• Adam York Gregory’s strip, The Flowfield Unity, has recently become part of the Transplant Comics collective; he will be appearing at the Lancaster Comics Festival in on Saturday (along with other webcomics luminaries). Also new to Transplant Comics, Grumps by Chris Jones (about which more here).
• Speaking of Lancaster, John Allison will have a special set of prints and a new SGR book that can only be had in person. Somebody pick me up one of each.
• Whitney Robinson wishes to direct your attention to her new comic, Alma Mater. It’s a slice-of-life comic set at Blenheim, an all-girls’ secondary school. New comics on MWF, and we are promised experimentations with the form in the future (psst: nobody tell Eric that means fucking infinite canvas).
• Jason Kotecki tells us that he really enjoys reading Fleen to get the inside scoop on new web comics. Thanks for the kind words, Jason! Coincidentally, he informs us as well about his comic, Kim & Jason; it’s about childhood, and he’s been running it, seven days a week, for about six years. Daily strip free, subscription to get into the archives.
• A. Nonymous reports that the WCCA committee is considering some changes to the awards; we’ll be following up with the committee to find out if the report is in fact true, and we’ll bring you the response. Along similar lines, Lewis Powell writes to suggest that we at Fleen set up our own readers choice awards, suggesting “The Fleenies” as the name. I dunno about that one … what do you guys think?
• Chad Diez informs us that he’s officially ending his comic, Today: The Comic, mostly due to copyright issues. The full story is available at the site of our arch-rivals, Digital Strips.
• And finally, Sean Conchieri writes:
  

  Bomb Shelter Comics Wants YOU

  So you’ve got a webcomic, huh? You’ve even thought about trying to join a collective, but never heard back from anyone, right? Well, this is your lucky day. Because Bomb Shelter Comics is having their first-ever first annual Webcomic Idol membership competition! That’s right, we’re letting you guys try for a chance to join the BSC.

  Not only that, we’re offering up some goodies to whoever wins. We’re gonna give you everything you need to make that comic of yours wicked sweet, things like:

  a free BSC subdomain to host your comic on if you need it
  your very own forum on our board
  free web-design
  and a free comic management script decked out just the way you like it
  To enter all you have to do is send an email with your name and comic URL, DeviantArt accounts and things like that are okay too.

  There is a catch though, you have to update at least once a week. Miss an update and you’re out of the running. Of course, things like losing a limb and alien abduction will have exceptions made for them.

  We’ve even compiled an all-star team of judges to help out on this thing too, like:

  Tim Demeter — editor, Graphic Smash
  Daku the Rogue — founder/podcaster, Digital Strips
  and DJ Coffman — cartoonist, Yirmumah!
  plus a one or two BSC members may get in on the action
  So what’re you waiting for, drop that email on us. We’re ready and the judges are starting to foam at the mouth.

Ryan North, unsatisfied with having Oh No Robot and RSSPECT out there, has dropped Project Wonderful on the wide world o’ webcomics. In the words of the site, Advertising online just got totally awesome (a scary thought) and everybody wins, which is more reassuring.

Basic rundown: it’s an advertisting auction market. If you want to run an ad, you can bid a price and a period of time you want the ad to run (or reverse it: “run my ad whenever I can get it for a dollar a day”); if you have the high bid, the ad runs, and if you don’t, you’re not charged. If you want to run ads, you take the top bid for a period of time. It’s also got an interesting wrinkle, which we’ll let the TMM tell us about:

The wrinkle we throw on top of that is free advertising: all auctions start at $0, and you can place a bid of $0 if you want. This has two benefits: advertisers get free advertising (always a bonus) and website owners get to replace the “advertise here PLEASE I NEED THIS” banners that we’ve all seen with actual ads. It gets around the problem of people thinking “nobody’s advertising here – maybe it’s because there’s something wrong with it!” in a way that I hope is pretty elegant!

In addition, North has included “ad boxes”, where multiple ads (from multiple advertisers, at potentially different prices) can run in the space of a single banner ad; check out the top line on Dinosaur Comics for an example of eight ads in one. Of more interest is the transparency in the model; again, Ryan North:

A lot of online advertising has relied upon hiding information: ad companies want to get the highest ad prices for their member websites, but ALSO want to get the cheapest rates for their advertisers, and they way they do this is basically by hiding the truth: sites like AdSense won’t tell you what an advertiser paid to have their ad on your site — they’ll just tell you what they’re paying you. Stuff like that is dishonest or at least evasive, and what PW does is offer complete transparency: we show you what kind of hits the site is getting, who’s been linking to them, and what people have been paying in the past. We’re not going to rip anyone off by leading them to believe something that isn’t true, and we’re offering a free informed market for ads.

