The PULP SECRET REPORT is one of those internet/Tv show’s covering pop culture and the comics, but it’s actually pretty entertaining. Exec producer David P. Levin is spicing up the grew by giving away his comic book collection on the show:

A collector for over forty years, Levin is now the Executive Producer of THE PULP SECRET REPORT, available three times a week on Pulp Secret (http://pulpsecret.com), an online network devoted to comic book news and culture. To promote the show, Levin is giving away one comic book a week from his collection – which dates back to 1962.

The Pulp Secret Report is a comic newscast hosted by improv comics and writers Alex Zalben, Justin Tyler and Pete LePage, and includes news, interviews, and features about the world of comics. Fans can participate in the show by contributing their own videos, comments and email tips.

“This is a show that I’ve been waiting to see all my life,” said Levin. “I believe in it so much that I’m willing to put my money where my mouth is – or at least my comic collection – to get people to tune in.”

“I’m not going to simply give away recent comics – to really make this work, I’m going to give away comics that are really worth something to collectors,” Levin adds.

(more…)

Here’s a somewhat epochal story we’ve managed to miss until now: Downloadable animated New Yorker cartoons on iTunes.

Everyone knows that downloadable ‘toons to iPods and Wiis and cell phones and what not are the future, but even so it’s a little surprising to see the venerable New Yorker jumping into the fray. The toons are free, sponsored by advocacy site drugfree.org.

The New Yorker has partnered with RingTales, which “animated print comics for ad-supported syndication across all digital media” for the venture. RingTones has indeed animated the familiar figures of Barsotti, Shanahan and company. A trip to the main New Yorker page for the animations reveals a gallery of familiar images: bespectacled scientists, talking dogs, elephants, a kitty by the litter box — but then they begin to move and talk! A miracle!

New media thrives on quality content — and the podcast version is in the Top 20 of the iTunes podcast listing. Will it be enough to move the needle on a system of toon delivery that in its infancy?

You can read a bit more about it at paidcontent.org, and the complete PR from earlier last month is in the jump.

But before you go, here is the most famous New Yorker cartoon of them all.
.
(more…)

Well, crap, now they can squeeze a whole elephantman into a mobile phone! How do they do that? Oh it’s a COMIC BOOK by Richard Starkings and Moritat. In fact, interested parties might want to check out the Gocomics website and see what all they are distributing–the march of progress.

uclick has announced an exclusive agreement with comic book publisher Active Images to distribute its popular ELEPHANTMEN line of comic books on mobile phones.

The mobile product line will debut in early summer with comic books and wallpapers starring the series’ larger-than-life characters.

“Whether readers are aware of it or not, ELEPHANTMEN and HIP FLASK were designed from the ground up to be digital media friendly,” said writer/creator Richard Starkings. “Moritat and I are very happy to be working with uclick Mobile, and can’t wait to see our work on the small screen!”

ELEPHANTMEN is an ongoing monthly published by Image Comics. The series takes place in a not-too-distant dystopian future in which an insidious corporation known as MAPPO genetically manufactured intelligent hybrids of humans and animals as super soldiers to fight in a New World War. Decades after their liberation, the hybrids have been integrated into human society.

Starkings originally created the character Hip Flask, an anthropomorphic hippopotamus, to serve as the mascot for the Comicraft library of comic book fonts. The character was soon featured in his own comic book mini series, before jumping into Image Comics’s ELEPHANTMEN.

(more…)

Although the headline says Publisher to launch Japan’s first monthly online manga magazine is sounds a bit misleading, because the magazine is actually the first (orone of the first) for mobile phones:

Publisher Shinchosha will soon launch what it calls the country’s first digital subscription magazine, an online comic regularly transmitted to mobile phones, a news report said Wednesday.

“Com2″ will contain about 200 pages of cartoons and is geared toward cell phones so readers in tech-savvy, comic-book-crazy Japan can keep up with their favorites on the go.

The new service will be launched Friday. It will originally have cartoons in Japanese only, but Tokyo-based Shinchosha plans to add English and Chinese translations in the future, public broadcaster NHK said.

