Manual · 24 May 2002
Some months ago a proposal was circulated among a number of web writers, including
Joshua Allen
Gail Armstrong
Jon Armstrong
Rosecrans Baldwin
Michael Barrish
Kevin Fanning
Paul Ford
Kevin Guilfoile
Jason Gurley
Heather B. Hamilton
Leslie Harpold
Scott David Herman
Dennis A. Mahoney
Alexis Massie
Magdalen Powers
Tobias Seamon
Andrew Womack
and myself. The proposal was to write pieces unified by a central theme, to be gathered up and presented in some fashion. It took awhile to arrive at an idea upon which the majority could agree; eventually the contributors acquiesced to take the concept of ‘how to’ as a starting point, then proceed in any damn way they liked.
Everyone, except for me, finished their pieces in a timely fashion, and thus it turned out to be a rather good collection. The question of distribution arose: would it be a book, a zine, another cursed website? I proposed designing it as an Acrobat PDF that would be available from each of our sites, downloaded, printed out and enjoyed, ideally, away from the computers that usually deliver what we do. In a bath, say, or a hammock, where the familiar distractions of desk life are less everywhere.
And then I took for fucking ever to get it done – a detail that will be unsurprising to many. Nonetheless, here at last:
“Manual” (203 Kb, PDF)
Please enjoy. Just not onscreen.
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