I'm looking for someone ambitious enough to do
some artwork for an original piece of fiction I'm
serializing in my mag. It's a fantasy story, featuring an elf
and a wood nymph as they battle the forces of an evil
overlord. The author would really like some original art to
grace the pages, but all I really have contacts for
around here are writers. Being a fanzine, I can only
give a contributor's copy as payment for anyone's
work, but if this is something you're interested in as
extra practice and to get your work seen in a different
part of the country, e-mail me or post here, and I'll
get in touch with you regarding sending you a
character description and a sample of the story. My e-mail
is thirdhorseman@....<br><br>(Jim, I hope I
haven't overstepped my bounds in posting this. I was
hoping you wouldn't mind, since this is for people with
zines to help each other out. It's your board, so I'll
understand if you delete it and chew me out about it. But,
if it doesn't bother you, I appreciate you letting
me beg for help. Thanks -- War.)

Yeah, I've noticed Kinko's is a bit pricey. Most
of the small shops around here aren't much cheaper,
but I have noticed that Office Max (if you've got
one) is a decent compromise between price and quality,
with a good turnaround if you catch them at the right
time of day.<br><br>That's a tough call, regarding the
price/quality issue. I guess it's up to you to decide what's
more important, though I'd probably lean toward the
price. You can always look around for yet another place
to try until you find just the right
combination.<br><br>I've noticed that no matter how many issues I put out,
there's always room for improvement. I think that's a
sign of someone with a critical eye that can look at
his own work objectively and wants to do his best. A
quality that isn't as common as one would
hope.<br><br>I'll e-mail you as soon as I'm done here. Thanks for
your interest.<br><br>Gotta get going, be back on
Monday.

Congrats,<br><br>I just finished my second
issue--my second zine ever! I think it's much better than
my first issue, but there's still plenty of room for
improvement. I did my first issue at Kinko's, and my second
issue at a smaller local copy place. There were a few
things I noted:<br><br>1) My Kinko copies look exactly
like the original, while some of the ones done at a
local place are a little faded.<br><br>2) Kinko's time
to do 250 copies: around 5 minutes. Local place to
do 500 copies: about a day.<br><br>3) On the plus
side, the local place is much, much cheaper, but I'm
wondering if the extra money might be worth it, as far as
quality goes.<br><br>The time wasn't really and issue
since I didn't need the copies right away, but I was
kind of disappointed with the quality.<br><br>War, if
you could e-mail me your snail mail address I'll send
you a couple bucks. My e-mail is
jrb266@...<br><br>Jim

Issue 10 is finished - about a week later than I
wanted it to be! On a bright note, I've increased my
page count to 24, and the print quality is pretty good
for a change. Of course, the printer had to be fussy
and stupid for a while first, but I got that taken
care of around midnight and started printing this
morning. Anyone interested in a copy, let me know. You can
post here or e-mail me: thirdhorseman@....
I'll take a trade (which seems to be the thing to do),
or $1.50, whichever you're more willing to part
with.<br><br>What's in the issue, you ask? Well, you've got my
editorial, the prologue to a piece of original fantasy
fiction we'll be serializing for the next several months,
short reviews of "Fantasia 2000" and the anime "Cutey
Honey", an account of the happenings at a recent anime
convention, a disertation on video games that get turned into
anime, a review of the CD "Bat Out of Hell II", and all
our regular features, all wrapped in a festive Spring
green cover. I think it's one of our better issues to
date, but I'm prejudiced. I'd tell you to get a preview
at my website, but it's still down and we don't
quite have a new one up yet. I'll let you all know when
it is.<br><br>Gotta go staple the issue together.
See y'all later.

