#and it’s a for profit zine for that added layer

[kink-tomato]

This zine, and I cannot over emphasize how funny this is, is for Anne Rice’s Interview with the Vampire

[transhawks]

In general, what’s your opinion on artists profiting off oc’s of there’s in fandoms? Like when they make little comics for them paired with a character, prints, etc from let’s say MHA? And they have people pay for exclusives such as Patreon and such. It’s ok if your not comfortable answering

Sorry about taking a while to get to asks. I'm really sick right now so finding strength to answer is hard. I don't think this is the right question. What we should be asking is should fandoms be profitable? And are there consequences if we have this mindset of profiting off of fandom?

Now, personally, I think OCs are much more fair game than characters that are the intellectual property of someone else, but everything else is very messy. I've paid artists for commissions and I think there's a lot of greyness here because people should be compensated for labor, but our current socioeconomic situation necessitates, more so than other generations, that we monetize our hobbies. That's definitely what's behind a lot of this - fandoms are profitable, artists especially can make livings off drawing fandom art, and I'd argue easier than with original art.

(there's another conversation to be had about the valuing of visual art over writing, especially in terms of fandom profitability. I've seen screenshots of zine runners outright telling writers that they weren't prioritized because people bought zines for art and I think this profit-maximizing hurts fandoms.)

When so much labor is spent on making art, and these days labor and time are expected to go into jobs full-time due to how high a cost of living is compared to stagnating wages worldwide, is it any surprise talented artists just realize that fandoms can be a primary source of income? No, not at all. But there's a question of how stable that is. Animanga fandoms also have issue of that Japan has long had a culture of doujins and unofficial works. I stumbled upon this article (it's a bit dated, though, as it's from 2011 and the landscape has irrevocably changed) while thinking how to answer this question and something stuck out to me:

So, I feel like doujins are like zines in this way - slim profits (though zines unfortunately have the staff hoping to make as much as possible over a good product) that typically escape the notice of the large copyright holders of the properties they portray. But more and more people are attempting to make money, and not just based on commission, which I understand a bit more as a person to person transaction. I'm specifically talking about patreon here.

Not to bring up Twitter/IG drama on tumblr, but this makes me think of the issue surrounding Sofia Samara and her art. Here's a link to an explanation. Now while there's SO MUCH to unpack there, I keep thinking about how a minor was able to make massive amounts of money drawing nsfw art typically for adults (and was paid by adults), all of off fan content. and there's several things I think are also worth paying attention to -

On one hand, fans afraid of cease and desists or who have gotten cease and desists for very specific content will usually capitulate and either completely take down their stuff, or edit (censor) it to the copyright holder's standards.

On the other hand, when artists and writers realize something is profitable, they'll likely focus in on that rather than perhaps experimental content specifically due to perceived worth/value. Sofia had this issue with when there were request for 'PoC' version of her art (kind of fucked given the characters are /Japanese/) and for a trans masc version of some of the characters she was already drawing. Her first impulse was to question whether these were popular/profitable and some of her comments really make it clear that this art was done with the intent of maximizing profit. The representation mattered only in terms of monetary value. So, I think this is important to note. On one hand, you don't want a fandom so scared of corporations and governments that it doesn't make content whatsoever. Issues of what is ethical to produce aside, China's ban on fan content and AO3 silences so many people, especially vulnerable gender and sexuality minorities. It's a state enforcing what is acceptable and not on its citizens and so often that specifically targets queerness, which fandoms have often a small haven for.

On the other hand, the mainstreaming of fandom and when artists and writers only approach their stuff with the idea of market appeal, the unfortunate dynamics we see in the rest of the world get replicated. Not that haven't already - but there's a bitterness in the idea that fandom will prioritize content made not by marginalized voices who might not have the same access to make content like others. Or in Sofia's case, she traced art with the intent to make money, adding a whole other layer of "iffy" to this.

In all, I seriously don't know if I have a stance on this as much a bunch of 'worries'. I have love for fan content and think it's as worthy of respect as other art or writing or other mediums. I also believe in the compensation of labor. But when people approach something like a hobby as a job, and a fandom as a market, there are going to be people shut out and hurt, and there's going to be a big change in what is made and prioritized by fandoms.

