New DC V-P, Ad Sales
Alysse Soll has been named the new vice president of ad sales and custom publishing at DC Comics. Soll was previously the v-p of Marketing of the National Hockey League. At DC Comics Soll will develop and manage new advertising initiatives, oversee DC’s custom publishing program, work to develop new opportunities with other media companies, and head the advertising sales team.

Howl! Comics Panel
A panel, “Inside Out: Self and Society in Comic Art,” will be held as part of the annual Howl! Festival at the St. Mark’s Church on September 10 at 7:15 p.m.the panel will focus on autobiography, journalism, and social critique in graphic novels. PWCW’s Calvin Reid will moderate the panel, which will feature David A. Berona (author of Wordless Books), DC/Vertigo editor Pornsak Pichetshote, and artists Josh Neufeld (author of A.D., a webcomic chronicle of Hurricane Katrina survivors), Jill Tamaki (artist cocreator of the graphic novel Skim) and James Romberger (artist and cocreator of the graphic memoir Seven Miles a Second)

PW The Beat: Batman Recalled and More
Over at The Beat, Heidi MacDonald’s comics industry blog, she takes note of a recall of copies of All Star Batman and Robin #10 because of a printing problem; and she takes note of a spurt of activity by artists and hackers who are “remixing” drawings from Scott McLoud’s comic about Google’s forthcoming web browser Chrome and coming up with very funny results. MacDonald also takes note of the Goth Lolita presence at the upcoming New York Anime Festival (Sept. 26-28) at the Javits Center.

Ben Katchor at SPX
The Small Press Expo has announced that Ben Katchor will be a guest at this years show. Katchor is the author of Julius Knipl, Real Estate Photographer and The Jew of New York. SPX will be held October 4-5 at the North Bethesda Marriott Convention Center in Bethesda, Maryland.

Dark Tower, The Stand Midnight Signing
On September 9writer Peter David and artist Mark Perkins will hold a midnight signing for The Stand and Dark Tower at Midtown Comics in NYC. Midtown Comics is located at 200 West 40th Street on the corner of 7th Avenue.

Death Note Day at Kinokuniya
The New York Anime Festival and Viz Media is holding a Death Note Day at the Kinokuniya bookstore in New York City on Sunday September 14. The event will celebrate the US DVD release of the, and the DVD will be on sale two days early at the event. The first 50 people to purchase the Death Note movie will receive a free Death Note movie poster. Programming for the event includes a Death Note anime screening at 2 p.m., a recording of Samurai Beat Radio at 4 p.m, a behind the scenes look at the process of adapting the manga and anime to live action at 4:30 p.m. and a Death Note Raffle at 5 p.m..

Runaways Free Online
The first issue of the new Runaways series, written by Terry Moore, is available for free online through Marvel Digital Comics Unlimited. The series is illustrated by Humberto Ramos. The first issue is now on sale, and the second issue will be released on September 24.

Middleman Collected Edition
Viper Comics is releasing a compendium edition of The Middleman, which collects the first three volumes of the comic. The book is a limited edition with an alternate ABC Family cover; there are only 250 copies in print. It costs $20 and can be purchased in the Viper Shop. The comic has been adapted into a television show on the ABC Family Channel. The twelfth episode of the series can be watched on the ABC Family website.

Comics In the Media
Villard's American Widow, writer Alissa Torres’ much anticipated memoir about losing her husband in the 9/11 attacks has been reviewed and profiled in Publishers Weekly, The New York Times Book Review, USA Today and the Oregonian. In addition Marguerite Abouet and Clement Oubrerie’s graphic novel, Aya of Yop City, the story of a smart teenage African girl and her boy-crazy girlfriends growing up in the Ivory Coast in the 1970s, was profiled in the Wall Street Journal.

Spurge Talks to John Pham
The Comics Reporter’s Tom Spurgeon interviews the talented comics artist John Pham about his new comics series, Sublife, to be published by Fantagraphics.