Timewaster's Guide Archive
General => Suggestions Box => Topic started by: Tage on September 04, 2003, 05:16:51 PM
-
Because I am at the receiving end of suggestions/complaints/snarkiness/whathaveyou for the TWG website, I started thinking again about why on earth we have this site, anyway. Initially, it was an excuse to get free games. While it has fulfilled and continues to fulfill this original goal passably, it seems that various people want TWG to be various things.
On that note, here are some things that I think about regarding TWG. These are in no particular order, and some of them are strictly my deal. But please feel free to add or comment on anything after reading this.
First and foremost, I want to know WTH is up with PHP truncating strings when entering into MySQL for pre-built packages. Both the polls and phpmyadmin are doing this, but nothing else is. This only started happening after the Solaris 5.8 OS upgrade. Whatever the cause, it's given me renewed motivation to simply move my server back to FreeBSD. This would mean downtime for TWG as I worked out the problems that come with switching OS.
I know that most people enjoy the little titles associated with your post count, but I'm tired of the Perl YaBB and wish we could move to something MySQL-based. Of course, this would mean rewriting the entire user authentication system. (i.e. more downtime for TWG)
I hate the current way the departments are handled. TWG was originally built that way because EUOL wanted to have full control over his department pages. So I made it so each department has its own directory and homepage. Of course, shortly after EUOL stopped admining (is that a word?) and the only department that's ever had any significant work done is the RPG section. Everything else looks like crap.
If we aren't going to have department heads who want to actively maintain their own pages, I want to go back to the "single page template" that PHP-nuke uses. Adding features to a single department page is so much easier than going through every one in every directory. Also, then we'd be able to manage departments through the database, instead of having to do it all by hand.
When Fell and I started TWG, we really didn't know what to expect. I made the online article submission so that we could branch out and let other people write articles without making Fell do everything. At the time, we thought we'd have more admins: me, Fell, EUOL. Turns out EUOL and I aren't interested in maintaining the site content, so it ends up being all Fell anyway.
What we do have now, though, is a small but loyal group of regulars. Some of you even write great articles, so I'm glad we have the online thing. The question is, are all of you using it? If not, why? If so, what do you like or dislike about it? The one thing I'd really like is to see more content, and more submitters, working with TWG. I'm not sure how to facilitate that, though.
Despite all my ignoring and resisting, I personally feel that TWG still has a lot that could be improved. Most of the reason I avoid changing things is because there's no real consensus on what should be changed, and how. If we're just going to keep posting reviews here and there, and occasionally get free games for it, I see no reason to change anything at all. However, if the TWG community (now that we have one) wants something else, I feel like we should at least know what that is.
-
I agree with you on the deparment pages. I've been the only one trying to maintain them and my lack of artisic ability has kept me from doing anything special for them. And considering they're all the same format now why have seperate ones?
As I told Tage before I see no need in haveing redesign TWG for just a small request as haveing the authors name automaticaly appear in the blurb. If there's a bunch of things he's going to do then ya it might be nice, but it's not something I care about.
-
A local MBA student has contacted me about doing some market research for TWG (ie, how to make it profitable) as his masters thesis project. It will take at least a year or more before we have any results, but it's a cool thing that could really help TWG take off (or not, depending on what they find).
-
ok, see, here's the thing.
If we want to be taken seriously, and I think we do, because being taken seriously means more free stuff, because the people who've already sent it will send again, and the people who don't yet, even if they're bigger, will say, "hey, this is a legit place." and want the exposure. Being taken seriously means getting more stuff, and getting that stuff more dependably.
This means several things. If we want to be taken seriously, we need to have dependable content, a professional looking site, and enthusiastic (as well as numerous) reader base.
1) Dependable content:
We need to be able to count on a certain number of new articles/reviews a week. I'd suggest three. This means that if Fell is out of town, someone needs to be able to post a submitted article. Now, yeah, maybe it sounds like power grabbing, but I spend more time here than most anyone. If you count coding time, SPriggan and Tage might beat me, but I read nearly all the articles now, and my post count has grown to third place (and closing fast on 2nd and 1st) since I started participating something like 6 months ago. So, that, combined with my reasons for caring that come later, and the spare time I have, make me say that I'd be happy to be backup content administrator. I won't be surprised if we get other interested parties.
