Dave Brzeski of The House On The Borderland in Peterborough, England read Steve Bennett’s recent column (see “Confessions of a Comic Book Guy—This N’That”) and says publishing Webcomics in a hardcover edition is “not quite unprecedented:”

In his latest column Steve Bennett said: "So their business model is to give their product away via the Internet then publish the individual comics in hardcover; I'll repeat that, in HARDCOVER.  I suppose it shouldn't come as a surprise given Dubai has always had a reputation for wanting the finest things without having to worry about the cost; but in the cheapjack world of American comic book publishing, this is unprecedented."

Not quite unprecedented, Steve!

Volume one of Freakangels, the free Webcomic by Warren Ellis and Paul Duffield is to be collected in trade paperback, hardcover and limited, signed editions by Avatar in time for Christmas.  The Webcomic has been available for free at a rate of six pages per week, since March 2008,and will remain available after the publication of the hard copy.

OK, so it's not quite the same.  Freakangels isn't being published online in 44-page complete issues, which are then released as individual hardcovers, and it is also being released as a TP, but I think this still negates the claim that releasing material available for free online in an expensive hardcover format is "unprecedented."

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