GO Comics Followers
At the beginning of the year, David42 used to publish stats on the changes in the numbers of followers for certain comic strips, including Alley Oop. He doesn't post here anymore and I don't think I've seen it in the new year so hear are the numbers for a few of your "favorite" strips:
12/31/20 12/31/21 Change
9 Chickweed Lane 76,643 77,139 496
Alley Oop 23,255 23,750 450
Gasoline Alley 29,273 29,586 313
Heart of the City 30,616 30,617 1
Studio Jantze 0 466 466
Lemon and Sayers probably tipped a couple of glasses of champagne with those numbers. Despite the abysmal writing and dreary artwork, 450 new readers started following the strip. I don't have the numbers prior to the team taking over three (!) years ago because all of the old comments were removed where the numbers were posted for a while. We also know that there were a few days early on when there was a suspicious increase in followers as fake accounts were created. Overall, I believe the numbers are up but there is no way to prove it. "Heart of the City" also had a change in the creative team that saw readerships drop several thousand (in 2020) but things seem to have leveled out. "9 Chickweed Lane" lost a major newspaper December 1 when creator Brooke McGamgam published a strip with a racist epithet. That move helped buoy followers as 80, by far the biggest monthly increase, were added in December. "Studio Jantze" is a new panel from Michael Janzte, creator of "The Norm" which started early in January. When I started following the strip, I was follower #4 so I am interested to see how that number increases. "Gasoline Alley" sort of tracks with "Alley Oop" but didn't get the same boost that AO did when it highlighted Joey's standing in the LGBQ community.
Just posting this since I am tracking it and some might find it of interest.
