A week or so back, I signed up for both Pullbox Online and Direct2Drive’s digital comic book stores in order to compare and contrast the two approaches towards legitimizing and monetizing downloadable comic books. The Pullbox experience was a good one, but Direct2Drive was a nightmare from the start, with the ultimate result being that I ended up with several programs on my computer I never wanted as well as an unusable product. When I went to check the D2D customer support area for help, there was absolutely nothing available that dealt with my issue (a PDF file filled with 25 virgin white pages - a steal at $1.99!), and in order to file a support ticket, I was told I had to create another wholly separate account with D2D. At that point, having wasted nearly half an hour struggling with their service in the first place, I just walked away.

Imagine my surprise last night when I received an email telling me:

Dear Stephen ,

Great news! Your new support login has been created and you may now login to our online support center

It would appear that someone in the D2D family stumbled across/was directed to my post and, in an effort to “make things right,” took it upon themselves to open an account for me.

That’s right - someone at Direct2Drive thought it would be a good idea to root through their customer database and use my personal information to open up an account that I’m on record as saying I do not want. Way to go guys - you’ve just guaranteed that I’ll never use your service again for anything!

Comics