Punk Planet zine has announced their own death today, halting printing due to a variety of difficulties in the past few years. Here’s some of the statement, all of which can be found here;

Dear Friends,As much as it breaks our hearts to write these words, the final issue of Punk Planet is in the post, possibly heading toward you right now. Over the last 80 issues and 13 years, we’ve covered every aspect of the financially independent, emotionally autonomous, free culture we refer to as “the underground.” In that time we’ve sounded many alarms from our editorial offices: about threats of co-optation, big-media emulation, and unseen corporate sponsorship. We’ve also done everything in our power to create a support network for independent media, experiment with revenue streams, and correct the distribution issues that have increasingly plagued independent magazines. But now we’ve come to the impossible decision to stop printing, having sounded all the alarms and reenvisioned all the systems we can. Benefit shows are no longer enough to make up for bad distribution deals, disappearing advertisers, and a decreasing audience of subscribers.

It’s a sad day for independent media, because Punk Planet has, for years, been a great resource not only for punk music but also hip-hop, metal, political activism, and literature.
Though some of us might say that it’s just an inevitable step forward due to technological growth and the expanding flexibility of independent media online, it’s still sad. Paper zines have been a staple of punk rock forever, and in the days of media conglomeration, News Corp, and whatnot, it was pretty cool to still see non-mainstream paper media surviving. Not anymore, though.

Tags: Punk Planet, zines //