This one is going to take a bit of thought to see how useful it is (for example, a number of smart people hold to the idea that online advertising is essentially dead), but it definitely bears watching. North is running beta testing on it now, and when it’s ready to roll for actual sign-ups, he hopes to have other features in place:

We have a search engine for websites where you can specify what kind of sites you want to advertise on, and get emailed whenever there’s new results. You can even say things like “Tell me whenever a new site is linked to by BoingBoing (or Fleen) because that means they’re going to get a lot of hits and I want to get in on that”. Of course, with just me on the network right now that’s not THAT useful, but I hope it will become a powerful tool in the next few months.

We’ll check back in on Project Wonderful in a couple of months and see if we can get North to give us a rundown on to what degree it’s met his expectations. In the meantime, Fleen is accepting entries in the first iteration of the “What kind of webcomics tool will Ryan North come up with next?” contest; whoever comes closest in description and timeframe with their guess will win the people’s ovation and fame forever.

Things is happening over Dumbrella way; many people seem to think that Jeff Rowland doesn’t actually like Garfield. In other news, Rich Stevens is picking his battles; two shirts are going away on Friday, one may be hanging in there, but final disposition remains to be seen. On the positive side, Pixelween starts today with a little animation action.

Speaking of action, Jon Rosenberg‘s got an action figure, and if you pre-ordered one, you possibly have it now, too! At least, I do — waiting on my front porch when I got home last night. My wife was very amused by the back-of-the-box copy, and thinks that the little tiny Necronomicon (2nd edition) accessory is the funniest toy supplement ever. As an added bonus, I now have proof positive that as he was autographing my toy’s box, Jon ordered pizza. Bringing you the nutritional habits of your favorite webtooners is what we’re all about here at Fleen.

Speaking of my porch, I’m carving my annual webcomics–themed Halloween pumpkins this week. One will be an Andy Bell design (and some day, I hope to be able to manage a devil bears and Esther tableau), and one is a mystery until I see if I can make it work the way I want to. Pictures coming soon.

As noted in his LiveJournal, Ryan North survived a stair-climb up the tallest building in the world. In his own words:

Then my brother and I got an hour of sleep before getting up at 4:30 am to climb the CN tower, aka the tallest building1 in the world. It is 143 flights of stairs straight up, and Victor, Allene and I were among the first to start at 6:00 am. Victor was the hero, doing it 2 steps at a time most of the way up, getting to the top in 19 minutes. Also he was still drunk from last night when he did it, and puked literally minutes before he climbed the tower. TRULY UNSTOPPABLE??

I waited with Allene (NO ONE GETS LEFT BEHIND) and we did it in 33 minutes, 36 seconds. I got a shirt that says this and am going to modify it to 3.3 minutes, 3.6 seconds, which is a very complicated way of time measurement but which gives me ULTRA SUPER HUMAN TIME. Also: I dropped my little time card and had to go down 2 stories to get it, which means I actually climbed 145 stories, 2 more than everyone else, and those stories account for any slowness real or imagined?

…

So while we did not break the world record, we did raise together about $500 for charity, and I started out my new year in style. Thank you everyone for donating! We then slept and at 4:00 Victor and Paul and I dressed up like Harry Potter, a Bell Canada Service Repairman, and a woman in a very pretty skirt, respectively, and participated in the Spooky Shred / Critical Mass ride downtown, which was a ton of longboarders, all in costume, riding through the city. Awesome!

Awesome indeed! Should North attempt the CN Tower climb again next year, all lovers of webcomics (and things that are FUN) are urged to support him. The best thing is that you support him in Canadian dollars, which are 112% as colorful as American dollars.

In other news of things that are fun: new Winterview! With Jeff Rowland! Intentional lies! Disconcerting eye contact!

What does it say about Rich Stevens that, even as he’s being strong-armed by cease-and-desist letters, he finds the presence of mind to sneak in a quote from The Big Lebowski?

