Missed this thread about Bitpass on Slashdot, but Scott McCloud noted it on his website. Here's the lead-in post:

I have been following the story of BitPass for some time now. The micropayment solution provider has been featured on Slashdot before. That article focused on Scott McCloud, and his comic The Right Number. Since that story, BitPass has added a number of sites using their service. From this netizen, it looks like the idea is really taking off.

Art Spiegelman talked about comics and other topics to a crowd at Wisconsin University. The article has a few interesting quotes from the creator of the comic, Maus.

Down to Earth is now back on the web. Creators Gavin Chafin and Steve Wood have begun producing new comics for the series as of October 31st.

Down to Earth was formerly part of the Keenspot network but had previously left Keenspot to become indepedent. Creator Gavin Chafin explained the reasons for the return on the Keenspot message boards:

After a year and a half [since Down To Earth stopped publication] we still get a decent amount of fan mail asking us to start up again. We realized that we really do enjoy it and will come back with 3 days a week. That way it shouldn't be difficult to keep up and we should be able to keep it funny.