That's both reassuring and depressing at the same
time. I guess I'm just too old. I remember the days of
hand cut-and-pasted pictures and columns, and the
publisher going from shop to shop in his area peddling his
mag to anyone who'd take it. Of course, I remember
stores being more willing to take a chance on something
like that, too. With comics and such in a slump, too
many comic shops are concerned with what will bring in
the fast buck to pay rent, instead of having things
that might expand their customers' interests taking up
valuable shelf space. Just yesterday I heard that one of
the cooler shops in central MI is going out of
business. The real bummer is that they said they were
interested in carrying my mag as soon as they figured out
where they were moving. Guess that answers
that.<br><br>'Til next time,<br>War

I haven't sold a single issue yet. I'm just
getting started, though. Hopefully my issues will improve
over time. Some day, there might just be a dollar
waiting for me in the post office box. I like receiving
trades, though. I haven't gotten a bad zine
yet.<br><br>Jim

Thanks, guess I'll have to e-mail her again and
tell her I'm in.<br><br>So does anyone actually SELL
their mags, or do we all just trade back and forth? I'm
feeling increasingly like a minority in that I try to get
mine into stores. The nice thing about a trade, I
guess, is that a lot more people will see it in a
variety of areas, but I think I'd rather have the money
from selling it, rather than take a chance on getting
a poorly done mag that I don't like. I suppose I
could always use them as examples of how I don't want
to do mine.<br><br>Later everyone,<br>War

I got this reply regarding the trade a couple
days ago: <br><br>Hey everyone. Here is part two of
the Zine trade. Part one was you telling me ya wnated
to do it! Now as what we have to do is EVERYONE
E-MAIL ME<br>telling me your zine name and which issue.
If you own or do more than one zine you may jsut
list them all. Once everyoen has done this then<br>I
will e-mail the list to everyone.....with further
instructions. As of now we have about 25 zines participating.
If for some reason you need<br>to back out please
tell me ASAP! :) Any Questions? E-mail them to
me<br>:)<br>~Dovie Duhon~<br><br>and I just realized, I forgot to
reply to it. I think the e-mail address is
crackerzine@...<br><br>Jim

About a week ago I e-mailed you about your
trading plan. I was wondering if you'd gotten it because
I haven't gotten a response, and sometimes my
e-mail loses mail. If you responded, please do so again;
hopefully I'll get it this time. Otherwise, just post more
information here, and I'll e-mail you again if I'm
interested.<br><br>Thanks,<br>War

Somehow I'd missed this message, so it took me a
while to reply to it. Sorry. I had been printing around
the 15th of every month, but the past couple months
circumstances keep pushing that back, so I'll be done by the
20th at the latest. I think I'm going to make that my
new print date. Now I just have to figure out how to
adjust my issue numbers, since the March issue comes out
in March, but if it's that late in the month it's a
little silly and should probably be the April issue.
I've got a special issue coming out in June, so that
might be a good time to change things.<br><br>All of my
back issues are available, so just let me know when
you want them. I finally checked out your website, so
I've got your P.O. Box address. I offer subscriptions,
too, if you'd be interested. (This goes for anyone
else, as well.) I'd been going to send you a couple
issues for trade, anyway, but just haven't yet. Like I
said, circumstances. Things should clear up by this
time next week, which will last until about the 10th
of April, the way things have been.<br><br>Catch ya
later.

Hi all! Iam new to this Club. Iam putting
togeather a BIG ZINE TRADE. Print zines only. Here is what
it will be like. Iam gonna spread the word, if your
intereasted e-mail me. Once I see how many people are
intereasted they will e-mail me a list of that says which
issue of their zine they are going to use in the trade.
Once this is done I e-mail everone and you see if you
already have that issue . THen I e-mail each individual
and tell them how many zines to send. I probally wont
do but 30 zines so if your intereasted in getting 30
of your zines out there and recieving 30 zines
e-mail me. Also you must pay for shipping, which will
probally be less than $5. THis is great fun. If your
intereasted e-mail me at CRACKERzine@... for more info.
Thanks and have a groovey day!<br><br>Dovie
Duhon<br>www.geocities.com/jillharrell/Cracker.html

I definitely appreciate your input. I think the
best solution for my immediate feelings over being
reiewed somewhat negatively is just time so I can think
about it. I'm probably just going to keep doing what
I've been doing so far, so I can get a second issue
out and then work on other projects, if they're able
to stay afloat for more than a few hours.
<br><br>Let me know when your next issue is done so I can get
a copy, and do you have all your past issues
available? I got paid today.:)

