Joey Manley
TokyoHigh comes to Modern Tales!
Submitted by Joey Manley on April 4, 2003 - 02:55
Modern Tales, the leading publisher of subscription-based webcomics, announced this week that TokyoHigh, a new series by cartoonist George Panella, has joined the lineup of its flagship website ModernTales.com. New episodes of the manga-influenced series will appear on the site every Tuesday and Thursday. Like other Modern Tales comics, the latest episode of the series will be free, but past episodes will only be available to subscribers.
News for April 1, 2003
Submitted by Xaviar Xerexes on April 1, 2003 - 02:22
Dateline: April 1, 2003
All the News That Fits!
- Keenspot Servers Rated #1 by J.D. Power & Associates
- Everyone Agrees with Latest Scott Kurtz Rant
- Buddy Cop Movie: Serialize This! to feature Joey Manley & Chris Crosby
- Carson Fire Has Completely Glitch-free Week
- Eight Announces His Return to Road Waffles: Death of All Main Characters Just a Dream the Squirrel Had in the Shower.
- Tang Changes Direction with new Cute Fluffy Bunnies and Ponies webcomic.
War in Iraq Validates Sprite Comic
Daniel Bergmann, creator of the sprite-based webcomic ChocoBot, believes the tensions brought on by the military action in Iraq not only justify his creation, but deem it necessary.
"Let's face it," Bergmann noted, "The world desperately needs heroes right now, and there are no greater heroes than ChocoBot the Robot Chocobo and his merry band of woodland friends. And Cammy from Street Fighter."
While Bergmann will not directly mention the war in his webcomic, he plans to combat terrorism via the parody character Osonic bin Hedgehog.
Bruno and Bruno the Bandit Mini-series
Ian McDonald and Christopher Baldwin announced plans to feature a cross-over storyline in the near future. Bruno, the neurotic writer, will imagine Bruno, the anachronistic bandit, into scenes of the new novel she is writing. Like a cheap harlequin romance novel (or the movie Somewhere in Time), Bruno will leap from the pages to win Bruno's heart.
After the series, Baldwin plans to shift the focus of his Bruno strip to a gag-a-day comic and do away with the strip's extensive background artwork. "I want people to be happy. Oblivious and happy. Oblivious and happy sheep... wait, no. Just happy. Yes. Happy."
Sinfest No More: Go In Peace to Serve
Tatsuya Ishida announced in his latest Keenspot Newsbox for Sinfest that he has become a born again christian and as such the comic strip will now solely feature his characters Dog and Cat.
Is that a Rocket in Your Box or Are You Just Happy to See me?
After completing a ten step program, Barry T. Smith, creator of Angst Technology recently renounced all forms of gaming and caffeine.
He than exploded.
Shocking Expose on Greg Dean!
Greg Dean the creator of the comic strip Real Life admits, "Yeah, sometimes I just make s@$t up."
Mike Leffel Named Most Prolific Cartoonist of his Generation
After producing two daily comic strips (Owlie and Fat Jesus) for six years without missing a day, Mike Leffel recently took his first break, but only for a solitary Saturday. "I have to get back to work - can't let my fans twist slowly in the wind waiting for an update like some other cartoonists I won't mention."
"I only wish I was as consistent as Mike Leffel," said Chris Crosby. "Sure my strip, Superosity, has run for four years straight without missing a day but Leffel's like a god. Or like Alf. But really, what's the difference?"
Bizzleman7 Announces New Webcomic
Bizzleman7, the creator of the widely acclaimed webcomic about Mohammed Ali and his pet camel, When We Were Kings, announced his plans for a new hip-hop inspired webcomic to be called Schnizzle, Dizzle, It's All About the Bah-fizzle.
Scott McCloud immediately praised it as a classic. "Incorporating gangsta rap imagery into webcomics is the next natural step in reinventing comics. I've always thought the infinite canvas would be necessary to portray the complexities of musical personas such as Busta Rhymes and Redman."
