Google, meanwhile, isn't working on a device, but they do plan to launch an e-book store in order to deliver electronic books to "any device with a web browser." Time will tell what any of this means for the comic industry, but with a color tablet coming out soon, you can see the possibilities.

Webcomics | Writing for PBS's Mediashift blog, Simon Owens writes about what newspaper cartoonists can learn from web cartoonists. He spoke with both Richard Stevens and Howard Tayler for the piece.

Digital comics | With the movie coming out soon, IDW has released a whole bunch of Astro Boy comics for the iPhone.

Digital comics | Alex De Campi shares her thoughts on the various digital comics applications that are out there.

Webcomics | Questionable Content creator Jeph Jacques offers up a State of the Webcomics Union, discussing what's changed in online comics over the six years he's been making them. (Via Scott McCloud)

Video games | OK, this probably isn't the usual Slash Print material, but I'm kind of stoked about this Epic Mickey game that Disney is working on.

Hellboy: Seed of Destruction

Digital Comics | Dark Horse announced via press release that both Umbrella Academy and Hellboy: Seed of Destruction are available through the iTunes Store, with subsequent issues available soon. Seed of Destruction is available as four issues at $0.99 each, or as a bundle of all four issues for $3.99. The first issue of Apocalypse Suite is available for free, with issues #2–#6 only $0.99 each, or a bundle of all six issues for $4.99.

Digital Comics | Disney Comics Worldwide shares more details on Disney's DigiComics initiative. They'll eventually be rolled out worldwide, starting in December in English-speaking countries and Italy. They'll be available for the iPhone, iPod and Sony PSP, and eventually Disney hopes to expand to other platforms like Nokia phones and the Wii. The stories will initially come from "the huge archive that The Walt Disney Company Italy has built up in the last 50 years."

Motion Comics | All five episodes of the Spider Woman, Agent of S.W.O.R.D. motion comic are now available for free viewing on Hulu. Because it is "intended for mature audiences," you'll have to register and verify your age.

Webcomics | At Comic Space, Joey Manley offers some advice to webcomics creators on promoting their comics outside of traditional comic audiences.

"In print, comics are their own category of thing. People think you have to be a special kind of person to read and enjoy them. They’re either intimidated by comics, or superior to comics, or both. Not always. Yeah. But often," he writes. "On the web, comics are just one more fun thing to look at. It’s all part of 'the web,' and people don’t get their guard up so quickly. They go from blog to animated cartoon to webcomic to photo-sharing site to social network and back to blog again, without paying attention to the differences between these things. It’s just one big mush of fun. They don’t feel like they have to be 'comics fans' to read a webcomic.

This is just one of several interesting posts over the last few days; read his blog to check them all out. (via Paperless Comics)

Webcomics | Brad Guigar at Webcomics.com has posted many of the funny things Scott Kurtz said while emceeing the Harvey Awards. And a lot of them are pretty funny.

Digital Comics | In November you'll be able to read Robert Crumb on your iPhone.

Digital Comics | Alex De Campi kicks off a column at Bleeding Cool by talking about her upcoming digital comic Valentine.

Webcomics | Michel Fiffe's Zegas has kicked off over at ACT-I-VATE.

Zuda

Webcomics | Scott Kurtz, who hosted the Harvey Awards this past weekend, shares his thoughts on what he saw at the Zuda table over the weekend. Kurtz, the creator of the long-running and highly successful PvP webcomic, has been an outspoken critic of Zuda since they launched, but had a different take on DC's monthly webcomics contest after this weekend.

"If companies like DC can enter the Webcomics world, and find a way to work with creators fairly and bring credibility and positive attention to this medium…that’s good," Kurtz writes. "If Zuda can light a fire under the asses of talent that normally wouldn’t make progress, that’s awesome. We want that, don’t we? Doesn’t a rising tide lift all ships? I know I’m skeptical. I like being skeptical. But maybe I’ve witnessed so many Platinums in the past that I’m a little gun-shy. Maybe…maybe…Zuda isn’t going to fuck people over."

Also worth reading on his blog, Kurtz talks about what it was like to host the Harveys.

Webcomics | In anticipation of the release of the ACT-I-VATE Primer from IDW, Graphic NYC has dubbed this ACT-I-VATE week and will run features all week about the webcomics collective and its contributors.

Blogs | Kevin mentioned this earlier today, but I just wanted to draw your attention to our own Brigid Alverson's new blog, Paperless Comics. "My goal is to cover the world of webcomics and do it objectively," she says in her first post.

Digital comics | Evan Young has released his complete graphic novel The Carrier for the iPhone.

Webcomics | Dustin Harbin turns his favorite passage from the Charles Bukowski novel Women into a webcomic.

Webcomics | SLG reminds us that Matthew Shepherd and Roy Boney Jr. are serializing their mini-series Dead Eyes Open on the web.