Additionally, when you add a barrier to access stuff, do you ask who sees your work? If I hid my best metas under a paywall, I'd exclude marginalized readers who cannot afford something like pay idk 10 bucks just to read my previously free content, would I? So I genuinely think this hurry to profit off fan content is something that should be questioned. We might lose a lot of the creativity and freedom that draws people to fandoms in the first place. We might shut out creators and consumers who simply don't have the resources compared to others to keep up. Is that really what we want?

[codedredalert]

this might be odd but i really admire your work for law in that op zine and was wondering how you'd manage to come across zines to apply for because it's hard to filter through results on twt and hard to find exactly who is doing what

hey anon, thank you so much! i'm really happy with how that law fic turned out, glad you like it!

not odd at all, i agree it's hard to filter zines! let's see if i can help. this got a bit long bc i misread the question and talked about finding zines to apply for as well as generally what i keep in mind when choosing what zines i apply to so im putting it under a cut

best generally / for fandoms you're already deep in/ fandoms you're less invested in and just happen to think are neat if they pop up. for the op tarot zine, and most zines i applied to/ got into, usually i heard about via word of mouth. so that's reblogs of the promo posts or casual mentions from people I follow, or discord servers, or just chats with friends in that fandom. i like this method because it's the lowest effort and highest likelihood of matching my interests and having the apps still open, and they tend to be a little more reliable bc you already have one layer of someone checking them out/ vouching for them. (but bear in mind i'm also someone who mostly only reads recommended fics from friends whose taste i'm familiar with)

second best/ new fandoms/ fandoms you're not established in. here we have to actually search (boooooo) (i'm lazy lol). you can still use the first method a little bit by searching on the page/blog of a creator you like in that fandom, because that helps filter a bit for interests/ style/ taste/ reliability. i also searched [fandom name] zine or variations. so like "#ygozine" or"yugioh zine" when I was looking for yugioh zines to join. then i consider the application open ones to see if i like the theme, and whether the other details work for me (eg amount of work expected, schedule, rules, faqs, charity/profit, mods, physical/digital only etc).

zine promo / app amalgamation sites. it's pretty easy to find them by looking at existing zines promo posts and seeing the amalgamation blogs/accounts they tag. i don't really use them that much so i can't really recommend specific ones, and the ones i know don't sort easily by fandom or deadline stage, so it's too much work for me personally. i might browse them a little to try my luck but it's the highest effort for the lowest reward. still worth a shot if you can define your search terms well or are willing to trawl. I'd try by just searching the fandom confined to the blog/page. (on tumblr you can do this by adding "/search/[fandom name or shortname]" to the end of the URL.)

very established in a fandom/ willing to ask randomly. you might get invited or someone might drop you an ask saying hey check this zine out they're looking for writers/ other types of creators. you can also just do a general post asking for help like "does anyone know of any zines for [fandom] that are open to apps?" personally and from what i gather from friends, just because they're recommendations doesn't mean that they will necessarily match what you look for in projects but they're worth checking out bc the person recommending usually has some idea of your likes/style/fit. this method has a lot of constraints obviously.

when applying... it may be worthwhile to consider why you're interested in joining, what they are looking for, how many slots they have for what kind of creators, how popular the zine is, what you "specialise" in for the fandom, what your best skills are, what the mods might be looking for (most if not all zines require you to submit sample work). tailor your application. of course, not all zines take writers so your options here might be a little limited (though i'm happy to say i feel like including writing is becoming more common). at the same time, a lot of people underestimate themselves, so definitely apply if you want to even if you feel you might not get in. i think this is probably not what you're asking about though so i wont belabour the point

be careful. i have had the good fortune to have only been in "okay" to "amazing 10/10 extremely trustworthy" zines so far (fingers crossed), but i do have a couple of friends who were burned by dishonest or unreliable zine management before, so do take care! you can save yourself a lot of heartache at the stage when you check out the zine you are applying to. some general indicators for me are whether mod skills cover necessary categories (zines are essentially a business venture and i feel like a lot of people underestimate or do not give enough respect to that); mod experience, age, personal reputations; how questions, rules, schedule, expectations, compensation/charity are addressed. Also these are after joining, but mod treatment of contributors via email or in the discord server and how assignments are handled are early enough that you can form your own assessment and drop if necessary.