Hey, we've all gotta start somewhere. I've put in
my time at a couple convenience stores, McDonald's,
and a local grocery chain. It gets you out in the
world and you can meet the most...interesting
people.<br><br>At least you had the guts to send yours in somewhere
for review. I've been meaning to, but haven't gotten
around to it, meaning I've either been too lazy or
chicken to stick a couple mags in an envelope. Don't let
it get you completely down. Try to look objectively
at what they said and see if you can use any of it
to improve your mag. Of course, I usually take
anything critics say with a grain of salt. If critics hate
a movie, chances are I'll like it. Conversely, if
critics love a movie, I'll usually avoid it. Just goes to
show there's no accounting for taste. Also, they might
be judging you on levels you don't care about. I
say, do whatever makes you happy. I know we'd all like
to earn a living and possibly become famous with our
little mags, but realistically, I don't know if anyone
ever has. That doesn't mean it's impossible, I'm just
saying that most fanzines are printed by the creator,
for the creator, and if anyone else likes what he's
got to say, that's just gravy. As for photocopying
it, that's what the self-serve area is
for.<br><br>I'm not sure if this came out as supportive as I
meant it to, but I tried. That's part of what we're
here for, right, to be a little support group?

I don't have a special job or anything, I just
work at a convenience store in town. That's pretty
much how I've been financing my zine efforts so far.
<br><br>I got a bad review today from a well established
zine, so I'm a little bummed out. I think I'm about
ready to scrap its status as a "literary zine" and just
start throwing in all the crap that I want to throw in.
The only problem might be convincing the copy places
to photocopy some risky content. I don't know. I
probably just need more time to think.

I can understand work and classes being
important. I'll get kind of scarce in another week when it
comes down to the wire to get my next isue out, too. At
least you took the time to warn us. What sort of work
do you do, if I may ask?

Heya all,<br><br>Sorry I haven't had the chance
to do in depth replies to posts lately. I've been
bogged down in pre-spring break class junk and my job.
I'll be working full time this week, so I'm going to
be bogged down with work over spring break. Plus I'm
doing my zine on the side, and ideas for other zines
that I might start doing soon. I'll keep checking the
club daily, though, and hopefully at some point I'll
have time to make some coherent, focused
posts.<br><br>Jim

I'm still trying to access it today. I've tried
telling it to send me my password, but haven't gotten a
response, so maybe the leap year killed the server. I'd
really have to think hard and be a bit more committed
than I am right now before I got my own domain. I've
heard they can get pretty expensive, too.<br><br>I know
it's difficult to get noticed on the web, what
everything going dotcom crazy, but I linked to a couple
popular pages to even the odds a little. Again, not that
it helps if I've got no front page, but I tried. I
would never be able to switch over fully to a web-based
mag. The ones I've seen just don't "cut
it".<br><br>Agreed again with the difference between print and
electronic writing. There really is something to be said
about the feel of the pages under your fingers. And
it's awful hard to curl up in bed with a good webpage
on a rainy day.<br><br>I think a lot of people take
less care with web pages (and e-mails, chats, posts,
etc.) than with printed words because there's a sense
of immediacy to typing something and seeing it come
up on the screen. You have a tendency to forget that
it doesn't go anywhere until you hit "send". While I
enjoy working on my writing at the computer more than I
ever would have imagined, I don't leave the rules of
spelling and grammar behind when I'm at the keyboard. Like
I said in a previous post, just because the
computer claims it can check spelling and grammar, doesn't
mean it's 100% correct when things are put into proper
context. Too many people are relenquishing their ability
to use their brains over to machines, forgetting
that a human brain programmed the machine to begin
with.<br><br>Thanks for the added help to get my site noticed. I
forgot to visit yours yesterday, but I'll try to
remember today. As for therapy, I can't afford that (and
they'd lock me up for sure - "Incarnation of war, huh?
Right this way, we've got a nice comfy room, and this
jacket we'd like you to try on..."), so I guess this is
as close as I get.<br><br>Have a good day; see ya
next time.

