Have you ever had somebody tell you they would do something, like give you a job, marry you or do decently in the World Cup, only to have them fall through? If you haven’t, let me fill you in, it sucks.

For the same reasons, although to a much lesser extent, it sucks when you favorite web comic doesn’t update when you’d like it to. I know a lot of you think I’m about to proceed to beat a dead horse but I think I may have something new this time.

Web comics’ creators, I’m going to ask you to be honest with your selves and with the readers. Look at your strip, look at your life. Are you missing more updates than just a few here and there? Are you getting a buttload (which is a legitimate unit of measurement where I’m from) of emails demanding you’re head on a platter? Does the abbreviation MWF make you twinge? If you answered yes to any of these questions, maybe it’s time for you to give up.

Not your comic. Don’t give that up, especially if I read you. Give up the living the lie that is your update schedule. There are a lot of great strips out there that are on the “updated when I have the time” schedule and since really, that’s what you’re doing anyway, you might as well be honest about it. Don’t worry about losing readers when you ditch the schedule, if you’re strips quality, we’ll stick around. Rich Burlew made the switch early in the summer, from what I can tell, it hasn’t hurt him at all. Joe Loves Crappy Movies and Dork Tower have always been updated sporadically. It’s a good system, because you don’t go making promises you can’t keep.

I’m just a kid, don’t tell me you’re coming to my ballet recital and then go to the strip club; just tell me your going to the strip club and I’ll still love you.