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Rich Stevens

Late for Monday, Early for Tuesday News

Submitted by Xaviar Xerexes on January 16, 2007 - 00:21

More articles uploaded to the January issue of Comixpedia Magazine: an interview with Tyler Martin, creator of Wally & Osborne and another installment of Full Story Highlights which features completed webcomics. Don't forget to check out last week's articles: an interview with Foxy Lollop creator Mike Lacroix, Jon Morris' Plea for Hand-Lettering comic and 24 Hour Pixel People interviews King Arthur.

And now on to the news & views!

HEADLINES

JUSTIFY MY HYPE

AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 BLOGS

Vericon

Vericon is Saturday, January 27 from 1:30 pm - 3:00 pm

Where: Harvard

News For Thursday, January 4, 2007 (UPDATED)

Submitted by Xaviar Xerexes on January 4, 2007 - 11:00

HEADLINES

INTERVIEWS

  • Wizard interviews Nick Gurewitch, creator of Perry Bible Fellowship. Gurewitch mentions that the first print collection of PBF is due this September or October.

NOT COMICS

JUSTIFY MY HYPE

AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 BLOGS

  • Websnark is back with the almost obligatory comment on the end of Narbonic and an interesting spin on Home On The Strange. My immediate reaction to Eric's post on HOTS was that he was reading way too much into it to fit it into a neat little framework he had cooked up but still an interesting essay. In the comments, both creators of HOTS show up at the very end and add a few reactions to the post.
  • FLEEN looks at the webcomic Russell's Teapot.
  • More star-studded comments on the year that was 2006 at The Beat: part 3 (includes Shaenon Garrity and Svetlana Chmakova), part 2 (includes Dean Haspiel and ) and part 1.

Ted Rall on Diesel Sweeties To Newspapers

Submitted by Xaviar Xerexes on December 21, 2006 - 18:41

As promised, the Daily Cartoonist has a short interview with Ted Rall about his role in luring Rich Stevens to the dark side newspaper syndication.

News For Tuesday December 19, 2006 (UPDATED)

Submitted by Xaviar Xerexes on December 19, 2006 - 12:54

MAGAZINE

  • A smaller December issue then years past but still full of great webcomic recommendations and plenty of opinions to discuss. There's a slight chance we'll have a few more pieces, but I may hold those until January.
  • I just wanted to say thanks and congrats to Kris Straub who has contributed to Comixpedia for a couple years - first with Modern Humor Authority and this year with Checkerboard Nightmare. Kris' plate has gotten considerably more full lately so he won't have time to contribute next year.

    We'll see you in Xanadu, Mr. Straub... They call it Xanadu.

  • If you have a minute please vote for the Roundtable and People of Webcomics articles over at ComicNe.ws - it's a different crowd at CBR and having Comixpedia articles on the front page over there has helped bring some of their readers over here to check out Comixpedia. At this point it only takes about 6 votes to get something on the front page over there so click that little "c" below your posts if you think it might be of interest.

BUSINESS

A warning to those using google ads and placing images near the ads themselves - that appears to be against Google Adsense's new policy:

Can I place small images next to my Google ads?

We ask that publishers not line up images and ads in a way that suggests arelationship between the images and the ads. If your visitors believe that the images and the ads are directly associated, or that the advertiser is offering the exact item found in the neighboring image, they may click the ad expecting to find something that isn't actually being offered. That's nota good experience for users or advertisers.

Let's All Go To The Movies

Journalista has a significant section today on Scott Rosenberg and Platinum Studios called "Meet the new Scott Rosenberg, the same as the old Scott Rosenberg." (A side note: Rosenberg was included in our People Of Webcomics list this year.) Obviously anyone who has followed Rosenberg in the news this year knows at this point he's been around comics in various ventures for quite some time. A chief, recurring, criticism seems to be that Rosenberg is interesting in comics properties solely for their potential to be licensed to filmmakers and that he does not actual perform the basic publishing function of a comics publisher.

