See, the thing about Brad Guigar (aside from the obvious, such as he’s a hell of a nice guy, he has the world’s most understanding wife, and he laughs a lot) is that he’s almost more interested in the question What’s behind the curtain? than the question What is it? And by that I mean, rather than be content with a comic strip, he’s compelled to abstract things by a layer or two and look under the hood.

When he started comic strippin’ with Greystone Inn, he put recursion in plain sight; from the Google search on “Greystone Inn”:

Greystone Inn, by Brad Guigar
A comic strip about a comic strip, featuring Argus the gargoyle.

“A comic strip about a comic strip.” This wasn’t just using a comic to talk about comics, this was using the story structure to comment on itself and everything else comicstrippy. Sure, you see things like this, but not entirely — 30 Rock is a workplace comedy about making sketch comedy. Greystone, on the other hand, is a workplace comedy about making a workplace comedy — you get topic and medium recursion. It’s a little mind-blowing when you think about it.

Which maybe explains why it was never a gonzo-huge success. The meta maybe showed a little too much, the conceit maybe took too much of the place of the funny? In any event, Guigar found it not as satisfying as it could be (I suspect for both the audience and himself) and oh-so-smoothly (and this is where his technical mastery of the comic strip form really shone) transitioned it to a completely different strip, with a completely different premise.

Enter Evil, Inc., about a supervillian-run corporation. Still room for metahumor there, but also satire of society in general, and the occasional musing on the nature of Good and Evil (including a lengthy arc where the supervillian company had to be run by a hero following a hostile takeover — the herioc and the villainous need each other, but the Good Guys still tried to run the company as poorly as could be plausibly explained).

More impressively, Guigar has demonstrated that you can translate the capes ‘n’ tights genre into the four-panel form and still make it work. Hey, creative team behind Spider-Man on the comics page? Somehow, Guigar manages to move a story forward without spending the first panel recapping yesterday, the last panel previewing tomorrow, and the middle panel narrating what the characters are doing. Seriously, there’s more action and better villians in Mary Worth (meth labs!) or Judge Parker (murderous strippers!).

So congratulations to Brad Guigar for nine years of continuous explorations of the four-panel form (unlike most of his contemporaries, I can’t recall a time that Guigar has let himself outside the boundaries of a four-panel-sized entry). Guigar is celebrating his milestone not in the traditional manner (drugs and groupies), but rather by auctioning a piece of original E,I art, with the proceeds to benefit a Quaker school in his hometown of Philadelphia.

• Speaking of anniversaries, webcomics collective Eyeskream is five years old, and is holding a contest with loads of stuff up for grabs. Woo!
• ‘Bout six months back, my erstwhile colleague Anne Thalheimer pointed you towards some minicomics by L Nichols. Please note that Nichols is back with Dirt Between My Toes, a webcomic with equal parts (visually speaking) R Crumb, David Hellman, and Aaron Diaz when he’s drawing on paper, with a color palette that is somehow simultaneously Day-Glo and muted. Visually stunning stuff.
• Essays on business models for [web]comics (courtesy of Jim Thomas), and a tutorial/review of ad services (courtesy of Tony Piro) are your how-tos for the day.

We at Fleen are deeply saddened to learn that Karen Ellis of Planet Karen has lost nearly everything in a fire; the apartment above hers was the source, and tragically her neighbor was found dead. Ellis has one good coat, an MP3 player, and about nothing else.

Since “nearly everything” probably includes originals and work done on her previously announced book, the need will probably be ongoing.

Girl-Wonder.org, which hosts Planet Karen, is planning a fundraising auction on Karen’s behalf. If you have items you think you’d like to donate, please contact Karen Healey at karen dot healey at girl dash wonder dot org.

There’s also a donation link on the main page of her site, and now would be a good time for that generosity which webcomicdom is so very good at to directed toward the aid of one of our own.

Whatever you may think of Scott Kurtz from his online presence (and there’s a spectrum that runs pretty far from extreme to extreme), know this: I’ve made my living by speaking at the front of a room for longer than I care to admit, and Kurtz is a natural in front of people. Hand him a mic and you can just sit back to enjoy the ride; add in his love of comicss, and he is a terrific choice for any kind of MC gig. Raise your hand if you just got a mental image of Kurtz totally blinged out and giving his best gangster face.

• Not moustachery, but close enough: the noble beard. Be sure to read the whole thing for maximum understanding of how we hirsuite types have been persecuted throughout history.
• Speaking of reading the whole thing, Valerie d’Orazio is supremely well versed in comics (particularly business issues), writes beautifully and passionately, and is currently the president of Friends of Lulu. So it’s a little disheartening to see her get the idea of corporate + webcomics so very wrong.

