Alternative Comics has announced that 9-11 Emergency Relief , its benefit book for the American Red Cross, is the #1 graphic novel on Diamond Comic Distributors' bestseller list for January.

Both Publishers Weekly and the New York Times are reporting that Barnes & Noble, the nation's largest bookselling chain, is working hard behind the scenes to get a better deal from publishers.

Dreamwave Productions announced that it is ending its association with Image Comics effective in April 2002.

Hasbro announced its third quarter earnings this week, and the news was better than expected. On sales that were down to $893 million from $1.1 billion a year ago, the company earned $50.6 million, compared to $13.8 million in 2000.

Over the past few weeks, we've done two major articles on Diamond's poll regarding the release day for new comics that produced some retailer response.

When Diamond and Alliance opened the floor for questions from retailers during a luncheon event at the Retailer Summit in Las Vegas this week, it only took a few minutes before the topic of Diamond's proposed change to a Thursday release day for new comic shipments was raised, and once it was raised little else was discussed for the remainder of the Q&A session.

For the first time this month, we've applied our analysis methodology to calculating the initial orders to Diamond U.S. for graphic novels ordered for shipment in October 2001.

MGM has announced that two titles of interest to pop culture retailers will be released on DVD on January 4, 2002 -- The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai and Mad Max .

In Part I of this far-ranging interview, the person in charge of DC's business operation talks about how his background in the business, the organization of DC's top management, the comic market size and trends, the state of DC, and the comics code.

This December Viz will publish the first English edition of Kazushi Hagiwara's Bastard!!, while Image Comics will debut a prime example of American 'manga,' Bastard Samurai .