Welcome to November!

Today I wanted to talk a little bit about digital comics. This was inspired by two things; first, I just got an iphone, and it is rockin’ my world. Second, on Friday Marvel comics began making their comics available digitally through a number of sources. You can read more about Marvel’s deal here.

Now, I’ve ranted before on motion comics and webcomics, but today I wanted to talk to all those smart phone holding comic book readers out there about your options for reading comics on the go. There are a number of choices out there, so you all should know what you are getting into.

iVerse: Of all the comic readers available for phone use, iVerse is the cleanest and most professional. The store is simple and easy to navigate, and the reader itself is intuitive to use. For those who need a tutorial, iVerse has videos on it’s website to show how to navigate both the store and reader pages.

Several companies have signed up with iVerse, including Red 5, IDW, and Boom! studios, as well as Marvel. Currently, the company has not decided to produce the iVerse application anywhere other than for the iphone, but press releases state that the company does have an eye towards eventually developing apps for other smart phones. Perhaps most importantly, while the comics themselves may cost you 99 cents or so, the app itself is free.

Comixology: Comixology is also a comic viewer, but the focus for this company less about the reader and more about the comic shop experience. The Comixology app and website both try to give subscribers a more connected feeling than other apps do. With Comixology, subscribers can read and write reviews, create virtual pull lists, read columns,listen to podcasts, and find the local comic book shop. Comixology is also working on a virtual subsciption service, but it’s still in beta testing. The app itself is easy to navigate but the reader is not as good as the iVerse reader, but the browsing capability is better. Comixology is also paired up with Marvel, as well as Vertigo, Aspen, and Top Cow among others. The Comixology app is currently only available for the iphone, but Blackberry and Android versions are on the way. The full app costs $1.99, (as well as the comics themselves) but there is a lite version for free as well.

Panelfly: Another of the companies that Marvel has partnered with, Panelfly is a pretty neat app. Like Comixology, Panelfly gives a community feel, allowing subscribers to rate and review comics, and post their feelings onto facebook and twitter, straight from the app, as opposed to Comixology, where a lot of the features are available from the website. The reader itself is basic, but neat, and the store is well arranged and easy to navigate.

Aside from Marvel, Panelfly doesn’t have a lot of big name publishers in it’s stable yet, with SLG, Antarctic and picturebox being about the biggest names you will find available, but that is sure to change with Marvel signing up. Panelfly, like the other apps I’ve mentioned so far, is currently only available for the iphone. The panelfly app is free, which we all love, and there are a large number of free books available to download.

Comic Zeal: The Comic Zeal comics reader is very different than your other comic apps. The app itself is $3.99, and then there are a number of steps that one has to go through to make the comic books readable on the application itself. The goal of Comic Zeal is to create more of a library effect, like the way people have their music set up in an ipod. This app is still a ways from being something to really think about for on the go comic enjoyment.

Uclick: Uclick’s focus has been creating the best comic book reader available. The difference with Uclick is that there is no app to download, you just download the book you want to read, and Uclick makes the story readable. The approach is great for those who don’t want to be bothered with downloading another app, but for those who want to browse, this is not the way to go. Uclick has partnered with brands like IDW, Mirage, and TOKYOPOP, and is currently available only on the iphone.

Clickwheel: The new kid on the block in the comic reader market, click wheel is still finding it’s place. Clickwheel is pretty standard, nothing spectacular, or terrible about it. The one thing that Clickwheel has that other companies do not is 2000AD, home to stories like JUDGE DREDD.  The company’s biggest drawback is a dearth of big publishers involved. As of right now, Clickwheel is only available for the iphone, but other platforms are being looked into. The app is free.

There are a lot of choices on the market for reading comics from your phone, and the great thing is, you can try most of them out for free. None of these reader apps are exclusive to any particular company which means that you don’t have to go to company A for Marvel, company B for DC. People can choose a reader based on what they want most out of the comic book experience, and that is what is so neat about all of these companies, they all offer readers something different. I am sure that eventually there will be one app that becomes the standard, but this moment, with the amount of choices available, the winners are comic book fans.

Thanks for stopping by folks, see you tomorrow.