For five years, Pif has been committed to promoting writers and artists who pursue their craft on the Web and in other electronic mediums. Here’s a brief history of how art and technology have intersected at Pif:

2000

October — Issue #41, the Out of Print Books Issue

• Pif’s content included fiction by Richard Yates; poetry by William Faulkner and C.D. Wright; and an interview with William Gass.
• Jen Bergmark became a partner at Pif.
• Camille Renshaw became Editor-in-Chief.
• David Lehman became a Contributing Editor (Poetry).
• Liam Rector became a Contributing Editor (Poetry).
• Michael Joyce became a Contributing Editor (Hypertext).
• Sabin Streeter became a Contributing Editor (Cyber Art and Memoir).
• Karen Essex became a Contributing Editor (Music).

September — Issue #40, the Science Issue

• Pif’s content included poetry by Billy Collins and an interview with Dale Peck.
• Richard deGaris Doble became a Contributing Artist (Photography).

August — Issue #39

• Pif’s content included commentary by Douglas Bauer and poetry by Jason Shinder.
• Colette Sartor and Kathryn Kulpa became Associate Fiction Editors.
• Richard Weems became a Contributing Writer (Fiction).

July — Issue #38

• Jen Bergmark became the Managing Editor, in addition to her Fiction Editor duties.
• Richard Luck became the Technical Director, limiting his duties strictly to the technology side of Pif.
• Rachel Barenblat became the Acquisitions Editor, in addition to her Associate Poetry Editor duties.

June — Issue #37

• Pif’s content included an interview with Elizabeth Cox.
• Nick Burton’s final "Remote Control" column.

May — Issue #36

• Pif’s content included an interview with Francisco Goldman and fiction by Marcy Dermansky.

April — Issue #35, the Sex Issue

• The Best of Pif Magazine, Off-line, the print anthology, was published by Fusion Press.

March — Issue #34, the Craft Issue

• Pif’s content included commentary by Douglas Bauer and an interview with Sheila Schwartz and Mary Grimm.
• Winners of the 1999 Fiction and Poetry Contest published.
• "Father Antonio’s Black Label" is Pif’s first memoir piece.

February — Issue #33, the Home Issue

• Pif’s content included an interview with Helen Ellis.
• Over 100,000 readers visited Pif accumulating a million impressions and nearly 2 million hits.
• Martin Ott became an Associate Fiction Editor.

January — Issue #32, the Hypertext Issue

• Pif’s content included an interview with Michael Joyce.
• "Scratching" is Pif’s first hypertext cover.

1999

December — Issue #31

• Pif’s content included an interview with Judy Budnitz.

November — Issue #30

• Pif’s content included an interview with Julia Slavin.
• Ingrid Woodrow and Tom Hartman became Pif’s Zine Reviewers.
• Stuart Woods became an Associate Fiction Editor.

October — Issue #29, our 4th Anniversary Issue

• Pif’s content included an interview with interview with Greg Joly of Bull Thistle Press.
• Daryl Lease wrote his last column for Pif.
• "la terre" by Richard deGaris Doble is Pif’s first animated cover.

September — Issue #28, the Fiction Issue

• Pif’s content included an interview with Jhumpa Lahiri and commentary by George Myers, Jr.
• Maureen Murray became an Associate Fiction Editor.
• 75,000 readers visited Pif accumulating nearly a million hits .

August — Issue #27, the Poetry Issue

• Pif’s content included as interview with Naomi Shihab Nye.
• PifMagazine.com went to a new layout.
• Rachel Barenblat became an Associate Poetry Editor.
• Elizabeth Knapp became an Associate Poetry Editor.
• "Stick It in Your Ear," music reviews by Curt Cloninger, joined Pif’s Commentary section.

July — Issue #26, the Theater Issue

• The commercial server we leased space on crashed relentlessly, so we bought our own servers adding marked stability to all systems.
• Scott Kampen became the Associate Web Editor.
• Jen Bergmark became the Fiction Editor.
• Camille Renshaw became the Senior Editor.
• Richard Luck became the Managing Editor.