  There’s a decent, polite back-and-forth going on in the comments thread and pretty much all of the points that need to be made have been, but I’ll add in one thought here: If her merging of Big Media and webcomics does occur in whatever future timeframe, it won’t be because Big Media bought out webcomics — it’ll be the other way around.

• I honestly have no idea what the central thesis of this email (reproduced as received) is:
  

  We’ve had a lot of free help for the development of our webcomic from the kindness of strangers, which is amazing since we honestly have no idea how to use the internet in any technical sense. We really wanted to do Tuna Carpaccio P.I. promotions and other fun stuff that you see on ton of other sites, but between full-time jobs and putting the comic together, the process of learning the full ins-and-outs of programming seems ridiculously daunting. I guess this seems more like a sad confession than “insight” but we really just wanted to do the webcomic part… too bad there aren’t people out there willing to be the 3rd party only: programming for the sake of programming. That said, you can definitely appreciate webcomickers that are one-person shows.

  … but it got me to check out the linked site on a whim. In that respect, I suppose it’s a success, because I found a bizarrely compelling mystery story there that somehow reminds me of the bastard child of Don Martin and Kris Straub, but not in any way I can articulate. Weird, huh?

• Missed in the Con Fever/Recovery/General Laziness of the past week (with apologies all ’round): an almost silent (and rare non-irritating use of a nearly infinite canvas) Valentine’s Day strip from Eros, Inc. (which happened to be strip #100). Even more missed, another #100, this one from Boxcar Astronaut (but since both strips are now only onto strips #101, I didn’t miss either one too badly, did I?).
• Most beautiful thing I’ve seen in about forever: Tiny Kitten Teeth, by Becky Dreistadt and Frank Gibson, whom you may remember from the long-wrapped (and sorely missed) Combustible Orange. Frank and Becky have since decamped to New Zealand (which is on its face awesome) and have been working TKT since the last week of January and managed seven updates — an amazing feat when you realize it’s painted in gouache on watercolor paper and is frickin’ gorgeous. (obligatory disclaimer: I have just learned that Dreistadt is also known as “my niece Colleen’s buddy Becky from college”, which just goes to prove it’s a small damn world).

It’s a holiday for some of us in America — no mail, banks are closed, just a lazy day to do a bunch o’ nothing — and you get an update to match!

Remind me — didn’t we settle this crappy TOS thing when MySpace did it? Facebook tries to pull a fast one, not realizing that Jeff Rowland went toe to toe with Rupert Murdoch to save us all. Those of you with webcomicky content on Facebook are now officially Mark Zuckerberg’s bitches.

Holiday how-tos:

The line at the cupcake place is down the block and around the corner, and Fashion Week is kicking in across the street (complete with the still-unaired Project Runway finalists … how are they going to keep the lid on this one?), bringing with it the hordes of snootistas that reek of too much money and other people’s labor. But there’s still things to be happy about — for example, I get Monday off work. In other news:

• Via ¡Journalista!, coverage of the Intellectual Property panel at NYCC that I didn’t get to attend; the recap goes heavy on copyright and trademark, and it good reading.
• Newly re-indyfied Steven Cloud hits the reading stage tonight for a talk about comics with Ted Rall and Stephanie McMillan at Blue Stockings bookstore tonight at 7pm. I know we mentioned this one about two weeks ago, but just in case you forgot with all the Valentines Day/Fashion Week hoopla. You can recognize Steven by his magnificent beard.
• Lost in the shuffle: interviews with Norm Feuti (by Tom Mason) and Brendan McGinley (by Brian Warmoth).
• As of this writing, Kiva Team Webcomics is eight days old; it is large (in terms of members) than Germany, Sweden, Japan, or France. It has contributed more money than Brazil, Lebanon, Austria, or Democrats (US). And for all teams created in the last eight days, Team Webcomics exceeds the monetary donations of the next-most-generous team by $7700. Keep up the momentum, guys.
• In response to our question about preserving clusters of exhibitors in their new venue, MoCCA replied that they’ll try to honor requests for booth proximity, but it will naturally be impossible to guarantee the same layouts in a very differently-shaped space. So if you want to show at MoCCA and be near the other webcomickers, be sure to request it on the reservation form.

News all over Webcomicstan this morning — there’s going to be an international gathering of creators in Easthampton, MA the weekend of March 20 — 22. Public details are a bit sketchy right now, but word on the street is that it’s going to be informal … think meetups, studio tours (lotta creators in the the Western Massachusetts zone), signings, and perhaps some light commerce. Behind the scenes will surely include creators “hanging” and “drinking”, with a side order of banging their heads together to figure out ways to entertain you more effectively.