take care of yourself also i feel like in these trying times i want to add a note on mental health. i see this too often in my friends, but if your personal circumstances change and you feel like you can't handle the zine obligations anymore, just drop. early is better than late for both you and the organiser, and respectful communication of "sorry i can't be part of the zine anymore for personal reasons" is totally fine. you don't have to disclose anything you don't want to in order to leave and no one can force you to. it's also okay if you don't get into a zine. it doesn't say anything about your worth as a person, even though we as creators can feel rejection of our work very deeply. take time to recover, block/mute/unfollow whatever keywords or accounts you have to for even the tiniest of arbitrary reasons (i absolutely do and highly recommend it), take time to nurture your skills, take time to make things that bring joy, take time to appreciate yourself and the people who like your work. maybe i'm just old/lucky but fandom has been an incredibly accepting and enjoyable place and rejection from a zine (though it can hurt like a bitch sometimes) is not rejection from the community.

i hope this was helpful!

[littlestgahena1301]

3 recipes that uses sugar syrup, side recipe ideas for @Katsukitchen Zine!

Hello everyone! Hopefully everyone is well and in joyous spirit! Its been a lovely week for me and right after Halloween I will be going back to college for my second half of this semester but not before letting you guys know that @katsukitchen zine is having their last week of sale and we are already more than halfway through the sales to unlock EXTRA content pdf and also a set of of poscards for those who bought the merch bundle set.

Now back to what I am here for, to give simple recipes that you can follow along with. The main ingridient things to use in this recipe is the cinnamon sugar syrup that are used in my other recipe which is the Rose flavoured shaved ice with tapioca pearls! Two of these also uses rose syrup so if you happen to have some of those left you can make these two drink and I will tell you how to layer them.

For the cold version. You would want to pour your syrup on the bottom of the glass and coat them with as much syrup as you love. Put in some ice, about halfway up

Next, pour in your cold milk to cover the ice. You can use any kinds of milk you like. Even soy milk, which you can add some vanilla essence to make it even more delicious before you add it into the glass.

Have your favourite kind of tea ready and infused with some rose water, or you can just use rose tea but just incase if you dont have either rose water or rose tea, you can just add the rose syrup to the tea and it will give you 3 layers without the gradient but it will just be as impressive!

The trick to layering milk te is to have the most dense liquid at the bottom and the most watery one at the top. The ice also helps to slow down the layers from mixing. To make sure that the ice doesnt melt, make sure that the tea is in room temperature before you pour it in.

Now for the finishing touch, you would need to water down some of the red rose syrup to just enough to colour the water bright pink. This step is totally skippable since it is just for the aesthethics but it makes such a lovely colour to not do it! Take a spoon and then just drip the water at the top of the tea using a spoon to control the flow.

Put that on top of a coaster and there you have it, your first recipe! Feel free to mess around with the ratios. Some like more milk than tea while others the other way around! Onto the hot version.

So we are basically using the same ingridients except this time we would want to mix the tea and rose syrup together later.

The first step is to pour down the cinnamon syrup like we did before and now before you pour down the milk, I would want you to warm the milk, not to boil, just warm the milk before we can froth it.

Frothing the milk would add a nice layer of foam on top of the milk. You dont need a special utensil for this, just two about similar sized cup that you can "pull" the milk from back and forth until you get the foam that you want. If you watched Indian pulled tea videos on youtube, you know exactly how it is.

You would need to raise the cup that you ARE pouring from high up from the cup that you are pouring into. Pouring while having cup high up will incorporate some air into the milk that will create that nice foam that you want. Pour it into the cup and then we can move on to pouring the tea.

Now compared to last time you would actually want the tea to be hot. After mixing in the rose syrup, you would need a spoon big enough to slow down the tea from mixing. Have the back of your spoon facimg up and have the edge pointing to the side of the cup. Slowly and gently pour the tea onto the backside so that it will drip down to the edge of the cup and went below the foam.

