about those Amateur Press Associations

The roughly mid-90's and earlier (generally pre-Toonami, pre-anime boom) era of anime & manga fandom: early cons, clubs, tape trading, Nth Generation VHS fansubs, old magazines & fanzines, fandubs, ancient merchandise, rec.arts.anime, and more!
davemerrill
Posts: 1235
Joined: Sat Feb 18, 2012 3:38 pm
Anime Fan Since: 1984
Location: the YYZ
Contact:

about those Amateur Press Associations

Post by davemerrill »

the JAN thread kind of wandered off topic, so I am starting a new topic about APAs.

from the previous topic:
"APAs were similar to fanzines in that they were non-professional and printed in small press runs, but there the similarity ends - fanzines were intended to be sold to a general audience of anyone willing to buy a copy, while APAs were strictly for the members of the association. If an APA had fifteen members, there would be fifteen copies of any particular issue. Every member of the APA was responsible for printing their own submissions, so Bob would print fifteen copies of his contribution, and mail the copies to the central collator. The central collator would collate one copy of everyone's submissions into one combination package, and mail them back out to the members. Bob would get an issue of the APA with his contribution and the 14 other contributions from the 14 other members, which would include art, articles, conversations going back and forth between members about previous submissions, upcoming projects, items of interest, and what have you, all intended specifically for those fifteen or however many members of the APA."

One thing I wanted to expand upon in the earlier piece is that while APAs were essentially private clubs, joining an APA was a matter of writing the collator (or "official editor") with a note asking to join the APA. Most APAs would limit their members to a certain number and there might be a waiting list, but if there was space, most APAs were open to anyone who could meet the minimum activity requirements and keep their postage accounts in the black.

I wrote a piece in 2008 about APAs in general and the APA that I was a part of for the longest, the Animanga APA that lasted from 1986 until 2001, thereabouts.

http://letsanime.blogspot.com/2008/08/animanga-apa.html
User avatar
mbanu
Posts: 476
Joined: Wed Jan 11, 2017 3:26 am
Anime Fan Since: 2001

Re: about those Amateur Press Associations

Post by mbanu »

davemerrill wrote:
mbanu wrote:
From the perspective of someone who never experienced it, one of the most wonderful things about Old School fandom is that it is distinctly regional; clubs had characters of their own built on where they were located, and the resources available in that particular area.

For fans who grew up in the twilight days of anime clubs or after most of them had died, I think fandom is more like /r/anime on Reddit; a poster emerges from the primordial ooze and posts a picture of Lum dressed like Captain Harlock, no source. Is it original content? A repost? Was the poster a real person or an automated bot? It gets 5000 upvotes from other people, bots, or maybe the original poster using duplicate accounts... whatever the source, there is a number and it is going up not down, a number that means that it has attracted the interest of the semi-sentient thing that fandom has become, a mass of interests that exists outside of any Real World place.

Compared to that, seeing fans whose fandom is a product of the place they live, like an anime fandom terroir, is absolutely fascinating, so I can understand the temptation to want to keep location info in, although I agree that it is a privacy problem.

My only hope is that they don't end up being thrown out. (^_^;)
Unsure how the regional aspect of fandom comes into play here: APAs were not at all limited to any particular region. I was in APAs with people from all over the United States and Canada, with a smattering of fans in places like Japan and Mexico.
As someone viewing them from the outside, APAs sort of remind me of those anime shows where they assemble a team of heroes from across the globe to work on something and each member has some sort of crazy cosplay, but then over the course of the show they visit that member's home region and everyone there dresses that way. (^_^;) I mean, an APA might have contributions all talking about the work of Megumi Hayashibara or whatever, but beyond that the contributions were all really unique in a way that I don't see very often in the standardized all-internet fandom forums people use today, not just in opinions but even down to little details like the font of their word processor.

I guess that assuming that APA contributors were always associated with clubs was a bias of mine from digging up info on old clubs; whenever I saw a familiar name, it was usually because it was connected to a club. (Was it hard for lone individuals to find out about APAs if they weren't already connected to anime fandom somehow?)

