We’re nearing the end of International Zine Month! Here’s a recap of week 4:

Day 19 – Zine Distro Appreciation Day! Tell people about your favorite zine distros! Order zines from a distro. Didn’t we just cover distros? I’m feeling a little bit of déjà-zine. 😉 That being said, there’s never a wrong time to talk about shoppin’ for zines. My local distro Neither/nor – who I featured during Week 2’s distro prompt – is fantastic, and I also really love buying zines from Portland Button Works, Wasted Ink, and Vampire Hag.

Day 20 – Tell someone about something you learned in a zine. This prompt was a great opportunity to feature a zine I was sent to review: “The Content Cipher” by Ellie Reis. This handy guide to intellectual property rights breaks down the ins and outs of everything from copyright law to NFTs. Before reading this zine, I couldn’t tell you the difference between a trademark and a copyright — and I certainly couldn’t tell you how either actually protected a work of art from theft and forgery — but now IP rights are a lot less mysterious and it all makes a lot more sense. This guide is a quick read, but it’s packed with info and has some great layout design to boot. Check it out!

Day 21 – Zine Library Day! Search for a zine library in your area and make plans to go someday or contact them about how to include your zine in their collection. Or attend their virtual Zine Librarian UnConference. I got a really lovely surprise on this day: I learned that three of my zines have been added to the Zine Archive at the Museum of Contemporary Witchcraft. I had to pinch myself when I first got the news… what an honor! (And big thanks to Alex Wrekk for making it happen. 💜) My zines are also in the LaBudde Special Collections at UMKC, as well as in the Denver Zine Library (which I blogged about all the way back in 2017), and I have plans to submit them to even more zine libraries… I just gotta carve out the time to send them in!

Day 22 – Check out YouTube channels about zines! I’m ashamed to say that I didn’t know of many zine Youtube channels before IZM. While I’m a video creator, and a daily Youtube watcher, my tastes usually skew towards makeup hauls and Good Mythical Morning. But I’ve been diving into Zinetube this month, and I’ve been loving the videos I’ve found. I especially dig Twenty Two Zines and Coin-Operated Press’ zine vlogs.

Oh, and while we’re on the topic, I’ve gotta plug my own Zine Youtube channel here! I’ve only uploaded two videos thus far, but so many more are on the way… and if you subscribe, you’ll be the first to know when new episodes drop.

Day 23 – Check out a zine distro you have never ordered from before. I didn’t get a chance to check out a new zine distro on Day 23, so I’m leaving the comments to this post open: let me know what zine distros you’ve been loving and I might just pick up some zines from them. 🙂

Day 24 – Teach yourself a new zine skill like a new binding technique or how to make a 1 page zine. I celebrated Day 24 by teaching zine skills to others; I taught a “Zines as Activism” workshop at Soulcentricitea, a local tea shop here in KC. It was a blast! The turn out was a little light (given the pandemic, I’m not too surprised by that), but the students who did show up were delightful, and together we worked on drafting outlines for activist zines.

Day 25 – Send your zine out for review to a website or magazine that does reviews. This prompt is a great chance to remind you that I’m always accepting zines for review on the @zinereviews instagram! Check out my submission guidelines and then send ’em on in… I’d love to read your zines!