Ladies and gentlemen,
To make a long story short: I’ve made the difficult decision to step aside after three years as your genial host. Snarking on Funky Winkerbean has been lots of fun, but it does consume quite a bit of time that I really need to be devoting to my family and my career.
The SoSF community is the wittiest and friendliest online community I’ve ever had the pleasure to be involved with, and I would hate to turn you all loose with no place to snark. To that end, I am looking for a successor. I feel that there are more than a few of you reading this whose ability to rip Tom Batiuk a new one on a daily basis far surpasses my own.
I’m hoping that I can turn over the proceedings here to a new master (or mistress) of ceremonies. In addition to a knowledge of Funky Winkerbean canon, the ideal candidate should have experience with WordPress and access to a web hosting service (preferably not GoDaddy, but that’s up to you). I would be handing over all assets: the sonofstuckfunky.com domain, the @sonofstuckfunky Twitter account, the last three years’ worth of posts, and help with the transition.
So give it some thought; do be advised that maintaining a blog like this can turn into a time suck (hell, just reading Funky Winkerbean can be a waste of time, let alone analyzing it). I will entertain any questions in the comments below, or you can contact me directly using the “Contact SoSF” form in the right sidebar of this page.
Thanks for reading and, for the love of God, stay Funky!
Your pal,
TFHackett
Son of Stuck Funky
Son of Stuck Funky 
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
I’m gonna miss your posts. You always knew precisely what was wrong with a given strip and just how to highlight it. But real life takes priority over Funky any day. Good luck, and I hope you can still comment from time to time!
*Sniff* Now what am I going to read first thing every morning? Thanks for three hilarious years.
Dude…no! But, sadly, I understand. Running a website, even a personal one, is hard work; however, you’ve done a fantastic job and you will truly be missed. The best of luck to you in your personal and professional life.
And thanks for the last three years of joy….Bill
*sniff* Before you leave, will you at least explain to us why you have the Cowardly Lion as your avatar? Does it have a meaning, or just something random?
Don’t let Tom Batiuk win!
TFH sez: RE: the Cowardly Lion, it’s both random and meaningful for me; the Lion is my favorite character in my favorite movie of all time. He helps me search for my courage. GrrrrUFFF!
Terrible news, TFH, thanks for three glorious years of therapeutic Funky release. Before I stumbled across SoSF, I thought I was the only one baffled by Batiuk (mainly because I’d never met anyone who read it or who even knew what the hell it was). It’s been a real pleasure (the blog, not the strip) and you’ll be sorely missed.
Best of luck to you, TFH, and many thanks for adding amusement to the day.
I hope you find someone to take over. I can’t; my time is limited and my talent even more so, besides, I run a blog about as well as a certain cartoonist writes and draws…
Perhaps it can be a team effort. Thanks for all of the laughs.
TFH sez: I had the same thought about it being a team effort. Thanks for bringing it up!
Sad to see you go TFH. Hope everything goes well with your career and family.
I would nominate myself, but my life is so hectic these days. it’s not even funny….kind of like a Funky Winkerbean strip! Ha!
I think the team effort thing is interesting. If we can keep the schedule.. I would be willing to do commentary on one strip a week if that works.
I wonder if Tom Batiuk is laughing in an evil manner “Ha! I’ve won. i’ve finally worn down that insufferable TFH!!! Mwa-ha-ha!!!!”
Sorry Tommy Boy…the snarkers will prevail!!
A remarkable amount of effort has gone into this blog, and despite the legal efforts of Batom Enterprises and the incompetence of the web hosting, you’ve managed to continue to come through every day. Unfortunately there is no way in God’s Globally Warming Green Earth I could expend the energy it takes to keep this blog up to date. I do like the idea of a rotating schedule. The only thing is, that somebody has to take ultimate ownership of all the assets, and be responsible for making sure the rotation is in place, etc.