Webcomics | Scott O. Brown is continuing his Zuda entry Red Ice on his own web site, where he's also posting several horror strips just in time for Halloween.

Tablets | Although the Apple tablet I mentioned a few days ago hasn't even been officially announced yet, this Ad Age story says traditional publishers are already talking about ways to bypass iTunes and offer "an industry-wide digital storefront where tablet users could buy digital issues or subscriptions without going through iTunes or the App Store."

Tablets | Speaking of tablets (and SLG, for that matter), SLG chief Jennifer de Guzman talks about digital comics in her latest column for Publisher's Weekly, noting the difficulties that come with trying to make comics for Amazon's Kindle.

"To be acceptable to Amazon's Kindle store, a comic needs to be 'reflowed,' which means breaking each page into individual panels and saving each as a separate file," she writes. "This is a process that could take hours for every graphic novel—and that means additional costs for a publisher."

Digital Comics | If you missed part one of the Brian Michael Bendis interview I linked to earlier because you were too busy checking out what he had to say about Avengers, he talks with Blair Butler about the Spider Woman Motion Comic and the future of digital comics.

Webcomics | Caleb Goellner over at Comics Alliance chats with TopatoCo's Jeffrey Rowland about achieving financial independence through webcomics.

"This is still a pretty young market since it was ever granted any sort of widely-believed sense of legitimacy, five or so years ago," Rowland says. "I think the best thing creators can do is just continue to be talented but don't be afraid to be weird. Just do quality work that's weird. It's still the friggin' wild west out here; if you can get 20,000 people to read your comic about a dog that huffs paint, there is a way to make a living from that."

Webcomics | The second half of Fleen's interview with Howard Tayler, which I linked to in the last Slash print, is now up on the site.

Webcomics | Congrats to Marc Ellerby, who is celebrating his 200th Ellerbisms strip this week with a series of guest artists.

Scott McCloud comments on the potential for such a device to change comics: "Most of today’s comics publishers are likely to jump into the pool with their clothes on—print-style pages intact. But if Apple’s gadget is anything like what’s being described, we could see a shift over time from point-and-click fragmented delivery, like what we have on the Web today, to more continuous spatial metaphors of the sort a lot of us turn-of-the-century mad scientists were playing with. Should be interesting."

Digital comics | You can read some of Brian Clevinger and Scott Wegener's excellent Atomic Robo comics, including the Free Comic Book Day stories from the past few years, at the Nuklear Power website.

Motion Comics | Eagle One Media has released Street Fighter and Voltron motion comics on iTunes.

Webcomics | Fleen interviews Schlock Mercenary creator Howard Tayler about his recent appearance at a Success in Comics seminar in Las Vegas.

Ant Man

Webcomics | In case you missed it, like I did ... Chris Eliopolis shares a fun Ant Man tribute comic on his website. (via Comics Alliance)

Webcomics | Alex Hoffman of the webcomics site Transmission-X discusses how webcomics are usually limited to one category when awards time rolls around.

"The issue is that since webcomics are allowed nominations in only a single category - while print comics are nominated under a multitude of aspects of comic production – webcomics are severely limited in their recognition," he writes. "The online comics community is large and growing quickly, but as yet, all the major awards exclude them from the majority of categories. While they do honour the Best Webcomic, they do not allow those strips to compete for recognition as Best Artist, Best Cartoonist, etc."

Mobile | The independent publishing house McSweeney's has launched an iPhone application called Small Chair that will feature content from their various publications, as well as music and art portfolios. "No longer will T-Pain be your only salvation on trains, during lunch, and through all the other empty gaps in a day." They say to expect content from Spike Jonze, Wells Tower, Chris Ware, and Jonathan Ames.

Video games | I thought this was an interesting piece by Russ Fischer. Writing for the Baylor University newspaper, he compared the storytelling techniques of three recent video games -- Infamous, Batman: Arkham Asylum and Prototype -- to the storytelling techniques of Marvel, DC and independent comics 20 years ago. I haven't played any of these three games, so I'm not sure how well the analogies hold up, but it was an interesting place to go.

Digital comics | Last week Rich Johnston did another "Twinterview," or interview over Twitter, this time with Longbox inventor Rantz Hoseley. The entire thing is collected over at BleedingCool.com. Rich asks about how Longbox will affect comic shops, mobile devices, funding and more. You can also watch Hoseley's panel from HeroesCon over at iFanboy.

Digital comics | Van Jensen, who helped Top Shelf with getting Owly on the Kindle, shares his thoughts on digital distribution, Longbox, iPhones and more.

from Scary Go Round

Webcomics | The webcomic Scary Go Round ran into a bit of unfortunate timing, as recent strips featured a one-gloved character "who is a kind of grotesque version of a world superstar," creator John Allison posted on the strip's site.

