Are weekly comics doomed?

[Kid Robson]

and indeed, 4d to 2p was a price cut.

No, 2p = 5d, so it rose by a penny. However, it added 4 extra pages a few weeks later, from 16 to 20 pages.

What was that about learning basic mathematics, Andy? Hoist with your own petard, methinks.

[AndyB]

Some of us weren't alive in 1971.

[colcool007]

I'll tell you why, Col. Or to be precise, I'll reiterate why. But first allow me to make an analogy. If I have £200 in my wallet and I give you £100, I've given you 50%. However, if I have £400 and I give you £150, I've only given you 37 and 1/2%. I've given you more money, but percentage-wise, it's less. So, while you have indeed shown that percentage-wise, The Beano has had higher rises, in actual money terms, none of them have been as high as 50p, which is why I regard it as unprecedented. Sure, it was only a 25% rise, but it was the heftiest yet in real terms, surely? That is why politicians very often resort to statistics, because it makes it easier to distort the true picture of events. I'm not suggesting that that's what you were trying to do, but it has much the same effect.

Andy, I'm been trying to be as nice as possible here, but I've just seen your comment and your hostility is crystal clear. Time for you to take a step back, I'd suggest. Your prejudices are protruding.

It's a false analogy as 1p in 1973 bought you a fair whack of sweets, whereas 50p today and you are lucky to get one. You seem to forget that spending power per pound diminishes over time and it is why I could get 4 Commandos in 1975 for 20p, whereas today it would cost me £8.

You are presenting a case based on your presumption that a 50p rise in 2013 is a bigger rise than 1p back in 1973 and it is just not being backed up with anything more than vague supposition on your part.

And as to hostility, I am concerned that you feel that way about Andy. Perhaps you could counsel us as to where we are being hostile towards you?

[ISPYSHHHGUY]

If I remember the convoluted conversions regarding going over to decimilization in 1971, '2p' was an oddly-concocted sum which equated to either 4 or 5 'old pennies' in different circumstances: in the early days at least.

'5p' when there used to be 12 in a shilling [the same value in 'old money'] meant that every conversion in between was never going to add up correctly in every case.

[AndyB]

Would a rise of 1p in 1973 be the price of one Mars Bar, Colin?

Rab, 5d was just over 2p.

[Kid Robson]

There may be lies, damn lies and statistics, but that is the sort of argument that a right winger makes when they try to argue that everyone should pay a flat rate of tax because then it would be fair, yet for a poor taxpayer to pay 25% tax could be the difference between surviving and bankruptcy, but a rich taxpayer isn't going to have any significant effect on their ability to do much other than put money in the bank whether they are taxed at a flat rate of 25% or a marginal rate of 50%.

Thanks, Lew!

Perhaps, but that's not what I'm arguing, now is it? And surely the concept of paying a flat rate of tax isn't so much the problem as what the amount actually is? However, I'm completely neutral when it comes to politicians - they're all tubes.

[AndyB]

No, but it has just as much validity as such an argument.

[Lew Stringer]

Would a rise of 1p in 1973 be the price of one Mars Bar, Colin?

Rab, 5d was just over 2p.

I agree with you on your other points Andy, but you're slightly out on this one. Sorry to be pedantic but decimalization was such a huge thing for us back in 1971 that it's ingrained. 5d was 2p, dead on. Here's a blog post I did a few years ago about the coinage change on The Dandy (and Beano), showing the actual conversion chart we were issued with way back when:

http://lewstringer.blogspot.co.uk/2011/ ... y-day.html

[Kid Robson]

It's a false analogy as 1p in 1973 bought you a fair whack of sweets, whereas 50p today and you are lucky to get one. You seem to forget that spending power per pound diminishes over time and it is why I could get 4 Commandos in 1975 for 20p, whereas today it would cost me £8.

You are presenting a case based on your presumption that a 50p rise in 2013 is a bigger rise than 1p back in 1973 and it is just not being backed up with anything more than vague supposition on your part.

And as to hostility, I am concerned that you feel that way about Andy. Perhaps you could counsel us as to where we are being hostile towards you?

It's not a false analogy, Col, 'though it's a far from perfect one (the nature of analogies, alas). However, it does its job in illustrating that your own use of statistics was very far from presenting a full and entirely accurate picture. And I can buy a Mars Bar in Farmfoods for 49p. (Used to be 39p 'til around last year.) Could never buy one for 1p or 2p at any time in my life (or so it seemed). And I would hardly say that 1p ever bought a 'fair whack of sweets' in 1973. Even penny caramels went up to 2p, did they not? Ah, my head hurts.