That sucks about your web site. I've been doing
web sites for several years now, and I really got
tired of messing with free home page providers, with
their unreliable servers, and introduction of banner
ads and other various evil javascript advertisements.
Just a couple of months ago, I finally started paying
for my own domain, and it has proved very much worth
it. I signed up with a web server that guarantees 99%
uptime or a refund, and as far as being available when
anyone wants it--I haven't had any troubles so far. I
think it is a good way to reach potential readers and
contributors, however, the web isn't the same place that it
used to be. Any peson had a good chance of getting
their page noticed four years ago, but given the way
that it's exploded, and the way that it's quickly
being commercialized, it's hard just getting people to
notice your site at all. But I'm just currently using
the web pages as an addition to my zine. I've done
ezines before, but I still think there's something to
printed pages. I'm much more proud of my print zine than
I was of my ezines. Of course, the writing is much
better, too.<br><br>I added your web page address to the
"Links" section of this club, so hopefully anyone who
happens to drop in will be able to find it pretty
easily.<br><br>Don't feel bad about venting. We all have to do it. I
happen to do most of mine during therapy.8)

I don't think I know my way around Word well
enough to do any decent layout in it. That does sound
like it takes a lot of time. I know what you mean
about moving things around until they're just right and
losing hours of the day, though. I'll do that trying to
get the text wrapped around a picture to my
satisfaction.<br><br>I have a group of people working with me that love
to write for the sake of writing, and a couple that
just like to see their names in print. Each of the
Horsemen has a specific area of influence, so to speak,
although cross-over does occur. I've only had to tell a
couple people they couldn't do a specific article, and
only because someone else already had the idea and got
to me about it first. That's as close to assigning
work as it gets. Everyone knows when I need their
stuff by, and if it gets close I send them a friendly
e-mail reminder. I've got the e-mail I use for the mag
set with a sig file that says "War, Third Horseman of
the Apocalypse, editor of 'Revelations' magazine", so
when they get one from there instead of my regular
account, they know it's serious.<br><br>I do what I can to
work with a couple of the writers to help them polish
their skills and improve the quality of their writing.
Most everyone else is articulate enough to do well
with a little tweaking, and the regular writers all
know I might take a few liberties with a word change
or do some judicious editing for space concerns, but
they're happy to be printed and have their opinions
getting out there. If I ever feel that I'm making too
many changes on a piece, I go back to the writer and
give him the corrections I'd make as suggestions, and
maybe a few ideas to make the piece flow better. It's
hard to know where to stop being a writer and just be
the editor sometimes. I do my best to maintain each
writer's "voice", though.<br><br>Right now I'm working
with a guy who used to be a journalism major, then
left college and let life get in the way of his
writing. (Personal experience note to others: NEVER let
this happen.) He's trying to get back in practice by
sending in small articles and is now working on a
six-part (or more, depending upon how it goes) fantasy
story for the mag. Let's just say he's a little rusty.
(This is why you shouldn't let life keep you from your
writing. I at least kept my hand in by keeping a journal.)
As brutal as I feel I'm being with him on some
things (yet I feel I'm also being easy on him), he's
happy to be getting feed back and encouragement. I
suggested that he join a writer's group, though I suppose I
should try that, as well. The hardest thing about
helping him with this project is that he lives an hour
away, so we keep mailing floppy and hard copies back
and forth with revisions.<br><br>With all the people
I've got that want to write, I don't have to worry
about producing anything from my brain except the
editorial. On one hand, this is good because there aren't
enough hours in the day for me to fill 20 pages on my
own and maintain a monthly schedule. On the other
hand, it sucks because I don't have the same creative
outlet everyone else has. I chose to be editor, and I
suppose that's the editor's lot. It is honing my writing
skills somewhat because I am looking at other writing
styles and keeping my grammar and spelling skills in
shape.<br><br>May I say before I go today that I'm really enjoying
this. I just hope my long posts aren't boring or
annoying anyone. Despite being in a big city, it's hard to
find writers who understand the process, the drive,
behind truly writing. (Like I said, maybe I'm the one
who should join a writer's group.) This is an added
benefit to being able to discuss aspects of producing a
fanzine with other editors/publishers.<br><br>Thanks for
starting this club, Jim. (Sorry about calling you john in
a previous post, but your handle was all I had to
go by.)<br><br>See ya next time,<br>War