"As much as some of the comics of the next few weeks may seem a kind of unpleasant cash-in, I drew them weeks ago," he said. "I had written and thumbnailed my comics up to July 22nd when the King of Pop turned his toes up." (Via)

Webcomics | I enjoyed this blog post by Jorge F. Muñoz, artist of Yon Kuma. The webcomic is about bear wrestlers, and Muñoz talks about his appreciation for the masks worn by various luchadores. And it ends with a bear wearing one of those masks, which is a nice bonus.

Social media | Matt Price interviews Rob Vollmar about tweeting the script from his most recent work, The Twin Cities.

Longbox

Digital Comics | Rantz Hoseley posted some additional information and answered questions on the Longbox digital comics in the comments section of the iFanboy article Kevin linked to yesterday.

Those updates include:

• Although only BOOM! and Top Cow have been announced so far, Hoseley said seven publishers have signed on for the launch, and the other five will be announced in the next few weeks leading up to the San Diego Comic Con.
• The software will include a "Manga Mode" that flips the left-to-right reading order. That's pretty damn clever.
• The software will also allow for "age-restricted sub-accounts," so your kids can read the Muppets but can't get to your Black Kiss comics.
• Hoseley says that "while we certainly welcome DC and Marvel's participation, the entire system was designed to have a business model that would be successful and profitable for all involved if they chose not to participate."

There's more at the link, so click over and read. This gets more interesting by the day ...

e-Devices | Uclick, which has brought titles like Bone and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles to the iPhone, announced today that they've released an Eisner Award iPhone application, available now for free on iTunes. The app will update with icons indicating the winners in each category shortly after the voting results are announced on Friday, July 24 at the San Diego Comic Con.

I actually downloaded it last night; it only works in landscape, but it includes information on the awards and Will Eisner, as well as covers of all the nominees. It's pretty slick and well worth the asking price.

Social media | The Castaways and Bluesman writer Rob Vollmar is tweeting a comic script at the rate of one page per day. No doubt that's one way to ensure that every word -- heck, every character -- counts. (Via)

e-Devices | Publishers Weekly's Calvin Reid reviews the Kindle DX, which started shipping June 10. "Comics displayed on the improved Kindle 2 looked dim and small and were hard to read and the device’s zoom feature didn’t really help much," he wrote. "Comics are now much easier to read on the DX but they still seem dim and veiled by the screen’s grey cast." He also notes that Amazon was meeting with comic publishers at the BookExpo America to discuss enhancing the device for comic viewing.

Webcomics | Wired.com's GeekDad interviews Dr. McNinja creator Chris Hastings.

Social media | MySpace announced they are cutting another 300 jobs overseas.

Social media | Coming soon to a theater near you -- Facebook, the movie.

DMZ on Google Maps

Internet | Brian Wood uses Google Maps to highlight key locations from his Vertigo series DMZ.

Social media | Twitter, apparently, has taken the place of message boards as the preferred arena for fights between comic pros and gossip columnists.

Last Friday, an online dust-up occurred between comics writer Mark Waid and former All the Rage columnist Rich Johnston. You can read their respective takes on it here and here.

It was certainly a lot easier to follow the back-and-forth flames in the old days of message boards. Kids and their crazy newfangled internet tools ...

Digital comics | And now a look at the gentler side of Twitter ... also on Friday, Johnston interviewed Ryan Penagos, aka Agent_M, about Marvel.com and Marvel's Digital Comics Initiative. The interview took place on Twitter.

Internet | The New York Times talks to artists who were recently invited by Google to contribute artwork that would be used on their web browser, Google Chrome. Google asked them to do it for exposure rather than pay. (via)

The Crooked Man

Webcomics | Corinna Bechko, one of the co-creators of The Crooked Man, says that she and artist Gabriel Hardman are working to turn their Zuda submission into a graphic novel. They placed fifth in the July 2008 Zuda competition. (Thanks David!)

Webcomics | Warren Pleece's Montague Terrace has started running on the ACTIVATE website. You can also find all the pages at his blog. In other ACTIVATE news, the site also now includes a column by Tim Hall.

Twitter | T Campbell is twittering his thoughts on Crisis on Infinite Earths as he rereads the decades-old crossover series. "Praise, critique, and lots of snark ahead." [Via The Beat]

e-Devices | The full audio of the South by Southwest interactive panel "Comics on Handhelds: Taking Webcomics Mobile" is now online. The panel features Dan Goldman, Rich Stevens, Douglas Edwards, Molly Crabapple, Dave Bort and Rantz Hoseley "in a let's-sketch-out-solutions talk for transitioning webcomics to a variety of new petri dishes," Goldman said.

Webcomics | The Zuda Fan Art blog features exactly what it says it does in its name.

e-Devices | Rumor has it that the new iPhone, announced earlier this week, will have graphic capabilities beyond Sony's PSP. (Personally I'm digging the new Voice Memo feature it'll sport). The new iPhone will be available June 19.