Aspiring historians of webcomics, remember what a meet/greet for just one group of webcomickers did for one of the pioneers of our field a little over four years ago: it cemented E. B-White‘s place in our narrow discipline as The Literary One (Xaviar Xerexes remains The Cute One, and I’m Ringo), and forever associated [Dumbrella Hosting principal and Fleen publisher] Phillip Karlsson’s name with malefactors. You too could have that kind of lasting influence, or at least say hi to some talented people and enjoy some sophisticated adult beverages that make everybody around you seem smarter and more attractive.

In other news today, books!

• Via Mike Russell, news that Dylan Meconis is going to be self-publishing the collected Bite Me; I am ashamed to say that I didn’t catch this new myself, but Meconis’s current series, Family Man, is one that I only visit every few months so that I can absorb as many pages at one time as possible — I simply cannot read one page a week without going mad with anticipation. Meconis is podcating about the self-publishing experience with fellow conspirator Bill Mudron, which you should listen to with the caveat that there may be the odd naughty word or concept in your earbuds.
• And who’s up for a new Templar, AZ book? If you didn’t shout Me! Over here, me!, you’re a filthy liar because all right-thinking people love Templar, AZ. From Spike herself:
  

  I’m now taking pre-orders for book three of TAZ, with the same intent as always: To cover the print bill. I’ve put everything I sell on sale, but the prices are going right back up the second the bill’s covered. This won’t last forever, so people have gotta hurry.

  You heard the lady — get your orders in, ’cause she don’t go to print ’til it’s paid for and I want my book, dammit.

Things that have happened since we last ran current news:

• Dave Roman did some walking around at NYCC, did some panels, and did some thinking on the future of [web]comics and how digital future media will be. Good reads, and well worth your time.
• While at NYCC, I got to speak to Scott Kurtz and Meredith Gran about their recent pushes into premium content — both have seen a modest take-up amongst their readers (although Kurtz’s jumped when he announced the first three months of net profits would go to the Ringo Scholarship at SCAD), and are pretty much playing it by ear.

  The big questions in this experiment (and this year of economic turmoil is nothing if not a test-bed for new approaches to making a living online) is how many people will carry over from the first month to the second, and whether or not people will even sign up for that first month, believing themselves to be locked into an automatically-renewing subscription that keeps charging them (they aren’t).

  Similarly, I was contacted recently by Israel L’Heureux (what a great name), one of the founders of Assetbar. To clarify some of my initial descriptions of the Fanflow program, it was built by L’Heureux and his compatriots to meet Chris Onstad‘s needs, and has been generalized as a tool for the community since. The commenting/rating interface at Achewood (aka acheworld), while powered by the first iteration of the AssetBar technology, is not part of the premium feature set, and remains free to use. Fleen thanks L’Heureux for the clarification and regrets the incorrect description.

• In the less-than-a-week since the webcomics team at Kiva launched, membership has swelled (as of this writing) to 132 and total lending to $4500, placing Team Webcomics 42nd out of 481 teams in terms of membership, and somewhere around 127th in terms of money lent (placing well above teams in existence for many months). Take that, Team Harvard!
• Yep, it’s true. Gotta love the commenters taking it seriously.
• Finally, check what popped into my inbox a few minutes ago — the long-anticipated exhibitor registration for MoCCA Art Fest ’09 is now available:
  

  Exhibitor Applications & Guidelines for the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art’s 2009 MoCCA Festival are now available for download on the museum’s website [PDF].

  Artists, writers, and publishers wishing to have a table at the 2009 Festival are encouraged to get in their applications and payment as early as possible, as well over half of vendor space has already been sold to returning exhibitors and MoCCA members.

  The 2009 MoCCA Festival will take place the weekend of June 6-7 at the 69th Regiment Armory at Lexington Avenue and 25th Street in New York City. As the 69th Regiment Armory is a much larger venue, nearly 100 more exhibitors will be attending, and arranged in a more democratic manner than in previous years.

  MoCCA will begin accepting and processing new 2009 MAF Exhibitor Applications on Thursday, February 12th. Exhibitor applications arriving at the Museum before that date will be processed as if postmarked at 11:59pm on February 11th.

  We have an inquiry in with MoCCA to see if the new venue allows the webcomics creators to a) be clustered together as at the Puck Building, and b) to have some newcomers join the party. Answers as we receive them.

