and I have repaid that faith by moving to the other side of the continent and not mentioning his paper on my website.

Yes, I recognize that I am the luckiest guy on Earth.