Remember the Alt Text

February 5, 2022 11:10 AM

It was a simple story about a responsible owl, trying to raise a curious (human) son and a geeky (human) daughter in their giant treehouse while dealing with his longtime bear buddy (and honey researcher), Steve. Though it debuted, humbly enough, in the Cracked.com forums, Benjamin Driscoll's drolly sweet comic Daisy Owl soon gained a loyal following, earning a regular feature there and routinely making the front pages of sites like Digg and Reddit. In March 2009, Driscoll went pro, quitting his job to work on the comic full-time and making Daisy Owl one of the few self-sufficient webcomics on the net. Its quirky, character-driven humor, focused mainly on children, friendship, and families, earned comparisons to a PG-rated Achewood, as well as plenty of fan art. Highlights: Basement - Honey - Parenting - Shampoo - Skittle on the Moon - Nightmare - Movie Night - Thrift Store - Classic Dad - Wallpapers

Sadly, the comic went on indefinite hiatus just 14 months after the original post (though there was a single update in 2018 to the delight of RSS faithful). The fan community lived on in a series of unofficial forums called The Treehouse, and most recently made the move to Discord. As for Driscoll, he moved on to another short-lived comic (Peep) and a successful spaceship-building video game project (Sunshine Heavy Industries).

[Part of #DoublesJubilee month!]

posted by Rhaomi (7 comments total)

“Skeletons… aren’t real.” Hilarious!
posted by ejs at 11:36 AM on February 5, 2022

This is just wonderful. I'd never heard of Daisy Owl. I love the drawing style, and the characters, and the way Daisy thinks.

(And thanks for pointing out the alt text. I am so bad about looking at alt text. You would think XKCD would have trained me, but apparently not.)

I am so glad to know about this, and to have 14 months of comics to page through.

Thank you so much for posting this, Rhaomi!
posted by kristi at 1:41 PM on February 5, 2022 [1 favorite]

This was pretty much my very favorite comic on the internet, back when it was a going concern. I particularly remember the story of the dentist and the stickers.

It's great to get an overview of the author's projects since those days.
posted by Western Infidels at 1:56 PM on February 5, 2022 [1 favorite]

God, this makes me feel old. I remember refreshing the site every day in that year and probably most of the next waiting for another update. 12 years ago??
posted by thewumpusisdead at 4:11 PM on February 5, 2022

It's a shame that oneswellfoop isn't around much these days, as I'm sure he'd have tons to say, both about this and Argon Zark.
posted by JHarris at 4:30 PM on February 5, 2022

Thank you for reminding me of this highly amusing comic.

Also now I am sad again about how it cut off right at the beginning of what promised to be a highly amusing arc.
posted by Scattercat at 8:11 PM on February 5, 2022 [1 favorite]

Oh, this is a fun strip that I didn’t know existed. Thanks!
posted by Going To Maine at 9:20 AM on February 6, 2022