how do y'all feel about this?

[ramsey everydaypants]

I just got this e-mail:

"Dear Ramsey

I am currently completing a book called FANZINES (Thames & Hudson) and have included the cover of List / Goodbye, Baltimore, no. 12 (fall 2008), fully credited in the book.

My book looks at the history of fanzines in a general overview of UK and USA-based self-publishing. As a good example of an interesting contemporary personal zine it would be remiss not to include it in any history of fanzines. The book is due out in September and I hope this will establish the importance of this form of self-publishing.

I do hope this is okay.

Yours sincerely,

Prof Teal Triggs
University of the Arts London
"

Poor form right? I know a lot of zinesters don't care about their things being reproduced or used, and I actually don't mind at all for it to be included, but it seems like asking ahead of time would be the right thing to do, right? Especially for a book?

[Bradley Adita]

 

Dan, i would venture that whoever published that 7" book did much more work to clear the use of those images than the effort that Triggs gave in trying to contact the creators of the zines she used. Here's another side note about Triggs carelessness - she left the price tag on the covers of a number the zines. I know its a small thing, but it just shows that this book seems haphazardly thrown together.

Dan 10things said:

For me it's because there are tons of books about zines, records, books, and music history that have done this and it's pretty clear it doesn't violate copyright. Every book about zines, and there's over twenty of them, have printed zine covers and pages as art and content. I have 50 books here on my shelf about punk, music history, zines, etc. that do the exact same thing. I just don't understand the outrage, this is normal. Have you guys never read any other books about zines? Or is it just because this is the first one that included your zine?

 

I was just looking through a book at the bookstore featuring DIY record cover design. It was funny to me because it was mostly punk, indie rock and hardcore 7" covers from the '90s that I have in my record collection. The author did really nice photographs of all these record covers and featured one on each page and added in a few pages of text about DIY style and design. Same sort of deal.

NicoleIntrovert said:

I'm having a hard time understanding why folks find it so hard to grasp the concept that it is different to print a little picture of a zine cover next to a review in a zine vs. printing a zine cover as art in a for profit book.

[Loserdom zine]

I've been reluctant to get involved in this debate as it seems to me to be a mountain out of a mole hill, but I can see that it is still going strong months after the book came out.

For the purpose of balance I want to say that I was contacted before hand about images from Loserdom being used in the book by Teal and I was more than happy to give my permission.

If I hadn't been contacted before hand and later found that images from my zine were used in the book, I would also be more than happy. Proud infact. I have a collection of books about zines just as I have a collection of zines and I'm happy now to be included in one of these books.

I believe that Teal's intentions were very much genuine and supportive of the zine community and independent publishing. Although it was an oversight not to contact everyone perhaps given the range of emotions that have come out since. As regards permission for using images of zine covers, that seems a bizarre one to me. I often put in (images of) zine covers alongside reviews if I like the zine and it's a nice cover. (I usually consider it a compliment).

On the issue of profiteering through a major publisher off of zines. Thats laughable! Has anyone seen the book? It's a huge coffee table sized thing. The reproduction of the zine covers and images in it are top quality. The book only retails for €20 or £20. To independently produce a book of its quality would cost a small fortune I am quite sure and I'm even not sure how a major publisher can produce it for so cheap.

Making zines here in Ireland for many years I've often found it difficult to get distros to take my zine outside of this country where as zines from North America are much more widely available through the big distros like Microcosm. Whether its because of postage or not I'm certain that North American zines get preferential treatment for those distros. So basically I'm quite happy to get a little bit of glory by being featured in this book for what can generally be an ongoing struggle to get distributed or read outside of my local scene.

Anyway thats my 2 cents.

[Jenna Appleseed]

accidentally found out this week that somebody I know elsewhere whose zine I buy had it featured in the book with wrong details. 

