Digital Manga Guild Secures 487 Titles
The Digital Manga Guild, a program created by publisher Digital Manga Publishing to harness the fan labor used in scanlations to bring out cheap official translations of more obscure manga, has announced it has acquired the English language publishing rights to 487 Japanese manga titles. The titles themselves, as well as their Japanese publishers, remain undisclosed. The Digital Manga Guild's translators and editors earn only a percentage of their book's profits, with no salary up front, which understandably bothers many professional translators, but is undoubtedly more than the $0 fan scanlators make on their subrosa translations.
Banned Egyptian Graphic Novel Comes to English
Egyptian graphic novel Metro, by Magdy El Shafee, was banned in Egypt in 2008 for “offending public decency”, but will now come out in the US from publisher Macmillan. Although it had been shopped around American publishers before, it was only purchased after the Egyptian revolution, which increased its marketability. El Shafee plans to attempt to republish it in Egypt under the new regime. More details are available here.
Stumptown Comics Festival
On April 16-17, Portland will host the annual Stumptown Comic Book Festival, a creator-centric comic book convention. Special guests include Colleen Coover, Phil Foglio, Scott Kurtz and Larry Marder among many others. A wide variety of comics creators and publishers will be in attendance on the convention floor and panels and workshops on various comics related topics will take place throughout the weekend. More information is available on the Stumptown website. The Stumptown Comic Book Festival takes place from 10 a.m. - 6 p.m. daily at the Oregon Convention Center, located at 777 North East Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, Portland, Oregon. Admission is $7 per day or $12 for the weekend and may be purchased online.
Kirkman Leads April Fools Zombie Bar Crawl
Robert Kirkman, co-creator of the hit zombie comics and tv series The Walking Dead, is leading a zombie-themed bar crawl across San Francisco on April 1. Comic fans over 21 may purchase tickets for a special bus tour across the city that will drop them at a variety of drinking establishments across the city for zombie themed drinks, while in the company of Kirkman. Tickets are $50 and will become available at 3 p.m. EST tomorrow at ifanboy.com and isotopecomics.com.
Radical Debuts R News on YouTube
Radical Publishing has launched R News, a YouTube video channel, that offers updates on creator news, new books and new projects coming from the Radical Universe. Cohosts Josh Berger and Britt Karolina Nielson deliver the goods on Radical in a show that features funny hats, singing, pretty girls and other hi-jinks in addition the news from Radical. Radical has posted three episodes of R News; click here for episode #2 and here for episode #3.
All Top 10 Graphic Books Bestsellers From Indie Presses
This week Robert Kirkman's Walking Dead series from Image took the top spot on the New York Times Graphic Books Bestseller List and three other slots in the top ten, and all of Bryan Lee O'Malley's Scott Pilgrim titles from Oni managed to grab the remaining top ten spot. This is remarkable, because together, the two indie hits managed to keep Marvel and DC out of the lead. Image and Oni Press are both distributed to the book trade by Diamond Book Distributors.
This Week @ Good Comics For Kids
This week School Library Journal’s blog Good Comics for Kids had a review oftwo more adventures with the Squat Bears, what the GC4K reviewers are reading this week, and the 3/23 listing of comics suitable for all ages.
This Week @ The Beat
This week at PWCW editor Heidi MacDonald’s blog The Beat, she covered yet another the Rob Granito scandal, this year's MoCCA programming, and Joanne Siegel's lost last letter.