If I hadn't gotten the laser printer I've got for
free, I would have photocopied my stuff, too. Of
course, the way the printer's been acting lately, it may
as well be photocopied, as lousy as the printing
comes out sometimes.<br><br>I put out about 25 issues
each month. I'm working with a guy who retails anime
tapes, so some issues go out to his mail order
customers. This was how I got started; he (by now, actually
the guy this guy bought the business from - long
story) wanted something to send to his customers to
remind them to do business with him, instead of going to
Suncoast, or some other big-name retailer. He mentioned the
idea to several people, including the editor of the
mag I'd been working with, and I was the first person
who seemed to take it seriously enough to make a
prototype.<br><br>I'd forgotten about filling that out. You got to the
site just in time because when we attempted to update
it last night it wouldn't upload anything correctly,
so now we have no main page. No main page, no way to
access any other part of the site. As of just before
coming here, they were telling me that I was trying to
use the wrong password to access my files. I know
that's not the problem because earlier today I got in,
but when I tried to upload files it started telling
me I'd used the wrong password. There must be
something wrong with their server. I love
technology.<br><br>The only reason I found somewhere to put up a website
to begin with was to get more exposure, and
hopefully sell some extra issues. That's not going to
happen if no one can see it. Oh well, I'll deal with it.
Thanks for letting me vent.

The most time consuming aspect of doing my zine
has to be doing the layout. I do mine in Word in a
way that's probably not the best, and I tend to move
things around a lot, substitute one thing for another,
and all kinds of cutting, pasting and reformatting,
so I can spend a couple hours every night working on
the layout. I don't assign pieces to people, so
waiting for submissions isn't really a problem for me,
since I usually write enough to fill almost an entire
zine alone. I like to include other people, though.
Especially people who write well and wouldn't get published
otherwise, for whatever reason.<br><br>So, yeah, I do take
contributions from other people. I haven't gotten many so far.
I received a couple for my first issue from writers
I've met through the internet, and I put up some
fliers around campus, and actually got a few submissions
from a local person that I'm throwing into issue 2 . I
got another submission from someone I don't know
personally through the internet--I think he saw my post on
alt.zines, or stumbled across my web page somehow. I like to
include bios, and if people don't remember to send me
one, waiting for those really tests my patience, but
so far, waiting for contributions hasn't been too
bad, beyond the frustration over having my own brain
not being able to produce. I've more or less got my
second issue complete, and I want to go over it more
carefully than my first issue to shoot for uniform
formatting and as few typos as possible.<br><br>Jim B.

I myself use a Bubblejet printer(gasp!), which
given the current technology, is about on par with a
dot matrix printer. However, since I am in college, I
have access to the University's laser printers, and I
can print around 100 free pages per semester. The
only downside to laser printers that keeps me from
buying one right away, is precisely the problem you
mentioned--the cost. Lately I've been leaning much more towards
staying with photocopying my zine, because I doubt the
demand will ever be that high. <br><br>Sorry to freak
you out with my knowledge of your zine.:) I just
clicked on your username, and saw your web page address
listed in your user profile. So we're not on too uneven
ground, you can see my web page at:
<a href=http://www.myspleen.com
target=new>http://www.myspleen.com</a><br><br>Jim B.

It does look like we've got a good group of
people here. It's such a change of pace to be able to
"talk" with people who not only understand the process
of writing and publishing, but can express
themselves in full sentences.<br><br>What aspect of
producing your mag do you find to be the most
time-consuming? For me it's a toss-up between layout and waiting
for my writers to get their stuff in (well, then
there's looking for decent pictures, but that's a
different matter). Also, am I the only one who is using
contributions from other people?

