Wednesday, December 21, 2005

James N. Dawson

Thanks for the notice [that Challenger #22 was on-line].

I clicked on www.challzine.net and it came up. When I tried to click on 2 of the first items in the table of contents, they each came of "this page cannot be displayed" (PCNBD).

I managed to bring up the 3rd one, but when I called up Print Preview so I could see how many pages it was to decided whether I wanted to actually print it out, it got stuck on page one and I couldn't even scroll down with it to go to the next page.

This morning I thought I'd try it again, called up challzine, and I got another PCNBD.

Yes, I could haul out a manual or try to wade through some on-line "Help" page or pages, but that's a tiresome and time consuming chore and completely negates, for me, the whole concept of reading a zine, and that's to relax. With a paper zine I just pick it up and with my thumb and forefingers (functionally, in my opinion, so much easier and more efficient than a "mouse") and start reading ­ preferably in a relaxing, reclining position. No wrestling with glitches and struggling to decipher cryptic, technicalese "error messages", just to "turn the page".

Okay, I'm not trying to complain or be down on you ­ I appreciate your notice and maybe I'll get to Challenger if and when I have the time and determination ­ but I just wanted to try to explain, at least partly, why some of us "still do (and much prefer) paper zines.”

No need to explain that to me. I infinitely prefer paperzines myself. In fact, if I had my way I’d be cranking this thing out on mimeotone and sending it to every faned, SF club, BNF, cute girl, and fan-friendly pro in the English-speaking world. Not to mention running it through SFPA.

But I can’t have my way ­ I work for poor people and simply earn too little to print and distribute sufficient paper copies of Challenger. I’ll continue to run Chall on the web and offer print copies to those who can help print them. Better than that I cannot do.

Your woes have been duely noted. I changed my method and uploaded all of the new challzine issue in one fell swoop. In the future, please let me know if you experience problems with any pages. I may be able to help you and you will certainly be helping me if there is a problem. Thanks! ~ challzine webmaster ;-p

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