Well last year in the Spring of 2008, we applied as press to cover Comic-Con International 2008. At first FuTurXTV.com and Hiphopbattle.com were rejected by Comic-Con 2008’s publicists for no good reason. I kept my cool and didn’t flip out over getting rejected. I just remained persistent and vigilant about why we should be allowed at Comic-Con 2008. I kept reaching out by e-mail and on the phone to everyone and anyone who would listen at the Comic-Con press office until someone finally allowed us to be press. And I fully understand the position that a major media event like Comic-Con has in not allowing or approving every new media request.

But Comic-Con 2009 has an online application process of pre-screening out those media requests that do not occur before a certain deadline. And Comic-Con has online procedures to weed out first time applicants from returning journalists. And Comic-Con like many large media events like Sundance or Cannes does not accept on site media requests. You really do not want to show up at any top media event nowadays and hope that they will feel sorry for you and let you in. That ain’t happening no matter what excuse you give. And personally E3 Expo is still the hardest U.S. press pass we ever had to earn. But nothing truly tops the Cannes Film Festival for having highly stringent and the most selective press applications.

But one of the main reason why might have been approved as press for Comic-Con 2008 was because we were insistent that we wanted to cover Comic-Con’s minority themed panel called The Black Panel. I had never covered Comic-Con before, so I did not know they annually host The Black Panel composed of mainly black or multiracial artists, writers and comic book publishers. So I will admit I was definitely geeked about covering and filming The Black Panel to later post on the Web. Which we did do on Youtube, Dailymotion and on our mobile social network Zannel.com. There was only one other person filming the Black Panel, but I am not even sure that they were minority journalists. Anyway, we fully covered and filmed the first Black Panel which had as its panelists Method Man (Def Jam artist), Reggie Hudlin (president, B.E.T.), Denys Cowan (B.E.T. Animation), Rusty Cundieff (director, Chappelle’s Show, Fear of a Black Hat), John Dokes (Marvel Comics), Dwayne McDuffie (Milestone Media, Justice League, Ben 10), Faith Cheltnham (Tot.com) and Prodigal Sunn. During the Black Panel 2008 Q&A session I waited behind a brotha dressed in a Captain America costume. In fact, his costume was so on point that the moderator and most of the panelists saluted him and the moderator gave him a hug. It was a highly funny and spontaneous moment that we captured on film.