Naver Webtoon
Logo of the website
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Type of site
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Webcomic platform |
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| Available in | English |
| Owner | Naver Corporation |
| Created by | JunKoo Kim |
| Website | www |
| Alexa rank |
 2,447 (02/2017) |
| Commercial | Yes |
| Registration | Optional |
| Launched | 2005, 2014 |
| Current status | Active |
Line Webtoon (stylized as LINE Webtoon) is a webcomic syndicate launched by Naver Corporation in Korea in 2005. The service promotes a distinct infinite canvas layout for webtoons and gained a large amount of traction during the late 2000s and early 2010s. Line Webtoon was launched globally in July 2014.
Line Webtoon was founded by JunKoo Kim in 2005, under the name "Webtoon", after he watched the manhwa industry crash in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Kim, who grew up reading Japanese manga and Korean superhero comics, was looking for a way to get new comics created because he found that there were very few new comics coming out. Kim theorized that tall, scrollable comics would work well on the World Wide Web, as users were already used to scrolling through web pages. Because of this unusual layout, Kim initially had difficulty finding artist to create webcomics on his service, but he found that cartoonists were willing to do something different because of the poor state of the local manhwa industry.
Though content on Line Webtoon is entirely creator-owned, search engine/web portal Naver Corporation profits from the website through various revenue models, ranging from online advertising to selling intellectual property rights and featuring its characters in other media.
On July 2, 2014, the Line Webtoon website and mobile app were launched worldwide; shortly later, international artists became able to upload their own works to the service. Naver Corporation selected 42 webtoons (including Noblesse, Tower of God, and The God of High School) and one new webcomic by an American artist to be available on the service in English at launch. According to 148 Apps, the service offered "plenty of content" at launch, as seven to ten webtoons were updated each day and the webtoons spanned various genres.
In 2015, Naver partnered with US comics veteran Stan Lee, Image Comics founder Marc Silvestri, and make-up artist Michelle Phan in order to promote their service. Silvestri brought his long-running comics series Cyber Force to the platform. Various other established American cartoonists have also partnered with Naver over time, including Dean Haspiel (New Brooklyn),Katie Cook (Nothing Special),Seth Kushner and Shamus Beyale (The Brooklynite), and Tracy J. Butler (Lackadaisy).
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