The fifth and last part of the editing contest which deals with the strips #201 – #249 starts now.

Here are the winners of the third part of the competition:

1. C. Wray: $19 + $5
2. Chris: $18
3. Brenden Myers: $8
4. Jeremy Heater: $3
5. Matt Fonti: $1

I want to thank everybody who participated in the fourth part of the contest.

I’d like to point out that we had a different “winner” each time. All four of them also still have the chance to win the additional $10 for the overall winner:

1. C. Wray: $8 + $9 + $18 + $19 = $54 + $5 = $59
2. Chris: $0 + $10 + $19 + $18 = $47 + $5 = $52
3. Brenden Myers: $20 + $8 + $10 + $8 = $46 + $5 = $51
4. Charles Wang: $16 + $22 + $5 + $0 = $43 + $5 = $48

As promised in the description section of one of our last strips, I made a large donation to the German division of the Italian charity Help without Frontiers (Helfen ohne Grenzen) today. Despite its somewhat generic name, the charity’s sole mission is to help Burmese refugees in Thailand who have been forced to flee Burma/Myanmar by the tyrannic military regime.

As their main project, Help without Frontiers funds schools for around 6,400 students in the border region, and provides meals for the students. On top of that, they sponsor a clinic and a sewing workshop which provides employment opportunites for some of the adult refugees.

If you have a look at their financial reports you can see that they are very careful with their limited financial resources (the total income of the charity in 2009 was 669,672 €, and they spend 473,740 € for projects) and that their administrative costs are usually around 10% (the net costs for administration in 2009 were 56,602 €, in 2008 they were only 31,277 €, but they had to hire a full-time employee) which is a very good number for a charity of any size.

If you want to support Help without Frontiers yourself, you can find the relevant information on these pages:

• Information for donators in Germany
• Information for donators in Austria, Switzerland and Trentino-Alto Adige
• Information for donators in other countries

Here is a list of all our Burma related strips.

The fourth part of the editing contest which deals with the strips #151 – #200 starts now.

Here are the winners of the third part of the competition:

1. Chris: $19 + $5
2. C. Wray: $18
3. Brenden Myers: $10
4. Matt Fonti: $5
5. Charles Wang: $5
6. Jaded L.: $3

I want to thank everybody who participated in the third part of the contest.

The third part of the editing contest which deals with the strips #101 – #150 starts now.

Here are the winners of the second part of the competition:

1. Charles Wang: $22 + $5
2. Chris: $10
3. C. Wray: $9
4. Brenden Myers: $8
5. Matt Fonti: $6
6. Melissa Marx: $2

I want to thank everybody who participated in the second part of the contest. I have already incorporated all corrections to the first 100 strips.

The “Zita the Spacegirl” comic book by Ben Hatke has been released. Maybe you remember the blog entry about Zita and her big heart 😉 that I posted last November. There was also a nice story featuring Zita and her gang in “Flight Explorer” some time ago, so I’m sure that the story in the new book will be entertaining as well. It’s also quite cheap at the moment for just $7.04 for 192 colored pages at Amazon.com. There are also three very positive reviews about it, for example the following one:

It’s a visual feast from beginning to end, and a great story kids of all ages will love. At times it reminded me of “The Iron Giant” and Miyazaki’s “Spirited Away”–here’s hoping for a Zita movie next.

I have already ordered a copy. At Amazon.de, so you might have luck with local bookstores as well.