Not as serious an error as some on here but she/they've managed to describe Woofah ( a dub/reggae/grime/dubstep etc fanzine www.woofahmag.com) as being print and online instead of being a print mag with a basic details/ordering website, illustrate it with a screenshot of one of the site pages that's obviously not a webzine & ignore the quote on their front page about being printed only. 

(arrgh run on sentences)

They're well pissed off (esp after seeing this thread) at paying £20 for it.

[Stephanos]

They can always get hold of a free issue and ebay it

Jenna Appleseed said:

accidentally found out this week that somebody I know elsewhere whose zine I buy had it featured in the book with wrong details. 

Not as serious an error as some on here but she/they've managed to describe Woofah ( a dub/reggae/grime/dubstep etc fanzine www.woofahmag.com) as being print and online instead of being a print mag with a basic details/ordering website, illustrate it with a screenshot of one of the site pages that's obviously not a webzine & ignore the quote on their front page about being printed only. 

(arrgh run on sentences)

They're well pissed off (esp after seeing this thread) at paying £20 for it.

[Jerianne]

I've posted an article from the new issue of Zine World: Why I'm Mad About the New Fanzines Book.

[Tom Hendricks]

Welcome to corporate art - they've ignored zines for decades now they've tried to co-op it without fair or reasonable credit to the zinesters who created it. That's wrong on every level.

Ready to join the art and media revolution yet?

 

[Nichole]

If you're so bored with it, why bother keeping up with the thread and responding? Makes it seem like you don't wish to let this go either, even if you're sitting on the other side of the fence when it comes to opinion on the matter.

 

Just a thought.

[Alex Wrekk]

The new issue ofNobody Cares About You Stupid Zine Podcast is about this very topic!

In this Episode of Nobody Cares About Your Stupid Zine Podcast, Derek Neuland and Alex Wrekk discuss the book Fanzines by Teal Triggs and several issues surrounding it including copyright and etiquette as they interview Ramsey Beyer (illustrator and List zine) Amber Forrester  (http://www.hello-amber.com/) and Jerianne Thompson (librarian and editor of Zine World).

[Alex Wrekk]

Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't know that minority opinions aren't allowed to be heard. If you are so upset about it why don't you do your own podcast with your opinion. I'm not a journalist and I have no false pretenses about being objective, I tell the story I want to tell. I don't get why you think that everyone has to believe exactly as you do about this situation. Everybody is entitled to their own opinion. I support and respect how you feel about the things you create but not everyone feels the same. Why can't you respect people with a differing opinion?

 

Have fun finding all 50+ zines I have ever created and wasting your money and time publishing them. I seriously doubt you'd find a publisher let alone distribution for that. Anyone who has been doing zines long enough knows that anyone can publish something yourself, it takes a lot of work and energy to find the distribution. I find it laughable that you would seriously hate my opinion so much as to go to those lengths.

[Derek Neuland]

We thought about contacting Teal Triggs to see if she wanted to be interviewed for the podcast, but then we decided that she has been given enough opportunities to publicly apologize.  Nobody Cares About Your Stupid Zine Podcast is by and for zinesters, and we actually celebrate zine culture.  We had a story and we decided to present it the way we wanted to.  We didn't change or omit facts, and many people in the episode gave Teal Triggs the benefit of the doubt as Amber said.

 

I have hosted and edited a dozen podcast episodes on two different podcasts, and this is by far the one i'm most proud of so far.  I was happy to be able to help this Fanzines issue reach more people and in a different format: http://nobodycareszine.libsyn.com/nobody-cares-about-your-stupid-zi... 

[Tiffany Daniels]

Hmm, as a Professor of the University of London you'd have thought she'd appreciate copyrighting laws. Personally I'd have let it slide if the person asking/telling wasn't a professional.

[Elaine]

"Though if you're really intent on seeing us take legal action, maybe you'd like to foot the cost?"

 Just FYI --In Milwaukee a 'cheap' copyright lawyer is $145 an hour. I had to use one a few years back. I'm sure their cost has gone up since.