Free Comic Book Day has never been a big deal for me. It’s kind of neat and good for the kids but not one of those things I take an extra long lunch for and go visit the local store. The number of participants has increased and it does bring more awareness of the variety out there. I think my biggest issue is that it’s marketed towards kids. As if those are the ones that need to be pulled in, although the biggest audience is probably teens and, more recently, young adults. So does anyone know any stores that are trying to market to say, those in our 30’s?

Found another list out there of someone telling us their favorite webcomics. Normally these kinds of lists bug me a little because they always list pretty much the big players and something like 2 no one has ever heard. As if making a list would give everyone to go to theirs if they list it at the same level as the accepted. The difference here is Jack has listed a few of the less acknowledged players and even so of the more off the wall strips we are only now just discovering.

The joys of getting notice are wide and varied. When advertising and word of mouth are just not moving fast enough some may result to special code to get bots to notice you more. The problem is that if you thought of it and found someone else to do it for you then the people you’re trying to take advantage of have thought a way around it. The lesson learned is that there is nothing better than word of mouth and the only way to do it successfully is time and effort, lots and lots of it. Learn to accept that you will not make it to full time artist within the first 2 years and you’ll be taking your first step towards earning a living off your work.

Found a comic that’s disappeared? Did your favorite comic update so infrequently that you stop paying attention only to come back 6 months later and see it has gone on definite hiatus? Well here are a few more.

Dave Kellett is going to at yet another con. This time it’s the Calgary Comic Expo at booth #502! He will be selling books, prints, original art…and FREE sketches for any and all! On Sunday at 1PM, he’ll be joining Kris Straub and Brad Guigar, in Room A, giving a talk on “How to Make Webcomics”. Goes to show you can never give up the convention race.

Zach Weiner shows us that when you miss an update you go the extra mile and give your readers more. One of the biggest problems with young strips is real life getting in the way of your posting schedule. At some point they all made a decision to sacrifice something in return for selling their souls… Wait, that was just me.

Another dedicated team is headed to the Calgary Comic Expo. Ryan and Lar seem to be getting annoyed with just how many Cons there are during convention season but since this one is in their backyard they’re exstatic about not needing to bring their passports. Maybe they’ll make a strip about giving Americans a hard time entering the US? They’ll be at booth #500.

OK, OK! Why am I not heading to Calgary this weekend? It looks like they will also have Ryan North.

It looks like if you don’t have your passport the place to be is the Stumptown Comics Fest. There you can meet Aaron and Spike

It’s not every day that a webcomic makes a legitimate attempt to go solo. Five years ago we could probably name, off the top of our head, every single webcomic that fully supported their creators. In this day and age that has changed drastically with the number pushing past the 40 mark. For this to happen there are usually three paths to take: advertising, merchandising, and donations. That would be in the order of most common use. Believe it or not most artists start their careers with a donation drive. They get to a point where their committed and number of fans exceeds their spare time and they lay it all on the line with a donation drive.

That’s where Patrick Farley steps in. The creator of Electric Sheep is making his second attempt at webcomics as a full time job. Here’s how he puts it:

This is it, my friends. Like the dog from the Roman poem, I’ve been going around in circles, licking one bone then the other, for long enough. Today, the Equinox of 2010, it’s time for me to exercise my freedom of choice and make the fateful decision once and for all:

Is Electric Sheep going to linger on as my B-game, spare-time, side-project “hobby?” — or am I going to devote myself to it FULL TIME and make it my career, my A-game, my FLOW?

Hint: I would like the answer to be Number 2 🙂

This time around he’s using a tool that’s been popping up more and more. Kickstarter is an online fund-raising platform, focusing on creative projects, which operates on an “all-or-nothing” basis; funds are collected only if the fund-raising goal is met. If and when Farley makes his $6000 goal that will mean there is a sufficient demand for Electric Sheep Comix that Patrick can very likely parlay it into a full-time, self-sustaining career. It will mean Electric Sheep has enough fans to include it among the  Webcomics Professional Elite.

I’ve been meaning to post this for a while but life, child, editing the show, taking my mother in law to the airport and trying to beat Mario Galaxy before the coworker who lent it to me finds another job have all repeatedly gotten in the way.

It’s a hard life, let me tell you.

Anyway, the big news that I am bringing to you is that our good buddy and super nice guy Larry Latham has started up dating his much praised comic Lovecraft is Missing. It’s been back for about a week now. See how much I’ve failed you guys.

For those of you just joining us, Lovecraft is missing was first featured on this site as a Horizons Watch pick back in May of 2009 and was much beloved then. It was then refeatured when it was Jason’s pick for “Best Newcomer of 2009.”

If you haven’t read it yet, go do so. Right now. There’s nothing else on the Internet that combines adventure, history and horror like Lovecraft is Missing. I’ve talked to Larry and this is a true labor of love for you. Go support him in it. I personally guarantee that if you don’t like it, you have no soul.

For the longest time I’ve been wanting to do this but I was hoping to hire someone because there are just so many feeds to go through. What I’ll be doing are random updates on comics that are reported as self-sufficient. Why? Because we all want to do the same and what better way to figure out how then by studying the ways of those before us?

Clevinger reports there will be a brief delay in How I Killed Your Master pages due to poor planning. Something about needing to write pages before they can be drawn. Don’t know how that’s supposed to move you along the covenant road but it does show we are all victim to the same problems.

Kochalka has some great little paintings in a group show called Small Favors, at Giant Robot in NYC. Oh, and I’ve also got some little paintings in another Giant Robot show, Game Over, in San Francisco.

While recovering from PAX East and their book tour he pointed out two things. First is a disturbing video of the PAX East witch. Second is something that never occurred to me I would ever be interested in. Gabe and Tycho are up for Time Magazine’s 100 most influential people of the year poll.

Turns out WonderCon has been going on all weekend. I really have to keep up with the Convention tour list.

Dave Kellet reports he will be going in on a second printing on Sheldon book two: The Good, The Bad & The Pugly. It’s a wonderful sign of support for the strip, and means there’s a lot of love for Sheldon, out there! For an independent cartoonist like myself, there is no kinder support you can show than picking up a book in the Sheldon Store. It directly relates to the continued good health of the strip and the site.

It’s Crazy Internet Day. The one day of the year where the Internet and all it netizins decide that it’s OK to lie. April Fool’s day and Web comics go way back like Mr. Peabody and it’s always fun for us readers. I like to keep a running tab of all the jokes people make, you know for posterity. There’s less this year than some because it doesn’t fall on a Monday, Wednesday or Friday which is the update schedule for many comics but I was still able to find a bunch in just a ½ hour of looking (I gots to work ya know).

Here’s what I’ve found so far.

Nedroid takes over T-Rex’s gig

Darin finally grows up at Imagine This

Gastrophobia, Girly and others take a stab at Zuda.

XKCD goes command line

A general warning about the holiday by Rich Stevens of Diesel Sweeties

Whatever the crap this is over at QC.

Pajama Forest does a bonus comic.

Not sure if it’s a joke, an ad or just a regular comic, but Order of the Stick made me laugh.

If you see anything else, let me know in the comments. If I find any more I’ll be sure to add it.