In a letter to its subscribers, Punk Planet’s publisher Dan Sinker listed a handful of reasons why the respected indie-culture zine threw in the towel after 13 years and 80 issues.

“Benefit shows are no longer enough to make up for bad distribution deals, disappearing advertisers and a decreasing audience of subscribers,” he wrote in the letter published on the magazine’s Web site.

And while Punk Planet may be the most recognized publication to fold lately, there is a disturbing amount of independent magazines that have recently closed, gone on hiatus or stopped printing and moved online.

This new and growing graveyard of niche publications – the ones on the margins of the industry that serve as voices for the many cultural issues out of the mainstream – now unfortunately begs an important question: Will the independent press survive in print?

Brooklyn-based Stay Free!, which focused on American consumer culture is one of the latest casualties. Its publisher Carrie McClaren says: “Selling ads has gotten all but impossible. Indie record labels and small book publishers – our bread and butter – are in the toilet. Ditto newsstand sales. No one goes to book stores looking for zines anymore; the nerds are all online.”

To be sure, the internet is partly to blame. “It makes editorial content — and bands — easy to find, for free,” Sinker wrote.

This is certainly not new news, but much of the substance that was once unique to independent publications has become so readily available on the internet that anyone, including those who publish big, slick commercial magazines, can scoop it. In other words, thanks to the internet, what was fringe and underground has now become ubiquitous.

Eric Levin, owner of Criminal Records in Atlanta, one of the few retailers in town where you can pick up Punk Planet and other indie pubs, says the retail tier is also feeling the pinch.
“We are definitely in a similar situation in the music business,” he said. “Labels both small and large are shuttering left and right.”

While indie record labels and other potential advertisers are also looking elsewhere to stretch their meager budgets, independent magazine distributors are either collapsing or being bought out by bigger publishing houses.

In Punk Planet’s case, their distributor, the Independent Press Association, declared bankruptcy in January and left their distribution network in shambles. Magazine distributors work by serving as a logistical middle-man. The publisher sends copies to the distributor, and then the distributor gets them to newsstands. The magazine that aren’t bought – which is usually about half – oftentimes get their covers ripped off by the distributors and are ignominiously tossed aside. Money lost.

Moreover, the way the system is set up, publishers won’t get paid from newsstand sales until long after an issue hits the streets, which further tightens a publisher’s financial belt.

“And while I once welcomed the challenge of making things work on a tight budget,” says McClaren, “I just can’t bring myself to beg another distributor to pay us the money they owe – or to beg more local stores to let us leave out free magazines.”

Shortly after the Independent Press Association went under, Publishers Group West, the independent book distributor whose clients included McSweeney’s and others, also went belly up.

But, and here’s the shred of good news about all of this, in response to their call for help – a sale and auction of such things as a painting by Dave Eggers of George W. Bush as a double amputee – fans and admirers of McSweeney’s came through and helped it shore up a debt of around $130,000.

While Levin admits that the state of independent publishing looks pretty grim, he notes that in his case, the work is honest, vital and worth the risk.

“The overall picture is pretty dark,” he said, “As long as the notion that art and journalism is free exists, it will be very difficult for the producers of art to get compensated. The damage behind this notion is already being shown. Every day it’s a constant ‘choice’ to open or close, but I feel a strong need to continue striving for the dream, even if it is exceptionally tough.”

The independent press has pretty much always been a labor of love, and there’s still an amazing amount of print journalism and criticism out there. Perhaps these recent closings are symptomatic, or, perhaps, there is an entirely new model that can be developed to resuscitate this very important industry?

“I don’t know,” says Levin. “I live like a hobo, but I’m living the dream. Is that the way for independent magazines to overcome the inherent financial obstacles? Live like a hobo?

“I guess so,” he says.

William Inman is editor of Dry Ink Magazine. Write to him at william@dryinkmag.com