The second thing we need for "dependable" is quality articles. Something I'm guilty of as much as anyone else, but seriously, someone should be editing these things. We should both proofread and suggest where the writing needs some work. Now, I'm not talking about rejecting articles or doing wholesale rewrites, especially when the problem is just that we disagree with what's being said, but I am suggesting that when a review doesn't do a good enough job (case in point, my recent Nobilis review -- which, incidentally has been updated, if you want to read it again) that the author should be told what he needs to do. This request would optimally be made within 72 hours of the article's submission, just to make it easy to keep additions frequent.
Third, it'd be nice if we got a few more articles besides reviews. We've had a couple "strategy" guides, and the Rifts article about what to get was really good, but we don't see them very often. I think we should get anecdotes, rules conversions, free games, maybe even theory or tips. New ORP's could even be advertised for a week on the main page, which would get some attention from lurkers to our forum, which I'll get into in part three.
Development in the areas of books and movies would be nice.
-
2) We already have a pretty sharp looking site, maybe with the exception of what happens with that banner on the forum. But if we're going for serious, we need to make changes. To make this easier, I think we need to let Tage do his new things. If we're down for a short time to make a better TWG, we can suffer (so long as we're talking, days, not months). Incidentally, I believe YABB's more recent efforts are PHP/MySQL based. Uniform dept pages would be good, and as Tage points out, easy.
But that also means that we need to agree what changes to be made. This means we need a committee for this. I don't know how to determine the committe, other than it should be headed by Fell, seconded by our coder (Tage) and with some of the frequent rabble thrown in. But only Rabble who are willing to participate in the decisions and accept assignments that may be given (if any). This committee doesn't have to "meet." Through the magic of our own forum, we could do a hidden topic where the members just discuss, vote, and come to a conclusion.
3) Enthusiastic/Numerous reader base:
Brett Murrell of Duel of Ages mentioned that the reason we're getting a copy of it is that we have an active forum. And we do, but only about a dozen of hte members are active. I don't have the number counts, but we've got to have more readers than that. 100 people have registered on the board, so I'm sure SOME of them read occassionally. I'm sure there are a number who just refuse to message board (like I don't at gameknot or bm.com), and some of them just because there's only a tiny link to the forum. More things to call attention to it would be nice. Maybe a default piece of code that shows up on every article inviting readers to visit the forum to discuss the review or article. Getting activity on the forum will help get
To increase readership, we need to reach out. Maybe some stealthy ads for ourselves at RPG.net or other places wehre readers can interact. I'm not talking about showing up, posting a link, and then disappearing, but maybe if someone posts on those they could put the URL in their signature, find an excuse to refer to an article or discussion, etc. just off hand I can think of potential crossover readership existing at theforce.net, rpg.net, wizards.com, geekculture, slashdot, and only about a billion web sites dedicated to gaming.
This is also why I dreamed up a more comprehensive evaluation of different systems. If we can be seen as a resource, not just an occassional, than we can attract casual readers as well.
So there, that's my little treatise on "how to be taken seriously." That would help us be "smooth and mellow and very profitable" int he words of Dr. Teeth, as Fell is indicating might be possible from his last post.
Now, for what *I* want? I'll admit, I have an ulterior motive for being taken seriously. If we're solid player, than I can list my contributive writings and potential editing work on a resume and show it off. And yeah, I want more games. I often feel like being a known factor would improve our chances with the people I talk to about that. Plus it's a fun place, and it'd be nice to know that despite the name, it's not JUST a waste of time to hang out here.
-
I found the site a few months ago, and strted reading most of the articles. I liked the idea of the site: a collection of writings about various games and assorted other nerdary. Coincidently, this was a round the time my existing forum community was falling apart, so I decided to join this one. I lurked the forums, decided that the people were interesting, and then registered and started posting, along with writing occasional reviews.
