Politics Starbucks has sued Kieron Dwyer & successfully banned issue #0 of his LCD comics (Lowest Comic Denominator). The good news is, he's again allowed to post the parody logo that prompted the suit: members.tripod.com/~LowestComicD/ (he just isn't allowed to make any money off of it). It could have been worse. It could have been much worse . . .

MediaReader (issues one & two; autumn 1999 & undated). A dialogue between academics James Twitchell & Sut Jhally (pro- & con- ad), an expose of a PR campaign by Phillip Morris, & media as politics (issue one); interviews with Ralph Nader & John Stauber (PR Watch), the "drug war", & the phoniness of the "two party" system (issue two). Best of all, there's pieces by zine great Al Burian in each issue. No, wait. Best of all, it's free. But Burian's a close second (his collected Burn Collector is evidently available in book form & gets my highest recommendation). Record reviews. Ho-hum. Record ads. Hmm. They'll send you dozens of 'em for a few bucks if you'll give 'em away. Sounds like a pretty good system. 20 & 24 page tabloids. New addy: Dave Laney Box 641544 Chicago IL 60664. www.mediareader.org

Survivor (v. 11 #7 & v. 12 #4). Pretty god-awful. Pro-gun propaganda, with doses of multi-level-marketing. The 2 pages of "classified" style ads are the best part; some of the cartoons he clipped from right-wing papers are funny more or less by accident; that's about it. Suggested donation: $2. 20 standard pages. Evans, Apt 2E, 1115 45th Ave. Long Island City NY 11101

Anarchy: A Journal of Desire Armed (#50, Fall-Winter 2000-2001). This is certainly no competition for The Match!. (Mini-rave: "self-publishing at its best" -- me, in TPN #21. Send Fred Woodworth money right now. No, really. Box 3012 Tucson AZ 85702.) But it's gotten quite a bit better since I used to get it occasionally in the 80's. Maybe it's because there's more for them to cover now -- there's still much more than enough about bloviating theoreticians like Raoul Vaneigem & Murray Bookchin, thank you very much, but kids have also been taking to the streets in large numbers fairly often these days, so that's pretty cool. Time was, about all I'd read were the letters.

This particular issue also has a 8-page group interview with the AK Collective (publishers): the main reason I picked it up. The same outfit that does Anarchy also puts out the Alternative Press Review, which of course I wouldn't miss an issue of. Order one of those instead. If you love that, think about looking at one of these. 84 standard pages; $4.95. C.A.L. Press POB 1446 Columbia MO 65205.

2600 (Volume 17 ## 1-3). I resisted getting this "Hacker Quarterly" for years because I'm not hackish -- it looked much too technical to be of any interest. I was way wrong. I finally picked it up because of the cover story on the MPAA suit: 2600 is currently prohibited by judicial injunction from even posting a link on the web to sites providing programs to read your own DVDs. I couldn't believe it either. But wait, there's more. Their layout designer, Shape-Shifter (Terrence McGuckin) was busted at the Republican convention in Philly for using his cel phone & held for several days on half-a-million dollars bail. The charge was later dropped, but the damage was done -- so much for the right of assembly. So now I wouldn't miss an issue. It's just so fascinating watching your illusions of freedom going up in flames like this.

Yes, there's plenty of intricate techy stuff & I skip most of it. That leaves mostly the long letters sections & the legal stuff. Plenty good enough. For that matter, Shape-Shifter does sort of a lousy job & frequently uses backgrounds that cause me to skip stuff I might otherwise read. Too bad, too. But essentially beside the point. You should subscribe to this on general principle, just like you should join the ACLU. If you learn a little about the technology, what's the harm? 62 digest pages, $5. PO Box 752 Middle Island NY 11953. www.2600.com

slander (7, undated -- late 1999?). Mimi Nguyen is a zine legend -- with a column in Punk Planet, reviews in Maximum, & (though she'd rather I didn't mention it) an interview in V. Vale's Zines! (Vol. II), for example, in addition to her own zines. She even posts now & then in the Zinesters e-list, so I suppose this review could have appeared in that section instead. But the level of politics in the newsgroup is all too often at the level of "I can so be a feminist & wear makeup!", whereas Nguyen actually teaches women's studies & reads Foucault for fun & knows what the heck she's talking about.

In the issue at hand, she's becoming reconciled to Punk after a period of estrangement, travelling around with her boyfriend (fellow zine legend Mark Murrman of Sty & Shoot the Stars see IU #2), &, as always, thinking long & hard about race & gender issues. Which, it has to be said, usually make my eyes glaze over pretty quick. But not here. Think Patricia Williams for the zine set -- Nguyen is that good. Somebody get this kid a genius grant. No price: try $2. 80 mini pagges. POB 11906 Berkeley CA 94712.

Let's see, what else? Well, speaking of the blurry line between media & politics, I might as well take this small space to plug another favorite: Carrie McLaren's all-too-infrequent Stay Free! (see IU #4). $4 to Box 306 Prince St. Station NY NY 10012; www.stay-free.org