Mobile Comics are back again. The last time they appeared, they slipped back into coma. Will this time be any different or will we witness a repeat? If the mauling of Romans by Asterix and Obelix fascinates many, the idiosyncratic gestures of Suppandi in Tinkle or the audacious exploration of Tintin make hours on a weekend seem like minutes for the young-minded readers. But call it either a germination from the various Earth-saving movements or an intervention of the technology gods, the paper back craze is now going mobile too! Teenagers today are catching up with their favourite comic characters on their cellphones and sharing it with their friends. Welcome to the world of mobile comics; call them ‘Momics’!
So what’s this latest fad? To put it simply, it’s nothing never heard of before. Historically, Nazara (a gaming portal) first experimented with the Archie momics in 2005. The concept bombed. This time apparently is the second coming for momics, with many telecom operators, content providers, advertisers and of course comic players betting big on this medium.
Opines Rajesh Razdan, Co-founder & Director – Sales and Marketing, mCarbon (a telecom VAS provider, which also develops mobile applications and tools), “Various reports in the media value the comics market anywhere between `100 crore to `400 crore. Approximately 10 million comics are sold every year in the traditional manner. And with the digital/mobile media augmenting the personalisation and outreach in all respects, the comic book market should witness at least a 50% appreciation in market size over the next three or four years.” To this, Gaurav Luthra, Head – Content, Mogaé Digital (a mobile advertising player), adds, “With some innovations, more smartphones and 3G on the horizon, the market for momics is set to increase manifold. The market at present is estimated at about 25% of the current 600 million telecom subscribers. It’s a big audience.” Currently, many experts opine that Mogaé Digital is the largest player in this segment today, with close to over 100 titles across various genres like folklore, mythology, history, fiction et al. Some of its famous momics strips include Tenali Rama, Akbar Birbal and Bal Hanuman.
Typically, the momics category has three entities in its ecosystem:
(a) Content Providers, that range from established print comic book publishers like Diamond comics, Raj comics et al to TV channels like Cartoon Network to independent content providers like Mogae Digital, ZealCity et al. They create the content which then is distributed by the telecom operators directly or through the portals of Mobile VAS players;
(b) Mobile VAS Players/Technology providers (like Rediff, mCarbon et al), that act as aggregators for content. Users access the portals of these VAS players and then subscribe to the content which is delivered through the telecom operators or companies like ZeroSum, which act as application providers to the telecom operators;
(c) Telecom operators (Airtel, Vodafone, Tata DoCoMo et al), who have billing relations with the users. The users can subscribe to momics directly through a telecom operator or through a mobile VAS provider’s portal.
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Source : IIPM Editorial, 2011.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri and Arindam chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).
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