What the Hell Is a Zine?
A zine is a small, self-published work that someone — usually one person, sometimes a tiny group — made because they had something to say and couldn't be bothered to wait for permission. That's the whole definition. Everything past that is style.
Zines can be writing, comics, essays, art, collage, poetry, manifestos, recipes, gardening advice, sex education, instructions for surviving a bad job, field notes on a swamp, love letters to dead media, or a tiny rant about how the bus is never on time. They can be one folded page or one hundred. They can be photocopied at Kinko's at 11pm or printed on the printer at your office when no one's looking (we don't endorse this. we don't not endorse this either).
A very short history
Zines come out of a long tradition of people making things in their kitchens and basements and putting them in other people's hands. Sci-fi fanzines in the 1930s. Civil rights pamphlets. Riot grrrl zines in the 90s. Perzines (personal zines) written by lonely 16-year-olds in suburbs with photocopiers. Mail art networks. Tape trade scenes. Anarchist pamphlets. Queer zines. Sober punk zines. Grandma's church newsletter is, in a real way, a zine.
The point is: independent publishing is older than the internet, and it's outlived every platform it's been compared to.
So what makes something a zine?
Honestly, very little. Some loose markers:
- Self-published. No publisher. No agent. No editor (unless that's your friend).
- Small print run. Five copies, fifty copies, a few hundred — not millions.
- Personal voice. A zine sounds like a person, not a brand.
- Cheap to make. Paper, a copier, a stapler. Maybe glue.
- Physical, usually. PDFs exist (and we like them), but the smell of toner is part of the experience.
If you printed it, folded it, and handed it to someone — congratulations, it's a zine.
What zines are not
Zines are not blog posts. They're not newsletters. They're not "content." Those things are fine — we like blog posts! you're reading one! — but they live inside platforms that count things and sort things and reward things and punish things. A zine has nothing to count. It just exists in someone's hands.
Zines also don't have to be "good" in any objective sense. There's no quality bar. There's no committee. If it's ugly and weird and means something to the person who made it, that's enough. Imperfect is alive.
Why zines still matter
Because they are small. Because they are slow. Because they are physical. Because they don't need an algorithm. Because they survive when platforms die. Because they pass hand to hand. Because they give a person — any person, including you, including the version of you that thinks you "don't have anything to say" — permission to make a thing without permission.
You don't need a publisher. You don't need followers. You don't need a personal brand. You don't need to be good at "content." You just need an idea and a copier.
Okay so how do I make one?
We wrote a whole separate piece on this — Make the Weird Little Thing. The short version: take one piece of paper. Fold it. Write on it. Photocopy it. Mail it. Done.