The voting is fast and furious -- be sure to vote if you want to have your say on who gets the boot this week.  (I really prefer'd the vote for your favorite comic approach of last year, but that's not the way they've organized it this year).  Here are the top 3 comics in danger of not making the cut to week 2 (as of Friday AM):

• The Book of Biff (23%)
• Newspaper Comic Strip (16%)
• Xylia (13%)

Wow - lots of news and stuff for the day before Halloween and five (5!) days until the end of the Dubya era in the US of A.  (Btw fellow Americans - get out there and vote on November 4th - early if it's allowed in your state..  I already did myself)

BUSINESS
Advertising platform Project Wonderful warns - autosurfing sites are a really bad idea (and a violation of PW's TOS).

DJ Coffman likes what he sees from T-shirt printer Redbubble.com.

Don't miss Howard and Sandra Tayler's guide to shipping -- there's clearly a lot you can learn from their experience before trying to sell your own t-shirts or books.

INTERVIEWS
The New Yorker has an interview with Dilbert creator Scott Adams.

CBR has an interview with Smile creator Raina Telgemeier.

Daily Cross Hatch has an interview with Slow Wave creator Jesse Reklaw.

HOLLYWOOOOOOD!!
Paramount has acquired the screen rights to Dave Roman's supernatural detective series, Agnes Quill.  I've read Agnes stories before (click here for the webcomic version) and just picked up a collection from Dave at this year's SPX (the collection is from SLG, published in 2006).  You never know how these deal will turn out -- movie gets made or development hell -- but I have to say, this is a great premise for a movie.  I could easily see a version of it as Ghostbusters crossed with Buffy.

BASIC TRAINING
Comicspace Colonel Joey Manley is looking for comics about military life.  He lists several he's found already.

This looks interesting! FLEEN has a few notes on this project from a September conversation with creator Aaron Diaz.

20 PERCENT
A Distant Soil blog has a list of literary agents accepting graphic novel representation. (h/t Journalista!)

BOMB SHELTER WEBCOMIC IDOL
Talking about Webcomics Idol 2008, Gary says Brad Guigar is Simon.  I'm guessing D.J. Coffman, who usually doesn't worry about telling people what he thinks, has an equal claim to that seat  Maybe with a few more "dawgs" Brad can take the Randy role.  I guess that makes me Paula?  Bomb Shelter encouraged us to throw up some initial critiques -- I was sweating a cold+ all weekend so I'm hoping to throw some more constructive feedback up there as the contest goes on.  Brad and D.J. are successful practicing cartoonists.  I'm not, of course.  So I won't be trying to break down craft, but trying to offer impressions as a reader and perhaps observations based on webcomcs as a whole.  We'll see what I come up with!

FRIGHT NIGHT
Eric Millikin is part of a big scary art show in Detroit on October 30th called Damned.

Jennifer Contino has an interview with Sam Costello of the webcomic Split Lip.

Tomorrow a new webcomic Werewif debuts.

Graham Annable has a Halloween cartoon for your enjoyment.

Not comics, but Entertainment Weekly has a list of the 20 Scariest Movies of all time.

Huzzah!  The first new Copper comic in over a year.  Here's the story from Kazu Kibuishi:

I intended to post this comic at the beginning of November, but Amy and I leave to go on a book tour in Italy tomorrow (courtesy of Michele Foschini and Renoir Comics), so I decided to post a little bit early.  Along with my ragtag crew of artists, I've been pulling longer hours on Amulet 2 than ever before.  Amy and I have been getting up and heading to the studio at around noon and leaving when the sun is rising.  So what prompted me to find the time to do this?

COMIXTALK
If you're just joining us this Monday we've got new stuff posted this weekend including interviews with the creators of ZAP!, Chronillogical and Misfile.  Plus Dr. Haus reviews the webcomic Mistakes of Youth.  We've had a big October issue so if be sure to check it out to see what else you might have missed!

BOMB SHELTER WEBCOMIC IDOL
It's another edition of BSC Webcomic Idol and I'm a judge again.  I'm not sure if they're letting you vote off a comic each week or you have to vote for your favorite (and the least vote-getter leaves) but either way it's an elimination contest.  I keep doing it because the entrants have been strong contenders and the feedback and dialogue over the webcomics has usually been very interesting.  Plus ultimately some good comics get a lot of exposure.

I've gotten a chance to look at some representative work from all of the webcomic entrants but I'll definitely be digging into each of them.  Unlike the other judges who all are extremely talented comic creators I am the "journalist" type so my feedback may be more general but it'll be aimed at whether I think the comic is working for the audience.

MILESTONES
FLEEN in writing about American Elf's 10th year anniversary asks "would yesterday’s American Elf tenth anniversary strip be the first webcomic that went for ten years on a daily basis? I think it might."  I think the answer is clearly no.  American Elf is certainly a comic that has been created for 10 years on a daily basis but it was only published on the web on a daily basis back to 2002 (here's the Wayback Archive for the site).  I have a ton of respect for Kochalka's work but his career at this point in time is largely split between a pre and post-web era.  (Moreover, American Elf is not the first journal-style published on the webcomic, Drew Weing's The Journal Comic got to the web first.  I saw Heidi MacDonald's panel with James Kochalka at SPX this year and he actually cited seeing Weing's webcomic as a strong motivation to agreeing to work with Joey Manley to put his diary strips up on the web.  UPDATE: thanks to James Kochalka for commenting below -- and just to clarify -- Drew's contribution to the genre of journal/diary comics was putting it on the web, essentially as he made them; an idea that someone assuredly would have got to but I think it's generally agreed that Drew acted on first.  As to the basic idea of making a daily journal comic, Drew's comic came well after James Kochalka's work.)

UPDATE 2: Very interesting podcast of an interview between Joey Manley and James Kochalka at the recent SPX in Bethesda, MD.

REVIEWS
A review of The Phoenix Requiem (h/t Journalista!).  ComixTALK recently interviewed the creator, Sarah Ellerton.

ADVERTS
Ryan North writes that he's updated the help/FAQ system at Project Wonderful.

EVENTS
Blog@Newsarama writes about the Transgender Day of Remembrance Webcomics Project.

The top ten finalists for this year's Bomb Shelter Webcomic Idol contest are up: Shi Long Pang, The Superfogeys, The Book of Biff, Soul Driver, Simulated Comic Product, Xylia, Newspaper Comic Strip, Marooned, Lawn Darts, and Calamities of Nature.

Just a few quick site notes:

The "import your outside blog feed" function was broken this week but I've fixed it now and if you're interested in adding your outside blog feed to your ComixTalk account log in and click here.

However, some folks are having trouble using our forum and I have yet to have time to dig into it.  So if you're having a problem getting into the forum hang in there and I hope to have it cleaned up by the end of this weekend.

ALSO post your Halloween webcomic news at FrightNight.  Not long now until the big night...

Wow - ten years of James Kochalka's diary comics this Sunday.  Kochalka linked this week to a short documentary about him and his life with his family and his art. Very worth watching.

And Kochalka promises something special for Sunday so be sure to drop by americanelf.com

AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 BLOGS

• Brigid Alverson writes about the new webcomics site from Shadowland Comics.
• An interview with David King, the creator of the webcomic Danny Dutch. (h/t Journalista!)
• ComicMix praises the now completed webcomic Minus from Ryan Armand.
• Ping Teo writes about the many changes in webcomicland over the last few years.