I suppose I started seeing them as the voice of a particular anime perspective that would likely be shared by anyone from their club, since each club would have been built using its own pool of shows available to them locally or through the tape trade avenues they knew about, its own set of local Japanese shops to look for merchandise, and just the general vibe of their particular social circle that would make it so that if you brought up the same show in two clubs, one would end up talking about mech designs while the other ended up talking about cosplay opportunities. (^_^) So in an APA about the same topic, it seems like you would get a diversity of viewpoints, rather than in a Reddit style forum where everyone is pushing towards finding the dominant and definitive opinion on any subject that will get the most upvotes from the world as a whole, The One True Right Answer to any anime question.

I'm probably looking at it in a rose-tinted sort of way; I imagine that without the discussion dampening effect of thousands of angry downvotes, you'd have ended up with some truly white-hot flamewars. (^_^;) Did the smaller size and less anonymous nature of APAs keep their flamewars from reaching rec.arts.anime proportions, or was it cancelled out by the extra time between mailings allowing people to stew over whatever was frustrating them?
mbanu: What's between Old School and New School?
runesaint: Hmmm. "Middle School", perhaps?
davemerrill
Posts: 1235
Joined: Sat Feb 18, 2012 3:38 pm
Anime Fan Since: 1984
Location: the YYZ
Contact:

Re: about those Amateur Press Associations

Post by davemerrill »

APAs could be focused or unfocused. Minds Eye would be stories and art and articles about ESPer anime (Towards The Terra, Locke The Superman), Bird Scramble was a Gatchaman APA. USA Yatsura was an Urusei Yatsura APA. APA Hasshin was a general anime fandom APA. Animanga started as a general anime fandom APA but moved towards a focus on artists - though some members were not artists and never did any art.

There were Animanga members who were in anime clubs and members who weren't. Some members went to conventions, others did not. There wasn't any defining characteristic of an APA member, other than it being someone who could deliver thirty copies of a document every three months.

Of course, some APAs were based around specific locations. The SF fans at Swarthmore College had (perhaps still have) an APA called "SWAPA" and I think the membership is limited to current and former Swarthmore students.

APAs would be listed in the fandom directory sections of newsletters and zines, sometimes they'd advertise with flyers, but generally new members would join because a friend was already a member and they learned about it that way.

And there were some amazingly angry flame wars in APAs. Just as snarly as anything on rec.arts.anime. The arguments just took longer to burn through.
davemerrill
Posts: 1235
Joined: Sat Feb 18, 2012 3:38 pm
Anime Fan Since: 1984
Location: the YYZ
Contact:

Re: about those Amateur Press Associations

Post by davemerrill »

Also wanna say that there was pretty wide diversity among the members, at least that's my experience; we didn't all like the exact same shows or the exact same art styles. Some Animanga members weren't even anime fans, which is something that I never quite grasped the utility of, but I think there were people who liked the social aspects, or just liked being in a bunch of different APAs, or something.

Just like today, people would flame each other (I remember the phrase "flame war" being used to describe the feuds that would erupt in APA comments) and members would team up to argue against another member, etc. Members would get into political fights, fights about their favorite cartoons, fights about whether "furry" was a legitimate artistic thing or a deviant blind alley, fights about whether hentai manga/anime should be permitted or not, you name it, people would fight over it.

Heck, I think the big furry APA "Rowrbazzle" is still around. As I recall, the big hentai anime-fan APA was "Lemon APA".
davemerrill
Posts: 1235
Joined: Sat Feb 18, 2012 3:38 pm
Anime Fan Since: 1984
Location: the YYZ
Contact:

Re: about those Amateur Press Associations

Post by davemerrill »

other APAs from the memory banks:

Sasha APA was a general anime APA run by New Jersey fans, I know Rob Fenelon & Walter Amos were members. Lasted quite a while.

There was a Lensman APA, for fans of both the anime and the original novels. Didn't last too long.

Starsha APA was a Space Battleship Yamato APA started by EDC founder Derek Wakefield. It was a general Yamato fan APA for a bit and then changed into a shared universe fan fiction APA, its name changed to "Weird APA", and then it suddenly halted when one of the contributors did a stretch in jail for kiddy porn.

This is one of those situations where I have to keep reminding myself that these APAs were private and that the crazy, lurid cheesecake fanart posted in those APAs by a future sex offender wasn't meant for general distribution, and that as much as I would love to post this stuff on Twitter or Tumblr and mock it, well, I'm not going to do that.

