Tom Spurgeon has a long post on how he, if he was "emperor of comics" would fix things.  It's interesting and covers a range of topics from awards (Keep the Eisners, nix the Harveys) to direct market retailers to digital strategies.

I attended the Small Publishers panel at SPX this year and it was interesting -- it included someone from Sparkplug, Buenaventure, Bodega, (and one more publisher I can't remember this sec) but not encouraging.  It's not surprising that it's a barely profitable to profitless business (all four panelists were hoping that growing back catalogues would eventually sustain their business) but it was also revealing that there is a great deal of art and guesswork to making a go of it.  There were different approaches to selling through AMAZON, various levels of website-driven sales, different ideas on marketing.  All I think had a background in working for larger publishers and all said they were doing it for the love of comics.

I've sometimes given thought to getting into publishing but I would certainly do it from a web-heavy approach.  One of the publishers that seems very savvy so far is AVATAR which is handling Warren Ellis' Freak Angels comic and I suspect will sell massive amounts of the print collection driven by the comic's serialization on the web.

Derik Badman had a presentation called “Freedom within Boundaries: the Theory and Practice of Constraint in Comics” in Second Life at Met@Morph, the first annual Web Comics Comic-Con and Conference, on Friday October 3rd.

I moved frightnight.org onto the Drupal platform that ComixTALK uses although I'm not entirely sure I'll have time to do a real "event" with it this year (for those who haven't heard about it, Fright Night started in 1999 with a number of webcomic creators grouping up to tell collaborative stories, often featuring characters from their own strips.)  I will try to blog about Halloween-related comics there (might cross-post here too) and anyone else should feel free to post about scary things there too.  (The site does get a steady if not huge level of traffic in October...)

The archives of previous Fright Night events (and the two Blind Date events) are still there - just click the "archived events" link in the top menu.

A great day at SPX this Sunday.  Saw a whole bunch of familiar (web)comic artists (and bought some great stuff too) and met some new ones.  I get overwhelmed trying to check out everything at SPX -- I don't think I'd cut it at San Diego.  I guess it's 'cause I do try to check out as much of the work as possible.  (I missed the Ignatz awards Satuday night but click here to find out about the winners.  Apparently there was another dude in a gorilla suit this year just like last year. UPDATE: Yep - there's a moneky in THIS YEAR's presentation.  h/t FLEEN).

Anyhow, I may have some reviews and interviews coming up leading out of today but for now I'm putting my new poster of the "Atheist's Afterlife" strip from Aaron Diaz's Dresden Codak up on the wall next to my A Lesson Is Learned But the Damage is Irreversible poster.  I also picked up some books from Dirk Tiede, Spike, Meredith Gran, Josh Lesnick, Joe Dunn... jeez, really too many to list in one post.  I'll get to them this week!

Also ran into the elusive Joey Manley (well he was up in the wilds of Maine for awhile... now he's apparently in the more hospitable land of Brooklyn) along with T Campbell.  I think the gist of that conversation was that the new Comicspace.com is coming soon AND YET in some ways is already here.  I should try harder to get an interview with him (although I have asked!), shouldn't I?

I also talked briefly with Raina Telgemeier about her new book with Scholastic - which will be a print version of her webcomic Smile. Raina thought a press release had gone out but I can't find it just now.  Raina had done four Babysitters Club books with Scholastic, but she said that was it for the graphic novel series.  I asked Raina about the experience and she was extremely positive on it, noting she had done about 800 pages on the series.  Best wishes for the Smile project and I'll post more details when I get them.

Tom Spurgeon has a list of the Ignatz 08 winners announced last night at SPX. Achewood by Chris Onstad won for OUTSTANDING ON-LINE COMIC.

I'll be wandering around SPX today.

TOOLS
Publishers Weekly has a story on an upgrade to the Sony e-book reader.  Still expensive ($399) but better touch screen, a readling light and more storage capacty (also will play music!?).  

CIVIC LESSONS
An interview with Tom Tomorrow who has a book collection out, called The Future's So Bright, I Can't Bear to Look.

An interview with Ted Rall who will be at SPX in Bethesda MD this weekend.

Kerry Edwards brings the pain.

NOT WEBCOMICS
Penny Arcade's Episode Two of its videogame Adventures on the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness is almost set for release.

An opera based on Dinosaur Comics -- not the first such cross-medium adaptation (Too Much Coffee Man probably claims that footnote in history) but still pretty unusual.  It's tonight if you're interested in attending!

New MC Frontalot album: Final Boss.

SPX in Bethesda MD is this weekend (this year - Saturday and Sunday).  I'll be there on Sunday hanging out - drop me an email (xerexes AT gmail DOT com) if you're attending.  I'll also have the low-tech video camera this year shooting some footage and maybe if all goes well doing a few interviews.  If you're game for letting me ask you questions about your comics let me know!

Wow.  Okay cartoonist Barry Deutch (amptoons.com and hereville.com) is actually a wedding planner as well and he recently staged a fake wedding in Portland, OR ("I see a lot of weddings. I wanted to make fun of them.").  Cartoonist Mike Russell covered it in his reporting comic, CulturePulp.  Russell's comic is hilarious (and the wedding is filled with even more local cartoonists such as Meconis, Manley Lee and Mudron).

I haven't been able to get ahold of Alexander Danner in awhile so I'm hoping someone reading ComixTalk can help me out. 

His website has been down for a good chunk of September (including Full Story, the great directory of completed webcomics).

I think I failed to mention both the 10 year anniversary and the "end" of Cigarro & Cerveja by Tony Esteves earlier in September.  The last strip (although Esteves says there may be more on a very sporadic basis) is a nice ending to what was definitely an underappreciated strip.  I finally got to meet Tony in person at last year's SPX - I'm looking forward to his new comic project.