Meredith Gran, de facto organizer of the mass gathering known as the New England Webcomics Weekend, has let it be known today that a pre-registration for the event is now required due to the huge influx of visitors and creators they are expecting.

Go fill out a quick form and make sure you won’t be the one whimpering, “But my girlfriend’s in there”, to which Gran will reply, “Hey, a LOT of people’s girlfriends are in there.”

UPDATE: And registration is closed. Wow. Check back here or the Webcomics Weekend site to see if more space might open up, because this is one party you DON’T want to miss!

It’s no secret that we here at Digital Strips don’t dig the MySpace model of reading comics. It’s clunky, ugly, and infested with poor, user-manifested web design. This would be the main reason why I’ve never bothered with the Dark Horse comic series, Dark Horse Presents. Today, however, there is hope at the end of this long, dark, dank, diseased tunnel.

Three webcomics all-stars are now featured in the twentieth edition of DHP. In this edition, you can find:

• The Catch! A Wondermark Tale by David Malki!
• An Achewood tale by Chris Onstad
• A Darwin comic by Kate Beaton

As loathe as I am to say this, you should very quickly and very carefully check the DHP site for some webcomics goodness from three of the industry’s (community’s?) finest.

Tom Mason of Comix 411 has an interview up with Norm Feuti, creator of the syndicated strip, Retail, and the webcomic, Gill. As a recent convert to Feuti’s work (Feutism? Feutistic?) I am currently reading through this interview with the man who has captured childhood essence and combined it with adult sensibilities (Gill) and you should do the same.

Also, keep your eyes peeled and ears perked up for a future mini-review of Gill on an upcoming Horizons Watch podcast!

P.S. Newspaper sites take note: it took me forever to find a decent way to view Retail, and even then it wasn’t the best. Tyler Martin has already done it for you, just use it and we’ll all be better off.

By now you’ve probably seen at least one story about Karen Ellis, creator of Planet Karen, and the fire that engulfed her apartment building, killing the neighbor upstairs and destroying everything she owned, leaving her essentially homeless.

It’s been proven, time and time again, that the webcomics community can work some amazing magic when someone is in need, and Karen needs as much as you can give right now. She’s since updated (via extremely sporadic Internet access) that she appreciates any donation and that giving actual, physical items right now is more of a burden as she has nowhere to put it.

Visit Karen’s page and click the donate button on the right side to give whatever you can to this webcomic creator in need.

It’s like a dream come true for anyone who has followed webcomics, heard of webcomics, or who may have come into contact with webcomics (consult a physician).

This week, the Webcomics Weekend was announced, and it is packed full of webcomic talent, the likes of which has never been found under one roof. Taking place in Easthampton, MA, this meet-and-greet-and-possibly-buy-some-merch-not-a-convention get-together already has a huge list of guests and it’s just going to get bigger before the March 20th kickoff date.

Visit the Webcomics Weekend site, join the Facebook group, follow the webcomicsweekend bird on Twitter, and get yourselves to MA come March to take part in a milestone in webcomics history!

Attribute Twitter with yet another news catch worth posting.

Steven L. Cloud has announced that his critically-praised, existentially-presented strip, Boy on a Stick and Slither (heretofore known as BOASAS) has seen its final update on Comics.com, the official realm where webcomics go to lose their souls. 

Steven requested, via a Tweet today, that people be alerted to the move for those who (for whatever reason) read BOASAS on Comics.com, and so, it is done. Change your bookmarks, if necessary, to Boasas.com (gosh, so much easier than www.comics.com/boy_on_a_stick_and_slither).

Also, enjoy the short conversation The Geek and I had about the matter, as dramatized below:

What’s tougher and sharper than a Diamond? Could it possibly be a… Comics Monkey?

Ok, so the ad slogan might be a bit difficult to write, but Ka-Blam has taken the wraps off its new direct distribution alternative to the Diamond Distributors behemoth and its name is Comics Monkey. Thus far, there’s little to go on other than pure speculation and hopes and dreams which may or may not be shattered, so I’ll let the presser speak for itself.

Distribution into the direct comics market system is something we’ve had on the drawing board almost since we launched in 2005. It’s a daunting prospect and we’ve spent a lot of time over the last couple of years puzzling through how we wanted to approach it. We had planned to roll out a brief pilot program of sorts – offering a limited catalog of items available only to a handful of volunteer retailers – by summer of this year. And then take what we learned from that program, retool a bit, add the full catalog, and launch the actual service sometime this fall.

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