FAT-Zine

TYPE: riding webzine

Bart de Jong has been doing his `zine, FAT, since as long as I can remember. Why is it called "FAT", you ask? Each issue was huge -- the fattest `zine around -- packed full of riding stuff (contest reports, interviews, stories, opinions, drinking stories, etc.). Bart's discovered what I found out a couple years ago: it's a pain in the ass (and expensive) to do a printed `zine. And thus, FAT has found it's was onto the Web.

Issue #35 of FAT -- which is issue #1 online -- is packed full of stuff (as you'd expect). The navigation is a little weird: there's a list of contents on the left and a scrolling table of contents in the top right frame (plus you can get the TOC in the main frame, too). Also, the site is optimized for 800x600 monitors, so if you have a small screen things might look a bit weird and/or cramped. But unlike most riding web sites, FAT is pretty nicely designed, and -- more importantly -- it has actual content to keep you busy for a while.

The site's got plenty to read: Freestyle World Championships stories, video reviews, scenes (Paris, Munich, Italy, NYC...), interviews, some random stories (about parties, the U.S., old school riding, etc.), contests, CD reviews, and racing coverage (if that's your kind of thing) -- most with drinking overtones. Photos are small thumbnails that you can click to see the full picture, which is a nice touch for those accessing the site via slow modem. I wish there were more photos on the site, but people could say the same for eWire, so I'll shut up about that.

I'm not sure how often FAT will be updated: the editorial says "don't expect a new issue of FAT every month, this one took almost three years to be finished". Web surfers tend to prefer small periodic updates rather than huge updates every few months (or years); we'll have to wait and see if Bart prefers print-based schedules over web-based schedules. In the meantime, FAT is still one of the better riding sites out there.

(Postscript: The FAT site was updated with issue #2 very soon after issue #1 was posted.)

Uploaded March 1999