Last mention of the Sketchbattle Bull$hit
Well, I see that Comixpedia has picked up on the news about the Vote rigging shenanigans at the SketchBattle competition. And I wanted to post my final thought on this, so for those following the Drama from Yirmumah, look inside…
I want to state for the record, I joined up with Sketchbattle because it looked like fun. I saw the submission alert posted on a webcomic news site somewhere and thought it would be fun to battle people I didn’t know. I looked through the previous battles, and it all looked like fun.
The Admin guy “Sambro” is now backpeddling like a mothercrunker, IMing me and accusing me of defaming his character, or accusing ME of edition the transcripts, when I simply copy and pasted the items in. He also tried to insult me for being 29 and making a webcomic and how pathetic that was. He probably doesn’t realize, that’s a diss to other people in his competition too.. Crashlander is 29. (looks like he’s 52 
) And I know plenty of other creators in their 30s making comics. He’s 19, so I can kinda forgive his ignorance. After all, 19 year olds don’t really grasp that 10 years comes pretty fast, wonder if he’ll be living his dreams at 29 or 30? Hah! Look, the people can read it all, and they can decide for themselves whether or not it’s a bullshit competition.
One valuable lesson I learned is to not waste my time with the “little guys” anymore. That’s sad, I hate to say that or think that. I’d hate to seperate myself from the community. People asked me why i was even bothering to enter, there was no “prize” or anything. I did it for fun! — But the next time I’m approached by some stranger about entering as contest or helping out their site… I’ll definitly think twice.
Most of the people, including the admin embraced the popularity of our webcomic coming into their competition, and now he used that as some sort of reason for fudging the numbers so it was more fair to the other people. That makes no sense at all. It makes it look like he’s just using creators for traffic, then selling advertising— and worse, if the guy admits to cheating on his own numbers and that you can simply log off and log back on, it makes me wonder that their site is at the top of some of those pointless toplists like buzz comix.
The guy says to me, that I can’t stand to lose…. but it sure seems like he couldn’t stand to see me win. I hope he learns something about honesty out of this. Honesty really IS the best policy.
And look…. looks like word is spreading around on other forums and news sites. The truth travels pretty fast.
And since the guy won’t allow anyone to post their complaints on his forum, and he’s banned or deleted just about everyone there who agrees with our evidence, you can do your part by spreading the word to your own webcomic communities or forums. Seriously, let’s make creators aware of this asshat so no one is taken advantage of.
October 26th, 2005 at 11:27 am
I remember, sometime ago, reading something about SB’s numbers on bCx being inflated.
So, it’s not as though this is the first time someone’s tried to “cook the books” over yonder.
On another note, I think it’s rather sad that the co-creator seems to have to take the blame for the both of them, when it was Sambro’s fuck up.
The kid doesn’t get that regardless of what he was trying to prove “shifting” votes and whatnot, it completely discredits him and SHOULD make people think twice about participating in something that may not be entirely fair.
October 26th, 2005 at 11:40 am
The sad part for me is that sketchbattle was starting to look cool. I was even thinking of joining in. Now that I have doubts about how it’s run, I won’t even recommend that other people check it out.
October 26th, 2005 at 11:44 am
Yeah, this is just a crappy ass situation, to be sure. Rest assured there are people out there who can see through the sketchbattle crap.
Really dig your comic by the way.
October 26th, 2005 at 11:56 am
I had a bad experience with the forum people a short while back. I didn’t know things were that bad all the way up.
Good on you for taking the high-road on this DJ
October 26th, 2005 at 12:07 pm
Ah, he’s 19. Yeah, when I read his IM with you, it sounded very … high-schoolish.
High-schoolish = don’t waste your time
October 26th, 2005 at 12:21 pm
Myself, I deleted my Sketch Battle bookmark. I only started visiting when it was mentioned here.
October 26th, 2005 at 12:36 pm
Hey — I’m 51 and I have 2 webcomics.
God. I’m such a friggin’ loser.
October 26th, 2005 at 1:03 pm
Reading through their forum, it’s a wonder that people can defend the actions of cheating with arguments like “it doesn’t involve you.” Someone murders a stranger across town, is it okay because “it doesn’t involve you?” That people think that DJ is the one out of line would make me lose hope for humanity, but I’m supposed to be an idealist!
October 26th, 2005 at 1:12 pm
Let this be a warning to everyone I guess.
They were just not ready for your popularity…and Sambro’s not very good at dealing with people…or situations from the looks of it.
