Infoshop

An infoshop (the word being a portmanteau of information and shop) is a physical space where people can access radical ideas through flyers, posters, zines, pamphlets and books.

[1] Some infoshops have computers, copy machines and printers so that pamphlets, position papers, articles, magazines, and newspapers can be created and then circulated between the network of spaces.

[2] Academic Chris Atton describes the infoshop as a "forum for alternative cultural, economic, political and social activities.

"[3] For example, in a flyer announcing its planned activities, the Autonomous Centre of Edinburgh (ACE) stated it would make available locally produced arts and crafts, records, T-shirts, badges, books, zines and information.

[3] When it opened the following year, ACE provided flyers, leaflets, newsletters, magazines and journals about causes such as antivivisectionism, anti-monarchism, hunt sabotage and jobseeker's allowance advice.

[6] In the United Kingdom, early antecedents of infoshops were the radical presses such as Giles Calvert's printshop (1600s) and John Doherty's coffee house (1830s).