I have performed another pass through my near-illegible notes of NYCC happenings, so please forgive me for any omissions yesterday, and for things that happened when I was largely out of the loop. For instance, I met a capital fellow named Colin who was attending his very first con, and he totally didn’t go insane. Also, in the photos below, you will see on Vincent LaBate, writer of Kitty Hawk, and my fellow Studio Foglio booth monkey; one really couldn’t ask for better company.

In missed news, we didn’t even have time to report on the DrMcColorist search before it was done. Everybody feel good for Anthony “Nedroid” Clark. Nor did we have time to mention that it’s now The End Times over at Ugly Hill, as creator Paul Southworth wraps up the story and prepares for his next project. I’m gonna miss the sexist, classist, ocularist, speciesist, and everything-else-ist Hastings Kilgore, but I can’t wait to see what Southworth drops on us next.

Okay: pictures!

Over at the Studio Foglio booth, you had Vincent (L) and Phil (R) in a moment of repose before the storm. I think that Phil’s mom (L) had little idea what she was in for. But the weekend saw plenty of Girl Genius cosplayers, including three different Agathas, one of whom brought her own Gil, and another who showed up with an unrelated Zeetha.

Non-GG-themed costumes that stopped to say hi included various iterations of punky and steamy, with odd doo-dads and thingies aplenty.

Wandering by the booth you had fake webcomickers, various villainesses, a herculean Hulk towering over the crowd, and above it all, the privileged few in their luxury suites.

Back in the trenches, Mike and Jerry enjoyed their last moment of quiet for two days (aside from a panel or two), men in snappy hats did snappy things, and filthy hobos huddled for warmth around an open fire. Meanwhile, Ryan Sohmer came out totally blurry (it’s rumored that he can’t be photographed unless he wishes it), and the hardest working man in webcomics was … somewhere else? Huh. Better work on that, Brad.

Andy Bell, on discovering I was working a different booth — You’re dead to us, Gary.

Me, to Jon Rosenberg, in reponse to the Dumbrella goods sign — Can I have a hug?
Rosenberg — No.

Back to regular stuff tomorrow.

Well, Scott Kurtz may have feared the pimps and chuds that reside in New York, but apparently the only thing to fear was not bringing enough stuff to sell. In the time that I made it away from helping at the Studio Foglio booth (read Girl Genius, dammit — it’s brilliant), it appeared the theme of NYCC09 (apart from Scott Pilgrim rules) was What recession?

Talking things over with Heidi MacDonald on Saturday night, we marvelled at where all the money we saw getting dropped was coming from. Then we talked at length about Cyanide and Happiness, and I was able to point her in the direction of Kris, Dave, and Rob so that she could get educated on the gentlemen in question. Meeting Rob, Kris, and Dave was one of the highlights of the show for me (C&Her Matt was unable to attend, unfortunately), and I quickly discovered several things about them:

• They dress sharply, with jackets, bowties, and snappy hats (bowler, fedora, top)
• The single most common word out of their mouths is thanks, or some variation thereon; I’m struck by how genuinely grateful they are for the well-wishes and interactions from readers
• They’re almost digustingly young, and I had to fight the urge to tell them to stay the hell off my lawn
• Kris flew to New York from his home in Wyoming; per the latest US Census data, the population of Wyoming should have no more than 0.73 of one cartoonist, making him a rounding error or a statistic anomaly — a charming one, in a hat

Mike “Mister” Krahulik and Jerry “Mister” Holkins can, in fact, have a conversation without using the word wang; they brought their teach schoolkids to make comics program to NYCC, and despite the fact that there were about 90% adults in the audience, they conducted the program for the inner 3rd grader in all of us. Takeaways:

• My art skills have improved from subliterate stick figures to barely recognizable cartoon men, ladies, cats, elephants, octopi, dogs, and monkeys … the secret is ovals, the letters C and T, and not worrying that I don’t draw as well as Mr Krahulik
• Those barely recognizable cartoons will accompany me to my grave

Speaking of Penny Arcade, a talk with P-A business supremo Robert Khoo led to some secret plans about where the website is heading, which I can now reveal exclusively: Penny Arcade will be making comics about videogames, then releasing those comics in book form.