Writing intelligently is one of the few things I
pride myself on. Not only can't a lot of people spell
or type, they don't seem to be able to grasp the
concept of proof reading. I agree, if they can't write,
how can they possibly produce a decent mag? Granted,
when my printer acts up and the print quality really
sucks, I tell myself, "It's only a fanzine," but if you
get past the print quality, the contents are
well-written. What's sad is when you see the same sort of
mistakes in professional mags or newspapers. Spell-check
is a great invention, but it can't be solely relied
upon, because no one has invented content check. My
favorite thing for it to do (aside from grammar check and
go nuts on my writing style) is accept a word as
being correctly spelled, but not realize I've got the
wrong word in there to begin with. I'm not the best
typist, so a lot of time I'll mix up "s" and "d" or "d"
and "k". A lot of words contain those letters that
are still a word (which, to support my example, I
almost typed in as "work") if you confuse two of
them.<br><br>I'll be sure to check out your page as soon as I'm
done being long-winded here. One more post to go, I
think.

I can only remember so much, so I'm going to
reply to each post individually, so as not to miss any
points I'd like to cover. (No, I don't have a
life.)<br><br>It would seem that I'm the most experienced
publisher of us all, as I'm currently working on issue 10
of my mag. I've been publishing since June of '99,
and have managed to maintain a fairly consistent
monthly publication schedule. The Feb. issue was late due
to my getting the flu near when I should have been
printing, and switching over to a new computer. The old one
was Ok, but I use Publisher as my layout program, and
pub files eat space. Plus, I had a slow processor, so
there was lag time when pictures loaded up. I didn't
get the computer exclusively for the mag, though, so
don't follow that lead. If you're like me, you're
publishing on a shoestring. I'm a housewife with a husband
who has a good job and likes toys, so the computer is
as much his toy as it is my word processor.<br><br>I
got lucky and was given an old Epson Action Laser
printer, so I can print my stuff as needed. My big problem
right now is that a new ink cartridge would have cost
about as much as a decent little printer, so I had the
old one refilled. Not such a good idea. The toner
isn't a high enough quality, so my print quality went
down. I've done what I can to even it out, but it's
just not as crisp as it could be. I'd love to just buy
a newer printer, but my husband's job isn't that
good, and I'd like to try to "make it on my own". My
suggestion on your printing problem would be to stick with
photocopies, unless you've really got the budget to go to a
professional printer and store the extra
issues.<br><br>Although this is the first mag I've published, I worked
for several months with someone in this area who was
working on one. It taught me a lot of things I didn't
want to do, if i ever did my own. He was very
unprofessional, and constantly begged for contributors, but
wouldn't follow up and tell someone when their article
wasn't good enough. He'd just bury stuff in a pile and
ignore it if he didn't want to use it. Eventually, we
went our separate ways, for a variety of reasons. A
few months after that I got the opportunity to start
my own and jumped at it, if only to show him how a
mag should be run. Shortly after that, he ceased
publication.<br><br>There are a lot of apathetic people out there. It's a
shame that none of your friends are supportive of you
(if I'm reading your post right). You do have me not
only at a disadvantage, but also a little freaked out.
How did you know I had an article about Eva in my
mag? I didn't send you an issue, and I didn't tell you
where my website was (or even that I had one). If you
managed to find it on a search, that's great, as I was
wondering if it would turn up. Otherwise, I'm just
confused.<br><br>Regarding the title of the mag, I've got a friend who
always called himself Death. Before I met him, a couple
other people took the cue and took on the names of
Pestilence and War, then someone decided to declare he was
the Fifth Horseman. It took Death a while to figure
out what could possibly be worse than Death, but he
eventually got it: Telemarketing. By the time I met Death,
two of his friends had parted company with him, so I
inherited War, and my husband got Pestilence. If you knew
us, you'd know how appropriate these titles are in
relation to our personalities. Another friend of ours
became Famine. Thus, the Five Horsemen were born. We've
done several projects under "Apocalyptic Productions",
and a few other things bear "A Five Horsemen of the
Apocalypse Production" on them, including the mag I do.
Anyone not possessing john's psychic ability can check
out an online version of what we do at
www.afreehome.com/revelations. It should be getting updated tonight or
Wednesday, and we'll be adding a list of the other projects
we've done.<br><br>That's about it for this post, just
a couple more to go.

