In a Twitter thread posted by ComiXology on February 12, which was supposed to shed light on the transition, many users grumbled about how it ruins their reading experience. “All my purchased comics are gone, just like that. From now on, I won’t be buying anything from ComiXology ever again. Thanks a lot, you guys f— up. I want my money back,” one Twitter user quote tweeted in response. The Twitter thread was bombarded with similar angry responses. Even the actor and creator Patton Oswalt pleaded to “switch it back,” promising that there would be “no hard feelings” with the gaffe.
— Patton Oswalt (@pattonoswalt) February 18, 2022
The majority of the criticisms came from those who have large libraries; since the app is an overhaul, many had to re-download their past purchases. Aside from that, many complained that the revamped app is slow, the user interface is like “diet Kindle,” the images are of low quality, and the web reader is nonfunctional.
ComiXology 4.0: What You Need to Know
The Website and the Integrations
These developments may seem confusing. Indeed, the only two things that differentiate ComiXology Unlimited and Kindle Unlimited now are accessibility and catalog size. The former is only available in the United States, whereas the latter is offered in several marketplaces. In addition, ComiXology Unlimited obviously has a wider selection of comics titles. On Kindle Unlimited, there are only 5,000 titles available, including ComiXology Originals comics. In a nutshell, Prime Reading, Kindle Unlimited, and ComiXology now share the same services/apps.
The App and the Web Reader
Though reading on the new app is tolerable, it bears a resemblance to the no-frills Kindle, as they share the same codebase. In the aforementioned controversial Twitter thread, ComiXology said that it can’t keep two separate codebases because it “isn’t sustainable.” Reading on desktop, meanwhile, has become impossible. Users now have to read via Kindle Cloud Reader, as the native ComiXology web reader is gone. This is not ideal, as Kindle Cloud Reader lacks basic features like zoom, guided view, and two-page spread. The panel view feature stayed, but upon tapping on a scene, it doesn’t zoom in. There’s also a bad news for future digital comic readers. Consequently, Twitters users expressed concern about the possibility that the changes might push readers to go back to pirating comics. If this indeed happens, it would be a blow to the comics publishing industry.
Availability and Missing Features
For years, ComiXology, having no direct competition, has been the destination for many comic readers. These major changes can absolutely feel like a betrayal for them. But can they expect anything good from ComiXology soon? ComiXology broke the silence more than a week after the scandalous update, offering vague solutions. In another series of tweets on February 24, it said that it has already pushed an update to the Fire OS app and is making several other updates, “prioritizing fast incremental improvements to ease the hardest pain points.” It also said that its priority now is fixing the web reader. But as pointed out by Gizmodo, ComiXology still didn’t address the more important issues of the update, including the unavailability of series subscriptions for non-U.S. readers and the move to Kindle Direct Publishing of its comic publishing platform, which causes burden to creators. It also didn’t give a specific date as to when it plans to roll out the fixes it mentioned. For the meantime, here are other apps and services like ComiXology while we wait for the promised updates.
