The long-awaited “Webcomics Nation”, a webcomic hosting service by Joey Manley, has finally arrived. Joey is the man behind, among others, “Modern Tales”, “Graphic Smash”, “Girlamatic” and “TalkaboutComics forum”. Though similiar to ComicGenesis in that it will be a site to host online comics, Webcomics Nation will not be free. Instead, it will offer creators the opportunity to easily sell advertisements or to set up subscription based comics, plus a lot of automated features that other webcomic hosts don’t offer. The following is the official press release:

http://www.talkaboutcomics.com/blog/index.php

"MODERN TALES LAUNCHES WEBCOMICSNATION.COM"
==================================
July 29, 2005
For Immediate Release

Joey Manley, publisher of the leading commercial webcomics site, Modern Tales, announced today that WebcomicsNation.com, a premier hosting and automation service for online cartoonists, has launched today.

BUSINESS STRATEGY SHIFT

"Webcomics Nation is meant to do for online comics what services like Blogger have done for personal journals, or Flickr for photo-sharing: enable anybody and everybody to reach a large audience with his/her ideas and creations -- in this case, in comics form," said Manley. "WCN tames the latest and most complex online technologies (like, say, XML, RSS, and 'web services') and puts them to work for you, easily, invisibly, and in an automated way."

Webcomics Nation represents a major turning point in the company's strategy, said Manley. In the past, Manley has acted more as a traditional editor/publisher, pulling together online 'publications' which he sold to readers. That business is still viable, and Manley says he has no intention of abandoning it. "The problem," he said, "is that we can't grow fast enough, that way. We can't grow as fast as the web demands." The idea was, he said, to get himself out of the "middleman" position for this project. "With the Modern Tales model, I'm more like Stan Lee or J. Jonah Jameson than I'd like to be," says Manley. "It's unsustainable -- there are too many cartoonists coming onto the webcomics train every day, and the readership is growing exponentially. The 'middleman' structure can't bear the strain of that kind of growth. There's got to be this guy in there who touches everything. It slows you down. That's not the way the web works."

WCN takes all the daily hassle of running a successful webcomics service and automates it completely, so that any individual cartoonist can easily and quickly run a top-of-the-line commercial webcomics site. "The idea is that cartoonists will purchase Webcomics Nation accounts -- which cost roughly the same amount as the average web hosting account -- and use them to build their own online businesses. And I'm not in their way, slowing them down."

"With Webcomics Nation, I become more like Kinko's, or Quebecor, or the Post Office, or whatever -- I provide the services that cartoonists need to reach their own goals, rather than enlisting them to help me reach mine." He quickly added, "Um. Not that there's anything wrong with that."

FEATURES

This service has been in development for two years, and has been beta-tested by approximately 200 leading cartoonists from the Modern Tales network of websites, including indie icons from the print world like James Kochalka, Lea Hernandez, Roger Langridge and Tom Hart, as well as cartoonists whose reputations have been made mostly online, like cayetano garza jr., Daniel Merlin Goodbrey, and Spike. "This is not a plaything for children," said Manley. "It's a serious tool for real cartoonists."

FEATURE LIST

# Post an unlimited number of webcomics series, or one-shots. No need to juggle multiple accounts for multiple comics!

# Take advantage of unmetered bandwidth and unlimited disk storage for your account. We just keep adding servers and hard drives as needed, and the risks are spread out across the entire community, so there's no need to worry about paying the "success tax" if you get unexpectedly popular!

# Promote your comics with complimentary banner ads on the Modern Tales network, which includes TalkAboutComics.com, GraphicNovelReview.com, AdventureStrips.com, and many other popular sites!

# Take advantage of all the very latest technological tricks to build and keep an audience, including automatically-generated RSS feeds for every comic on your site, and xml-rpc update pings to 12 major search engines and aggregators every time you post something new, including Yahoo! and Technorati!

# It should go without saying, but due to the sometimes predatory nature of certain sort-of half-way similar services (like, you know, the one owned by a big established newspaper syndicate), you retain all rights to your work, online, in print, and otherwise. I mean: obviously. Puh-leeze.

# Create your own webcomics subscription service, and lock some or all of your comics behind a subscription wall, collecting money directly from your subscribers (using PayPal or any other payment method).

# Sell ads on your own pages, and keep all the money for yourself!

# Sell your print comics and other real-world merchandise on Modern Tales' popular Small Press Swapmeet website!

# Make your webcomics available as Playstation Portable Download Packs!

# Use our "Tooncasting" feature to allow other websites to present the latest strip from your series -- readers will have to click through to your site to get to the full story. It's a great way to build your audience!

# Run an automated email list that lets your readers know when your comic has updated -- you don't have to remember to send it out! It just works!

# Schedule your comics pages in advance, with no worries about your readers "peeking ahead" by figuring out your file naming system (you can name your files any old random name you want).