October 26th, 2005 at 1:14 pm
Hey Steve! Ain’t nothing wrong with drawing comics until you’re dead! Someday I’ll be 80 and proud I’m still drawing comics. Just like Kirby, Eisner and my other heroes.
I wonder what that guy will be doing when he’s 51?
October 26th, 2005 at 1:39 pm
I’m 23, 24 in July, and I draw webcomics…and I fucking love it. People come and read my stuff, and that gives me a sense of accomplishment, that I can tell my little story…and someone is interested.
Then to build on that, we have other awesome comics out there to read and inspire us and help us continue to keep doing what we love. Comics like Least I could Do, Penny Arcade, Darken, VG Cats, Tales of Pylea, Pointless, Neil Lisst, Questionable Content……and of course, one of my rising favorites, Yirmumuh.
Call me childish. I don’t care. I don’t live in my moms basement, either. I have a home, a car, 3 kittens, a girlfriend, every videogame system known to man, and a magic the gathering collection that would probably kill me if I dumped it on myself….and hopefully a puppy soon. I’m more of a man than that little nematoad that ran sketchbattle could ever hope to be.
It’s a shame he was rigging it all along, and took something meant to be FUN and made it into something that so many other websites do; made it into an income generator, and lost the initial spirit. Generating income is cool, don’t get me wrong….but spitting on everyone who helped you get there? That’s not cool.
Sorry to see there’s a troll out there who took something fun from you, DJ. Don’t let it sour you on our beloved community though…we’re not all vote rigging assholes.
October 26th, 2005 at 2:04 pm
I don’t know… my opinion is that some of the shots taken in the sketchbattle were shots against yirmumah, so my voting was largely in support of this comic.
Unless the other one was really, really funny.
Still, its a damn shame thats this is what you get for trying to be involved. Internet Community my ass.
–R
October 26th, 2005 at 3:00 pm
DJ, your site hit 20k hits in a day yet? Curious to see how all this drama is affecting the site hits.
That and if the departure of Bob has affected it at all.
October 26th, 2005 at 3:04 pm
Yeah, it’s a community all right, as long as the dumbass running the sketchbattle site has his way with everything, and noone else has any rights to say anything about it. What a fucking joke.
October 26th, 2005 at 3:12 pm
Yeah, this situation’s pretty ridiculous. To me, the size of your comic is a definite double edged sword. I voted against you both times, and I dig your work. I’m familiar with your comic, when they make a good zinger, I know it. But when you comment on their long history of ____, I have no idea what you’re talking about and it falls flat.
Also, after having breakfast with your wife several times, the last two battles struck a personal note for me.
This is just dumb of them. Sketch battle is a great idea, but I think they just shot themselves in the foot by being asshats about something that should be fun and free of this kinda of BS.
October 26th, 2005 at 3:13 pm
i was thinking how cool it would be to take money from guys like that: start a no-tamper third-party polling webservice that charges a fixed amount per poll and to which only the webservice admin (me) would have access. if there’s money involved, it seems to weed out the retards who would gay up their polls since then it would most definitely have legal ramifications.
wonder how the TOS/EULA would look for that webservice? ::ponders::
TO VISUAL STUDIO! ::leaps into the air….. longingly::
DJ, why can’t humans fly yet? can you answer me that?
October 26th, 2005 at 3:15 pm
Please don’t kill me! But I voted for the other guy on that last one.
Tho that proves what you said about some of your fan base voting for the “enemy.”
I just voted for the one I felt more inclined to vote for, not whose link I clicked.
October 26th, 2005 at 3:40 pm
I heard of Sketch Battle before it was mentioned here and stuck with it BECAUSE DJ was going to be in it. From my perspective the battles really weren’t that good. I found myself voting for the one that sucked the least. How many ‘U R so Ghey!’ jokes can one tolerate? I was hoping DJ would inject some good ole Gen X style venom in there and show those Gen Y pukes what an insult is and to some extent he did. I think he might have pulled a punch or two, but whatever.
Anyway…Bookmark deleted. End of story.
October 26th, 2005 at 4:10 pm
I agree with you 100% about it seeming like a good idea, but I was repeatedly disappointed when I checked out the site. There’s good work there, but making it a low-blow, mudslinging competition sort of puts a bad taste in my mouth, and takes the “hey it’s just a friendly little battle” factor out of it. And to add this vote-weighing to it… ::shakes head::
I don’t think you should give up on the “little guys,” though. In this thread alone several webcomics people speak out (and I myself make one) - and we don’t exactly pull Yirmumah’s kind of numbers. But so what! We do what we love, and there are some really amazing webcomics out there that should get more hits than they do. I think we should do what we can to get awareness of other excellent comics out there, and there are better ways to do it than through a third party like the Sketchbattle. Chris Morrison of Polymer City Chronicles (http://www.polymercitychronicles.com/) does/did a weekly highlight of other comics he called a “Strip Search,” and Paul Taylor of Wapsi Square (http://wapsisquare.com/) has a “Special Attention Comic Section” at the bottom of their page. Webcomic communities (smaller ones, like Rocketbox used to be - not big ones like Keenspot or for-pay ones like Modern Tales) are beginning to come back, and offer comic creators valuable advice, links, input, and so on.