Disclaimer: I’m not a lawyer. But it seems to me that an obviously affectionate, highly-stylized, or abstract to the nth degree design that does nothing to diminish the worth of intellectual property, and causes no confusion in the minds of a reasonable person, should not be subject to this sort of treatment.

But then again, when has something like logic ever bothered a lawyer with a C&D template? It’s a good thing that by yelling at people who reinterpret existing ideas, you can ensure that they’ll never be seen again, ever. And I’m certain that thanks to this action on the part of Lucasfilm against that dastardly villain Stevens, nobody will ever appropriate intellectual property in wrong ways, either. Nope. Especially not where they might be noticed by a rights holder.

From Steve Raikow:

Normally I’m more reserved than this and shy away from the whole shameless self promotion thing. But, I recently stumbled into your site and saw that you solicit this sort of thing, so I’m saying what the hell. I’ve recently started a new online graphic novel called NODE which I update weekly. NODE is a science fiction story about technology and how it could have intriguing consequences for human consciousness. Its my goal to do something that’s a bit more serious than the average fare that I’ve encountered online. I want it to be provoking and possibly disturbing, without being gratuitous and violent. Anyway I thought that I would throw it out there. I welcome all to come on over and take a look!

Glad to, Steve, and sorry about the delay; Steve actually wrote us about a month ago, but given that he only updates weekly, I wanted to let a little more story build up before linking it. As it is, the story is building up nicely — there are a lot of interesting hooks that are being set up in the prologue.

Up next, Shishio says:

This news is a little over a month old, but it seems to have slipped under the radar, so I’m taking it upon myself to inform you of a new collective in webcomicdom. There’s some good stuff there.

Indeed, Cornstalker does include some good stuff. Have a browse around.

And from Roderick Leermakers:

Ahoy Fleen! Captain August has entered its third year and an excitable year it’ll be! I won’t spoil too much already, but be sure to read the press release that you can download here in perfectly safe and awesome GIF-format.

Thanks for your time and pirate greetings!

Ahoy, indeed. And please, nobody tell Dr McNinja that we’re consorting with pirates; even dead, he’s one bad muther.

That’ll wrap up the mailbag for today; we have some requests for full reviews that are still to come, as soon as we have time to go through the archives in a comprehensive manner. In the meantime, if you have news about your webcomic that you’d like to share, the link’s up there to the right.

I still haven’t heard back from my local paper about picking up Diesel Sweeties, but I’m pleased to report that the whole RS3-in-newspapers thing really is real. Check it out — promo kits! There’s still time for you to pester you local paper to pick up DS (even if you don’t read it regularly … tell them that you will if they add your favorite strip).

We’re a bit more than a month into the Applegeeks reboot, and while I expected a shift in Ananth Panagariya‘s story style (it’s been moving between characters and plot threads pretty freely, and pretty smoothly, I gotta say), I don’t think I was prepared for the shift in art style. Mohammad Haque‘s characters and look are still the same, but the panel layouts and especially the POVs seem to be much more varied and creative than before. Check out the current issue, and tell me it doesn’t scream “cinematic”. Nice job from the AG crew, and I’ll be sure not to fuck with your muffin yo.

So it seems that Scott Kurtz (who does an obscure little indy-themed webcomic you may have heard of) has been invited as one of the Guests of Honor to San Diego next year (alongside fellow art-comics creators like Bechdel and Sfar). To my recollection, this is the first time a webcomics type has reached GoH status at a show as large as SDCC. Fleen congratulates Kurtz, and we look forward to seeing him a) kick ass, and b) take names in San Diego.

In other news, God/Fate/Whatever seems to have it in for the merry lads and lasses of Dayfree Press. First, hiatuses announced for A Lesson Is Learned But The Damage Is Irreversible and No 4th Wall To Break, and now Jeph Jacques has injured his drawing hand (and with some server troubles, that direct link to today’s strip/blogpost may not be displaying the story; if need be, check the main page for details). Lucas TdS wrote to wonder if all these changes mean that Dayfree might have an open slot, but judging from the recent events I’d say that joining up with a cursed collective would be a scarier thing than Halloween in Dr Vampire‘s subconscious.

In the meantime, Fleen wishes Jacques a speedy recovery — don’t stress the hand by pushing it too hard, and do what your doctor tells you. The siren call of a daily update is a harsh mistress, and you don’t want to lose functionality down the road because you got too aggressive now. Take your time, and your readers will still be there when you’re better.

