It is a scene common to many high schools. Students pick up their schedules on the first day of school. In a busy hallway, a new girl, Ceilidh MacFarlane is trying hard to fit in and "not look stupid", as she puts it. However, as she quickly finds out, things don't always work out the way she wants it to. This is the story of Avalon, a popular comic strip on the internet, known as a webcomic. 

Webcomics are a relatively new concept on the web. They allow burgeoning artists and writers a chance to expose their artwork to a larger audience than ever before. Many artists who cannot get syndicated comics in the newspaper and many who simply enjoyed relaxed deadlines and freedom of speech are able to publish their ideas and interests in the form of a webcomic. There are different types of comics for different people. The subjects cover topics from gaming to high school to fantastical worlds of magic and myth. 

There are school-based comedies, like College Roomies from Hell and Avalon, anime and manga strips like Megatokyo, Okashina Okashi, and Neobaka, and fantasy and philosophical webcomics like Elf Life, Bruno the Bandit and Unicorn Jelly. Each has its own personal art style, ranging from classic American comic to Japanese manga style, often combining a novel mixture of both. 

Webcomics are published on a schedule set by the author. Many, like Avalon, CRFH, and Unicorn Jelly, are published on a weekday basis. Other, like Cool Cat Studio and Okashina Okashi are available three times a week. The frequency of a comic depends on the time and effort the artist need to put in on a comic. The beautiful manga style of Megatokyo takes Fred Gallagher hours to draw and clean up, and he still managed up until recently to put out three polished comics a week. It is this welcome ease of deadlines that makes webcomics more accessible to artists with other jobs and school.

Large communities are often created by a large readership of a comic. Often, there are forums where fans and readers are able to come together and express thoughts and ideas about the webcomic, and give critiques and comments. The comic may be read by a few hundred, in the case of smaller strips, two thousand or so, as in Avalon, or the 6,000+ that read Megatokyo, and the cult-like legend of College Roomies From Hell. Discussions are created, and soon a loyal band of fans post there. Some forums are well-run and provide an interesting place to talk to people, while others are notorious for their newbie hazing and pointless threads and flame wars. 

A special advantage that webcomics present is the interactions between the author and readers. In a webcomic, the artist often talks to the fans and is able to get feedback and comments on his or her strip. Often, the author will also provide more information, perhaps giving some insight into the way the plot is heading, or the reason a character acts the way he or she acts. A good example would be the forums recently set up by the artist of Unicorn Jelly, Jennifer Diane Reitz. Jennifer-san has created a world detailed beyond belief, with the physics and even the daily life of social classes of the universe worked out. In the forum, she answers questions and provides character explanations and discussions. Although Unicorn Jelly has been in existence for quite a long time, it was not until I browsed the forum that I was fully able to appreciate the magnitude of her creation. 

This special interaction between fans artists creates a worldwide network, a community of web artists and webcomic readers. They help each other our, chat and discuss topics online, and even get together once in a while at conventions and celebrations. People develop friendships and connections with other people. It is this sense of kinship and friendship that brings them even closer together in times of need. 

As you all know, on September 11th, terrorists attacked the World Trade Centers in New York and the Pentagon in Washington D.C. A horrifying large amount of people were killed or lost in the rubble. The normally light-hearted webcomic community came together to comfort those in need, and to offer their prayers and condolences. Most of the major webcomics, like Megatokyo, Okashina Okashi, Unicorn Jelly, and Penny Arcade took their site off, and put up a sorrow page in respect to the tragedy, expressing their despair, grief, and anger at the event. Comics that weren't even American, like CRFH, Cool Cat Studio and Framed! posted messages of their own. It was at a time like this that I was proud to be part of the webcomic community-a true, worldwide community.

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