Best of luck and thanks! I sure hope the site can continue. It was such a relief to find that I’m not a snarling misanthrope because I find long, drawn- out agony in the funny papers a wee bit out of line. (or that I am but I’m not alone)
TFH is there more to this than you are letting on? Were you getting nasty legal letters from Batiuk, his lawyers or his syndicate? Or from websites that you linked the daily strip from?
Don’t let Batiuk and his goons drive you from this place! We have your back!
TFH sez: Thanks, Dreamer! I’d like to assure my readers that the decision has nothing to do with any legal pressure.
OK, Mr. Hackett, please tell me that you’ll at least finish a “lame duck” session (or at least have a series of guest posters)
TFH sez: Señor, the snark shall go on until further notice. Knowing that whatever the transition turns out to be, it’s going to take some time, so I thought I’d just put out some feelers.
@The Dreamer: I hate to speak for TFH, but I have a feeling he’d tell us the truth if it was a legal issue– it’s not like him to clam up and hand the problems over to someone else. I run a blog much less eloquent than this, that doesn’t deal with canon or continuity or anything, and even that takes up a lot of time. It’s a hard decision, but I can understand why he made it.
The rotating authors idea sounds like it has potential, but ownership and finances are still an issue. At this point I have so much on my plate I can’t really help much. 😦
I run a blog too (which is why I changed my username in case my comments got too out of hand) but yeah, I rarely update, and frankly, I don’t hate/love FW to do it every day.
I feel like it would be a reasonable thing if there was a slow fade-out: constant guest posters, then one main “new” poster that would do some with TFH, then the reigns are handed over “off the scenes”, TFH would still post occasionally, then he leaves SoSF.
Hell, I’d settle for a once-weekly post, an arc recap kind of thing. TFH’s incredible consistency and high quality has made SoSF what it is today…the premier comics blog (snark or otherwise)…period. Wish I had the resources available to take over for TFH full-time but as far as helping out in any way I can, count me in.
TFH sez: Thanks, Bud! I did consider cutting back from a daily schedule, but that challenge of a daily deadline has been part of the fun in a sick sort of way. Plus I’d hate to ask my readers to settle.
Has it been three years? I’d swear that’s more years than story arcs — cognizant ones, anyway. Amazing that you’ve put more work into making fun of Funky Winkerbean than Batiuk has put into making Funky Winkerbean.
Thanks for all the very kind comments (check my responses above by looking for TFH sez:). I’ve made this post “sticky” to keep it on the home page for awhile. We ‘ll keep this discussion going and figure out what’s next for SoSF.
The “team” approach definitely would work for me, and I’ll help make that happen any way I can. I do want to make a clean break from admin duties, though.
Aw, tell the truth — You’ve been offered the position of Chief Technology Officer at Montoni’s Pizza, and all the Funkyboard meetings and status reports would take too much of your time.
I hate to hear it, but I can certainly understand. Thank you for all your efforts and I hope you stick around after the transfer to contribute. It has sure been a gas. You rescued SF from almost certain oblivion, weathered the wordpress snub as well as the Batboy lawsuit threats. It’s been a crazy ride with chart-toppin’ snark and I hope it carries on. I’m sure we will all endeavor to persevere. Best of luck to you and yours and don’t be a stranger. Thanks again Tom, thanks very much. Endeavor to persevere.
TFH sez: You are most welcome. For those who might not recall, Sarge is one of the readers who made the jump from the original Stuck Funky, and has been around these parts since day the first.
I’m sorry to hear you’re leaving us–snarking on this strip has been a very cathartic experience for me and I hope you find someone worthy to fill your shoes.
I certainly understand that you can’t keep working on the site forever. I can’t believe it’s been three years either.
You definitely put the Ape in Apricot! Good luck on future endeavors, and just promise to come back to this lofty post when you win the lottery and can live the life of Abby Spencer!
Thank you for all the effort, you’re doing God’s work here. I have a hard time even finding newspaper sites that load the strip properly, so running a blog is a no go. I migrated over here from Josh’s site after I determined that FW requires a daily blast of ridicule. I certainly hope the site continues, I am the only person I have ever met that reads newspaper comics, never mind this greasefire.