If your tea is not hot enough or the milk is not as cold compared to the tea, they will mix. You can cheat by making extra foam and adding the foam later after you added the tea. Especially since this is actually kind of dangerous as you might pour too much tea at once that it splashes onto you.

Alright so the last recipe which is a pumpkin pudding recipe. If you have made custard pudding before, you can just do that and add some pumpkin puree and have some pumpkin spice into the mixture but since this is autumn and pumpkins are in season, I would make my own puree from scratch. You want to use canned puree? Go ahead, you can. And I would usually infuse my milk with some pumpkin spice and then take them out after its infused.

I have my own golden ratio for my pumpkin pudding and I rather have it very soft and decadent rather than having it a little bit on the stiff side. I would like to add the full recipe for my pumkin pudding into the extra content zine. Now its kinda like a work in progress. I have all my numbers down, I just want to rewrite it in Baku's word so it would feel like you have your own Bakugou in your kitchen that likes to remind you to eat your vegetables.

Add all your ingridients which is the milk, the eggs and the puree rogether into a blender and blend away. This might create a foam on top and you would actually want to get rid of the foam before you pour it in cause the foam would actually change the texture of the pudding and you dont want that. For the smaller foam, you would want to get rid of it with the back of the spoon, and also a bowl of water. Coat the back of the spoon with foam, not scooping up any mixture and then rinse it off with the water.

In this recipe would actually want to steam the mixture in a ramekin, making sure you butter the sides if you want to take it out later. But eating it in the ramekin is also an option. If you're lazy you can just do that. Buttering the sides would make it easier to clean. Up to you. Cover it up with aluminium foil and make sure you close it shut and tight. Even use a rubber band to close it up real good. You dont want water to sneak in there cause that will change the texture.

Next, you can steam it for around 25 to 30 minutes, depending on the size of the ramekin. And also have your steamer cover open slightly as you dont want the water to pool on top of the lip and the drip onto our foil cover. You can even have some clean cloth wrapped around your cover to absorb the moisture if you want to be extra careful.

Once done, bring to room temperature and cool it off for an hour before serving it up with cinnamon syrup and also whipped cream.

So there you have it! Three different recipes that uses cinnamon sugar syrup!

If you like these, please make sure to get and buy the Katsukitchen zine, the profits will go to a charity that feeds the poor and the unfortunate. In a way, you are feeding yourself and also some homeless people off the street! Its a labour from a lot of time and love and I definitely hope you check it out!

Peace out!

@zinefans @zine-scene @zineapps

[popscurity]

TBT: Interview with Merrill Garbus of Tune-Yards

I was lucky enough to meet @tuneyards at the Future of Music conference in 2015, and she was gracious enough to do an interview for the second issue of my online zine Crust (click to see the full issue). We talked about her activist work and the podcast she hoped to make reality in 2016. Below she discusses the idea behind C.L.A.W. featuring strictly female MCs and hip-hoppers. 

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Against a graffitied wall hundreds of miles away via webcam was Merrill Garbus, whose infectious smile took up most of my computer screen. The chatter of outside conversation, whizzing of passing cars, and faint barks of dogs could be heard behind her stream-of-conscious thought, the convolution of which she unnecessarily apologized for.

“Sorry if I’m not articulate, I’m still kind of waking up,” as the noon Oakland sun shined on her face outside of Rooz cafe. “I’m a rock star, it is first thing in the morning!” she qualified.

Garbus is the brain-child behind tUnE-yArds, the one-woman turned multi-orchestrated wonder whose musical process is as much fun to watch as it is to hear. She caught the cusp of the loop machine wave early on, which got her noticed. She’s since used her popularity as a platform for big issues, small bands, and the greater good.

Before taking the reigns of a loop machine, she was armed only with a uke and professionally wielded a puppet. During her time in college studying theater, she took a job at a non-profit puppet theater. For the theater’s puppet operas, she wrote music and played the ukulele.

Although from a folk-revived family of multi-instrumental musicians, these plays are what peaked her interest in performing. “I got into playing music that way,” she said, “I liked the songwriting better than making a puppet seem like a real life thing.”