Heya Aiko,<br><br>We've got a few zinesters here,
so hopefully you'll find the club useful. And thanks
for saying my posts are written "intelligently,"
because sometimes I worry.<br><br>Your zine looks pretty
interesting. I'd like to trade with you, but I'm not sure
you'd want to trade since the first issue of my zine is
strictly literary, with a bunch of poetry. If you are
interested, just let me know, and I'll send you a copy right
away.<br><br>Congratulations on being able to get four issues done. My first
two issues have been extremely time
consuming.<br><br>Thanks,<br>Jim

Hey, what's up? I'm looking to connect with more
zinesters, so I thought I'd join this club because your
posts have actually been written intellegently. I'm
impressed. Some people cant speel or tipe and its anoying. u
dont want to order there zines when they cant even
right.<br><br>Anyway, I do a zine called Cobweb Junction, and issue #4
is going to be done very soon. (hooray!) If you're
interseted you can check out my webpage, but it's in a huge
mess to be
careful!<br><br><a href=http://www.gurlpages.com/zines/jitterbean
target=new>http://www.gurlpages.com/zines/jitterbean</a><br><br>Bye for
now!<br>Aiko

Howdy, thanks for joining the club:)<br><br>I'm
personally pretty new to the whole zine thing, but I've put
out one issue of a literary zine. There are
absolutely no zines done in my area, as far as I know, but I
managed to find an independently done chapbook of poetry
today at the bottom of a rack in a local record store.
The guy who rang up all my stuff didn't even
recognize the chapbook as part of his inventory, which is
kind of sad to me. <br><br>I haven't had the
frustration of stores not wanting to carry my zine, because I
haven't even bothered to try yet. So far, I've just been
trading with other zinesters, and I managed to move an
amazing 20 copies in the past week because someone
expressed interest in distributing some copies. But
basically, right now, I have around 20 (of the 50 I had
photocopied) copies of my zine sitting here in my desk, and I
haven't sold a single one. That's pretty much what I was
expected, though, given that this is the first zine I've
ever done in my life.<br><br>I think the most
frustrating thing for me is the lack of interest people that
I know have shown in it. It's not my fault that
they can't recognize good literature,
though.:)<br><br>And currently, I have a lot of things about my second
issue to work out. Whether to change the title to
something that'll mean NO one will want to carry it on
racks, whether to keep going with photocopy, or go with
an actual printer, and end up with around 900 copies
of my zine sitting around the apartment.<br><br>Glad
to see you have an article on Evangelion since your
fanzine is named Revelations. I'm not a huge anime fan
myself, but one of my past roommates was a HUGE
Evangelion fan, and he gave me some plot overviews several
times over.

I hope this goes better than the last club I
joined that was supposed to be about fanzines. I was in
the process of looking for where to put my own club
when I stumbled across this one.<br><br>I publish and
edit an anime and manga based fanzine called
"Revelations". See my psuedonyms to get the reference. Around
here, the fanzine seems to be a dying breed. Hardly any
stores carry them, so it's difficult, at best some days.
I have the benefit of a dedicated staff of writers,
who enjoy the creative outlet, so I'm not doing it
all alone, but I think I have a bigger staff than
readership base.<br><br>I'd be interested in hearing about
what you do, and possibly exchanging ideas or at least
sad stories. I probably won't be online over the
weekend, however, so I'll definitely check back in on
Monday.<br><br>See ya.

Welcome, This is the Yahoo! Message Board for Zine Publishers community.