Subscription will cost 350 yen a month, and the format is also accessible through the Internet on personal computers.

As everyone knows, the Japanese are phone-crazy and this is a logical step in the evolution of the non-paper comics economy.

§ The AP is running a nice profile of the webcomics collective Act-i-vate:

Artists in the year-old, invitation-only collective upload a new comic or installment to their graphic novels each week, making the content on the daily anthology highly diverse. ACT-I-VATE members draw upon a host of influences including Japanese comic book artists, music, film, literature and their own psyches.

The elaborately rendered comics cover a broad swath of genres ranging from horror and post-punk, to cliffhanging romance and extreme adventure. The stories are irreverent and hysterical, a blend of the tragic and pathological. They range from dark (take Nikki Cook’s “Sack of Puppies,” which is about “pretty nasty evil things and mean little kids”) to surrealistic (there’s Pedro Camargo’s “Glam,” which chronicles a “grungy cyberpunk trash universe that’s almost like Candyland with little stuffed animals running around.”)

§ An elite gang of academics have justified their time spent with Gameboys by naming “The Ten Most Important Video Games” :

“Creating this list is an assertion that digital games have a cultural significance and a historical significance,” Mr. Lowood said in an interview. And if that is acknowledged, he said, “maybe we should do something about preserving them.”

Mr. Lowood and the four members of his committee — the game designers Warren Spector and Steve Meretzky; Matteo Bittanti, an academic researcher; and Christopher Grant, a game journalist — announced their list of the 10 most important video games of all time: Spacewar! (1962), Star Raiders (1979), Zork (1980), Tetris (1985), SimCity (1989), Super Mario Bros. 3 (1990), Civilization I/II (1991), Doom (1993), Warcraft series (beginning 1994) and Sensible World of Soccer (1994).

Click on the link to find out which game is “one of the most important art works of the 20th century”!

§ The New York Comic-Con site is putting up various Audio Podcasts of panels, including “Review and Outlook 2007 for Comics Publishing”. Virtual confab!

ComiPress looks at an article that tracks the decline of the Japanese manga market:

The report says that tankoubon sales have been decreasing for the past two years, and that manga magazine sales have been decreasing 11 years in a row. The decline of manga magazine sales was especially noticeable, which indicates that the readers are moving away from the magazine field.

Japan’s domestic manga market has been gradually decreasing for the past 10 years. In 1996, the scale of the market was estimated to be 584.7 billion yen. After 10 years, the market has decreased by almost 20%. Last year, the size of the market has dropped under a symbolical number - 500 billion yen. This news should draw attention to the gradual reduction of the manga market.

The reasons behind the decline of the manga market could be attributed to the decline in the young adult/teen population Japan, and the movement away from the printed-book culture. Especially with the declining sales of manga magazines, which indicates a change in social trend where the younger generation’s time is occupied by their cell phones.

Cell phones! Damn you! Since Japan is lightening years ahead of us in all this, these trends call for very, very careful examination by US comics makers. While American cell phones lag far behind the capabilities of mobiles in other countries — like Korea where downloading comics is second nature — we’ll undoubtedly catch up some day. It would be interesting to know what kind of inroads downloadable comics have made in Japan. If the kids can be persuaded to read, maybe we still have a chance. Otherwise…enjoy it while you can.

Pulp Secret is a little webcast about comics. It calls itself a “network” but that’s a little ambitious as of yet. However the first episode does cover some nice territory. We didn’t have time to actually watch it yet, but we plan to.

Premiere episode - 3/7/07: meet Justin, Pete and Alex (from Comic Book Club); DC’s DVD plans; Captain America #25; Frank Miller directs The Spirit; exclusive look at All Star Batman #5 by Jim Lee; Midtown Comics; Peter David, Jae Lee, Joe Quesada on Stephen King’s Dark Tower; PopCultureShock; David’s comic book giveaway!

