• QuarterlyZine

TomHiggins suggested PersonalTelco start a zine. Adam thinks once a quarter would be about right for publishing it.

Here's a proposed table of contents written by TomHiggins for the first zine due out sometime in Q1 2003.

1. Letter from the Chief (that's you adam, think of something like the holiday party address to the masses and a general intro)

   • AdamShand will do this.

2. Wifi 101 - a basic history, terms, where things came from , where they are now.

   • TomHiggins will do this. Much of the content will come from the wiki.

3. How To Connect to PTP Nodes - (basically what's in the GetConnected ads but fleshed out, maybe some testimonials on how easy it is, examples for linux/win/mac)

4. My First Node -Steps to Building a Better Tomorrow Today- the basics of what it means to set up a node (platform unspecific), the options (now get OS specific) and the hardware. Not too techy, but enough to get started
5. Antenna Mojo -Tech article on antenna basics, with each issue getting into the tech aspects of particular setups

6. The Centerfold (sexy pics of Piourette cans (with plans), Weatherproofed gear, the guts of the ptp truck ¹, etc etc)

7. Ask ProfessorKnowItAll - questions from email, irc, etc answered by our resident staff of bigbrainians

8. Resources - basic list of other wireless projects , maybe a spotlight article or two, lists of urls
9. PTP Happenings - meeting schedules, long term plans, contact info
10. Back cover with some more cool pics of geekly wireless stuff

Additional or future articles

• Wireless and security -- ShaneGibson

Layout

If we keep it to 28-32 pages of content that would that would come out to 7-8 sheets of 8x11 with 4 pages of zine on each (2 front 2 back). I think with the rate the tech is moving, the expansion of a scene that wants to learn, and the prolific writings of some of our members we can easily do up a great zine this way.

Anyone who wants to do art, photos, images, etc.. start gathering them up and getting them ready. A good zine is about words but pics help greatly to make the words go down.

As to printing, I can handle doing about 40 copies or so of the zine IF we keep everything but the cover and back to black and white. The color cover and back I can get done in limited runs from a bud, but the while thing would be too much to do in color. I tried doing one issue of Countermoves in full color and nearly called it quits. Also, if you keep it to BandW I bet more than a few folks can squeeze off 10 or so copies from work related resources.

I also have one of them bigassed swingline staplers for stapling the beasts. Its not my original zine stapler, but it has the right mojo. If anyone else has one of them maybe we can get together a zine stapling party at my place. Ill even make dip:)- I have found in the past that a print run of about 150 to 200 can be done up this way in a night.

One Zine, Multiple Formats -- The Nitty Gritty of Zine Building

I have done a few zines and am currently putting a strategy board game zine out called Countermoves ( http://countermoves.blogspot.com/ ). Here is a way I have found to make one zine come out in multiple formats.

I start with just the text. I turn any images that are essential to an article into ascii (charts, boards, etc) when I can. All the proofing of words, syntax, grammar, spelling etc are done at this level. I then mold the basic zine as an ascii file, perfect for posting to usenet, bbs, or your fave ph!l3z drop.

Then I move up to Open Office. I pour the ascii into a zine template I made(page sizes, margins, gutters , etc all set up ). From there I add the presentational touches (fonts, tables, images, captions, etc). I save it up in OO format.

From there I run it thru PDFCreator which turns it into a PDF. This is the display PDF. The pages run sequentially.

I run the OO file thru PDFCreator again but this time set up for the Print Ready PDF output. The print ready PDF file has the pages set up right so all the end-user needs do is print all the even number pages, turn the paper over and put the stack back into their printer, and print all the odd pages.. Folks with duplex printers wont have to do the turn step.

HTML can be {?} had by saving the OO file to HTML and touching up what OO is bad at. Fairly simple and painless.

So there you have it.. start with simple ascii and build it up to whatever formats are needed. One source, many outputs.

I think that's a GREAT idea! The Newsletter could use any of the content Don and I have at dailywireless.org - Sam Churchill

I can help by filling most layout and design needs for this, and also (if so needed) i have connections with several printers around town if we ever wanted to make a large run of this. -Dan Davis

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