Dan Goodsell’s Sampler of Things blog is a daily must-see for everyone who loves classic cartoons and great retro package design. Today’s post is a particular nostalgic blast for me: a 1962 Kellogg’s promotion for it’s Hanna Barbera sponsored TV shows. I vividly remember cutting out these “trading cards” and package-back “pin-me-ups”. Around this time I also joined Hanna-Barbera’s Huckleberry Hound Fan Club - and getting the package, sent to home with my name on the label, was the first mail I ever received. I can never forget that thrill. In fact I think I still have the envelope. Thanks Dan, for reviving that cherished memory.

Where’s Waldo? Check this out.

No, the image above isn’t from the Filmation Tom and Jerry Comedy Show (1980), nor any U.S. produced latter day monstrosity. It’s a page out of one of the ugliest foreign childrens books I’ve ever seen. I just had to share.Someone left an anonymous donation at ASIFA-Hollywood last week - a set of Korean produced anime childrens books. When I took a closer look at the cover of first one I noticed, to my horror, something resembling an undersized Tom & Jerry cavorting with an oversized anime girl. The inside art redefines the word hideous. Whether this is a licensed product or not, I have no idea (I see no Time Warner or Turner Entertainment copyright mark anywhere on the book). It’s right up there with those ugly public domain video boxes you see in the bargain bins. Here’s the cover:

UPDATE! Brew reader Andre writes in to report that the anime girl on the cover is Minky Momo, “from Ashi Productions anime series (released in english as Magical Princess GiGi by Harmony Gold in the 80’s). So it’s not just one knockoff, it’s a two in one crossover.”For even more really bad animation art, don’t miss my 2006 edition of the Worst Cartoons Ever screening at the San Diego Comic Con. More info about my activities at the Comic Con will be posted in the next few days. In the meantime, enjoy!

We’re starting a Cartoon Brew mailing list. The Brew will be undergoing some major changes in the second half of 2006 and we want to keep our valued readers in the loop about all these exciting developments. Besides special messages from Jerry and Amid, list members will also be able to score free swag as we’ll be running exclusive contests for Brew list subscribers. If you want to get on the list, drop us an email, with only your email address in the subject header, to cartoonbrewlist [at] yahoo.com. The list will be low-volume (between 1-2 messages per month), and we also promise to NEVER share your email address with any outside party; we hate spam as much as you do.

I hope this will be the last update on ANIMATION BLAST 9 before the issue is finally released. My printer tells me that the issue will be out right in time for the San Diego Comic-Con. Unfortunately, the printing process has taken far longer than I’d anticipated, but somehow that seems fitting for an issue that took four years to put together. Initially, the printer discovered problems with my files during pre-press, and when everything had been straightened out, they made the proofs. The proofs looked great except all the italics in the text had disappeared. Not surprisingly, it’s been a tremendous challenge getting the italics back in because of incompatibilities between our software. Anyway, the second set of proofs should be done any day now, and if all goes according to plan, I’ll be receiving the issues in a couple weeks.

So, what’s new in the world of animation this week? Well, YouTube has bowed to pressure from the movie studios and removed hundreds of animated films from their site, deleted hundreds of user accounts, and in the process, alienated thousands of users who’ll now be taking their business to other sites like DailyMotion. What is most disturbing about this indiscriminate purge of cartoons is that they’ve also removed dozens of public domain cartoons which were legally posted on their site. Warner shorts like EATIN’ ON THE CUFF, PORKY’S MIDNIGHT MATINEE and A DAY AT THE ZOO, as well as the Fleischer SUPERMAN shorts, are all films that have entered the public domain, and can be freely reedited, redistributed and resold without permission from anybody. Unfortunately, YouTube has shown a woeful ignorance of copyright law and removed these films citing a baseless “terms of use violation” clause.

It’s important to look at the root cause of why so many classic shorts are appearing online in the first place. It’s because they aren’t available anywhere else for legal purchase. If these cartoons were available for purchase on dvd or available for download online, there’s no way that anybody in their right mind could justify these lo-res versions that are appearing on YouTube. Disney, for example, has been doing a commendable job of releasing their animation library onto dvd, in their Treasures collections, and relatively few of those cartoons show up on video hosting/sharing sites. Disney has also taken another positive step forward by releasing individual shorts onto iTunes. Other media conglomerates, however, neither care about nor respect the classic animation in their vaults, and corrupt “copyright protection” laws have allowed these companies to withhold the cartoons from the public for far too long.

There’s plenty more to be said about this topic, and nobody is saying it more eloquently than animation director Mark Mayerson. He wrote an excellent article on his blog yesterday that I highly recommend checking out. He even offers a novel solution for how YouTube can address the issue of copyright, and please both the studios and fans. The bottom line though is that until studios start listening to consumers and make these classic cartoons widely available, they can expect the shorts to appear over and over on the multitude of video hosting sites now available to the public.

