Platinum is joining the stampede to the web, the New York Times reports. Platinum Studios is the long gestating comics publisher run by Scott Mitchell Rosenberg that has been developing hundreds of properties over the last few years, optioning many for Hollywood development. Now, after some rumblings that Platinum would be ramping up it’s interactive division, comes the announcement that their comics will be appearing on the DrunkDuck.com site, which Platinum purchased. The article is from the tech section of the paper, and focuses on the forward-looking aspects of this deal:

The revamped DrunkDuck site will continue to encourage the growth of independent comic book creators by distributing their work digitally at no cost to them or to consumers, Mr. Rosenberg said. Some of the comics appear as static panels, while others are lightly spiced with soundtracks, audio effects and minimal animation, and this will continue.

But a crucial difference, he said, will be in how Platinum plans to use the site to create a broad mix of revenue streams, “full-circle commercialization,� for the company and its content contributors.

For example, Mr. Rosenberg said he planned aggressive marketing of the site — which already receives a million unique viewers a month, mostly drawn by word of mouth — coupled with advertising sales. While the advertising revenue would not be shared with the comic creators, artists would share in the revenue from downloadable comics for cellphones and mobile media devices like iPods, comics-related ring tones, wallpaper and items like T-shirts or plastic scale models of comic book characters.

Product creators, Mr. Rosenberg said, can expect to receive 10 percent of the adjusted gross revenue earned by sales.

100 Platinum graphic novels and comics will start appearing online this week, the article says.

We’re sure the webcomics community will have much to say about this, as always. The Times’s “Gosh wow! You can publish comics on the web!” attitude is a bit jarring, admittedly. We’ll just note that this effectively make Platinum the latest “we’re going to the web” publisher, after years of development heck for their properties.0.7117 Ironic0.1274 Fleshlight ModificationsDavid Bowie 0.0882 Free Downloads Music Spiralfrog0.0882 sandee fleshlight westgate exclusiveFleshlight Video 0.1274 UsingGreenberg: Lady's 0.0882 Hope Book Godey'sYour Fleshlight Homemade 0.0882 MakeFlightss 0.195 Fleshlight Map

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