What I found was the biggest problem with the site is the lack of articles. Usually, there was about one a day, but sometimes there are several days with nothing new. Part of my joining was because I want to remedy this. It's a great site, but I felt (and feel) that I can add something to it. So far I've written three or so reviews, and I have a couple of ideas of some others I plan to write sometime soon.
I agree with the comments on needing more than reviews, but I see it this way. I am a new member to the community, and I'm still settling in and finding my place here. As such, I could write other things, but I see few of them posted, and so feel almost like they don't quite fit in. Entering an existing community, I don't want to be seen as trampling in and forcing you all to do things my way, but rather I want to meld to adapt to the existing community.
OK, I know that was a bit of a ramble, and had no actual flow to it, but it's my opinion on the matter.
-
right. he sees MY two posts and then calls THAT a ramble. Let me tell you, in the world of rambling, you're as amature as a pokemon fan at a Warhammer 20k tourney.
(now, if that isn't the nerdiest thing I've ever said, I'm a bit lost).
Anyway, My first reaction to your post is "don't worry about fitting in." Of course, if no one likes it, it's likely to be ripped to shreds in the forum, but we're not here to enforce a world view, we want to see material about games. Sometimes we like it, sometimes we don't. But I don't know that "fitting in" is a problem. Submit your stuff. Or, if you prefer, send your material to one of the forum members. You can catch me on IM (and hopefully soon I'll be back on broadband and will be able to have my identities logged in ALWAYS) in the mronings soemtimes, and occassionally late at night. AIM, Yahoo, and ICQ are listed in my profile, my MSN id is arturiuspendragon@hotmail. if you see me, just ask. My email works too.
-
Ramble refers more to the structure than the length, but I see your point.
Thanks for that. If i do have any questions or such, I will make a point to ask someone. Anyway, doing my part to fix the content problems, expect a review of the homebrew RPG "Powergame" in the next few days. Now I've promised it, I might actually get around to writing it.
-
SE about 90% of what you talked about has been discussed heavly amoung the Utah people. Some of you might remeber that we use to have weekly meetings, that what we'd talk about. And some times we still do.
One of the biggest problems with reliable content as you put it is no matter what people say/promise it allwayse comes down to 2 or 3 people doing everything. Especialy when it comes to reivews. Too many of us don't have time to devote countless hours to a project that dosen't pay. Even doing one article a week is hard when you work, goto school or have a familiy. We've had two other times in the past where the same thing was happening and from past experence I can say chances are not much is going to happen, even if Tage remakes the site and every one start contributing regulary. After a month or so it'll stop. I'm sorry if this sounds pessamistic but reality sucks sometimes. I'm personaly sick of trying to come up with new things/ideas just to have them mocked or ignored by everyone else here (Entropy is the only one who ever humors me). And frankly I don't have to time or the desire to waste time on a site that most people who come here don't seam to care about. Not to say I'm going to stop comming to TWG or doing articles. But why should I be trying to come up with way to improve the site when at the time no one gave a flying $@#&. You should have spoken up about six months ago, then I would have been more excited about this.
As for non review content that's what draws people to a site. I've allwayse advocated this, but again you need people to devote the time for a lot of this. Like developing RPG stuff or new table top stuff. It;s never worked out. EUOL was working on a new RPG for TWG but no one replyed to his posts about it so he stoped because "No one at TWG cared".
As for advertiseing we'd love todo it but none of us are going to spend the little cash we have now for it. It's just not worth it right now with how the site is.
The main reason I do stuff for TWG isn;t for free thigs (heck I get hardly anything), all though it was the reason at first. But to do something fun with friends that we'd all enjoy.
-
I wasn't involved at first because I felt neglected.
Sorry you sound so pessimistic, but a few notes:
-I wasn't advocating spending any money on advertising. I was thinking of word of mouth, precisely because it inovolves spending no money.
-the problem is breaking out of the cycle. A more regular and complete site will generate more tangible rewards than the occassional freebie and some good times. More tangible rewards will generate more enthusiasm for providing/maintaiing content. etc. if we can get some of us started, and set REASONABLE goals, then we can go. That's why I said something like 3 articles a week, not daily posting.
