Winner of Amazon's "comic strip superstar" contest announced

[Dan Boris]

"Girl" by Dana Simpson is the Grand Prize winner of the Comic Strip Superstar contest.

http://tinyurl.com/lrbnfz

[Mike Peterson]

I don't think you can expect Amazon to turn everything over to the promotion of this tie-in contest. You can hope, of course. But it's not automatic that they'll turn down the heat on the rest of their marketing plans to push this particular piece to the top of the pile.

Having said that, I'd point out that F-Minus got a 75-paper launch based on having won an MTV contest that I never heard about until I started getting promotional material about the strip having won it. Will that happen for "Girl"?? Well, MTV does carry the promise of bringing young readers in, though I'm not sure MTV's cachet is where it was a generation ago. (But since when did editors know what is hip? Have you READ the style section?)

I'd say that, if Girl gets through the development stage, the "contest winner" tag will help with marketing. And, honestly, if the hype had been greater, the luster would be gone before it was really ready to launch and there would be a serious temptation to rush it out prematurely. And you wouldn't want to see a strip launched to major fanfare before the artist had actually mastered the knack of producing consistent work over a long period (*coff* Boondocks *coff*)

[Malc]

I think it's ok. Doesn't appeal to me, but capably drawn and this lady is obviously intelligent, so.... like I said, it's ok.

I don't think much of the so-called "prize". Put some serious money into these competitions and watch the real talent come out of the woodwork. Once again, with GoComics, Sherpa, etc, the syndicates are sub-contracting development to the net, doing things on the cheap, with no real commitment or expense incurred. A competition with real integrity and prospects of advancement is the way forward, no wonder this one was under-advertised, it's a thinly walled meringue of a thing with no real substance.

[Eric]

Does anyone know if they are going to have it agin next year?