As for hostility, I just seem to be detecting an increased aggressiveness in the tone of some of the posting. Much in line with what the anonymous commenter was suggesting on my blog. Jump back a bit - I added them to an earlier post. However, if you're telling me there's no animosity on your or Andy's part (as there isn't on mine), then I'm quite happy to accept that.

[colcool007]

Would a rise of 1p in 1973 be the price of one Mars Bar, Colin?

Rab, 5d was just over 2p.

My memory is good, but it's not that good! But Google confirms that a Mars bar was 2p and it was bigger too. And a go on the puggies, er I mean one armed bandits was 1p then as well. I had to learn pre-decimal prices just to understand what my parents were on about half the time!

[Kid Robson]

No, but it has just as much validity as such an argument.

In your opinion, Andy. There's a sizeable amount of people who hold the opposite view - at least as far as the political aspect goes.

[Kid Robson]

Would a rise of 1p in 1973 be the price of one Mars Bar, Colin?

Rab, 5d was just over 2p.

My memory is good, but it's not that good! But Google confirms that a Mars bar was 2p and it was bigger too. And a go on the puggies, er I mean one armed bandits was 1p then as well. I had to learn pre-decimal prices just to understand what my parents were on about half the time!

Well, at least you were right about the Mars Bars. But prices are all over the place these days, so it's difficult to make direct comparisons between a lot of things. Especially with the advent of the pound shops.

Surely we're way off-topic by now. Are weekly comics doomed?

[AndyB]

However, it does its job in illustrating that your own use of statistics was very far from presenting a full and entirely accurate picture. And I can buy a Mars Bar in Farmfoods for 49p. (Used to be 39p 'til around last year.)

That's irrelevant, given that 75p is the typical retail price of a single Mars Bar in any convenience store. That's a bit like saying that the Dandy Annual 2014 is only really £4.99 because that's the price in a supermarket on a particular week, but the official price is still £7.99 - supermarkets will discount heavily to the point of loss leaders, but it's still hardly the "normal" price.

On the face of it, Tesco put the price of butter went up 25% a couple of months ago, just like your Farmfoods Mars Bar last year. In reality, it was just increased to something resembling the "normal" retail price - the supermarket discount was reduced.

[colcool007]

It's a false analogy as 1p in 1973 bought you a fair whack of sweets, whereas 50p today and you are lucky to get one. You seem to forget that spending power per pound diminishes over time and it is why I could get 4 Commandos in 1975 for 20p, whereas today it would cost me £8.

You are presenting a case based on your presumption that a 50p rise in 2013 is a bigger rise than 1p back in 1973 and it is just not being backed up with anything more than vague supposition on your part.

And as to hostility, I am concerned that you feel that way about Andy. Perhaps you could counsel us as to where we are being hostile towards you?

It's not a false analogy, Col, 'though it's a far from perfect one (the nature of analogies, alas). However, it does its job in illustrating that your own use of statistics was very far from presenting a full and entirely accurate picture. And I can buy a Mars Bar in Farmfoods for 49p. (Used to be 39p 'til around last year.) Could never buy one for 1p or 2p at any time in my life. And I would hardly say that 1p ever bought a 'fair whack of sweets' in 1973. Even penny caramels went up to 2p, did they not?

As for hostility, I just seem to be detecting an increased aggressiveness in the tone of some of the posting. Much in line with what the anonymous commenter was suggesting on my blog. Jump back a bit - I added them to an earlier post. However, if you're telling me there's no animosity on your or Andy's part (as there isn't on mine), then I'm quite happy to accept that.

In 1973, we still had penny bags of sweets. Even up to 1979, we still had them in our local newsagent.

I stil don't get how your analogy is not a false one as in 1973, I remember my dad's outrage when petrol hit 50p a gallon, but when petrol went from gallons to litres, he was blase about each change in price as I have done so since beginning to drive. And how my analogy is false as all I did was present facts to demonstrate that your statement about the price rise was false throws me.

I am blase about comic price hikes as I will either buy or not buy the comic based on content, not on price.

Regarding hostility, if you think that a reasoned debate is hostile, then there is little I can do to convince you otherwise. Andy and I are here to just keep it all ticking over and enjoy discussing comics. We are not here to make friends, but we are not here to make enemies either. For both of us, a great night on here means that we learn something new about the comics we enjoy.

Anything that happens elsewhere in internet-land, we are not bothered about it on here unless someone deliberately brings that unpleasantness over.

[AndyB]

Surely we're way off-topic by now. Are weekly comics doomed?

We're currently on the related topic of misuse of statistics.