Smash Phone Launches Ad-Supported Comics
Filed in archive Mobile Content by tom on May 6, 2006
for mobile handsets, including existing strips Girls & Sports, The Meaning of Lila and a new strip entitled Mostly Heads.SmashPhone and Creators Syndicate (a multimillion dollar corporation that provides comic strips to newspapers and online) entered into a licensing agreement in April 2006, to make popular comic strips available on mobile phones. The first two newspaper comic strips released for mobile phones through Creators Syndicate are The Meaning of Lila and Girls & Sports.The advertisements will cost advertisers US$0.05 per panel, and will appear before each comic panel, although the comics themselves will be free to customers.
The Meaning of Lila was created by John Forgetta, currently editorial director at American Greetings. Lead character Lila, who is somewhere between Mary Tyler Moore and Carrie Bradshaw, appeals to a younger 14 to 30-year-old audience. The Los Angeles Times, The San Francisco Examiner, Denver Post and dozens of other newspapers have carried Lila daily since its 2004 debut.
Girls & Sports was created by Justin Borus and Andrew Feinstein, a former Warner Bros. animation producer. Exploring the two things most important to young guys -- watching sports and dating girls -- Girls & Sports also tracks to a younger audience. The New York Daily News, Denver Post, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, Stars and Stripes, and over 175 other newspapers carry Girls & Sports.
Mostly Heads is a new comic strip created by Darren Jones, a former E! Entertainment Network producer and co-founder of SmashPhone. Mostly Heads is an alternate universe in which Leon, Buddy, Ivy, and Julie have heads and hands, but no bodies. They don't seem to miss them...a comic strip about nothing except life's little misadventures.
The service is delivered using a custom JAVA program which must be downloaded from the Smash Phone website. Once installed, the application downloads strips via a mobile Internet connection. Whilst the player is currently free to download, Smash Phone eventually plan to sell the player for US$5. In addition, any applicable carrier or data transfer charges will apply to actually download the comics for viewing on the handset.
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