Don't Buy the Zines!

[byslantedlight]

Can I just say - gaaaaaah!

Have just been wandering around on Ebay and found some of the most blatant rip-off prices for Pros zines that I have ever seen - please, please please don't pay these prices for zines, especially ones that are still in print!

Links are not to the ebay seller, but...
The Peerless Pair - a fab AU historical zine by HG - is being sold for US$50.00 +p&p. It's available for half that price, brand new, from the publisher! That's being sold by someone called bandit2142 - he's always been overpriced, he's a dealer, and he's totally making money from HG's writing here. Making a profit from someone else's hard work and generously given effort! Leech!

In the Public Interest III is being sold by "Doctor Beth2000" for - wait for this - US$100.00 +p&p! Three of the stories are available in the archives - and I bet the other two are on the UK paper circuit.

Where do these people get off charging prices like that? They're blatantly making money from fic that was given freely to fandom - bastards!

Another one - Bene Dictum: A Dickensian Christmas can be downloaded for free at the publisher's own website - printed off in exactly the zine format, and comb bound yourself if you want it - "DoctorBeth2000" wants US$45.00 for it! The stories are also available for free online at the Circuit, Hatstand and on the ProsLib CD! Gaaaaaargh! I've seen her around ever since I was in Pros, and always overpriced too. I hear that she claims to be selling off her own zine collection - at the risk of sounding cycnical, yeah, right...

You know I love zines - I adore zines, proper paper stories, so much more than reading from the internet and my computer screen, but... please, please, please don't be ripped off by these people! You can defend capitalism all you want to me, and tell me that people won't pay it if they don't want it, and if they do then that's a fair price, but... no. Selling fanfic like that, blatantly making a profit from selling other people's writing when those authors were careful enough to fly under the fandom radar themselves? Just... no!

Grr.

Now back to writing. Which will always be free to Pros fans! *g*

Comments

[gilda-elise.livejournal.com]

Unfortunately, I really get the impression that the people who actually buy these zines aren't in touch with the rest of fandom or they would know about zine websites where you can buy the same zine for half or a third of the price. Out of ignorance or disinterest, they've never connected to fandom.

I normally sell my zines through groups (it's easier in that you reach just those people who are fans of that particular pairing,) but if that fails, I have no problem at all trying to sell them on eBay. Of course, my start price is usually around what I tried selling them on the group. The fact that I've been able to sell zines on eBay after not finding a buyer within the fandom only affirms my belief that, for some, eBay is their only avenue for buying zines.

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

Hmmn - or it might suggest that the Groups are getting more and more inaccessible... The only way I managed to find any of the Yahoo groups, including ProsLit, Zinelist and Slashswap, was if someone actually sent me a link to the group so that I could get in that way. Knowing the name wasn't enough - they never seemed to turn up on searches! And thinking about Pros, there's not any lj access to secondhand zines - you can find AWS and perhaps Requiem and Hermit/Knightwriter, but Pros fans don't often seem to sell zines secondhand in easily-googled forums... maybe that's why people turn to ebay? It's actually what I did, nearly four years ago now - and incidentally once reason I decided to set up palelyloitering. Only of course then you get into the whole be-nice-to-people thing... but I could link to debates like this, actually - it's the sort of thing that would be helpful... if people ever came across the site in the first place.

Just had a google for "The Professionals zines" and "Bodie and Doyle zines" - I get AWS, Alijot, and that Fanlore site (is that the one by that awful woman who's also out to make money?) and then AWS, justacat's one zine, Knightwriter, links to various stories that are in zines... but nothing about how to find second-hand zines! Hmmn!

[gilda-elise.livejournal.com]

But it does sound like you found out about the groups and such through other fans—which is what I'm talking about. I managed to find groups (only it was usenet at the time,) through Trek websites that had links to them. From there, other fans got me in contact with the various zine publishers and the few sites, like the Rondeaus' and Waverly, where used zines are sold. I have to admit though, most of my used zines were purchased at cons. In any event, all of it was only possible by making contact with other people.

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that's it though isn't it - you've got to be prepared to get involved with fandom in some way, to talk to people, and I know a lot of people are quite shy about it. I mean, we meet the people who are confident enough, one way or another, to approach the comms, and other fans and so on, but I can understand that not everyone wants to do that, and so would turn to something like Ebay. So ebay dealers like DrBeth2000 and Bandit2142 are taking advantage of people without that confidence...

[kiwisue.livejournal.com]

Fanlore is the fandom wiki run by the Organisation for Transformative Works.

F@nh!story.com is the site run by the person who's been criticised over connecting people's real names with their fandom ones, promoting wank as a way to drive up hit counts and using bots to scrape information (much of it misleading if not downright inaccurate) from fanfiction.net and livejournal.

