Webcomics are comics published on the internet, such as on a website or a mobile app. While many webcomics are published exclusively online, others are also published in magazines, newspapers, or comic books.
Serializer.net was a webcomic subscription service and artist collective published by Joey Manley and edited by Tom Hart and Eric Millikin that existed from 2002 to 2013. Designed to showcase artistic alternative webcomics using the unique nature of the medium, the works on Serializer.net were described by critics as "high art" and "avant-garde". The project became mostly inactive in 2007 and closed alongside Manley's other websites in 2013.
PartiallyClips is a webcomic, created by Rob Balder, which ran from 2002 to 2015. At the start of 2010, Balder handed authorship of the comic to Tim Crist, the comedy musician behind Worm Quartet.
A Softer World is a webcomic by the writer Joey Comeau and artist Emily Horne, both Canadians. It was first published online on 7 February 2003 and was released three times a week until its end in June 2015. Before starting the website in 2003, the comics had been published in zine form. With the launch of the website, the comic gained wider recognition, most notably when Warren Ellis linked to the comic on his blog, and then began to feature it as a "Favored Puny Human". It appeared in The Guardian for a short time until a change of editors caused it to be removed. Between 2008 and 2010, science fiction-themed strips of A Softer World were also produced and published on Tor.com.
Jeffrey Paul "Jeph" Jacques is an American cartoonist who writes and draws the webcomic Questionable Content. Jacques has formerly created the webcomics indietits,Derelict Orbital Reflector Devices and Alice Grove.
The Perry Bible Fellowship is a webcomic and newspaper comic strip by Nicholas Gurewitch. It first appeared in the Syracuse University newspaper The Daily Orange in 2001.
Dayfree Press was an online webcomic syndicate. Each Dayfree member had a special advertisement banner on their webpage that advertised the comics of another member-site. The ad was generated at random every time the page reloaded and sometimes showed an ad for the comics that were on the same webpage.
A Lesson Is Learned But The Damage Is Irreversible (ALILBTDII) is a webcomic drawn by David Hellman and written by Dale Beran. Ted Rall described the comic as "explor[ing] the limits of pessimism and fatal consequence in a universe that would be difficult to imagine on the printed page." David and Dale are the primary characters, although they do not appear in every episode, and there is a small cast of real-life supporting characters, including schoolfriend/mad scientist Paul, Dale's sister Sally, and David's mother, Debby Hellman.
Ryan North is a Canadian writer and computer programmer.
Jeffrey J. Rowland is the author and artist responsible for Wigu and Overcompensating, two popular webcomics. Originally from Locust Grove, Oklahoma, Rowland now lives in Easthampton, Massachusetts, where he continues to work on the two projects, while running TopatoCo, a company which sells merchandise based on his and other artists' comics.
Brad Guigar is an American cartoonist who is best known for his daily webcomic Greystone Inn and its sequel Evil Inc.
Sheldon is a comedy webcomic created by Dave Kellett. It centers on the odd family unit of 10-year-old Sheldon, his grandfather guardian and his talking duck, Arthur. Much humour is character-based, often joking at traits such as Sheldon's geekiness, Gramp's old age or Arthur's over-inflated ego. Kellett's other webcomic, Drive, had appeared on the Sheldon site each Saturday, before moving to a site of its own.
Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal (SMBC) is a webcomic by Zach Weinersmith. The gag-a-day comic features few recurring characters or storylines, and has no set format; some strips may be a single panel, while others may go on for ten panels or more. Recurring themes in SMBC include science, research, superheroes, religion, romance, dating, parenting and the meaning of life. SMBC has run since 2002 and is published daily.
Attitude: The New Subversive Cartoonists is a series of anthologies of alternative comics, photos and artists' interviews edited by Universal Press Syndicate editorial cartoonist Ted Rall. The books were designed by J. P. Trostle, news editor of EditorialCartoonists.com. Two sequels and three spin-off titles have been published to date. A group of cartoonists featured in the Attitude series formed the organization Cartoonists With Attitude in June 2006; the group has hosted slideshow and panel events around the United States to promote the series and alternative political cartooning. The New Labor Forum described the series as "filled with politically attuned graphic artistry."
Homestuck is an Internet fiction webcomic series created by American author and artist Andrew Hussie. The fourth and best-known of Hussie's four MS Paint Adventures, it originally ran from April 13, 2009 to April 13, 2016. Though normally described as a webcomic, and partly constituted by a series of single panel pages, Homestuck also relied heavily on Flash animations and instant message logs to convey its story, along with occasional use of browser games.
The history of webcomics follows the advances of technology, art, and business of comics on the Internet. The first comics were shared through the Internet in the mid-1980s. Some early webcomics were derivatives from print comics, but when the World Wide Web became widely popular in the mid-1990s, more people started creating comics exclusively for this medium. By the year 2000, various webcomic creators were financially successful and webcomics became more artistically recognized.
Notable events of 2004 in webcomics.
The business of webcomics involves creators earning a living through their webcomic, often using a variety of revenue channels. Those channels may include selling merchandise such as t-shirts, jackets, sweatpants, hats, pins, stickers, and toys, based on their work. Some also choose to sell print versions or compilations of their webcomics. Many webcomic creators make use of online advertisements on their websites, and possibly even product placement deals with larger companies. Crowdfunding through websites such as Kickstarter and Patreon are also popular choices for sources of potential income.
