Contents, fund appeal

Your table of contents has been pre-empted by the following plea for feedback & support.

Every edition of Fifth Estate could be our last. This issue, originally scheduled for summer, did not hit the press until early September, thus making it our Fall 2006 edition; subscribers and distributors, please take note. Back in June, when this issue was due, our bank account was depleted, and our volunteers needed a break. But thanks to all the writers and artists who gave us material and to all the readers who answered our perennial plea for funds, we can publish another time. Without the contributions of art, prose, and cash, we would not exist.

Since the turn of the century, many underground ‘zines and nonprofit publications have left the world of print and have gone online. But we have been slow to put content on the Internet. Many of our readers and writers actually reject pure electronic mediation entirely and would not be with us if we were an online project. Even as some of us write personal blogs or maintain websites, we take pride in keeping our print magazine alive.

As a publishing group, we’re currently in flux, with a small group of editors agreeing to keep the Fifth Estate afloat by rotating responsibilities. Production for this installment took place in Tennessee. The next issue will come from New York. Detroit will be back with the Spring 2007 edition. As of now, we’re postponing raising our prices or abandoning plans to come out quarterly. But if the desire to maintain our schedule will be a reality, we need sustainers, subscribers, appreciative readers, and volunteers. Let us know what you like about FE and what else you would like to see within our pages.

While regular pleas such as this are part of radical publishing, they do not dampen our enthusiasm for the content of this project--the ideas within these pages that are a core part of our lives and our recklessly persistent devotion to a new world.

Featured artists this issue:

James Koehnline: Front & Back Covers (http://www.koehnline.com/)

Viva Bonobo Centerfold and art featured on pages 17–27 and 42–43.

One1three Collage on pages 14–15 and 34–38

The Fifth Estate is a cooperative, non-profit, anti-authoritarian project published since 1965 by a volunteer collective of friends and comrades. We often hold divergent views on the opinions expressed within this magazine--but all share an anti-authoritarian perspective, both as critique and vision. We also have a commitment to non-dogmatic, action-oriented writing and activity to bring about a new world. As opposed to professionals who publish to secure wages, or those who invest in the media information industry, we produce this magazine as an expression of our resistance to an unjust and destructive society.

No copyright. No paid staff. No advertisements.

In Detroit: Fifth Estate, PO Box 201016, Ferndale, MI 48220

Pumpkin Hollow/bolo bonobo: Fifth Estate, PO Box 6, Liberty TN 37095

Email: fe — at — fifthestate — dot — org

Web site: http://fifthestate.org