I can't comment too much because I haven't done my homework on this subject, but it does strike me as odd that when numerous creators are abandoning the monthly comic book format for webcomics (albeit with a goal to collection in a graphic novel) that there is an expectation that Platinum would want to vigorously compete in the direct market. It also seems odd to criticize Platinum for using a creator-for-hire approach on its first comic book, Cowboy & Aliens -- isn't that the standard model for the majority of the industry (you know, DC and Marvel)? Deppey reports that a deal from 2004 may require Platinum to put out comic books in order to comply with the deal - to the extent that Platinum is treating such publication as an expense rather than a profit center, I'd think the most obvious question is what does that say about the health of the direct market?

If this is of interest, there's lot more on the topic at Journalista! today.

NEWS ABOUT COMICS NEWS SITES

I didn't realize that it was a common practice for comics publishers to own comics journalists, but today's Journalista! also alerted me to the fact that Platinum Studios bought the comics news site Broken Frontiers earlier this month. (Similarly, Journalista! and TCJ are owned by publisher Fantagraphics.) I'm sincere in asking how do such journalists deal with the obvious conflict of interest this presents? Is there a corporate separation that protects the ability of the journalists to cover the news without interference or does the journalist just not cover their owners?

JUSTIFY MY HYPE

If you haven't been reading ICE by Faith Erin Hicks get over there and check it out (the archives aren't that long). I'm not sure I like the black & white as much as the earlier coloring but that's only as a comparative matter - both periods of the comic are amazing. If you have been reading, the current scene is getting particularly tense as major plots points are revealed.

NOT COMICS

Joe Barbera passed away. I thought this guy's name meant animation when I was a kid.

Around The World in 80 BLOGS

Comixpedia's People Of Webcomics List For 2006

December 18, 2006 - 12:07

It's the third annual Comixpedia People Of Webcomics List. This was the hardest one yet to compile. There's a lot of webcomics and a lot of people doing interesting things in and around webcomics. This list, as in past years, is an odd effort to compare apples and oranges: artistic achievement, audience popularity, technical achievement, business savvy, news-making impact all go into the mix.

It'll Be a Blue Webcomic Without $%*#! You

Submitted by Xaviar Xerexes on December 18, 2006 - 10:41

MAGAZINE

  • Check out the End of 2006 Roundtable with 10 comics-savvy writers covering the year in webcomics. A few more articles should be up soon (I'm editing as fast as I can!) - possibly even today.

INTERVIEWS

REVIEWS

DEAD TREES

AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 BLOGS

The Comixpedia End of 2006 Roundtable

December 16, 2006 - 23:33 | Xaviar Xerexes

Our second annual virtual round table on the year in webcomics features comments from Eric Millikin, Daku, Gilead Pellaeon, Mike Russell, Lewis Powell, Alexander Danner, Eric Burns, Michael Rouse-Deane, Johanna Draper Carlson and Gary Tyrrell.

Web Versus Newsprint Drama... Again!

Submitted by Xaviar Xerexes on December 15, 2006 - 18:34

The Daily Cartoonist is a good blog, but clearly a good chunk of its audience is fairly clueless about webcomics and the web as a distribution/publication system. A short but sweet post about R. Stevens impending launch of Diesel Sweeties in newspapers is met with the kind of whiny, defensive reaction I haven't seen since Wiley versus Scott Kurtz until Rich Stevens himself shows up and leads the counterattack:

I won’t argue the rest of your points, but there’s a million or more people doing looking at my comics every month without any kind of major media backing. When you can say that about your own stuff, you can make blanket dismissals of six and a half years worth of comics.

After that a much more interesting discussion continues. The Daily Cartoonist also promises an interview with Ted Rall on Diesel Sweeties and webcomics-to-syndication coming soon.

Damn, I Wish I Was Your Webcomic

Submitted by Xaviar Xerexes on December 14, 2006 - 10:28

DEAD TREES

INTERVIEWS

CONSERVATIVE COMICS

  • Ted Rall defends the recently arrested creator of Mallard Fillmore, Bruce Tinsley.
  • Dirk Deppey wonders aloud (look under "digital comics" section) if the recent nearly nude shot of a character in Chris Muir’s webcomic Day by Day would offend readers of conservative blogs where the strip is syndicated.
  • I missed that Line Item Veto went on hiatus.

AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 BLOGS

NOT WEBCOMICS