-You do have an additional benefit. Jeffe and I are active members now, and we've done all kinds of crazy stuff. we even made a magazine between HS and my mission just cuz we could. Now that Fell let us run TWG-East (with his confirmation), we'll be providing more.
-another content idea, serialized writing. i have some ideas that would be fun but that I'll never turn into a real novel, and putting them up here would be kinda fun.
So that's what I have to say, i gues the real question is to the others involved. Do you WANT this to be "serious" or just "hobby?" Because if no one else wants to go, I'll turn to other projects and I'll dedicate a lot less time to TWG. I'm not necesarily having grandiose dreams of high profit, just something we can use as a real resume/portfolio item. Though it may eventually be profitable in the long term, and it may be more than I'm thinking. The point is to start small. Nothing worthwhile is going to happen without a lot of work and dedication.
So, Fell? Tage? 42? (even EUOL, though I'm thinking your decision is made)? Hobby? or Legit?
-
SE I do not dissagree with you on any of those points, I've allwayse beleaved them too. But I have a hard time convincing myself that this time people will actualy keep to a scedule.
-
well, schedule is definitely a major concern. But we also need commitment. There's no need even talking about a schedule if there's only one or two people who want to pursue it.
-
I've always thought about posting a review now and then, but haven't because 1. I felt like I was still kind of new, 2. well, I thought there was a two but there isn't, and 3. my inherent laziness feeds upon no. 1. Maybe I will now.
-
The first thing I need to point out (which SE already mentioned but Spriggan seems to need reminding of) is that any proposed change, no matter what it is, will neither be immediately accepted nor swiftly implemented. Things take time, and they require agreements, and they require well-formed plans.
I like to consider this a legit site, since it's been on my resume for a while and helped me get my last two jobs--and that was over two years ago, back when the site was much smaller. For me, legit means three things: there's a lot of content, it's well-written/well-formatted, and it's easy to find. An active forum community is a part of it as well, but I tend to see that as an effect of the first three (though forum-only programs such as the online games certainly help).
Tage is working on our coding and our search engine to help make our content easier to find. We need to fix the department pages and institute a few new formatting conventions. But the main thing that makes or breaks this site is the consistent and frequent posting of new content, and for that we need help. There's about three and a half people who provide consistent content right now, and that's not enough. We've tried the "staff member" model, where you're responsible for one article a week, and that hasn't worked. We've tried the "pot luck" model, where the regular writers fill in the gaps with whoever decides to submit, and that's worked better. Can you think of any other ideas?
I'm thinking of a more organized version of the pot luck model--let's call it the "requisition" model. We set up a handful of regular writers who agree to form a sort of staff; these people (I'm thinking of myself, SE, and Jeffe, mostly) will agree to at least one article a week, and will coordinate together at least one week in advance. We supplement that with me requesting articles from forum members--I'll send emails and ask you to write an article by a certain date. I may or may not give you a topic. If you have an idea for an article, tell me about it and save me the trouble of requesting one.
That's just one idea; there's plenty of things we could do. What do you think?
-
Sprig and SE, the discussion you're having is one we've often had. And as much as I hate to agree with Sprig (just as a general rule), he's right in that our biggest problem has always been this: people SAY they'll be active and contribute regularly, but eventually drop out. That, to me, is why TWG has stayed where it's at over the years.
Also, for me TWG is just a hobby. I don't have any plans on showing it to someone in a professional environment. So I'm just as guilty as anyone else for not contributing. I would, however, be willing to make upgrades to the site if I thought it would benefit a majority of people here. Plus, I would like it to be cool. I enjoy being a part of cool things.
In short, I guess I'm sitting the fence. There are a lot of things I think *can* be done with TWG, but I'm only willing to do them if other people take the lead.
EDIT: Fell and I posted at the same time. And I totally agree with him on what would/does make this a legit site. Still, the problem remains getting people to submit. How does everyone feel about that?
-
While I'm talking about it with a friend, I should mention images in our reviews. There are two difficulties with this: handling them in the site itself, and *getting* the images in the first place. My impression is that not many of our reviewers have the ability to create images themselves. That basically leaves us grabbing existing images from other places, which could lead to a host of problems.