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

Ah cheers - I know it's bad to get them mixed up, but they have to have such bloody similar names, and still OTW only seems to have presence in "fandom" circles, so that I'm not as familiar with the names of its various components! I'm trying to be open to it, and I know these things take a lot of time to set up if you're going to do it properly, and I gather that they've already done some good work defending fanvidders via the fair use defense, but... You know, I wish they'd talk about it as "OTW Fanlore" or something for a while, just to help us little fandom-types distinguish and remember... All it's got to do is soak into our consciousness for a while!

And yes - f@nh!story dot com is another disgraceful attempt to leech on what people in fandom do for the monetary profit of the unwary. Cow! (Name not spelled out, by the way, for anyone who doesn't know that story, to avoid her gaining new "hits" and thus pretending to potential buyers for her site that hers is any kind of fandom "authority"...)

[zana16.livejournal.com]

Thank you for listing the Yahoo groups! I'm new to Pros, and this is my first zine-based fandom. I looked to ebay but just couldn't afford anything there. I didn't know there was anywhere else to look.

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

Hey! Ooh, and welcome to Pros! (I'm gulping a bit over the fact that your first impression of me is a raving grump - I'm not always, I promise, just over this zine-rip-off thing... *g*)

And yes - the Yahoo groups! Let me be even more useful and give you some links, cos I swear I can never find the things, even when I search by exact name! There's some brill stuff in them, but - gaaargh! So...

Pros-Lit (the main one, though very quiet these days): http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Pros-Lit/

Pros-Lib (home of the ProsLib CD, which has thousands of stories. Well, at least hundreds, and probably one thousand - I've never counted! Anyway, lots that will never be online. It's sort of a cross between being online and being in zines...): http://groups.yahoo.com/group/proslib/

ProsLanguage (for those tricksy 1970s/80s Brit-based questions... Do you write? *g*): http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ProsLanguage/

ProsStoryFinders (does was it says on the can - there's an lj-based one as well, prosfinder): http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ProsStoryfinders/

Zinelist (multifandom - and I think it's run by a specific zine publisher too): http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Zinelist/

Slashswap (gosh, not been there for ages - multifandom again): http://groups.yahoo.com/group/slashswap/

Erm... there's more - if you get bored with this lot, let me know and I'll dig them out! *g*

Hmmn - and I saw you were talking about getting hold of zines, and I dunno if you know this place, but it might be helpful sometimes... http://www.palelyloitering.com/ It's way under construction still, but there's links to various publishers... And yeah, that means I was looking to see who you are and all... *waves*... *g* There's definitely more places to get zines - the Rondeaus are great, and they're out your way: http://www.crossovers.net/makeitgoaway/AdultNon.htm There's not as much there as there was last time I looked - scroll down to find the Pros zines - but it seems to go up and down. Jim and Melody are great to deal with... Hmmn, of the ones that are there I'd recommend HG's Hunted By Devils, but it's not actually B/D so maybe keep it for a while... it's based on another MS character, so it's AU B/D really...

Anyway, I shall go away and stop being over-excitable and scary... *g* Hope this helps though!

[zana16.livejournal.com]

(I'm gulping a bit over the fact that your first impression of me is a raving grump - I'm not always, I promise, just over this zine-rip-off thing... *g*)

Not to worry! I was poking around the Circuit Archive before realizing that this was actually an active fandom, so I read some of your stories and then looked up your LJ because I really liked your writing.

I just discovered the_safehouse quite literally yesterday, which makes me very happy. And I really really really appreciate your taking the time to link me to all this! In a fandom with thirty-plus years of history, it's difficult to get an idea of what's out there because there's simultaneously so much and also so much that's apparently offline. Thank you! Now I'm going to go spend too much money on zines...

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

Pros is definitely an active fandom! Very much so, in lots of different forums! *g* And whee - I am glad you liked me stories, cheers!

the_safehouse is brill... Have you found discoveredinalj and ci5hq as well? Aaand, what else is out there? Oh, The Hatstand, and the relatively new Automated Hatstand which is our most active archive at the moment. Circuit was great when I first found Pros (and fandom!) but the archivist is a bit quiet at the moment for various reasons...

Anyway - I adore it around here, and I'm in love with Pros zines, and actually talking to you has given me rather a good and probably overdue idea, so... I'm off to dash to work and mull on it a little... *g*

[zana16.livejournal.com]

I found discoveredinalj last month, but ci5hq is new to me. This is so exciting! I've come to several fandoms after the shows were over and the fans long gone, and it's the loneliest feeling! I assumed Pros would be similar. I'm so glad it's not.

Thank you again!

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

Oh, there will always be a Pros... something about it just means people fall in love with it over and over again... *g* And from what I gather from some of the very oldest Pros fans (who were writing in the eighties for the original paper circuits, even!) it's something that often stays with people when all other fandoms have faded... *g* I dunno - before I knew anything about fandom except in it's scary SF-con guise (to outsiders, you see) what I called my "obsessions" tended to fade away in time - Pros has been going strong for nearly four years though, so... *g*

And you're welcome! Pop by any time! *g*