Crowdfunding

J.T. Yost writes to alert us to a successful Kickstarter for a great sounding project called DIGESTATE, a food-theme anthology:

Lea Hernandez's Kickstarter for The Garlicks is ending today and it doesn't look like it's going to make it— it's currently only $15000 in to a $40K goal. We're not Kickstarter experts by any stretch of the imagination but in this case, it is a clear case that just being good isn't enough to get funded, because this was clearly a great-looking project.

The Oatmeal is a well known webcomic that crosses over into mainstream coverage with some regularity. And that's happened again. The short version is: some time ago, The Oatmeal had a dust up with a website called "FunnyJunk" over a bunch of The Oatmeals comics having been appearing on that site without authorization. Roughly a year later, FunnyJunk has sent a letter from a lawyer wanting $20K for defamation to avoid a lawsuit. Suffice it to say, The Oatmeal is a bit incredulous.

Notorious typewriter and fax guy Dave Sim is taking advantage of the internet's crowdfunding abilities to run a Kickstarter to reprint High Society, one of the best story lines from CEREBUS. The project met its $6000 goal within hours of starting. In case you are coming in fresh, Sim is the author of one of the great feats of the indie comics age: his 300-issue run on CEREBUS, a genre-defying melange of slapstick, fantasy and social commentary. The more the book had of the first two, the better it was; the more of the latter and...well...best not discussed.

Some holiday weekend tidbits, including Game of Thrones, Derek Kirk Kim's Mythomania looks to Kickstarter to fund it's 2nd season, a first look at The Walking Dead's Michonne, along with a whole lotta Kickass 2 news.

Well here's a new Kickstarter campaign for a comics memoir by former DC staffer Scott Young which promises some first-class lid ripping including the legendary comics scandal known as "Compgate":

Lea Hernandez, a pioneering cartoonist in the American manga hybrid style of storytelling, is back with a Kickstarter campaign. Target is $40K. Based on the art alone, this should be a success.

Is Kickstarter the next big comics distribution outlet? Some would say it already is. Mark Andrew Smith issues a call to action.

SULLIVAN'S SLUGGERS is only the latest comic to get funded on Kickstarter in a very substantial way.

A brief apology for posting this but the Star Trek nerd in me could NOT help myself. Many a weekend was spent in my youth attending the Star Trek conventions with my mom at the Plaza hotel in Las Vegas, the highlight of course was meeting Brent Spiner and Michael Dorn (Lieutenant Commanders Data and Worf).

When comics household names are turning to Kickstarter, you know it's real. In this case it's Paul Jenkins (WOLVERINE: ORIGINS, INHUMANS) and Humberto Ramos (SPIDER-MAN, RUNAWAYS) with FAIRY QUEST.We're just going to post the six page preview right here -- this is gorgeous, gorgeous stuff. The funding level is high though -- $60K of which $26K has been raised with 3 days to go. The art is very persuasive, however. Below you'll find a statement on the project.

In awesome news, the Sparkplug Books Indiegogo campaign has reached its goal. But you can still give them more money to publish creator-owned, independent books that validate the spirit of the best that comics can be.