TheInternational Network of Disney Universe Comic Knowers and Sources[1] (I.N.D.U.C.K.S.) orInducks is a freely available database aiming to index allDisney Universe comics ever printed in the world, created and maintained by both amateurs and professionals.[2] It is an internationalproject[3] which provides indexes of around 170,000 Disney comic publications worldwide.[4] It is distributed with its ownlicence.[5]
Efforts to catalog Disney comic stories on a large scale date from the late 1970s and early 1980s. Among the most important works are an index of Disney comics published inDenmark,[6] a list of stories produced inItaly,[7] a list of American daily strips and Sunday pages,[8] an index of AmericanDell Disney comics[9] and aCarl Barks index.[10] All these lists include artists and writer credits that were previously unknown.
In August 1992, Per Starbäck (fromSweden) created theDisney Comics Mailing List.[11] Members soon contributed lists of Disney comics and gave references for printed indexes. In May 1994, expanding on information exchanged on the mailing list, Harry Fluks (from theNetherlands) created a database to organize comic indexes, and called it theDisney Comics Database.[12]
In 1999, a German member suggested the nameInducks as a cross between "index" and "duck" (forDonald Duck). It was playfully writtenI.N.D.U.C.K.S. toresemble acronyms seen inJunior Woodchucks comics.[13] Several meanings have been proposed, including "Internet Database forUncle Walt's Comics and Stories", "International Network for Disney Universal Comic Knowledge and Sources",[14] up to 2008 whenInternational Network of Disney-Universe Comic Knowers and Sources was selected.[1]
Over the years, a Web search interface was introduced, later replaced by a second search engine, COA,[1][15] in 2001.
Inducks integrates previous studies and research works, with permission of the authors,[18] as well as its own research. Thanks to contacts with creators,[19] it provides credits to anonymous (or wrongly-credited) stories. In particular, mostDisney comics were not given credits until the 1980s or 1990s. It also contains information about unpublished Disney comics stories.[20]
The main interface to Inducks is asearch engine, browser and website abbreviated COA, which is daily updated based on Inducks data, and is available in thirteen languages. While COA uses Inducks data, it is not part of Inducks itself, but it enables users to navigate and search data which in its raw form consists of very user-unfriendly text files.[21] It has a few other features not part of Inducks, like a collection management system and an error tracker tool.[22]
Although parts of the database have been published in book form[23] and in specialized journals,[24] Inducks is most often used as a source by comic book historians in articles devoted toDisney comics.[25]
Inducks is also used by Disney editors around the world.[2][26] It is mentioned as a source by scholars[27] and is referenced in books about comics in general.[28] It has once been criticized for being a catalog of data rather than true (semantic) indexing work.[29]
Inducks sometimes gave talks and held meetings in comic-book fairs in Italy, such as inLucca in 1997 withDon Rosa andMarco Rota[30] and inReggio Emilia in 2007[31] and 2008.[32] In 2004, it won an Internet award fromafNews, an association of professional cartoonists in Italy.[33]
^abIrene De Togni,The Inducks index, editorialized by Disney comics amateurs and professionals: New dynamics, new participatory models, Hybrid. Revue des arts et médiations humaines 8, 2022.https://doi.org/10.4000/hybrid.2145.
^Olsen, Martin (1979–1983), "Det Store Index",Carl Barks & Co., no. 13–15,17–18,ISSN0901-3555.(in Danish)
^Fossati, Franco (1982), "Disney made in Italy",IF 1 (2a Serie) (in Italian).
^Becattini, Alberto; Boschi, Luca (1984),La produzione sindacata (1930–1980) (in Italian), Al Fumetto Club.
^Becattini, Alberto (1990),Disney Index, Comic Books - Vol. 1 & 2, Al Fumetto Club
^Barrier, Michael (1982),Carl Barks and the art of the comic-book, M. Lilien,ISBN0-9607652-0-4 (published earlier in a shorter form in the fanzineFunnyworld in the 1970s).
^The word Inducks is a combination of Index and Ducks. Brix Lichtenberg came up with this name as a replacement for the (more boring) name Disney comics Database. He intended it to be an abbreviation (I.N.D.U.C.K.S.) like the ranks in the Junior Woodchuck stories, but we haven't figured out yet what it is supposed to mean ... inAnkkalinnan Pamaus 2000-02Archived 2011-07-09 at theWayback Machine.
^A precise time-frame is as follows (from messages in theDisney comics mailing list): Disney comics indexes were exchanged as early as 1992,e.g., September 11; the first mention of theDisney comics database (DcD) is from April 18, 1994; its first public release is on May 25, 1994; the first mention of a web search program is from March 22, 1995; the first mention ofInducks is from February 9, 1999; the first mention of theCOA search engine on the Disney comics mailing list is from April 9, 2001 (see archived copyhere).
^Interview with the creator of COA,DDF(R)appet 10, 2007(in Danish).
^A. Becattini, L. Gori, F. Stajano, H. Fluks,Don Rosa e il Rinascimento Disneyano, Comic Art, 1997(in Italian);Giorgio Cavazzano Percorsi, Firenze: Edizioni II Penny, 2002(in Italian); P. Castagno et al.,Luciano Bottaro - Un "gioviale" omaggio (2006),Rodolfo Cimino - Dalla Tana del Bestio all'Angolo dei Salici (2007),Abramo e Giampaolo Barosso Fra logaritmi e fiordalisi (2008), Papersera(in Italian).
^Lapoussière, Tristan; Willot, François (2001), "Carl Barks: Bibliographie",Backup (in French), no. 8;Angot, Michel; Willot, François (2000) [1996], "Les belles histoires Walt Disney",Le collectionneur de bandes dessinées (in French), no. 81, 91.
^E.g.Stajano, Francesco (1999–2001), "Disney-serier i Italien",NAFS(k)uriren (in Swedish), no. 30–32,ISSN0282-4493 (revised English version); F. De Salvia,La via Italiana a Topolino, Rivista di storia e storiografia 5, 2004(in Italian); T. Lapoussière,Phil DeLara, bibliographie en France et aux États-Unis, Backup 12, 2002(in French); F. Castanet,Romano ScarpaArchived 2007-10-28 at theWayback Machine, Pimpf 13, 2006(in French);Willot, François (1999), "Giovan Battista Carpi",Le collectionneur de bandes dessinées (in French), no. 89.
^See e.g. Mickey Mouse And Friends 287;Roope-setä 2006-02(in Finnish); I Maestri Disney 20(in Italian);interview with Sérgio Figueiredo,Abril's Disney editor(in Portuguese); the integral ofFloyd Gottfredson published in by editorGlénat(in French).
^See e.g.D'Arcangelo, A, Zanettin, F (2004), "Dylan Dog Goes to the USA: a North-American Translation of an Italian Comic Book Series",International Journal of Comic Art,5 (2), Akadémiai Kiadó: 187,doi:10.1556/Acr.5.2004.2.3{{citation}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link);Mahrt, N (2008),"A Comic Approach to Politics? Political Education via Comics",Journal of Social Science Education,7/8 (2/1): 119
^J.-P. Gabilliet,Des comics et des hommes: Histoire culturelle des comic books aux Etats-Unis, 2005,ISBN2-84274-309-1(in French); H. Matla,Stripcatalogus (9th ed.), 1998(in Dutch).
^S. Brügger, L. Peyraud, M. Schmid,Les images ne sont pas des mots, study presented to theHaute École de Gestion de Genève, 2002(in French).