Other people I was thrilled to run into (in many cases, meeting for the first time), in no particular order:

• Karl Kerschl, who when asked for a Charles Christopher sketch, interrupted his commission sketch list to do an absolutely beautiful rendering of his title character, utilizing no fewer than four separate pens
• Rosscott, of The System, whose business card is as beautifully stark as his comic
• Milton Griepp of ICv2, with whom Phil Foglio and I had an interesting talk about webcomics, making money by giving things away, and what support services may be needed there
• Joey Manley, host extraordinaire; should he ever invite you to a party, jump on the opportunity because the food and booze and company and environs will all be wonderful
• Every one of the Foglio superfans who presented in nervous, thrilled states to meet Our Hero — you remind us why we love this medium so much (and to the five Girl Genius cosplayers — excellent jobs, all of you)
• No fewer than three people (Susan, John, and I’m sorry, didn’t get the third one’s name) who came up to say hi and recognized me solely by the moustache
• No fewer than three others who were convinced that I was Phil Foglio — given the general level of worship Phil’s fans demonstrate, I was tempted to agree with them and ride out the love
• Ottilie Millson, better known as Phil’s mom, who was with us in the booth for the weekend, and who assures us she still has the baby photos
• Carla Speed McNeil, whose Finder you really should be reading; grab the trades, then get to work on the latest story which is at her website
• Onezumi and Harknell, lovely people and soon to be forces of nature at next weekend’s Katsucon
• Darren Gendron of Dear Pirate, if only for the the business card that identifies him as a “known scallywag” (some evidence indicates that he may not be a scallywag after all)
• Magnolia Porter, who just happened to be at the ROFLThing party on Saturday night and whose Bobwhite is good readin’

But unfortunately, there are downsides to any convention:

• The creative team behind Remedy offered me a naked bribe in the form of a print to drum up some attention for their webcomic from Fleen. For shame! Naked bribery at NYCC is my schtick (traditionally on Saturday morning, I make the rounds with coffee and donuts for those who need them).
• The local restaurants that dropped menus off at every booth were apparently unprepared to handle the volume of orders from the Javits Center, resulting in late and often severely compromised food
• But they were still better than the convention center sandwiches, which lacked any kind of moistening agents (mayo, mustard, anything) for the low-low price of only nine bucks apiece
• Missing all but the last five minutes of the Making Comic Strips panel (with Danielle Corsetto and Brad Guigar) due to unannounced and undocumented room changes

Overheard during the show:
Mr Krahulik, on piggybacking your new comic to an existing audience — If you want to do a comic about a horse, maybe there’s a website that would like to run it. So have your mom and dad check out horselovers.com and ask.
Mr Holkins, on that suggestion — That might not be the best website to contact, kids.

Mr Holkins, on being offered a Saturday morning pick-me-up — Wait, there’s coffe in there? That’s a box.
Me, in reply — Yep. Want a donut?
Holkins — Don’t you worry about eroding the wall of your journalistic integrity?
Me — In fact, this is naked bribery.

A young woman who was literally dragged through the crowd by her friends to meet her idol, Phil Foglio, and was reduced to a state of bashful vibrations and giggling — Hi.

Danielle Corsetto, to Tom Wilson II at the conclusion of their panel, bouncing with excitement — I have to get a picture with you!

An ancient and white-haired bartender at the ComicSpace party, having been asked by Corsetto if he knew “how to make a Sex on the Beach” — I always get sand in it.
Corsetto, in response — He’s my New York boyfriend.

Pics tomorrow.

By the time you read this, I’ll already be at the Javits Center, trying to make myself useful. Should my fan wish to find me, I’m most likely helping out at the Dumbrella booth, or the Studio Foglio booth (who were suddenly short-handed, and desperate enough to take up my offer of free labor).

• You know who else will be at NYCC, but not in a fixed location? Rosscott, of The System, who coincidentally is the subject of Brian Warmoth’s latest CBR interview.
• Hey kids, have you heard about Kiva? Long story short, it’s a microlending site that allows you to help entrepreneurs in some of the world’s less well-off corners. It’s best to go in thinking, Hmm, I can spare ten bucks towards what sounds like a worthy project, and I’ll probably never see that money again. Then you’ll be surprised, because there’s about a 97.5% chance you’ll get your money back with interest.

  So why bring this up? Like many collective endeavors on the internet (lookin’ at you, distributed computing to cure disease!), Kiva allows you to form teams, such as the webcomics team just formed by Zach Weiner and Ryan North. Zach and Ryan assure me all are welcome.

• Tangentially webcomics: From Heidi over at The Beat comes word that Bloom County is getting a comprehensive reprinting. Were I to take my old Billy & The Boingers square flexi-record of U Stink But I ♥ U and fling it frisbee-like into any random gathering of webcomickers, 83.5% of the corneas I scratched would belong to somebody who was inspired to be a cartoonist by reading Berke Breathed’s work in bygone days of youth. Not that I would do so ’cause damn, it’s the only record I still own and I ain’t wanna get it all scratched up.