Fans of the inimitable Shatner will enjoy this clip of him doing a voiceover recording and then putting a clueless producer in his place, as Robin Quivers and Howard Stern guffaw in glee. As Robin and Howard point out, Shatner is being a total dick, and yet he’s kind of within his rights as well.

[Link via Cartoon Brew]

UPDATE: Actually, we highly recommend reading the comments at Cartoon Brew linked above where various voiceover directors and other pros discuss whether Shatner was the one being very unprofessional.

The Sound of Young America interviews VENTURE BROTHERS creator Jackson Publick for this podcast. (Thanks to Ian Brill for the link.)

Speaking of The Venture Bros, this weekend on Saturday at 4:30 at the NYCC (that AGAIN?) there will be a Venture Bros. spotlight with Jackson Publick, Doc Hammer, James Urbaniak (Rusty Venture, etc.), Michael Sinterniklaas (Dean Venture), and Steven Rattazzi (Dr. Orpheus). Although the ladies and Brock will be missing, this should be the greatest collection of Venture voices yet assembled at a convention and we admit to having had a teeny tiny bit to do with getting it put together, and anticipate that it will have moments of drollery.

Speaking of podcasts, DC has done something certified cool and put up a podcast of Rick Vetch reading the words from his stream-on-consciousness graphic novel CAN’T GET NO. Download and read along!

A year or two ago, some noise was being made by Clickwheel, a UK venture which hoped to develop comics content directly for iPods, presumably in a downloadable form via iTunes. Everyone agreed it was a good idea, but at least over stateside, it never became much more than a rumbling. Now, the company has been acquired by Rebellion, the publisher of 2000AD, and England’s premier comics producer:

Clickwheel Ltd, the comics to iPod company, has been acquired by computer games super-developer, Rebellion, developer of such video games as Alien vs Predator and Rogue Trooper.

“Being already involved in the next gen video game market, we know well the pace of development in world of entertainment”, says Jason Kingsley, CEO of Rebellion/2000 AD. “With the acquisition of Clickwheel, we look forward to pushing the boundaries of innovation even further”.

“With user-generated content set to augment the mainstream, new media is becoming ever more key to success,” says Chris Kingsley, CTO of Rebellion/2000 AD. “Our acquisition of Clickwheel is a natural extension of our existing focus and we look forward to helping pioneer a new way of reading comics.”

Throughout its 15 years of developing video games, Rebellion has branched out into other media, most notably comics. In June 2000 Rebellion purchased the UK’s premier Sci-Fi Comic 2000 AD and its entire character portfolio consisting of characters including Judge Dredd, Rogue Trooper, Strontium Dog, ABC Warriors as well as 700 other unique IP’s.

Founded in 2005, Clickwheel Ltd is an online media company that enables users to create a media channel for their comics or movies and broadcast them live on Clickwheel.net or, from the iTunes Music Store, via an RSS feed.

The acquisition will be accompanied by a site-wide relaunch of Clickwheel.net, which will include a full redesign, tools to streamline the user experience, easier previews of downloads, customizable creator profile pages, new types of content, ratings, forums, and other community features.

“This is very good news for Clickwheel and comics generally”, says Will Simons, Creative Director of Clickwheel. “2007 promises to be a very interesting year for digital media with more new products and services than most of us will know what to do with, so it’s very exciting to be re-launching at the beginning of it.

Along with acquisition, Clickwheel is pleased to announce some personnel changes. The development of the Clickwheel website site will be handled by Big Newt Software Studio Ltd., led by Dave Astels and Nancy Blenkhorn. Big Newt is a boutique web application development and hosting company with a strong focus on quality workmanship, delivery of business value, and open-source tools & technologies. Additionally, Tim Demeter has been promoted to editor and will oversee all creative content matters.
(more…)

It seems that “sexy” Comic Foundry founder Tim Leong has won the New York Comic-con’s Podcasting contest! Can you SAY…RINGER? I mean, come on! Tim already set YouTube ablaze in his famous “weeping wizard” outing. You can check out the winning entry at the above link, or see Tim try to explain himself here.

