The art field is a cruel one, where future greats can languish in obscurity until long after death, while two-bit chancers like John Allison (me) live a gilded life of the finest wines and kobe beef sammiches. Times have to change!

So from today, the Scary Go Round organisation unveils SGR IDOL. Your remit is simple: draw a Scary Go Round comic strip, to be judged by myself and a gallery of jaded cronies. The best five will run as weekday strips in early June, while the rest will be kept on permanent display in a special area of the website, accompanied by your website address (if you have one). It's a chance to have your art seen by 30,000+ sparkling eyes!

There are also prizes: four runners-up will receive original unlettered hand-drawn strips, and the winner will get a unique and expensive SGR objet d'art to excite and delight.

---

RULES:
1. Comics should be 580 pixels wide and on a black background (like the regular SGR strips). They should be in GIF, PNG or JPG format.

2. I reserve the right not to show entries for reasons of content. You've read the comic, you know what flies and what doesn't. I'm not a bad man.

3. The closing date for submissions is May 31st 2006.

4. There's no need for your comic to look anything like my artwork. Do your own thing!

Please send your entries to john@scarygoround.com marked "SCARY IDOL" in the subject line. I use Spamarrest to protect myself from junk mail so please don't be alarmed by the autoresponse. Don't forget to include your name, where you live, and your website URL!