Fanzines: Their Production, Culture and Future by Phil Stoneman

Phil Stoneman. (2001). Fanzines: Their Production, Culture and Future.Publishing Studies. 1 (1)

DISSERTATION.

p4: 'When I was about 15, I had an article published in Bamber's Right Foot, a fanzine dedicated to Torquay United Football Club' - personal approach for introduction

p5: 'I wish to use Duncombe's narrower definition: "zines are non-commercial, non-professional, small-circulation magazines which their creators produce, publish and distribute by themselves" (1997:6)'

p5: 'It should be noted that the 'fan' of fanzines is somewhat misleading in terms of their subject matter. Although many fanzines do exist to publish fan-related writing and pictures for and by follower of, particularly, a specific band, most are far wider in their scope.'

p5: '...Stephen Duncombe states this his initial reaction when asked the inevitable question 'what is a zine?' is to 'hand over a stack of zines and let the person asking the question decide' (1997:1). There is a certain truth to this statement: the character, content and format of zines is perhaps best understood through looking at a variety of the publications themselves, many of which defy easy description.'

p6: 'Gunderloy offers a number of different categories of zines that are useful here in displaying the breadth of both subject matter and approaches to this form of self-publishing. In terms of format the two main types that he describes are Genzines (the small-press equivalent to professional magazines, containing an editorial, a letter column and articles on various subjects) and Perzines (much more stylistically relaxed, often mainly consisting of a personal record of the life of the writer).' One of the most important distinctions between these two types is that although Genzines can be the product of wone person, it is often a collaborative effort, unlike Perzines which are only rarely not the work of a single individual. (1988: 8).'

p6: 'Concentrating on contemporary zine genres, Gunderloy identifies a high number of different fanzine types according to subject matter. Here he lists political/anti-political zines (including small-scale hate literature), zines dedicated to punk and other musical styles, poetry and literary zines, religious zines, science fiction, fantasy and role-playing games zines, along with many other subject areas from ecology to erotica (ibid. 9-14).'

p7: 'With fanzines as a whole being too wide an area to examine thoroughly in this dissertation, music zines offer not only an extremely large amount of publications bu also a great amount of variety in content and style.'

p10-11: 'Gunderloy then lists the different areas of zine publishing, as described in chapter one of this dissertation, before giving the potential zine publisher some advice on choosing a suitible topic for their fanzine. The interesting thing here is the underlying idea that someone might be interested in publishing a fanzine before having a subject matter for it. This runs contrary to conventional publishing practice, where an idea is created first, and decisions are then made as to how this can be put into effect; it suggests that in fanzines, the method and the form is perhaps of greater importance than substance.'

p17: 'When something that has from its origins been a 'fan-driven' publication achieves significant turnover and readership, it is clearly difficult to continue as an independent fanzine and can be perceived as having turned into the commercial counterparts that it was created in opposition to.'

p22: 'Fanzines are created in such a personal way that each one can be seen to be a genre of its own.'

p23: 'Fanzines are an area of publishing that is extremely difficult to refer to in terms that are not qualitative. As their publication is wholly undertaken by people who are not 'professional' publishers and writers in any way, people who are often learning what to do as they do it, it is necessary to understand the thoughts and feelings of the producers at the same time as looking at the publications themselves, which is what I will attempt to do in this dissertation.'

p24: 'Fanzines have existed for a considerable amount of time, the first one generally being recognised as being 'The Comet', originally published in 1930. This publication was created by the Science Correspondance Club, the first ever science fiction fan organisation to be founded, and its content was grounded in that genre.'

p25: 'The punk ethic stated that anyone could do things themselves, regardless of a lack of any 'professionalism' or recognised training, as long as they had the enthusiasm to get things done. This ethic was far reaching, ranging from suggesting that anyone could get a band together to inferring that enthusiasm was the only necessary prerequisite for the production of a publication.'

p25: 'The timing of this movement was also beneficial to self-publishers; photocopiers were more readily available, meaning that once a publication had been created, it had a relatively cheap and accessible means of being reproduced for a potentially considerable audience.'

p26: 'Using these original publications as an example of what could be done by virtually anyone motivated enough to try it, many other fanzines in a variety of different areas appeared.'

p26: 'People interested in any subject matter were then able to self-publish their own zine, providing information on any area that had perhaps been previously entirely ignored by the mainstream media.'

p27: 'A 'fanzine scene' is referred to by zine producers; it is difficult in some ways to conceptualise this scene due to its decentralised nature.'

p27: 'However, as geographically dispersed as the writers of fanzines might be, together they do represent a form of scene in the sense in which Duncombe refers to a 'virtual bohemia' of zine writers exchanging ideas through their publications. (1997:14)'

p29: 'Implicit in punk ideology is a belief of the corruption of money, and a support of musicians and record labels that do not have the backing of the commercial establishment and are perceived as operating for a higher goal than pure profit.'

p30: 'What is inferred here is that money is just as much of a motivation for music journalists to write as it is for their magazines to publish. Therefore, if the financial incentive for professional writers were to be taken away - if in short, they were to write under the same conditions as fanzine writers do - then they would simply stop.'

p33: 'Any commercial magazine, whatever subject area it covers, can only hold a certain amount of information, which is of course subject to the constraints related to consumer appeal as outlined above. The subject areas of fanzines can also cover, not only music that does not have a broad enough appeal for mass consumption, but also new bands and acts that would be considered too much of a risk to be covered in large circulation magazines.'

p34: 'A fanzine is typically the product of one person or a small group of friends who oversee the entire process of publication without complications such as financial matters and audience targeting to get in the way.'

p37: 'Fanzines are importantly a medium of the young and enthusiastic who, while having ideas, are still learning through experience how to publish them.'

p39: 'In keeping with the views explored on fanzines' various relationships with the commercial music press, it is perhaps not very surprising that what is valued most of all in fanzine writing is personality. Personality provides verification that the zine is written by a real person and not merely something produced by a professional, and therefore distanced, writer.'

p41: 'Solely concentrating on music fanzines published in Britain, there is a huge volume and variety of zines currently being published. But the question does have to be asked as to how people find out about them without first being inside fanzine culture itself.'

p42: 'As will be covered in the section of this dissertation related to fanzine production, there is now a growing number of fanzines that adopt similar production values and layouts to mainstream magazines. This blurring of the boundary between professional and amateur is, however, problematic for the traditional values of the fanzine.'

p42: 'The main problem here is the extent to which a fanzine can have many of the same characteristics as a magazine without bearing the same criticisms levelled at the mainstream media. While some might say that a fanzine can break out of its traditional bubble and gain greater commerciality without betraying its amateur and honest status, for others any concession to a wider audience are met with great disapproval; fanzines are supposed to stand against the mainstream, not attempt to be reconciled within it.'