Agency Publishing's 2024 Customer Letter (Patreon)

I wanted to give a letter to all of you on where we're at, where we're going, and in general where my head is on our tickling media library.

What is Agency Publishing, Inc.?

It is the corporate entity that owns all the "stuff" we make.  All the intellectual property belongs to the entity.  Whether it's the copyrights for all the comic books and related characters, ownership of all the videos, copyright to the underlying code for The Cyriaan Chronicles #10 and Tickle Magnet, it owns everything.

Oblesklk and his wife own the company, so there is little chance of it randomly converting from tickling digital media company to selling goldfish online.  And I know where she's ticklish, which helps with shareholder negotiations in case she gets the itch to distribute goldfish suddenly.

What is the focus for 2024 going to be?

It's going to be back to basics.

I consider tickling videos and tickling comic books to be the basics of what we offer.  It's our value proposition to the tickling community and I want to keep ensuring those fundamentals are working well.

On the tickling video space, I cleaned up some of my older drives and found a lot of older videos which were either never published, and I thought lost to time.  I've been posting those on the Patreon, and will continue to do so until the supply is exhausted.   I will continue partnering with talented tickling video producers like Tickle Kitty, Princess, Nina Luck, and Jessie Jax to bring you exclusive tickling videos in the future.  I will also continue slowly recruiting other interested models in providing a reliable stream of videos to share!

On the tickling comic space, we have a few issues on the verge of launch.  The Cyriaan Chronicles #12 will launch next week, while The Ruthless, Yelena, The Agencies all have issues currently in production.  My aim right now is to launch roughly 6 issues per year, about 1 every two months.  Comic books are extremely expensive to produce, so I need to be careful in weighing benefits to you that are excited and fresh, versus the costs to produce.

Does this mean no more innovation?

I will always innovate, because that's just who I am.  Projects outside the basics, such as the upcoming launch of my second tickling video game Tickle Magnet, are alive and well.  My next bucket list item, after releasing a tickling video game, is to produce tickling animation.  I will keep quietly recruiting potential animators to bring one of our IP to life in a new and exciting format.

The innovations in voice acting have paid off well in projects like The Cyriaan Chronicles #10, the animated issue of The Agencies #26 available on this Patreon, and the upcoming Tickle Magnet video game.  You all love that innovation in our products, so I will continue building working relationships with talented voice actors to bring the media to life in a different way.

Are there going to be any more tickling video games?

I'm going to take a break after Tickle Magnet's launch.  Granted, I will be around to issue hot fixes when new players inevitably find bugs that I missed during alpha and beta testing phases to ensure the game is stable and an enjoyable experience.

I've been developing pretty intensely for over two years now, and I need a break.  I'm a pretty big gaming geek, and the quality of video games that have released just in the last year is absurd...in a good way.  I have some catching up to do!  

If sales are strong, say 200+ of Tickle Magnet on Steam, and the reception is positive, say 80% positive review on Steam, that would be a positive sign I should consider adding to the tickling video game library.  Keeping mind, even if we hit that sales target, it's still a fraction of what the game cost to produce.  Thus, if Tickle Magnet has little engagement and poor reviews, that would be a sign this particular innovation didn't pay off and I should focus attention elsewhere where I can be more effective.

What about AI?

Generative AI is a hot button in the community today.  So what is our stance, and how much will it appear in our future media?

In the spirit of innovation, I will generally dabble in new advances, to see how I can improve our offerings.  For some examples, I used ChatGPT to help with some java coding issues in both The Cyriaan Chronicles #10 and some of the more complicated time mechanics in Tickle Magnet.  I experimented with the art generation piece to improve the artwork for some of the tertiary characters in Tickle Magnet.  And I've been dabbling in trying to create some fun re-imagined imagery of some of our comic book universe characters.  I think it's always fun to see characters you know in a new light, in different styles.  There's also some interesting uses of AI that I haven't experimented with, such as upscaling some of our older videos so they start to approach HD levels of resolution.

I index heavily on supporting artists.  I always have.  Most of the revenue we've collected over the years goes straight to artists creating the work, whether it's the literal artists creating the comic book art, the models creating the tickling videos, or the voice actors lending their heart and talents into the audio.  It's hard to be an artist and in my own little way, I try to make it less hard for them.

That won't change.  I will always hire human artists to work on our existing comic book lines.  I will always hire human models to create tickling videos.  My vision for generative AI is that it will be supplemental in nature, only.  It will not be the main draw.  Meaning, I will still use it to create fun little asides of the characters, like bonus material.  But it won't be the primary reason someone picks up one of our comic books, or watches our videos.

In closing

You are all amazing.  I love that we share this peculiar kink, and I love that you support indie creators in their mission to create new and fun tickling media.