199:' early-stage venture fund focused on empowering individuals, small businesses and disenfranchised communities through innovative uses of personal fabrication, digital media and on-demand business services." Gershenfeld found Manley while looking for mobile phone comics content, and was interested in working together with him and Roberts to "empower" individual cartoonists. Roberts and Manley were the largest shareholders in the ComicSpace venture, each owning an equal portion of the company while E-Line was a minority investor. The two primarily decided to reach out for investment because they needed to hire significant programming, design, and business management talent to continue to innovate at the level they wanted to.
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registered on OnlineComics.net in order to give them a chance to register an account before making the website fully public. Because the actual webcomic hosting features were not in place yet, Roberts expected only a few hundred people to register. However, the website was an early hit, accumulating 3,500 members within the first week. Among these early users were cartoonists
229:, for instance, had gone quiet in the second half of the 2000s, but it was relaunched in July 2009 under a new business model and with an expanded line-up of artists. Manley's websites still functioned as online magazines, but the webcomics on these sites became freely accessible and the creators were supported by the ComicSpace ad system.
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ComicSpace was planned to relaunch in the second quarter 2008, but Manley wrote in
January 2009 that the merger with Webcomics Nation was "one of the more technically difficult projects" they had undertaken, and that it was taking longer than he had hoped. In February 2009, a digital ComicSpace store
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Manley was very enthusiastic about the ComicSpace project, and moved closer to
Roberts in order to work on the company. However, the platform never fully took off, and Manley moved back to his native Kentucky in 2012. Though Manley continued to work on ComicSpace, his focus shifted on his creative
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and was intended as a place where writers, artists, publishers, and fans could interact and share their work. Though ComicSpace was highly successful upon launch, it never fully took off. Roberts and Manley expanded the scope of the project with the help of investment firm E-Line
Ventures in 2007,
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and longing for a break from the OnlineComics.net code, Roberts decided to build a comics-oriented version of MySpace to host on ComicSpace.com. ComicSpace launched within a month after being conceptualized, on
December 5, 2006. Roberts sent out an email to the 4,600 webcomic creators who were
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for the comics industry," as hosting, user-generated content, editorially-branded content, commentary, and social networking were all merged into a traditional comics-viewing portal. ComicSpace was to produce revenue for cartoonists through advertising, merchandising, and print publishing.
170:-family of curated subscription services. When asked what skills he and Roberts might bring to the table for ComicSpace, Manley noted that Roberts has experience with helping readers find and keep track of webcomics, while he had more experience with publishing and monetization himself.
27:
195:, and Roberts' website OnlineComics.net were all combined into ComicSpace. The website was funded by E-Line Ventures, a newly formed investment firm created by Alan Gershenfeld and Michael Angst. E-Line Ventures self-described as "a '
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In
October 2007, Joey Manley announced that he had partnered with Roberts, and that they had received an infusion of capital from an investment firm. Between November 2007 and April 2008, Manley's free webcomic hosting service
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ComicSpace's own earnings would be a function of the individual cartoonists' earnings. Manley stated himself that "the merchandising element will be the single most revolutionary part of it," though
Gershenfeld told
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was incorporated into ComicSpace shortly after its launch in late 2006. The service auctioned 16 small advertisements at the top of the ComicSpace website, and
Roberts expected to earn $ 1,000
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a major feature, and to allow users to specify their connection to the field of comics, letting users browse writers, artists, publishers, and retailers as sub-groups. Advertising network
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Josh
Roberts had created and run the webcomic directory OnlineComics.net since 2001, and began restructuring its codebase in the early summer of 2006. Roberts had registered the
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network. Manley decided that he wanted to relaunch all of his subscription services under the ComicSpace banner. Manley's webcomic magazine
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ComicSpace.com on a whim in 2005. In
November 2006, shortly after being introduced to the social media website
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that their main interest was being a service provider and facilitator rather than a publisher.
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said in 2007 that "ComicSpace is poised to become what I would call a vertical
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and Manley began merging his existing websites into ComicSpace, starting with
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work, and ComicSpace eventually shut down alongside Manley's other websites.
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briefly talked with Manley about potentially integrating her website
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318:"Ad Auction Platform Germinates in World of Online Comics"
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Roberts' initial plans for the website included to make
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hosting service created and managed by Josh
Roberts and
453:"ComicSpace Merger Status Update for January 29, 2009"
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joined Roberts in 2007, he described ComicSpace as a
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98:between 2006 and 2012. The website was inspired by
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397:"Scoping Out the Post-Merger Comic Space Network"
182:Roberts and Manley at a ComicSpace booth in 2009
155:per month after Project Wonderful took its cut.
166:website, in order to contrast it with his own
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293:"Josh Roberts on ComicSpace.com's Launch"
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708:Internet properties established in 2006
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718:American companies established in 2007
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369:"When Internet Comics Models Collide"
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559:ComicSpace.com, as captured by the
174:E-Line Media investment and mergers
703:Defunct social networking services
345:"Newsmaker Interview: Joey Manley"
14:
316:Nelson, Matthew G. (2006-12-13).
545:from the original on 2017-12-14.
488:from the original on 2018-10-15.
476:"Unbound: Rethinking Girlamatic"
409:from the original on 2019-08-23.
381:from the original on 2008-11-21.
357:from the original on 2018-10-17.
305:from the original on 2012-03-25.
474:Alverson, Brigid (2009-07-28).
693:Free webcomic hosting services
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291:Phillips, Mike (2006-12-11).
111:Concept and early development
451:Manley, Joey (2009-01-29).
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395:Allen, Todd (2007-11-05).
62:December 5, 2006
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533:"Joey Manley, 1965-2013"
615:'s Modern Tales family
420:Horton, Steve (2008).
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164:user-generated content
698:Blog hosting services
621:Subscription services
232:At one point, writer
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481:Comic Book Resources
402:Comic Book Resources
298:Sequart Organization
215:Comic Book Resources
205:Comic Book Resources
688:Webcomic syndicates
374:The Comics Reporter
350:The Comics Reporter
74:Current status
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538:The Comics Journal
267:"OnlineComics.net"
223:online advertising
197:double bottom line
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507:"RIP Joey Manley"
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531:(2013-11-15).
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505:(2013-08-11).
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463:on 2009-02-07.
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437:978-1598636826
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343:(2007-11-02).
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77:Discontinued
613:Joey Manley
244:Abandonment
160:Joey Manley
138:Ed Brubaker
117:domain name
96:Joey Manley
42:Joey Manley
682:Categories
667:ComicSpace
638:Girlamatic
253:References
227:Girlamatic
134:Steve Rude
84:ComicSpace
66:2006-12-05
54:(archived)
20:ComicSpace
565:July 2006
543:Archived
511:the Beat
486:Archived
407:Archived
379:Archived
355:Archived
303:Archived
238:The Beat
92:webcomic
59:Launched
121:MySpace
100:MySpace
64: (
575:, and
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322:Clickz
210:portal
136:, and
158:When
37:Owner
432:ISBN
90:and
563:in
153:USD
145:RSS
48:URL
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Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License. Additional terms may apply.