Well, crud.
Congratulations on a brilliant three-year run! A strip as crappy as FW deserves a blog as outstanding as this one. May the snarking continue for as long as necessary!
I stand in line, TFH. I stand in fucking line.
The team thing sounds most interesting! I guess those interested should contact you, right?
My hats off to you, doing this day in, day out is a Sisyphean task if there ever was one! That said, this site has provided more guffaws-per-click than even The Onion for me. Thanks for all of your work!
Your avatar is The Cowardly Lion? I coulda swore it was David Crosby!
Hey, I wish I had the wherewithall to pull off SOSF for a few years, but I’m lost at running anything in the cyber-world. The best I can ever do is an event page on Facebook.
Thanks for the laughs!
3 years, wow. Seems both longer and shorter.
TFH, I greatly appreciate your time and effort into running this site, one of the first things I check every morning. I also appreciate that you have a plan to keep SOSF going after you are no longer able to run it. It’ll be nice to, hopefully, avoid the wilderness that was the last several weeks on the original Stuck Funky. Hope you will stick around as an every-so-often commenter, at least.
Really sad news indeed!!!! The only reason I look at the pile of trash that is FW is for this site. This site leaves, I won’t be reading FW ever again, it’s to gawd awful to read without snark!
Disappointing news but very ubderstandable. I am not sure how you lasted this long. Rest assured your humorous takes on the FW tire fire made this site a must-see every day. Congrats on a job well done, TFH. Fingers crossed that someone more tech savvy than I steps forward to soldier on. I will say that I would be more than willing to chip in financially to help. We can’t let BatHack win, can we? Just thinking of the smug smirk on the DLoM makes me angry.
Why was I here fron the SoF days onward… because FW and TB are just so bad and yet so pompus in your face about it. These “snarks” turned out to be so much more creative and an outlet of the frustration with King Features for not cancelling and even “paying” for this load ‘O crap.
But all good things must pass… and that is exactly why FW continues.
So now I will pound my head in private without venting with long-time fellow snarkers like OB Dan and Sgt.
Oh… I think Comics Kingdom has my e-mail flagged and won’t post my snarks there.
If this does become a team thing, a great idea indeed, then whoever runs the show, can you find something for somebody who is still living part of his life in the (technological) past?
The posting-by-commitee thing seems to be gaining traction, especially since no one person has elbowed everyone out of the way, barged forward and bellowed “I’ll take it!”
Additionally, there might be a Friend of SoSF who can provide hosting on his personal web server.
Stay tuned!
Thanks TFH–I have been here since Stuck Funky got really stuck–really enjoy your take and the comments.
I went to middle school and high school reading Funky Winkerbean—pre-time jump Funky and I should be the same age, but who the hell knows how old he is now. I loved the strip in the 70’s and early 80’s but lost touch with FW in 1988 when I moved to a town whose newspaper didn’t carry FW. I re-connected with FW through the Comics Curmdgeon at about the same time as “Aldomania” and then through Stuck Funky and now SOSF.
Anyhow, thanks TFH and Stuck Funky before you. I think I would parrot what everyone else has said above. I trust you will be commenting still once reins are handed over?
Thanks for the last three years.
You could continue just at a lower volume. Still do the daily post but just have one word descriptions like “Wow”, “Really?”, “Again?”,”WTF?”, etc. The commentators would take it from there.
I do like the idea of a team effort– there aren’t many different voices in the comic strip fandom right now, and a rotating set of authors would guarantee variety. If I can make time, I’d love to be involved, but I can’t make promises just yet.
Adding my thanks to our host TFH for all his hard work. I’m not surprised that the current storyline coincides with this announcement. The retconning of Dead Lisa’s date rape has been mind-numbingly awful.
Sad to see you go, but I can definitely relate (obviously). May Stuck Funky the third keep the torch burning bright!