There may be a lot of dreck out there, but if we find something good we enjoy, just an email to the creator (because I guarantee you they will appreciate it) and a posted link bring in a lot of new blood, and sometimes help languishing sites to flourish. But basically - don’t give up on “the little guy” because of this. Sketchbattle is bringing a bad name to those who don’t (necessarily) deserve it. And I think every one of us who makes a comic has - at one time or another - greatly benefited (reader-wise, at the very least) from a timely link. I know I have, and I value every one I get. There may not be a cohesive “webcomics community” as such, and I don’t think one can reasonably exist with the current environment (and that’s okay), but if we CAN help out other talented webcomics creators, I think we should. I’m not about to stand up and say “WE HAVE TO IT IS OUR DUTY,” but I think it’d just be a decent thing to do. If something’s worth a look, why not direct attention to it? That’s all I’m saying ::smile::
Anyhow. Sorry Sketchbattle turned out to be such a crap deal, but don’t forget about the little guys out there ::grin:: Be good!
-A!
October 26th, 2005 at 4:56 pm
Those guys can just blow. You did it for the fun, they’re doing it for god knows what. Fuck’em! You rock!
October 26th, 2005 at 5:26 pm
concentrate on your own thing man. In the wise words of your father. Look where you’re at now because of doing just that. You don’t need these second rate hacks trying to pimp YOUR stuff to profit off of it. seriously. Spak, mothercrunkin’, Spak!!!
October 26th, 2005 at 5:35 pm
pseudosanity78 Says:
“I remember, sometime ago, reading something about SB’s numbers on bCx being inflated.”
That’s because visitors to the site appear to vote automatically, both on bCx and TopWebComics. I’ve tried voting by actually clicking on the vote buttons, and I always get these messages:
bCx: “There has been an error counting your vote. Perhaps you already voted for this comic today or someone with your same IP address has.”
TopWebComics: “Your vote or a vote from a similar network address has already been logged for today, thank you”
I wish voting could always be done like that, because it would save me a lot of clicking, and it’s not as if there ought to be a lot of dissatisfied visitors to sites who want to read a webcomic but absolutely not vote for it. But if only one or a few sites does it this way, it gives those sites an unfair advantage, and I do believe that it is against the rules for both bCx and TWC to force visitors to vote in this fashion.
October 26th, 2005 at 7:12 pm
What also bothers me about this whole situation is the behaviour of the admin. So people who can’t stand losing are girls? If you’re 29 and drawing webcomics, you’re pathedic?
I like to thank Sketchbattle’s administrator for saving this 20-something year old female webcartoonist’s time. This is one less site I’ll be visiting.
October 26th, 2005 at 7:35 pm
Sheesh, what a gimp. My wife and I are 31 this year, and we just started doing Sanity Check a little over a year ago, I guess that makes us pathetic girls too.
At least we can hold our heads high and proudly say we produce our comic simply because we enjoy sharing our special brand of oddness with everyone who stops by, instead of just to generate positive cashflow. Hell, if that was our goal, we would never have moved off of keenspace.
Paul
October 26th, 2005 at 8:09 pm
Well, i was lookin at SB and saw the news about u droppin out, so i came to check wtf happened, its sad this things happen in webcomics, when u read a comic you dont wonder about the artists age, just his perspective of life maybe if u even wonder about the artist, its art not sports or something where your age mattters, btw your comic is kewl and in my opinion, it was the best of all the new season artists, i read ya from Mexico, keep it up dude!
October 26th, 2005 at 8:14 pm
First, the admin is not giving fans of Yirmumah enough credit. I love DJ’s strip but in sketch battle if his opponent had a better strip (which no one has to date) I’d vote for them.
Second, DJ commenting about this in his blog and driving traffic the sketch battle site gives extra hits to his opponent. I don’t know any web cartoonist who would complain about that. I’ve never heard of his opponents or their websites until I visited sketch battle. I clicked their links to check them out.
Third, the more popular Yirmumah gets the more you’ll encounter jealous dickwads bitching about you.
