Tony Murphy raising money for weekly comic broadsheet

Alan Gardner June 7, 2010 1 minute 5 comments

It’s All About You creator Tony Murphy has started a Kickstart project to raise $5,500 to launch a weekly comic-strip broadsheet titled Coffee Talk that will be available in coffee shops and cafes.

In his project introduction, Tony writes,

I’m a daily syndicated cartoonist. Unfortunately, newspapers are dying, and while my strip It’s All About You is in a handful of papers – the Boston Globe, the Tampa Tribune, etc. – I’m looking for a way for comic strips to really thrive.

The internet is great — but there’s nothing like reading comic strips in a newspaper you can hold in your hand. The project is therefore to create a newspaper of comic strips. Since much of my strip IT’S ALL ABOUT YOU takes place in a cafe or is coffee-related, Coffee Talk could be carried in cafes and coffee shops.

The paper would include his feature It’s All About You, Max by Marc Bilgrey, Eve N’ Steven by Anne Gibbons, Strings Attached by Ali Solomon, Pop Culture Shock Therapy by Doug Bratton, Bitter Girl by Joan Hilty and other local artists.

He notes that advertising will keep the project funded.

h/t: Mike Lynch.

Comments ⁵

Josh McDonald

Love this idea. Best of luck to Tony et al — I hope it succeeds!

Tom Wood

This might work better as an insert in an alt-weekly since it will be competing for the same advertisers.

Tony Murphy

Interesting idea, Tom. It’s something to consider.

Randy Glasbergen

My freelance cartoons appear in a number of publications like this scattered around the country. Some are published by individual coffee shops, some are published on a bit broader scale. They can’t pay much, but if I can get them to order 10 or 15 weeks at a time, it’s worthwhile. Good luck with the project, Tony. I’m happy to be one of your backers!

John Read

Good for you, Tony! If I weren’t working on a very similar advertiser-supported concept (though my weekly “newspaper for comics,” THE REAL FUNNY PAGES, will also include editorial and gag ‘toons) I’d sign on as a backer. Obviously, I think it’s a great idea, and I really hope you find success with it.

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