Comics | A copy of Detective Comics #27 bought for 10 cents by Robert Irwin in 1939 sold at auction Thursday for $492,937. It's not a record price for the first appearance of Batman -- a CGC-graded 8.0 copy fetched more than $1 million in February -- but the $400,000 that the 84-year-old Irwin will make after the commission fee is subtracted will more than pay off the mortgage on his home. [Sacramento Bee]
Digital piracy | The U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday unanimously approved a bill that would grant the Justice Department the right to shut down a website with a court order "if copyright infringement is deemed 'central to the activity' of the site — regardless if the website has actually committed a crime." In short, Wired's Sam Gustin writes, the Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act "would allow the federal government to censor the internet without due process." [Epicenter, AFP]
Publishing | Image Comics Publisher Eric Stephenson returns for a second interview with Rich Johnston, and the subject turns, inevitably, to the price of comics: "It’s kind of a weird situation, because historically, indie books have always been about a dollar more than Marvel and DC books. I mean, you look at IDW and their books are $3.99, and based on the way things were done in the past, that’s exactly where they should be in relation to Marvel and DC. Now DC is scaling back prices to $2.99, but they’re cutting their page counts. Marvel is doing … something. They’re making announcements about doing something, anyway. It’s my understanding there actually isn’t going to be much of a change. But you know, hey, they got some attention with the announcement, right? It’s all pretty disingenuous." [Bleeding Cool]
Publishing | Marvel has overhauled its website. [Marvel.com]
Publishing | U.K. journalist Roz Laws goes on a tour of the DC Comics offices: "Our guide, BJ Hemann, points out the sad fact that schoolchildren who visited the offices had to be told what phone booths were, as they no longer exist in America." [Birmingham Post]
Awards | Deb Aoki spotlights the manga titles nominated for the Angoulême International Comics Festival's prestigious awards. (Man, that Sabu & Ichi cover is lovely.) [About.com]
Conventions | The programming schedule has been released for the Brooklyn Comics and Graphics Festival, set for Dec. 4 in Brooklyn, N.Y. [Brooklyn Comics and Graphics Festival]
Creators | Charles Burns discusses X-ed Out, his decision to use color, and the influence of Hergé: "When I was growing up, before I could even read, there were six books that were translated into American. There were English translations, but these were American translations that were published by Goldman Press. My dad was interested in comics and books and art, and he would regularly go out to bookstores. He found me the first, it was The Secret Of The Unicorn, and he brought that home for me, and I was totally dumbfounded and totally into it. I had seen typical kid comics, but this was really something different. You were really entering into this incredible world. I couldn’t read yet, so it was really examining those pages, reading it a different way than you would as an adult, I guess. Sometimes you’re just reading it to get through the story. This is examining the atmosphere, and the characters, and everything about it. So even though that clear-line, Franco-Belgian look that Hergé developed doesn’t really enter into my style of work. I think a lot of the intensity of the locales and the atmosphere of the stories certainly sunk in. And the characters." [The A.V. Club]
Creators | Writer Paul Tobin talks about Marvel's Spider-Girl. [BBC News]
Creators | Artist Guiseppe Camuncoli chats briefly about his influences and his work, and the differences between Marvel and DC: "Not so many, to be honest. There can be small or big differences in some things, but that apply as well inside the same company. It really depends on the book you work on, and the people you work with. But overall, I’m having a blast working with both companies. Call me lucky or whatever, but so far there’s not been any single editor/professional or company that I’ve worked with that gave me a hard time. Everyone has always treated me like a king, and I try to return that same kind of attitude with anyone." [The Star]
Comics | With the opening of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1, Graeme McMillan looks at two (earlier) comic-book boy wizards -- Luke Kirby of Summer Magic and Tim Hunter of The Books of Magic. [Techland]
Fandom | The different types of comic-book readers. [The Suffolk Voice]
Pop culture | A Christmas tree decorated with Superman ornaments is being erected at Cleveland Hopkins International Airport. [Cleveland.com]