If you missed Tim Demeter’s announcement on Graphic Smash this morning, let me repeat it here:

Where have all the good heroes gone? And where are all the vaguely Greco-Romanic gods?

I mentioned last week I had one last comic to unveil, and it’s not quite what you might expect. It’s pretty evident why, right from the title, The Non-Adventures of Wonderella.

They may be non-adventures, but there’s Nazis, and tanks, and 500 bears and other such staples of ACTION. I can also promise you what Wonderella is, is the funniest new comic I’ve read in a long time. Fans of Killroy and Tina will recognize the byline, and know that Justin Pierce is no stranger to comedy in his comics, but he’s pulled the cork off with this one. It’s absolutely, unabashedly, hilarious. (Also no worries KnT fans, I’m just making Justin do TWO comics now.)

If you like anything on Adult Swim, (and I know you do) you owe it to yourself to read this comic, which you can totally do right here on Saturdays.

Don’t drink anything while you read it.

The current link for Wonderella at Graphic Smash leads to a placeholder, but those of you in the know have been reading it from the link at Pierce’s K&T page, right? In any event, go check out Wonderella archive, and learn what a superhero really is. Also, I’ll never think of “Hello Kitty” the same way again.

In other news, that sound you heard earlier today from the northeast corner of the nation was Eric Snark squeeing about being right with his Narbonic predictions; good call, Eric!. Makes me wonder if Shaenon Garrity put all these hooks in intentionally years ago (the Whedon/Rowling model), or makes it up as she goes along (the Lost model). I’m leaning towards the former, but I imagine it’ll be a topic of vigorous debate for webcomics historians in coming decades.

In other-other news, A wee email exchange with a one Mr Lewis Powell, who wrote:

I’m not sure if this is up your guys’ alley, but I, along with a couple of other individuals, have a webcomics blog Wax Intellectual, and am seeking more regular contributors. Unlike Fleen, I would allow contributors that are also creators, but that isn’t a requirement.

I understand if this isn’t the sort of thing you guys would mention on your blog, but I figured there was a chance it might be, so it couldn’t hurt.

If this isn’t something you’d post about, but, being a webcomics blog, have advice about how to try and find other writers, any advice you might have would be appreciated.

Thank you.

No problem, Lewis! The more people writing about these crazy-ass entertainments we call webcomics, the better! As for advice, I can reduce that to two things:

1. Write, write, write some more. There’s no quality time in developing your voice and place in this community, just heaps of good ol’ quantity time.
2. Have a thick skin. Rest assured, somebody who only clicked on the link to your blog 20 seconds ago already hates you and everything you stand for.

Oh, and Lewis? It’s TYRRELL. Two “L”s.

If you can’t make SPX (starting today in Bethesda, MD), or the ZLIKS party (tonight in SoHo), or Stumptown (coupla weeks in Portland, OR) (and at least two of those events feature booze + webcomics artistes), there are a few things you might want to look into.

• Tomorrow and Sunday in Memphis, TN, it’s Con-Sequential, with Steve Troop representin’; drop by and let him know what you think of the 24-hour comic experiment he’s running.
• Do you like food? Because also in the great expanse of flyover country, Dave Kellett will be at Monty’s Gourmet Foods in Kansas City. Not really a comics-kinda deal, but Kellett designed labels for the sauces and salsas, and will be on hand from noon to six on Saturday. When you go, be sure to challenge Kellett to a rousing game of Eat That Taco (I can’t believe I found that strip).
• The Lancaster Comics Convention in Lancaster, UK hits on the 28th; webcomickers expected in attendance include Liz Greenfield, Ali Graham, James Turner, and the Mancunian Dreamboat himself, John Allison. Ladies, please! One at a time!
• In today’s Why Was I Not Informed Of This Earlier category, a quick disclaimer: the words “fan fiction” usually give me the jibblies pause, so why am I so taken with Serenity Tales? There’s some pretty damn good webcomics over there, set in the context of a pretty damn good story, with names like Mike Russell and Bill Mudron contributing. If you can’t make any of the events coming up and like things that are awesome, you could do worse than spending some time here.
• Finally, and appropos of nothing, I got a real kick out of the first panel of today’s Two Lumps. Cats know they’re superior to us, and sometimes they’ve got good reason to feel that way.