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

[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*