This may well be the funniest flyer we’ve ever seen:

ISR celebrates Valentine’s Day with a special celebration of love! Four comic creators, two married couples! Our guests Dave Roman & Raina Telgemeier and John Green & Marion Vitus join us to talk about love and comics! From how they met to getting hitched to what it’s like in a two comic creator household! Listen in and feel the love!

We will, right after we feel the laughs.

Continuing to roll-out their multi-media offerings, Comicmix has added podcasting to the mix:

Starting this week, ComicMix will produce three podcasts a week, airing on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays.

Hosted by Mike Raub ), each will feature the latest news on comics, films, music, television, games and more. Tuesday’s episodes will contain the latest information on new media for the week, including the final word on what shipped in comics, DVDs and music. Thursdays are for reviews from a variety of opinionated columnists, including Gwen David, Dave Marsh and Tony Isabella. ) Saturdays include feature interviews with the movers and shakers of pop, including Batman scribe John Ostrander, Disney animator Kyle Baker and more.

Mike Gold, Editor-in-Chief of ComicMix, said, “We’re excited to bring state-of-the-art journalism to our state-of-the-art site. And,” he added, “This is only Stage Two. In three weeks, we have an even bigger surprise. You’ll never look at comics the same way again.”

ComicMix.com is the new site for readers who enjoy all types of fantastic media, from comic books television and movies to video games and more. Every day, visitors find news, facts, reviews, commentary, columns and a community environment that reaches across the globe, across decades and into the future.

Kevin Melrose has relaunched Comics, Covered as his catch-all blog:

Like the previous version, this one will focus on comic-book cover art and design. But here I’ll also post reviews and creator interviews, and write about all-ages and young-adult fiction, contemporary fantasy and whatever else piques my interest.

If you browse through the site you’ll find archived pieces that originally appeared at Blog@Newsarama, Comic Foundry and on the previous version of this blog. And shortly, the new content will begin to appear.

But, alas, no ceramic owls.

All we can say is…it’s about time!

§ Beat Pal “Casey” writes to say:

Brian Michael Bendis was on Howard Stern Tuesday morning. He wasn’t on the actual show, just an interview with the Howard News team that they play in between the breaks. Kinda neat!

§ Wizard interview STAN SAKAI, who has been at USAGI YOJIMBO for 22 years, a run of some 160 issues that may just be second behind CEREBUS for continued achievement. And he’s still going.

Q:…so if you look at everything you’ve done with Usagi to date, from when you self-published through Fantagraphics and Mirage and everything, what goals did you have back then that you feel you’ve met with the book? And how have your goals for the book changed?

SAKAI: Well, it’s changed a lot, because especially back then, I just hoped to get the next issue in before the deadline. It was pretty much thinking one or two months in advance. “I’ve got another story to write, and I hope the sales continue to [rise] so Usagi can continue on.” Now, though, it’s about thinking in the long term. It’s not just what’s happening next month, but next year or two years from now or even more. There are stories that I’ve laid groundwork for that won’t be told for another three or four years.

§ Larry Young and Mimi Rosenheim star in a short film about AIT/PlanetLar.

§ See Spurge deliver a great punchline.

§ Our reporter who has learned about comics for the day comes from the Deseret News which gives us all kinds of useful definitions along the way. Emphasis ours.

Graphic novels are a loose genre comprising lengthy comic books — often hundreds of pages long — that contain literary elements such as a plot and characterization.

Some graphic novels feature favorite comic figures, such as Superman. Others are fantastical adventures, Japanese comics, or attempts to retell Shakespeare. One of the most famous graphic novels is “V for Vendetta,” by Alan Moore and David Lloyd. It was made into a movie and released on DVD last August.

Among Arrington’s favorite graphic novels are “Fullmetal Alchemist” books by Hiromu Arakawa, a tale about orphans who try to bring their mother back to life with alchemy. “It’s a wonderful story,” said Arrington, a ninth-grader at Orem’s Lakeridge Junior High. “It’s so invigorating. I just love it.”

§ The Phoenix Comicon went well:

§ When he’s not producing operas, Shannon Wheeler likes to drink civit shit coffee.

