Tens of thousands zines have been published in the last 45 years or so, since early punkers discovered self-publishing. But this is one of the only, and the best, documentary on zines there is. There should be more. $100 and a T-shirt.
Since 2007, I've tried probably 50 different blog ideas. Most sucked. But some didn't. My most successful blogs, in terms of readership, have been about Old School BMX freestyle. Guys (and a couple women), now in our late 40's and 50's, who got really into BMX trick riding in the 1980's, when it was a new sport. It doesn't get much more niche than that.
Yet, somehow, my best blogs together have clocked over 380,000 page views in 12 years. For real. My last main personal blog, Steve Emig; The White Bear (it's a BMX nickname, not anything racial), I retired about a year ago, when it hit 100,000 page views. Without really touching it, that blog has attracted about 24,000 more page views in the last year... just sitting there. It's about Old School BMX freestyle, a little Sharpie art, and my thoughts on economics and the future.
That's the power of blogs. If you put halfway decent thoughts in a blog, consistently, over a period of time, some people will check it out. Sometimes, A LOT of people will check it out. That blog is also the main one that's helped sell my Sharpie Scribble Style artwork across 12 or so states, maybe 10 countries, and on 6 of the 7 continents (still working on getting art to Antarctica and the International Space Station). And I was homeless nearly the whole 3 1/2 years that blog was being written.
Blogs (and zines) are a place to vent. They are a place to throw a new, or reasonably revamped, idea out into the world and see what people think. Blogs are a place to talk or write about those things that you are really into, and to find other people out there in the world who are also into those things. Blogs are a place to build a solid following as a writer, artist, performer, comic, or other type of creative person. Blogs are a place to write things off the top of your head, and ramble on about really niche topics. Blogs are a way to show the world things you think are cool, interesting, and need a little more attention. Blogs are a lot of things.
Best of all, blogs are one form of Constitutionally protected free speech (with a few minor limits), which I found out the hard way isn't popular in all parts of the United States. I've literally had a group of guys threaten me with baseball bats and clubs, because they didn't like my blog. It wasn't a particular thing I said they didn't like. They were mad (in a conservative Southern State that will remain nameless) because I was talking about a big recession I saw coming in the future, back in 2018. Obviously, everyone knew back in 2018 that we would never, ever have another recession, much less a major one. They were also mad because when people Googled that city (of about 250,000 people), a blog written by a homeless Sharpie artist came up in the top of the rankings. I told them, "It's not my fault you guys suck at blogging and social media, you have to EARN rankings on Google. Get on You Tube, learn how to do it, and get to work." That didn't go over well. But they decided not to beat me to a bloody pulp that night (about May 16th, 2018). Why? Because if I lived, they knew I would blog about the beating. Isn't it ironic, don'tcha think?
Anyhow, I love blogging. And blogging IS writing. It's not all writing, it's a particular type of writing, if you choose to write posts. You could shoot videos, talk at a camera, put them on YouTube, and also upload them to a blog, which is a good idea if you have a YouTube channel, BTW. Blogs are kinda like zines, but e-zines that the whole world can see. That's good in some ways, and bad in some ways. I like both blogs and zines, each in their own way. I began self-publishing as a zine guy in 1985, and blogging was pretty much inevitable, once I had time on my hands and a computer to use. For me, that happened in late 2008, when I was forced out of California and to North Carolina, very much to my dismay.
I first heard of zines in a FREESTYLIN' magazine article in late 1984, I think. I was a dorky high school senior in Boise, Idaho, and one of three serious BMX freestylers in that region. Our goofy little sport was brand new, and for some reason, the idea of publishing a zine about it appealed to me after reading that article. So I drew up some designs of what my zine would look like. Then, in my typical fashion at the time, I did nothing else, except talk about maybe doing a zine.
In late August of 1985, I finished my summer job at a little amusement park, called the Boise Fun Spot, and drove my 1971 Pontiac Bonneville land yacht to San Jose, California, where my family had moved in June. I promptly got a job at a local Pizza Hut, and tried to think of a way to find and meet all the good freestylers in the San Francisco Bay area (in the pre-internet days, meeting people you didn't know was much harder). I decided to publish a zine about BMX freestyle, and hand it out at local bike shops. It worked, and a month later, I was riding at a jam session with the Skyway factory team, the Curb Dogs, and the other local riders of the Bay Area.
Eleven issues of the zine landed me a job at FREESTYLIN' magazine (and BMX Action). At 20 years old, I was an editorial assistant, and the proofreader of, two national magazines... because I self-published a zine for a year. For real. That happened.
More than anything, my first zine, San Jose Stylin', taught me the power of following through on a creative idea, and finishing it. I've been self-publishing, on a regular basis, ever since. Much more on blogs, zines, and self-publishing coming in this blog. Oh, and if I die at the hands of someone in authority in the near future, it will probably be because of something I wrote in a blog. There are still a lot of people in this country to don't like the idea of free speech. I do. It's worth fighting for. If we lose free speech, we lose all other rights soon after. So go make a zine or write a blog. Publish something.
BMX freestyler, manager of the Boise Fun Spot, and a dork a couple months from becoming a zine publisher. Me, summer of 1985, at the Fun Spot. Photo by co-worker Vaughn Kidwell.
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