Digital Comics

A few months ago, comiXology announced its Digital Storefront Affiliate plan which would allow comics shops to sell digital comics -- the implementation plan is different from Diamond's, but the intent is the same -- to allow storefronts to make money off digital comics. Now, DC and several other publishers (Image Comics (including Shadowline and Top Cow), BOOM! Studios, and Dynamite Entertainment) have anounced they will be joining the initiative. PR below, but more news on this tomorrow live from the Diamond Retail summit.

Where are comics going anyway? Has anybody asked that lately? David Brothers and Matt Seneca have their own takes on the matter.

To mark their 100th manga for their iPad app, leading manga publisher Viz Media is launching several promotions, including the release of BAKUMAN #4 in digital form on March 28th, more than a week ahead of its April 5th print debut. In addition, they are making all #1 manga volumes just 99 cents for the rest of March. Finally, BAKUMAN #1 is available for free for 24 hours, starting today at noon PDT. Created by the popular DEATH NOTE team of Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata, BAKUMAN is a humorous look behind the manga business, following two students who are trying to break into the manga industry,

Consider this an open thread. When not working on The Beat, as longtime readers know, I edit the comics reviews for Publishers Weekly, among other duties there. And of late I've been trying to figure out what to to with digital review copies. Up until recently, I had a pretty hard and fast rule about only sending out books to reviewers that were actual books or galleys (with a few planned exceptions.) It seemed to me that if you couldn't afford to at least send out a handful of xeroxes or books to major review sources, you weren't that serious about publishing. While that may seem a tad draconian to some, the other reason is just logistics: we get dozens of books a week, and have a couple dozen reviewers, and keeping track of everything is very important. It's simply too easy to lose a pdf file or a link in an email unless you have a very careful, natural system in place. Plus, I've polled my reviewers several times, and most of them prefer to review from printed copies. The reason this is even an issue is that PW only reviews ADVANCE copies of books. Few comics publishers can afford galleys of any but the most important books, and getting the books in advance is always a race against the calendar.

Via: This food-theme comic runs in Gourmet Live, one of those iPad magazines from Condé Nast. You can download the app to read the strip here.

Graphic.ly has just released their app for Android phones, opening their comics to an audience of 22 million, according to the PR which you can read below.

If all you do is read the headline and the excerpt, I want you to remember this phrase: "Digital is the new Direct Market." Not "digital is the new newsstand". Direct Market. Let me explain with some history.

[Yesterday Diamond announced their plan to team with iVerse to offer digital comics downloads for sale in comics shops. Gievn the hot button nature of this discussion, and the big picture nature of the announcement, Dave Bowen, Diamond's Director of Digital Distribution, was eager to talk to us to explain more about it. This is a long interview, but Bowen goes into welcome detail on the thinking behind and motivation for this plan. Short version: retailers deserve to be brought into the process.]

Bam, the other shoe has dropped: as long anticipated, Diamond is starting a program to offer digital comics sales. Comics will be offered day-and-date exclusively through participating retailers -- with a 30-day exclusive for these stores. Products offered include regular downloads for $1.99 with "Digital Plus" comics -- extras offered with a print purchase -- for $.99, all in hopes of becoming a revenue stream for stores and publishers alike.

Apple's app stores -- the middleman of all middlemen -- have been the target of a stampede of old media magazines, newspapers, books and comics as the vehicle for sales in the new digital era. But several recent moves make it clear that Apple isn't in this game as a helping hand for anyone. Or, to put it in a more neutral light, Apple is a PARTNER, not a platform. The uh-oh feeling started yesterday when it was revealed that Apple had rejected Sony's e-reader app. This app like the Kindle, Nook, and other "storefronts" sent buyers to a website where they could make purchases without incurring Apple's 30% fee.

Problem solved! ComiXology, the leading digital comics provider, is going to let brick and mortar comics shops set up affiliate storefronts on their sites, building on comiXology's existing programs for retailers, such as digital pull lists and so on. Prominent retailer Chris Powell explains, “Having seen comiXology’s Retailer Tools and Pull List services, we trust comiXology’s technology to help us thrive in a market where customers are interested in both print and digital comics.  ComiXology will help us provide the one-stop shopping that customers are looking for.  Digital comics can be a great tool for reaching out to new or lapsed customers, and retailers should not be afraid of this new format.  Instead, they should look for ways to make the digital format complement their existing print business."

As more folks start off their year with funding announcements, Graphicly has just announced that they have received $3 million in VC via various...