# Let our archive management system handle the linking and cross-linking for you -- no more bewilderment over connecting hundreds and hundreds of past comic strips together in a manageable and navigable archive!

# Use our automated systems for fan-art, artist sketchbooks, cast and character pages, and more -- the kinds of goodies that help build interest and fan loyalty in your work among the most dedicated kinds of readers.

"WCN is, without doubt, the most powerful webcomics hosting and automation service around," Manley said, "but hosting and automation only represent a fraction of what WCN is all about. Hosting and Automation? That's where the other services stop. But it's where we get started. No other webcomics service offers the kinds of marketing and business tools that WCN provides (like the ability to launch your own subscription service, or the ability to sell your own ads); no other webcomics service automates as many aspects of running a webcomics site as WCN does (like the modules for fan-art, Playstation Portable Download Packs, etc), no other webcomics service can give you complimentary banner ads on the Modern Tales network of websites, and no other webcomics service is as close to the cutting edge of next-generation web technology as WCN, with its RSS and XML-based 'web services' functionality. Most importantly, no other webcomics service is as easy to use. All you have to know how to do is make comics."

"Whether you've never posted a webcomic, or you're an old hand with other, first-generation automation services, or even if you're a tech-savvy 'webcomics auteur' with a mastery of all that it takes to build a webcomics site -- give us a try. After one month using the service, you'll never want to go back to the "old way" of doing things (whatever your own individual "old way" happens to be). ... Join us! "

homepage: http://www.webcomicsnation.com/
overview: http://www.webcomicsnation.com/features.php
directory of comics: http://www.webcomicsnation.com/directory.php
join us: http://www.webcomicsnation.com/join_us.php”

Here is the more comprehensive list of Webcomic Nation’s advances in Joey’s own words: http://www.talkaboutcomics.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=30577

“The first and most obvious advantage over hosting it yourself somewhere: you get unmetered bandwidth and hard disk storage on WCN. You will be very hard pressed to find those things at reasonable rates anywhere else. This isn't important until you become popular, frankly -- but once you become popular, it's a Very Big Deal indeed.

You do get unmetered bandwidth at other webcomics automation services, though. The first and most obvious advantage over using another webcomics automation service: we don't put our own ads on your comics and profit from them. You won't see pop-ups, viagra ads, "shoot the monkey," epileptic-seizure-inducing flashing "free PSP" or "free iPod" banners, or any other banners on your pages -- unless you put them there yourself. And, obviously, if you put them there yourself, you get to keep all the money from them. We make it very easy for you to integrate ad-serving across your entire site, if that's what you want to do. So that's advantage number one.

The next advantage is that, if you want to, you can lock some of your comics behind a subscription wall and sell subscriptions to them, if you want to. Not a big deal if you don't, but it is there if you do.

Another advantage is the ability to promote any print comics or merchandise you have available for sale in our Small Press Swapmeet, which all by itself gets tens of thousands of visitors/day.

For those who don't know HTML, WCN has the advantage of ease-of-use: you do not have to know HTML to put up a WCN website. All you have to know how to do is create .gif, .jpg or .png files out of your comics, and use a web browser to upload them. (Note: if you do know HTML, you can put that knowledge to use if you want, and if you'd prefer to have an FTP account, we can provide one -- though they are optional, and not required).

WCN attempts to promote your work, with automatic complimentary banners on numerous popular websites, including this one (look on the top of the page and on the left-hand side of this page). The banners alone are worth ten bucks a month, frankly.

And WCN automates more than just your webcomic archives. If you want to post Playstation Portable download packs, character and cast pages, etc., or if you want to run a mailing list to allow your members to be automatically notified when your comic updates, if you want to "tooncast" your comic to other websites, or if you want automatically-generated RSS 2.0 syndication feeds, and xml-rpc "pingback"notifications to major search engines whenever you comic updates -- you won't get those things from Keenspace, I believe. And it's difficult to create them on your own, unless you're a PHP programming wizard or know someone who is. You do get them here, right out of the box.

The long and the short of it is: if your webcomic is strictly a hobby, and you don't have any intentions of ever trying to make any money from it, then Keenspace is probably more than adequate. If you're looking to move to the next step, and maybe want to try making a little money from your site, and you don't have the server-side coding chops to create the above kinds of functionality yourself, WCN is a great convenience -- possibly even essential. If you're already making a ton of money from your webcomic, or if you don't need the cross-promotional and complimentary marketing aspects of WCN, or the server-side application and automation aspects of WCN, then you'll probably want to just buy a regular web hosting account and go it alone.

We're for that middle layer, after you're no longer "Joe Keenspace" but before you're Scott Kurtz.”

And finally, on prices:

http://www.webcomicsnation.com/join_us.php

“If you sign up for WCN during its first week, and choose the "Annual Payments" option below, the charter price of $79.50/year will remain in place for the lifetime of your account. The price for accounts purchased after August 5, 2005 will be $99.50/year.”

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