§Frank Miller on NPR.

§ Top Shelf has a trailer up for Christian Slade’s new comics Korgi.

§ McCloud family Winterview with Hope Larson and Bryann Lee O’Malley, with “Newlywed Game” style questioning!

§ Revision announces that iFanboy will become an internet TV show:

Internet television network Revision3 today announced the debut of iFanboy — audio and video shows for hardcore comic fans and casual pop culture patrons alike. Each week hosts Josh Flanagan, Conor Kilpatrick, and Ron Richards will deliver in-depth interviews with leading comic and graphic novel creators and publishers, as well as everyday comic book fans. Whether it’s remote reporting from the hottest comic book conventions, interviews with the stars of the genre, or in-studio advice on the comic books you should be reading, iFanboy will cover a new topic every week with passion, honesty and humor.

“Comic book pop culture is exploding,” said Ron Richards, one of the hosts of iFanboy. “Our audience ranges from 16 year old kids to physicians in their 40s. While they’re an incredibly diverse group, what they share is their passion for the world of comics and the unique culture that surrounds it. Some of the most popular names in entertainment grew up being fans of comics — from Kevin Smith, director of Clerks and Chasing Amy and writer of the comic book Daredevil — to Joss Whedon, writer of Astonishing X-Men and the creator of Buffy The Vampire Slayer. As the comic fan base and culture grow by leaps and bounds, these fans are looking for a source of irreverent, but seriously fanatic information. That’s what iFanboy delivers.”

Okay gang, you know New York Comic-con 2: Electric Bugaloo is coming our way in a few short weeks. We have a bunch of press releases stockpiled, but we want to know YOUR plans. Booth assignments, signing scheules, party venues. Let us know — we’ll let the world know. Meanwhile, the con itself has just announced…PODCASTING!

In a significant development that will transform it into a year-round national event, New York Comic Con (NYCC) has announced that it will launch an audio and video podcast available free to the general public.

The podcast episodes, which will begin almost immediately after New York Comic Con (February 23-25) concludes, will feature interviews, anime clips, previews from TV shows and films and highlights from panel discussions at the show. The podcasts are expected to be released for several months following the convention and will remain available throughout the year. Fans may subscribe to the podcasts through the official podcast web site at www.nycccast.com or through popular podcast portals such as iTunes. They will be able to download the podcasts to their iPod, portable player or cell phone, or they will be able to watch or listen to the episodes directly on their computer through streaming technology.

This new podcast venture is similar to a program that was launched at BookExpo America (BEA) in May, 2006. New York Comic Con and BookExpo America are both managed by Reed Exhibitions and the podcast initiative at both conventions is produced in partnership with BurstMarketing. In its inaugural presentation, BEA’s podcast had 60,000 downloads and 220,000 unique visitors from 25 countries to the podcast website.

(more…)

NPR has another comics report to listen to:NPR : Black Artists Plot Diverse Themes for Graphic Novels. This one features Felipe Smith (MBQ), Andy Helfer, Randy DuBurke and PW’s own Calvin Reid.

More writers and artists are using graphic novels and comic art as a way to take on major issues. Some African-American artists are exploiting the medium to create books about black history, racism and to craft new stories about America’s diverse culture.

This press release struck our fancy, because it seems to presage the kind of content development deals that will become more and more prevalent in the YouTube universe. Icebox, Stan Lee Entertainment and Oxygen may have been ahead of their time, but short animated webisodes would seem to have a very viable future. Gotham Group is an agency that handles a ton of animation folk, and holds a huge luncheon every year at San Diego. Variety has a bit of context:

Netcos have been cautious as they began moving into original content in the past year. Yahoo!, in particular, has taken only a few small steps, making this pact particularly notable.

Gotham, which represents much of the top toon talent in Hollywood, will give Yahoo! access to online rights for animated shorts already produced by its clients, as well as new original projects.

“The Internet is the only place where you can make a real business out of animated shorts, which is exciting for the talent we work with,” said Gotham topper Ellen Goldsmith-Vein.