Similarly, there are people whose political, religious, and ethical positions changed radically over the years, and as tempting as it was to dig up their left-wing rants from two decades back to embarrass their current right-wing selves, the bottom line is that those were privileged communications. Making that material public is not my call to make.

There are other people in those APAs who have since changed their names, who have since changed their genders (Animanga was ahead of the curve on that one!) and who otherwise have been through a lot of life changes, both good and bad, since then. Digging up their 1990 selves for the world to gawk at, well, that's tacky.
SteveH
Posts: 645
Joined: Thu Apr 25, 2013 10:30 am
Anime Fan Since: 1979/82 (depending)
Location: Michigan and the Sea of Stars
Contact:

Re: about those Amateur Press Associations

Post by SteveH »

I feel the need to expound on some aspects of APAs that may not be obvious to the newer generations and we of the older line just assume from history and context and thus don't mention. :)

The unspoken question is "Why would an APA have a limit on members?"

The answer is cost. Cost to the members.

One of the most critical aspects of the APA was the postage fund. Every member was expected to put cash money in the hands of the collator for the purpose of paying for stamps and envelops. These accounts would be tallied every issue and if someone had a low or empty postage fund they would be advised to get some money in ASAP or they would be either dropped or just held back pending their account being made current.

And you had to keep a good balance in the account. Since the size and weight of each issue was a complete variable one couldn't assume "Each issue will cost $2.00 USD to ship" or anything like that.

Non-payment of cash into the postage fund was probably the single worst offense possible.

And woe to the collator who taps into that fund for personal reasons and is unable to ship the APA in a timely manner! Because EVERYTHING hinges on the collator being the most responsible person in the group. Keeping accounts straight. Buying the stamps and sturdy envelops. Making address labels. Getting the stack of stuff to the post office.

How much slack a collator would allow was, of course, dependent on the financial stability of the collator. Having a decent job and available funds they might let a tribbing member slide for an issue or two. Living on the edge and ONLY the postage fund money is available the rules would be harsh and unforgiving. No monee no shipee. :)

So to be a functioning member of an APA you had to a. Produce output of a kind that fits the general overall tone of the APA. b. Be able to afford to reproduce x number of copies (not everyone could take advantage of working in a printing shop DAVE ;) ) of said 'trib. c. Be able to ship that bundle of 'trib' to the collator and d. Have cash you can spare to leave in the hands of the collator for shipping the completed APA back to you.

It doesn't sound like that much, does it? You'd be surprised how having, say, $25 USD on hand for, oh, let's say quarterly basis for that process can sometimes be difficult.

Then there's the whole stressing over actually creating a 'trib in the face of other members who are just DRIPPING with crazy skill and talent. But that's more a personal issue I suspect. :)
SteveH
Posts: 645
Joined: Thu Apr 25, 2013 10:30 am
Anime Fan Since: 1979/82 (depending)
Location: Michigan and the Sea of Stars
Contact:

Re: about those Amateur Press Associations

Post by SteveH »

Arrgh I hate I can't edit!

The thing is, with the size of a completed APA being a complete variable, money from the postage account could drain in a heartbeat.

If one member sends in a 100 page 'trib (8 1/2 x 11 standard weight copy paper) while everyone else is submitting 'tribs on average 10 pages or less, that's a hefty bundle to ship. If HALF of the membership (oh, call it 10) submits 40 page 'tribs, that one guy is still cranking out 100 pages of content and the remaining 4 do whatever they can suddenly you're dealing with Special Moose levels of postage. That eats into the postage account like nobody's business.

Mind, it's a rare thing, I don't think I recall any in Animanga doing 100 pages but I do remember some giant 'tribs. Not by me, Noooo. I was usually a 'minac' (minimum activity) guy. :)
davemerrill
Posts: 1235
Joined: Sat Feb 18, 2012 3:38 pm
Anime Fan Since: 1984
Location: the YYZ
Contact:

Re: about those Amateur Press Associations

Post by davemerrill »

That is a great point about the mailing accounts, Steve. Back when I was OE of Animanga I was using "media mail" to ship out the APAs, and that was mighty cheap, even for back then, but a larger-than-usual APA would indeed cost more to mail.