PS: Even though all the Tex Avery cartoons have been removed from YouTube, the opening of the DiC series, THE WACKY WORLD OF TEX AVERY, is still available on YouTube. If this is any indication of YouTube’s future, you may as well stick a fork in ‘em because they’re done.

UPDATE: Some really intelligent posts are turning up about this Youtube issue. Tony Mines of Spite Your Face Productions, has a post about the terrific manner in which his company has dealt with their cartoons turning up on YouTube. And here’s another great post from ‘J.C. Loophole’ that describes the situation from a collector’s perspective. Studios would be wise to read his thoughts - especially the last paragraph - and discover how consumers feel about these classic cartoons.

There’s been a lot of buzz in recent months about services like YouTube that allow filmmakers to host and share videos. A BUSINESS 2.0 article reports that there are now a staggering 85 YouTube-esque websites that offer video sharing. Mark Mayerson had a post on his blog discussing why the advent of these sites is so exciting, and compares them to the days of vaudeville when anybody with talent had a chance to make a name for themselves.

Another nice summary of these sites comes from none other than former Disney chairman Michael Eisner, who has invested in a video sharing site called Veoh. He says in this NY TIMES article, “Anybody, now, can have their own network. There are no borders. No gatekeepers. No restrictions on creativity of any kind.” There’s just one problem with this entire scenario. There’s also no money to be made from any of these sites. Actually, let me rephrase that: there’s potentially plenty of money to be made by the people running the sites, like Eisner, but the individual content creators are going to be left out in the cold.

For example, the aforementiond BUSINESS 2.0 article suggests that if YouTube embeds ads into its user-created videos, the site would generate revenue of $15 million a year. Let’s say they announce a 50/50 revenue sharing deal with filmmakers (they still haven’t done this, but rumor is they’ll do something along these lines soon). That’s $7.5 million for filmmakers. And let’s make a conservative estimate that they’re hosting one million videos. That amounts to an average of $7.50 per filmmaker. Obviously some films will be more popular than others, but any way you do the math, even the successful filmmakers won’t be earning more than a few hundred dollars.

To offer a more concrete example of how the shared ad revenue model doesn’t work, look no further than this ANIMATION WORLD MAGAZINE article. The article discusses Revver.com, a video hosting site which pays filmmakers based on the number of people who click on ads attached at the end of their films. The article cites the recent live-action viral hit, “The Diet Coke and Mentos Experiment.” It says that the clip has attracted more than three million total views on Revver. From those three million views, the filmmakers have earned $20,700, or less than a penny per view.

Ironically, Revver’s founder says in the article that, “It’s proof that the model works.” I’d argue the opposite. Making a fraction of a penny every time somebody views your film is a perfect example of why the model doesn’t work, unless keeping filmmakers in perpetual poverty is part of the model’s plan, in which case, Revver should be a rousing success. AtomFilms.com, a predecessor of this current generation of video hosting/sharing sites, also operates on a similar shared ad revenue model, and every filmmaker I’ve spoken to has reported paltry earnings.

I don’t want to be all doom-and-gloom because I’m actually quite upbeat about all these developments. The fact that so many companies are jumping into the video sharing/hosting game proves that an audience exists for on-line video, and more specifically, animated films. It fascinates me to look at the page views on YouTube and see how an obscure piece of animation from decades ago can generate thousands of viewers.

The fact that a short video on Revver can draw three million viewers is pretty amazing when you think about it. Most filmmakers will likely never get such a huge audience, but even one-hundredth of that audience - 30,000 viewers - is significant. Attracting this many viewers to an independent animated short would have been impossible even a few years ago, but today, thanks to the Internet, a global audience exists for animated shorts, and filmmakers no longer need TV networks or cinemas to get their work seen. Now that the audience is in place, it’s time for filmmakers to stop giving away their films for free (or almost-free) and to start generating income from their work on-line.

Your thoughts? Email them to amid [at] animationblast [dot] com.

Here’s a blast from the past. Matt Richardson posted this vintage TV spot on his Poptique blog:

I’m 99.9% certain it was made back in 1980 by the London based Richard Williams Studio - it certainly has his trademark stylized, super-perspective animation, and has been stuck at the back of my mind all these years. It sort of links in with the the Thief & the Cobbler redux disc that’s floating about.

Update! Eric Goldberg sent in this additional info on the Superman spot:

Layouts by Dick, animated by me, and it’s still on my reel. Anecdote: When it premiered in London, I was at a party talking to a woman about what I had done for the telly lately. I told her about the Superman spot, and was immediately castigated for it being “anti-gay”. Howzat again? She explained: ” Superman’s all big and butch, and he says, ‘Never say yes to a cigarette,’ which is like saying ‘never say yes to a fag,’ and in America, gays are called fags….” I thanked her for her insight and moved on…