Desire lead her to the open-mic circuit, where soon her unique soul yearned to be more than “just another chick with a ukulele,” as Garbus said. The instrument’s lacking rhythm and a suggestion from a friend lead Garbus to the Line 6 looping pedal.

“It’s a way to have a one-woman band, and at that point, I was into that,” she said.

With this, she added a new dimension to her sound, creating backing drums by recording bangs on her uke. Layers of rhythms and harmonizing vocals were laid down piece by piece live, quickly separating Garbus from her strictly acoustic counterparts. This tantalizing process skyrocketed the success of her debut album, “BiRd-BrAiNs.”

Looping got Garbus noticed by Dirty Projectors, who asked her to join them on their 2009 European tour. “Shit! I don’t have enough, I’m not loud enough,” she said about her intimidation of playing aside the band in large venues.

“I didn’t feel like I had a low end or bass frequency down,” she said, “if you don’t have some kind of low frequency, people kind of tune out.”

Garbus invited now-fiancee Nate Brenner to fill this sonic void. Although he aided with some of “BiRd-BrAiNs,” he officially became a band member after the tour, during “w h o k i l l.” Brenner helped with much of the songwriting for the sophomore record, such as “Bizness” and the single, “Gangsta.”

With Brenner’s help, Garbus was able to focus more on investigating rhythm. She said the duo made tUnE-yArDs “less of a one-woman band and more…one woman voice & rhythm stuff with his bass playing.”

Garbus’ exploration of rhythm and expansion of her band perpetrated in her latest release, “Nikki Nack.” Haitian percussion was a huge inspiration, which she studied for a year in Haiti. Drums with intersecting parts enchanted Garbus, and utilizing this on the record taught her how to dissect a song and weave voices “to make the whole sound.”

Not only had the sound developed, but so has Garbus’ message behind her lyrics. She said they lyrics in “Nikki Nack” “had to do with these things that we take for granted, and maybe not taking them for granted anymore - specifically water.” Residing in the drought-ridden state of California has made Garbus appreciate H20 in a new way, along with increasing her anxiety about the growing problem.

“The best way…to deal with fear is be proactive,” she said, and she’s succeeded in combating fears with the Water Fountain Fund. Started after the reluctant sale of the catchy “Nikki-Nack” single “Water Fountain” to SONOS, the company struck up a deal to use the song only if they began Garbus’ fund. Since then, $1 from each ticket sale has been pooled and dispersed to several organizations helping with different water-related causes.

Funding has aided in Gulf restoration, community water centers in California, and Haitian medical wells. Garbus also used some of the money to send the Haitian drum group she studied within Oakland to play in their homeland for the first time.

In an effort to stay connected to the community as her success exponentially rises, Garbus has begun producing smaller artists albums, such as San Francisco based Sunny and the Sunsets. “I just hope I’m helping them make their musical dreams come true,” she said. One of Garbus’ new year’s resolutions is to keep her ear close to the ground, hoping to reconnect with the Montreal scene where she got her start and see more local shows.

Garbus also resolves to continue drum lessons, begin vocal lessons, and release a new tUnE-yArDs album in 2016. One of her most exciting ventures for the new year is her podcast, the working title of which is “Transformers are Women.”

The podcast searches for a diversity of voices in hip-hop, focusing solely on female MCs and producers here in the U.S. and abroad. Garbus’ friend and Istanbul-based producer Grup Ses inspired the project with his compilation of Turkish female rappers against his beats. “Rapping in Turkish is fuckin’ dope!” Merrill exclaimed.

“Women rappers are so important,” said Garbus, whose time spent abroad proved to her just how far hip-hop has spanned the globe since late-70s Brooklyn. Garbus said she hopes to “bring hip-hop in different languages and different cultures…more exposure.” and spark a “global conversation of women in hip-hop and beat making through this portal.”    

Since the success of “Nikki Nack,” Garbus has exercised how mainstream artists can potentially use their powers for good. Her philanthropist efforts in the past year and true love and respect of the music scene illustrate the folk ideologies her parents grew up on, exercised in the same vein as revivalist Pete Seeger. Constantly, Garbus is shifting the spotlight off of herself onto important issues and budding musicians, monopolizing on her notoriety to make others take notice.