June — Issue #25, the Film Issue

• Pif’s content included an interview with interview with Brent Spencer.
• Pilot-Search officially launched.
• 65,000 readers visited Pif accumulating 600,000 hits.

May — Issue #24, the Humor Issue (be sure to check out the Masthead)

• A mockup of the new Pilot-Search site was released to the press.
• Zine-X moved to its own domain.
• "Bold Wurg," by Scott Wold and Michael E. Burgin, ran its first comic strip.
• 25,000 readers visited Pif accumulating 275,000 hits.

April — Issue #23, the Spring Cleaning Issue

• Another new column: "What to Read" by Editor Camille Renshaw.
• Winners of the 1998 Fiction and Poetry Contest published.

March — Issue #22, the Car Issue

• 20,000 readers visited Pif accumulating 200,000 hits.
• PifMagazine.com went to a new layout.

February — Issue #21, the Religion Issue

• Pif’s content included creative non-fiction by Karen Essex.

January — Issue #20, the Music Issue

• Pif’s content included interviews with Sean Lennon and Lex Razon of Vinyl and fiction by David Ryan.
• Zine-X, the Banner Exchange for Zines, was created.
• 12,000 readers visited Pif accumulating more than 100,000 hits.

1998

December — Issue #19, the Winter Reading Issue

• Pif’s content included interviews with Michael Cunningham and Jon Scieszka and poetry by Diann Blakely.
• Michael E. Burgin became the Commentary Editor.
• That month 7,500 readers visited Pif accumulating nearly 75,000 hits.

November — Issue #18, the Sex Issue (and OH was there controversy)

• Pif’s content included an interview with Aimee Bender, poetry by Robert McDowell, and fiction by Richard K. Weems.

October — Issue #17, our 3rd Anniversary Issue

• Pif’s content included an interview with Ken Kalfus.
• 5,000 readers visited Pif accumulating nearly 60,000 hits.

September — Issue #16 (open theme)

• Pif’s content included fiction by Amy Hempel.

August — Issue #15, the Work Issue at www.Pifmagazine.com

• Pif’s content included an interview with Rick Moody and poetry by David Lehman. Interview column returns on a permanent basis with columnist Ryan Boudinot and other guest interviewers.
• PifMagazine.com went to a new layout.

July — Issue #14, the Alcohol Issue

• Pif’s content included poetry by Liam Rector.

June — Issue #13, the Superstition Issue

• Writers and artists are paid for the first time.
• Our first daily commentary, "The Bennington Diaries."
• First "Book Lovers" column, in association with Amazon.com.
• First "Sound Bites" column.
• First "Remote Control" column, in association with Reel.com.

May — Issue #12, the Suburban Issue (our first theme issue)

• "Micro Fiction" section began, the first of its kind online.
• Debut of commentary column "As I See It" by Daryl Lease.

April — Issue #11

• Pif Magazine became a "monthly."
• Penguin (now called Pilot-Search.com) was created and quickly became the Internet’s largest literary search engine.

March

• Anne Doolittle hired as Poetry Editor.
• Camille Renshaw hired as Fiction Editor.

January — Issue #10

• Pif’s content included an interview with A. Manette Ansay. This is the first Interview column, although it doesn’t return until Issue #14.
• Winners of the 1997 Fiction and Poetry Contest announced.
• 3,000 readers visited Pif accumulating more than 15,000 hits.

1997

October — Issue #9

• Print version of Pif, titled Poetic Justice published with limited release.
• Premiere of full-fledged Commentary section kicked off with 3 regular columns: "Adventures of Pageboy" by Jeremy Worsham, "Stranger Than Fiction" by Stefene Russell, and "Zine Reviews."

July — Issue #8

April — Issue #7

• First annual Fiction and Poetry Contest began.

January — Issue #6

• Camille Renshaw became a Contributing Editor.

1996

September

• Pif sold enough advertising to actually pay overhead.

February — Issue #5

• Camille Renshaw became Pif’s Advertising Director.

January — Issue #4

• Allison Jenks acts informally as Poetry Editor.
• Richard Luck continues in all other editorial positions.

1995

December — Issue #3

November — Issue #2

October —Issue #1 at www.dimax.com/Pif/

• Richard Luck founded Pif Magazine.