Generally there was enough cushion in the fund to float one or two members whose accounts were in the red for an issue or so, and I don't think mailing costs ever got above $10 per person for a year. It was pretty low cost entertainment.

In terms of minimum and maximum size contributions, I can't think of an APA that ever had a "maximum", copies were just too dang pricey back then.

I was not working in a photocopy type print shop for most of Animanga's time - I didn't get my first Xerox equipment job until the late 1990s - but there *were* some Animanga members who DID have unlimited access to scanners, high-speed duplicating equipment, and bindery machinery, and that resulted in some absolutely gigantic APAs every once in awhile. Most of this would be reprints of articles, it wouldn't all be original work.

If there had been a maximum size limit for contributions, he would have been the cause of it, I think. He also had access to a mail meter and sometimes I would literally get boxes full of stuff he'd scanned and printed dozens and dozens of copies of, just for the heck of it, because he could print and ship for free and he worked midnights and apparently nobody looked at the meter readings.
davemerrill
Posts: 1235
Joined: Sat Feb 18, 2012 3:38 pm
Anime Fan Since: 1984
Location: the YYZ
Contact:

Re: about those Amateur Press Associations

Post by davemerrill »

more ramblings:

the variety of tribs ("contributions") was always a plus - not only the content, but people would print on different colored paper, different sizes, etc. Some tribs would be folded booklets, some would be stapled, a few times somebody would make a poster-sized thing. Sometimes an artist would get a good deal on color copies. Sometimes somebody would get promo copies of a professional comic and send those along.

One of our members had his own photocopy machine that would accept red toner as a secondary toner, so he produced really nicely done two-color pieces.

I was lucky enough to salvage five or six boxes of manila envelopes from a job, and I used those envelopes for at least ten years for mailings of every conceivable kind, including APA mailings.

The Post Office really didn't like it when you showed up with twenty-three identical envelopes all going media mail to different places. I got the stinkeye more than once.

In the early days of the APA members did use the APA to trade tapes and fan-socialize; a few members would include their tape lists with their tribs. Being in Animanga meant you had somebody to talk to if you found yourself at a con in Los Angeles or Chicago or Chattanooga or Atlanta, you knew at least one person in the crowd and had something to talk about.

Just like with the later internet, you never REALLY knew if the person writing that APA trib was exactly as he or she was presenting him or herself. There were a few Animanga members whose tribs kind of blurred the line between reality and self-insert fan fiction, and to this day I do not know if they were executing a long-term tall-tale prank, if they actually believed the outlandish stories they were telling about themselves, or if it actually was all true. I'll probably never know.
SteveH
Posts: 645
Joined: Thu Apr 25, 2013 10:30 am
Anime Fan Since: 1979/82 (depending)
Location: Michigan and the Sea of Stars
Contact:

Re: about those Amateur Press Associations

Post by SteveH »

Thanks for the corrections and confirmations, Dave. All I recall was I had a tough time keeping my mailing account up to snuff and making copies (weird that the SNL skit is far enough in the past to be mostly forgotten...) was just a horrendous task.

This is pre-Computer. I had to type my 'trib, cut and paste photocopied material to illustrate things, all just horrible, horrible work to me. Thank GOD for the Mac and Desktop Publishing and all that.

(I should clarify. I actually enjoy old school production work, with glue and tape and X-Acto blades a-cutting. I just hate typing. Hate it. Even the ease of modern computer word processing is somewhat agonizing because I just don't feel I get all of my 'voice' into my writing. In a perfect world speech-to-text would be 100% perfect ala Star Trek and I could just talk and talk and talk my essays and blathering. :) )

So I didn't do well when it came to 'tribbing. I did always enjoy getting the new issue because of the cool stuff Dave, Danno, Ed, Bruce, others would put together. And I had a sick fascination for the 'trib that Dave obliquely references, which was a truly odd story indeed. Part of me wishes that it was all true, the guy WAS some kind of Government dude that lived in exotic places and raced F-1 cars and flew jet fighters and on and on.

Funny thing. 'Zine culture seems to hang in there, maybe because of the cache of respect for a quasi-professional hardcopy physical media object Vs. mayfly online stuff, but I don't think I've ever heard anyone today say "Ya know, I think I'll start an APA".
Post Reply