Futabasha Revives Comic Seed!

Last year, the free online monthly manga anthology Comic Seed! ceased publication after its publisher, Penguin Shobo, declared bankruptcy.

Now Futabasha plans to publish the magazine with the aid of a new business strategy. The first issue of the new Comic Seed! will be release on April 28th, with ten new series and several old series from the "old" Comic Seed. The second issue (5/31) will see the serialization of Kodomo no Jikan, the popular series by Kaworu Watashiyaka originally from Monthly Comic High.

Futabasha Publishing, Ltd. will be publishing a "new" monthly comic magazine - "Comic Seed!" (Chief Editor: Nonaka Nakago), which will be distributed free on the web at the end of each month.

"Comic Seed!" was originally created by Penguin Shobo in September 2002, and was suspended last year with the liquidation of Penguin Shobo. This time, our company will inherit the name of that magazine, and create a new publishing-advertising model in a web-based medium. This new approach to manga business will be built and managed through the cooperation with people from related industries. We are aiming at making profits through the advertisement from the web magazine, the tankobon, and the e-books."

We will be partnering with Digi-book Japan, Inc. and Axel-Mark Company in distributing manga through mobile phones, delivering advertisement, producing e-books, etc. For the web-advertising system, we will be using the new "Bro-AD-cast" system developed by Sapiens, Inc.. The advertisement for our magazine "Comic Seed!" will feature "puzzle-type advertisment," an animation advertisement which pops up before the reader reads a manga. Certainly, it will impress our advertisers.

The magazine's distribution will be utilizing a comic reading program developed by Sapiens, the "Plugin-free Weblishing Service." Readers will be able to read the magazine without any installation of external magazine viewers or the need to download plugins. Akazuki Printing Inc. will be responsible for additional processing of the contents. The paper-hardcopy, cell phone version, and e-book version of Comic Seed will all be available through a unified data system.

Our website (http://comicsesed.jp) will pre-open on March 27th. It will officially open on April 28th in conjuction with the first re-publication of Comic Seed. New series will be announced, works of numerous mangaka from the "Old Comic Seed!" will also be continuing in the new publication. For our first publication, we have ten series lined up and 250 pages planned. In our 2nd issue (May 31st), we're planning to serialize the popular series "Kodomo no Jikan" from the No.1 Amazon.co.jp bestseller "Monthly Comic High!" magazine.

On March 27th, we will be distributing the pre-launch preparation issues. We will be working on the promotion of the first issue of Comic Seed! as its April 28th re-launch date draws near. We plan on exceeding the 70,000 readers mark of the old Comic Seed! and doubling the number of readers to 150,000.

Translated by Floating_Sakura