Just came aross a little press release on a news site that may in fact turn out to be the biggest development in the American comic industry in years. The direct market has been a double-edged sword for years. Personally, I thought it was keeping comics back from being an actual mass medium again. Comic buying was weighted towards a dwindling number of collectors, rather than chasing after potential readers.
So this news goes a long way to reversing that trend: kids can again start pestering their oblivious parents to buy them a totally inappropriate comic again, just like when I was an ankle-biter.