Call for pages!

Paged Out! hosts on its pages articles showing cool tricks & tips, small projects, cheatsheets, and so much more. And they are all entertaining, informative, and (sometimes) deeply technical.

One article == one page!

It is a challenge to take a topic and chip away at it until only the essentials remain to make it fit the format. But we’ve also heard that this is what’s fun about it.

We're constantly looking for one-page articles for new issues of Paged Out! If you're interested in writing one (or more) articles for us, you'll find all the needed information (linked) below.

Don't know where to start, check out our previous issues and read the cool articles we've already published.

Writing articles for Paged Out!

The process explained in 5 simple steps!

If you have any questions after reading this, visit FAQ, the Writing Articles page or contact us at articles@pagedout.institute.

Step 1: (unskippable cutscene)

Please visit Writing Articles! That page is content-packed with technical details, policies, and requirements regarding size and fonts. It makes for a long read, but it will make the writing/submission and review process run much smoother.

Step 2: Write (or draw) the article

This is the most important step! Here are a few things to keep in mind:

  • one article == one page
  • If you have a topic in mind but are not sure if it is suitable for Paged Out!, check out the Writing Articles page or contact us and we’ll take a look at it for you.
  • Authors are responsible for the layout of the article. (Wait, what? The author has to do the layout? That's... unusual. Here is why.) But do not worry, we are offering ready-to-use templates here
  • Read your article once it is written, share it with your friends if you think it needs some feedback or proofreading before submitting it.
  • And most importantly - have fun!

Note: If you would prefer to have someone from the Paged Out! Institute look at the article early (e.g. before you spend time on the layout, or even to just discuss the topic you have in mind), feel free to contact us at any time.

Step 3: Check your licensing options. We will ask you about the chosen license in our standard Author’s Form (we will send you a link to it once we pre-approve your article).

To publish the article, we require a license (don't worry, we want *you* to keep the ownership of the article).

Here are some options to consider:

  1. You can use a selected variant of the Paged Out! Standard Author's Agreement.
  2. You can use a variant of everyone's favorite CC license (please note that we do need a "for commercial use" variant - see why).
  3. If you really don't care, you can always go with CC0 or "Do What The F*ck You Want To Public License" :).
  4. If none of the above options work for you, feel free to propose another license - in this case please contact us early to discuss the details.

Note: The first option allows the author to (if the author wishes so and all the criteria for eligibility are met) share in the issue's profit (if any) - as mentioned in several places: this is a not-for-profit project (though it is managed by a company, see the About page for more details), but we will take steps for it to be self-sustainable (more information), and this might generate some extra money to be paid out in the form of license fees. In all honesty, these will probably be really small sums, but still we wanted authors to have this option.

Step 4: Submit your article

Your article is ready? Send it to us at articles@pagedout.institute as a PDF (for articles) or PNG (for art) see Writing Articles for details. When sending the email, use the title of your article as the subject of the message.

Here is what happens once you do.

  • Once we receive your article, it will first be pre-approved (and sometimes returned to you for small changes and resubmission).
  • When the article is pre-approved, we will send you a link to our standard Author’s Form to fill out. The form will ask basic questions about the article’s metadata (title, author information), as well as the license you chose and what fonts and graphics you used.
  • After the form is filled, the article will be added to the review queue, where it will wait to be picked up by a reviewer. The waiting time might vary, depending on the availability of the reviewers who are familiar with the article’s topic. No worries, though, no article will be left unturned!

Note: When corresponding with us, please use the Reply to all option (yes, this time it is fine :)). It is common for multiple people to be in one e-mail thread, and we want to keep them all in the loop.

Step 5: Work with the reviewer

Reviewers are volunteers that work with the authors to make sure that the article meets the desired bar, and that no typos are left uncorrected.

Once a reviewer picks up your article, they will contact you with their technical feedback. The reviewer will work with you on making the article meet the desired bar. But remember that as the author, you have full control and last say in how your article will look.

Comments are often added to the PDF, some PDF readers have trouble displaying them depending on the software used to add them/view them. If you cannot see the added comments, use other PDF software to display them or contact the reviewer to let them know.

Once the technical review is done, proofreading will take over, and the language layer of your article will be reviewed. The good news is that in most cases this is the last step!

After proofreading is done and all corrections are made, congratulations, your article is now awaiting the final approval and is ready to be published in the upcoming issue of the zine!

Note: Our max number of articles in an issue is 100, if we receive more than that, we will be using a FIFO algorithm, or actually First Approved First Published, and the remaining articles will be moved to the next issue.

[Extra Step: Only in case of profit sharing]

In case in Step 3 you've chosen a license with profit sharing and there is actually some profit to share, we will contact you to ask for information needed for accounting and tax reasons (this will include your full name, address, tax numbers if any, and so on). Depending on the country you're in and/or pay taxes in there might be some back-and-forth until we figure out how exactly to proceed.

Note that the license fee payout is handled by HexArcana Cybersecurity GmbH – the company currently managing Paged Out! – and they will need to be able to process your data.