Digital Comics

Terry Moore has a pretty amazing track record as a self-publishing cartoonist. He's wrapped up his magnum opus STRANGERS IN PARADISE, but instead of going into that awkward "I just finished my magnum opus" mode, he jumped right back in with a new series -- the SF-tinged ECHO -- and just wrapped up THAT. And now he's a launched a new thriller series called RACHEL RISING, which debuted at Comic-Con. However, as successful as he's been, Moore still found his new #1 underordered, and #2 orders cut back even more. It's a familiar problem in the direct market. In an interview with Russ Burlingame, Moore is askedthe inevitable questions about digital delivery:

While we were linking to the previous Michael Dooley articles, we found another one from Comic-Con, an interview with Kim Munson, whose Comix Classics: Underground Comics app for iPhone, iPad, and Android hard a hard time getting approved. The app is a survey of classic underground comics art with images from S. Clay Wilson, Reed Waller, Denis Kitchen and more. The pictures are quite dirty -- we struggled to find one to post with this piece before settling on Jimmy Durante by Drew Friedman -- but nothing that isn't legal and available in other places. However, Apple, the electronic middleman, has other ideas:

Well, another Comic-Con is drawing to a close, with the traditional annual Buffy sing-along, this time in Hall H. (Perhaps they could also add a "Mayhem of the Music Meister!" event as well?) So, here's some more interesting tidbits from Comic-Con...

Manga publisher Viz has just announced VizManga.com, a digital comics site which immediately went live during the con. Viz's wide variety of manga titles are now available there in an array of digital formats, with first chapters available free, and first volumes available at 40% off for the first month.

Well, the second full day of Comic-Con is coming to an end, and there's been lots of amazing stuff announced! I've diligently sat deep in Stately Beat Manor, watching the news feeds, so you don't have to! Read on!

The digital teaming up is coming fast and furious as Top Shelf has signed with iVerse for digital distro. The idea of reading Nate Powell, James Kochalka, and Renee French on a tablet sounds very tasty indeed.

After a period of beta testing, Diamond is ready to roll out their digital comics sales this September. As there is not much else happening that month, maybe this will perk things up. More seriously, about 30 publishers are participating in the venture, which is run through iVerse and involves participating retailers generating codes for sale. The program will begin more advanced beta testing in stores in August. Interested retailers can sign up here.

Jeff Smith has joined the stand-alone digital store ranks with new apps for BONE and RASL via comiXology. To celebrate, there's a sale and at 4 pm a chat on Reddit with Smith. As kids books tend to do very well on tablets and phones, we'd expect Bone to conquer this medium as well as it has every other place it's appeared.

The USA Network and DC Comics recently launched a webcomic to tie in with the Season 5 premiere of Burn Notice. And readers seem to have liked it.

Cable network USA and DC Comics debuted Chapter 1 of its "Burn Notice" interactive graphic novel, "A New Day," alongside the show's Season 5 premiere on Thursday. To date, "A New Day" has scored more than 100,000 page views, according to the network.