And the PR:

Yahoo! Studios has formed a first-look deal with The Gotham Group to produce and distribute original animated content for the Internet.

“Gotham is committed to finding innovative ways to distribute our artists’ creative work and today’s agreement with Yahoo! furthers that business strategy to mutual benefit,” said Ellen Goldsmith-Vein, Gotham Group ceo and founder “We pride ourselves on finding new revenue streams for our content creators and Yahoo! provides a fresh and exciting opportunity for the world to interact with the great talent we represent.”

“We are always looking for opportunities to make dynamic and entertaining content available on Yahoo!,” said Drew Buckley, gm, Yahoo! Studios. “We are thrilled to work with Gotham to create and program compelling animated content for our users.”

(more…)

Tom notes that Stan Lee and Chris Ware share a birthday, a fact that always struck us as kind of eerie.

Blog @ links to a Stan interview on NPR that you can listen to to celebrate this special day.

We ran out of room to mention this, but you can still listen to Alan Moore on Fanboy Radio yesterday. Moore talks about Lost Girls, the Simpsons, and, we don’t doubt, more.

BTW, FBR is celebrating its Fifth Anniversary next week, so congrats to the crew for hanging in there.

Guy DeLisle, whose PYONGYANG related his stay in North Korea is a very popular media figure right now, NPR has an interview with him .
[Link via Bookslut.]

§ The November issue of MAD features a bunch of top comicy types in a “LESSER KNOWN SUPER-VILLAINS” ISSUE

Mike Mignola, Kevin Nowlan, Humberto Ramos, Chris Bachalo, John Cassaday, Terry Dodson, Glenn Fabry and Sam Kieth will join the Usual Gang of Idiots next month in the pages of MAD #472 (SEP060266). The artists will illustrate “Lesser Known Super-Villains,” which profiles evildoers including the Yakmaster, Dr. Umbrage, the Clarinetist and Professor Generico.

“We wanted this comic book villains article to be as authentic as possible,” says MAD Editor John Ficarra. “So we went out and found the most sinister and evil comic book artists working today.”

§ NBC’s HEROES looks to be a hit, while the more cerebral STUDIO 60 which references Moliere and Gilbert & Sullivan, founders:

On the flip side, “Heroes” (5.5 rating/13 share in adults 18-49, 12.96 million viewers overall) declined just 7% from its strong series premiere to beat its broadcast rivals in most demos, according to Nielsen.

No other first-year drama this fall has rated higher in 18-49 with its second seg than “Heroes.” And of all NBC dramas to bow in the past three seasons, only “Medium” rated higher in week two (6.3/16).

“Heroes” was supposed to be a more difficult sell for NBC, while “Studio 60,” with its Aaron Sorkin/Thomas Schlamme auspices, garnered most of the media attention.

§ Weird Al Yankovic will be the guest on this weeks FANBOY RADIO:

Master Satirist, Weird Al Yankovic joins hosts Scott Hinze and Oliver Tull on a pre-recorded episode of Fanboy Radio tomorrow. His new album Straight Out of Lynwood hit stores on September 26th and 97-98 The Weird Al Show is now on DVD. The single White & Nerdy, a parody of Chamillionaire and Krayzie Bone’s Ridin’, rose to #5 on the iTunes Top 100 Songs Chart last week.

“While Al may not be a comic book creator (yet), he sure is a power-player in regards to pop culture as a whole,�? says show host Scott. “My new favorite song, White & Nerdy features comic reading, Star Wars, Star Trek, D&D and Internet slang – all perfect fodder for the FbR audience. I’m really stoked about this interview.�?

Tune in for Fanboy Radio #338 Wednesday, October 4th, for Fanboy Radio with Weird Al Yankovic at 1pm Central (2pm Eastern, 11am Pacific)

Actually, Weird Al did star in at least one comic: a short fumetti in DISNEY ADVENTURES written by…The Beat.

Winter McCloud’s interview with Raina Telegemeier and Dave Roman is up at CBR. Winter is 11 and this is, yes, adorable…but also a good inetrview!