-^ Special interest magazines target people with a
strong interest in one particular area. On the national
level, for example, Essence features the success stories of
African Americans, as well as health and beauty advice.
Model Railroading suits those who like to work with model
trains. In a school, the athletic department may publish a
monthly magazine devoted to sports.
One other type of magazine may be circulating through your school
as an “underground” publication. Zines—short for magazines or fanzines
(made popular by the fans of certain punk music groups)—have prolifer-
ated as desktop publishing and photocopy machines have be come avail-
able to more and more people. (Zines is pronounced Zeens.) Photocopied
and often distributed hand-to-hand, the little magazines may nurture
many creative ideas and design innovations. They also may contain self-
indulgent rantings and ravings.
Some zines are the handiwork of a single person. Others gather sub-
missions from a wide range of guest contributors. Some are well designed
using computers. Some are crude cut-and-paste efforts. Most zines come
out haphazardly, as their production fits the whims, time and fiscal
resources of their creators. “It’s just hard for people to put them out every
month,” explains Garth Johnson, who runs a small record store that sells
zines on the side. “Whenever people have a chunk of time or are bored or
are at the copy shop, another issue comes out.”
With top prices around $3, zines are cheap. Most people who produce
zines are in high school or college. But there are a few older writers as well,
such as the creators of bOING bOING. Carla Sinclair and her husband,
Mark Frauenfelder, began their zine when they pasted some of their
thoughts on layout boards, made photocopies, stapled the pages together
and then watched the issues sell out at $2.95. The name bOING bOING,
says Sinclair, was meant “to sound energetic and childlike.”
The zine soon added a slick cover, and circulation numbers grew.
Sinclair was happy with the growth. But, as the only full-time employee,
she became a bit frazzled. “It used to be fun to earn $10 a year from this
thing. Now it takes all day to fill subscriptions, sell ads, market the maga-
zine and take care of our mail orders. I don’t have time to be creative
anymore.” Despite the zine’s initial success, Sinclair said any further
expansion would cramp her style. “The greatest part of what I do is that
I can write about anything I want and nobody can tell me not to. Doing
a zine really spoils you.”
Soliciting Material Let’s imagine that you are a staff member
of a new magazine at your school. One of your greatest challenges—a
challenge perhaps even tougher than choosing a concept for your maga-
zine or establishing a theme for a particular issue—is gathering material.
When staff members set out to gather art and articles, they should
explore every potential resource for contributions. They should seek
cooperation from the teachers of writing classes. The English depart-
ment is an obvious possibility, but so are other departments. The sci-
ence, mathematics, social studies or vocational departments could be
YEARBOOKS AND MAGAZINES^419
special interest magazine
a magazine that targets
people with a strong interest
in a particular topiczine
a small magazine with a
limited circulation that is pub-
lished by a few people, often
using desktop publishing
programs and photocopiers;
shorts for magazine or fanzine