Word counts

[Emma Jane Falconer]

A hangover from my university days is constantly checking my word count whenever I write something on the computer (more for my own amusement now than for sticking to word limits of course). My zines are usually 24 1/4 A4 pages, (with pictures and layout details of course) and they come in somewhere between 2,500 - 3,000 words per issue. I don't tend to go over the 24 page limit, because it's a size I can copy and send out affordably, and I'd rather have multiple smaller zines than one monster I can barely afford to copy or post to people.

Do you count your words at all? What's your usual mileage?

[fantasmagoric]

My current zine I'm working on is handwritten... so I can't really tell you.

But...

I have to check my word count on pretty much anything I type in a word processor.

[Emma Jane Falconer]

I even do it with handwriting! I think it's because the school exams here feature a lot of essay writing against the clock, so I'm pretty fast at counting them!

fantasmagoric said:

My current zine I'm working on is handwritten... so I can't really tell you.

But...

I too have to check my word count on pretty much anything I type in a word processor.

[Madrea Marie]

I don't count my words at all.I make my zines by hand mostly, typing stuff but then printing it out to glue and paste. I make zines too big though, and have trouble affording to mail them out. So word counting, or page counting, is probably a decent method.

[ciaraxyerra]

no clue, but i'll estimate that they are around 25,000 words. an average zine article length for me is around 2000-3000 words, & i usually write ten pieces for a zine.

[Dan C]

I check my word counts from time to time. It helps give me a sense of things like how much material I'm working with and how long it should take someone to read. I also use word counts in organizing layout to help keep pages relatively balanced.