Modern Tales asks for PHP coding help from users with Safari browser
Submitted by Joey Manley on March 29, 2003 - 20:05
Modern Tales publisher Joey Manley posted this request on his daily blog this week:
Do you know PHP and have access to a Macintosh? If so, help!
For some reason, people using the Safari browser (Apple's new browser) are unable to log into any of the Modern Tales family of websites. The problem seems to be that the Safari browser (which is currently in beta) is not accepting the cookie we use to maintain login state. As far as I can tell, the cookies we use are coded correctly, according to standard -- and they work on every other browser we've used for testing, from Netscape 4.x all the way through to the latest Opera. I don't have access to a Macintosh right now, so I can't debug, and have found no clue of Safari cookie problems or solutions to same on any PHP message boards. If you can help me to test and debug, I'd really appreciate it -- and will happily hand out a free lifetime subscription to any one of our websites to the person or people who can help me find the solution. To volunteer, pop me an email: joey@moderntales.com.
Whence Webcartoonist Subcommunity?
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The modern history of art has been largely the history of artist subcommunities, bound by common interest and usually but not always by geography. Michelangelo fraternized with colleagues, burned with rivalry for Leonardo, and clucked his tongue at Titian. To be in Paris in the 1920s was to glimpse Pablo Picasso in conversation with Gertrude Stein and Ernest Hemingway.
Makeshift Miracle Wraps Up
Submitted by Xaviar Xerexes on March 6, 2003 - 11:35
Jim Zubkavich's Makeshift Miracle, one of the launch strips on Modern Tales, has come to its conclusion.
Along with Derek Kirk Kim's Same Difference, Justine Shaw's Nowhere Girl, and Patrick Farley's The Spiders, Makeshift Miracle is one of the major longform works to come out of the webcomics scene. - Joey Manley
Modern Tales Animation Site -- animators needed
Submitted by Joey Manley on March 3, 2003 - 23:06
I've often thought that the Modern Tales business model could be applied to web animations as well.
I'm starting to get cocky, maybe, from the success of my webcomics "empire" -- but it's really looking like what we've done on MT could work for animation as well. I built my websites' content management and subscriber access systems to be compatible with Flash animations and/or RealVideo streams from the beginning, so I could literally turn a few knobs and have such a site up and running.
Sequential Tart Interviews Lea Hernandez
Submitted by Xaviar Xerexes on March 3, 2003 - 13:12
With the success of web-comics site Modern Tales and several of its offshoots, publisher/editor Joey Manley contacted contributor Lea Hernandez about beginning a new branch to attract a different and new audience. Hernandez became the editor of the new line making its debut March 31. The line, Girlamatic, features an eclectic mix of both creators and comics.
Read SQ's interview with Hernandez here.
Happy Birthday, Modern Tales!
Submitted by Joey Manley on March 2, 2003 - 17:41
Modern Tales, the leading subscription service for professional webcomics, is one year old today! Don't look for any special fanfare just yet: Joey Manley and company are too busy building new features (and launching new websites) to stop for too long to look back.
Why Do Online Comics? Making it Up As We Go
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When I was younger, I had a friend whose family was crazy about games. They had a linen closet filled to the brim with board games, bookshelf games, and role playing games, and had the obligatory Atari 2600 hooked up to their television. We'd play these games a lot, and we'd have an alright time. I'm not sure when this started exactly, but one time...
Making it Up As We Go.
Transcripts from Chat Sessions with Modern Tales Cartoonists
Submitted by Xaviar Xerexes on February 25, 2003 - 15:29
Joey Manley has been posting the transcripts from some of the scheduled chat sessions on the new Talkaboutcomics IRC channel.
Already you can read conversations between Joey and Jeff Crowther (Sketchbook) and Cat Garza and Tim Broderick (Odd Jobs), among others.
