To blog or the zine?

[Saling Pusa Distro/closed]

This discussion is NOT about which you think it better, but rather if you have a blog and make zines, how do you distinguish which piece is for a blog and which is for a zine? I guess I am having a hard time doing that, and with my cousin urging me to go paperless, I am thinking of just opening a blog/website for my zine stuff.... and then have a "personal blog".

i'm sorry it is really difficult to express myself well with the smell of maple syrup distracting me. I need breakfast. 

[will edit if i dont get stuck eating too long]

but yeah, basically i am asking whether how you decide which is print worthy (i.e. zine) and which stay online and unprinted on your blog....

p.s. link me to your blog :)

[ManDuh]

I just picked a topic (art) for my blog. Everything art related goes there, everything else is open consideration for zines.

Of course the two cross over, as I sometimes promote or review zines as an art form, but it mostly works out pretty nicely.

Also, there's no reason you couldn't print your blog articles at a later date. I'm toying with this idea with some of the artist interviews I've done...sort of a "greatest hits" idea.


http://manduh.jasonspadaro.com

[Dan C]

For me it's not an issue of what is "print worthy." I just put different things in different places, and some things in more than one place.

I edit a literary zine of stories under 500 words, Concisely (ConciselyMagazine.com). That's in print. That's all stuff submitted by other people. I think there's something that makes a magazine work better as a magazine when it's in print. I think it also makes a big difference to people submitting work that we are a print magazine.

I run an interview website/blog, QuestionRiot.com. That's all interviews. It's only online. I think that's the best way to reach people.

Sometimes I make little one-off zines. They are typically focused on a specific topic. I'll print some, but I also might put it up on zinelibrary.info or share it online somewhere else. I figure that if you think something is worth sharing, it's silly to only share it with people that want it in a particular format.

I have a Livejournal account too, which is a blog. I use that for more personal conversation, though. To me, that's a way to put a message out that a small group of friends is going to see.

I was thinking about starting a blog about intentional community.

I guess I think zines and blogs both benefit a lot from being about fairly specific subjects, even if that means one person splits up their thoughts in different places.

I think blogs work better for things that are ongoing at a regular pace, and zines work better for things that come in finished chunks.

[lauramarie]

My blog is like an online journal while my perzine is for book reviews and zine reviews, poems, and essays / vignettes. Occasionally I've had some crossover, said something in my blog that I wanted to expand upon into an essay for a zine. So for me, the blog is unedited and conversational while the zine is more thought through and still conversational but I sustain something longer.

http://dangerouscompassions.blogspot.com/

[Ro- The Apocalypse Girl]

I actually have a bit of a blog addiction problem. :X All my blogs have different focuses- one is for general nonsense, one is geared toward living with chronic illness and the third (which I really need to work on) is focused on dreams. My zine is mostly tied to the dream blog- the blog has (or will have) more practical and how-to stuff while the zine usually is just my personal dreams and less structured ramblings.

I usually see zines are more freeform, raw and personal writing while I try to keep my blogs less personal and more neutral. But that's just me- I've seen tons of blogs that are the exact opposite.

www.apocalypsegrrl.com
http://apocalypsegrrl.wordpress.com
http://intothedreamlands.weebly.com

[Nichole]

My blog is more of a day-to-day account of what projects I've been working on, things I've tried, events I've attended. While I share personal things, it's not super in-depth. Zines tend to be more reflective on my life, my past, my successes and failures and is more emotion driven. That isn't to say that I've gotten some zine ideas from blog posts I've made.

http://jinked.net

[Jami Sailor]

I use my blog for reviews, announcements, and works in progress. Mostly what ends up there is more related to timeliness, space, and theme.

If something I wrote in a blog post fits the theme and style of a zine I am working on I may use it, tweak it, revise it, or takes pieces from it. I don't really think in terms of "print-worthy" vs "non-print worthy." Online publishing is still publishing and we are finding more and more that once you put it out there it can stay out there, even if you hide or delete it. Despite this I would take into consideration whether I want a piece floating around - hypothetically "forever" - to be read and reread in the future. Blogs can be edited but once you give someone a zine it has permanence, even if you edit future copies. This also influences my decision of blog vs print.

[Catherine Elms]

This pretty much sums it up for me!

My blog is more informal, fluffy content - what I'm up to, lists, reviews, thoughts that don't really go very far, etc. My zine has more introspective rambling pieces, usually on topics like feminism, mental health, and creativity.

Also, one big thing that makes zines different to blogs is the option to create interesting art in the pages, something that you don't get to do on a blog (well, not nearly to the same extent at least). My zine feels more like a piece of art, something that I spend a lot of time on crafting and tweaking. A blog is more like "hello I'm still alive - here's what I've been up to this week..."

E.g. last week I published 2 posts on my blog: an album review, and a list of my top 10 iPhone apps. Neither of those are weighty enough to bother being printed in a zine! They're interesting to read once or twice, sure, but it's not something that really grips you. Catch my drift?


http://blatantblithe.wordpress.com

Nichole said:

My blog is more of a day-to-day account of what projects I've been working on, things I've tried, events I've attended. While I share personal things, it's not super in-depth. Zines tend to be more reflective on my life, my past, my successes and failures and is more emotion driven. That isn't to say that I've gotten some zine ideas from blog posts I've made.

http://jinked.net

[Fluxxii]

I have a huge issue with my zine where I must delete everything and rewrite it until it's perfect. I'm getting a typewriter so that I can fix that, so pretty much none of the content will overlap between my blog and my zine! But when I'm writing a zine, I try to stick with a specific issue and I write solely for the zine, but sometimes something will be relevant so I'll post it in the blog and say something like, "Hey this is an excerpt from my zine if you want to check it out!"

I think blogs and zines are totally different things, so switching to a blog will never fully replace the art of making a zine IMO. What you decide to put in either is completely up to you - I think that most people tend to blog about daily things in far more detail than with zines (as if someone were subscribed and actually keeping up with your life), whereas zines are usually more general (as if someone were reading it without knowing a thing about your life). Does that make any sense?

A lot of people are the exact opposite though. :)

And since you asked! http://divlayer.livejournal.com/