The only reason I checked out sketch battle was because you were in it. I would have continued if they hadn’t given you shit. Now I don’t have to mess with them anymore. Thanks for saving me a little more time to surf through your archives.
October 26th, 2005 at 8:32 pm
Yeah, I find myself thinking a lot about a phone conversation I had with Scott Kurtz about the bigger you get thing…. He’s probably seen it all in the dickhead department.
October 26th, 2005 at 8:37 pm
I love how (in his own forums!) Sambro more or less repeats the phrase, “I didn’t cheat! I just altered the votes!”
That’s like saying, “I didn’t kill the baby! I just shook it till it stopped crying!”
Somebody’s mom needs to revoke his magical innerweb access. Keep lying to yourself, kid. Let me know how that works for you in the Big Grown-Up World.
October 26th, 2005 at 8:42 pm
And that’s really what is sad about it, because that does happen when people get too successful and they don’t have the discipline to handle that success. Apparently, this super douche thinks that him doing what he did is somehow gonna wreck ur life, DJ. If it does, then just know that there are those of us who are willing to let you lean on us. I know what it’s like to feel rejected just because of how much artistic talent I possess. I experienced that before in of all places a junior high art class. Course, that teacher was probably intimidated by someone who just happened to be younger than they were, and more talented. Just keep doing what ur doing, DJ, cause ur a funny muthafunka, and ur talented to boot.
October 26th, 2005 at 9:39 pm
Adam Black Says:
October 26th, 2005 at 8:37 pm
I love how (in his own forums!) Sambro more or less repeats the phrase, “I didn’t cheat! I just altered the votes!”
That’s like saying, “I didn’t kill the baby! I just shook it till it stopped crying!”
Good Lord I LOVE your analysis Adam!! I just can’t stop laughing!!
October 26th, 2005 at 11:45 pm
Adam… just one word for you:
“Bravo”.
*claps*
October 27th, 2005 at 1:12 am
Do comics ’till you die. I feel like playing that old suck-ass game, ’skate or die’.
Aside from that, there should be a silencer for babies-shakers-analogy.
October 27th, 2005 at 5:54 am
The one thing I don’t get about the whole thing is how the sorry teenager that set up the contest failed to :
a) realise beforehand that bringing in DJ would bring in a lot of people, and as such might skew the results because of popularity factor.
b) utterly and completely to see this was not happening, given that if people coming from here simply voted for DJ because “he’s mr. Yirmumah, ya know” , the results would have DJ’s sketches winning by a frigging landslide every time he was up.
Elementary statistics and stuff…
It’s supposed to be a simple one-gag diss on your opponent, which means you have to come up with something good every single time. The field in that respect is even. DJ can have a bad day, and a completely unknown “little one” could come up with a whopper, you never know..
Ah well… maybe someone can come up with a better version with less ego and more SPAK!
October 27th, 2005 at 8:30 am
I love the “I completely trust him.” anonymous posts on that Comixpedia site. I think there should be some comments should be posted there so it doesn’t look like DJ is the one that is at fault.
October 27th, 2005 at 8:51 am
Anonymous posts are the greatest defenders of your cause! hahahhaha…
I think any normal minded person can read the transcripts, and what happened and know it was very unethical to do.
I take it that the guy is going around telling his friends I’m twisting his words, when all I did was paste them in! hah..
October 27th, 2005 at 3:30 pm
Really sad to read all this. That story about the votes (in the IM) is astonishing… whay take out votes and add them again later? It makes no sense. I think you handled it pretty well, and your incredulity comes across. Who’d have thought cartoons could be so *dramatic*!
October 28th, 2005 at 10:50 am
It makes sense from the perspective of a control freak. He thought that DJ would rally his readers in case he was losing, so in order to lull DJ into a false sense of security, he claims to have removed 45 votes from DJ’s opponents so that it would look as if DJ was winning when he was actually losing, and therefore DJ wouldn’t mention the sketch battle in his blog an extra time in order to get a few crucial extra votes from loyal readers. Though by that reasoning he might as well obscure the vote results completely until the battle is over. But that would make it even more evident that the result can be manipulated at will by the admin.
October 29th, 2005 at 4:57 am
Sketchbattle is a great idea, and a great community. I’m a part of the whole thing, and have been since I followed the link from Urban Myth, by the co-creator. However, I do agree, as someone that has been active in their forums, and chatted in the IRC channel, that Sambro is an asshat and control freak at times. However, I think he will have learnt his lesson now.
September 7th, 2007 at 9:09 pm
Hello
So interesting site, thanks!
G’night