Still, if we want to look "more legit," that's definitely something to keep in mind.
-
I think I can agree with that. And to date, Jeffe (who is currently undergoing internet problems) is doing well, and should have 3 or 4 reviews coming very soon (he's a fast reader, and if there's anything I get that I'm not going to get to quickly and not absolutely gung ho about, I pass to him, he'll get to it quick. One way to get review content, at least, is to establish something of a basic "contract." Basically, anyone who accepts a free product in behalf of TWG owes a review within 3 weeks (it's longer than I want to make it, but it's more realistic). They also owe another article for content, time of delivery to be agreed upon by both an editor and the recipient. The second article need not be related in any way to the reviewed product (though, obviously, the review must be). The "second" article may also be written BEFORE the product is received. Again, this will be part of the agreement mutually decided on.
As for the "semi-staff," i'm willing to commit myself to at least a page and a half a week. Which is a little shorter than most of my reviews. If I pass that point, so much the better for all of us.
I'd really like to hear more input on what "non-staff" contributers are willing to commit to (if anything).
Pictures: yes. We need to visit that, and we need to find a way to get professional legal advice on it without paying for it (as we are ever cheap), as well as the technical solutions we need. Guess it's time to make good on my promise to ask my brother about it.
As for coding, for a hobby, Tage puts a LOT of work into this site. he needs recognition for that more often. I'm glad he does it, whatever the reason. Thanks, Tage.
-
Well, let's see...I could commit to writing a review for every book I read (that's applicable to TWG.) It would be a good way for me to get back into the swing of writing regularly (which is a struggle for me.) I'm not a particularly fast reader, though. It rarely takes me less than a week and a half to finish a decent-sized book. And then the time to write the review on top of that. But I do read a lot. A conservative estimate would be 1.5 reviews/month. I could commit to that. That's not sounding like a lot, I know. Suggestions?
I'm not a frequent role-palying or computer gamer, so I wouldn't be much good in those departments.
-
I think TWG would benefit from the book reviews.
How about a "suggestions" section? where TWGers suggest books/games/whatever to be read/played/whatever?
-
Do we really need a suggestions section? We're never short of things we want to review, just people and time to review them (and occasionally the product itself). Though a suggestion box for non-review articles could be useful.
-
I like where this is going,... we have to show companies that their products are being reviewed. This means telling them about posted reviews, and linking to their websites or maybe amazon.com at the bottom of the review. Why? Because if we start linking the name of TWG to professional, quality work, and show people where they can get games, or movies, or whatever then not only could we gear the site up to make a little money (for upgrades and whatnot) but we can increase our readership and participation.
I'll be honest I came here first because I knew Eric, I stayed because I found that I could link to a dozen or more RPG websites. I also like reviewing.
We should put out a monthly PDF Digest, with art and reviews and articles, so people can print out and read TWG at home, or at work AFK.
Even fiction might be fun....
Set it at 10-20 pages and you've got even more incentive to visit the site.
Just some thoughts.
-
Speaking of free stuff/not free stuff, would there be any chance of getting me a free "reviewable" copy of EA's latest expansion for BF1942? I just played the demo and it was fun. Makes "Road to Rome" seem like a dolls house.
So ya, just let me know.
-
Reviews can be for bad products. I'm talking about having a monthly "recommendations" cycling through the depts. September could be RPG systems, for example. Anyone who wants to can just submit their 5 top recommendations with one or two sentences why. we post it on one page.
Like the "Staff picks" at the video or music store.
each month we do a different dept. When it comes back to the department, you do something else for picks. for example, different categories under RPGs could be systems, expansions, settings, etc. Books could be Fantasy, SF, juvenile, mystery, comics, etc. Movies could have action, drama, classics, comedy, etc. video games could do RPG, puzzle, rtf, fps, etc. We could also get creative and do different themes. One movie recommendations month could be "Steven Spielberg" or movies using the word "aluminum." In fact, I think I'll coordinate that.
-
Tage posted! *falls over*
Ok. So i am guilty of lack of commitment. I keep a running total of the number of reviews i want to do, but never did. Its around 30ish. Its a problem that has always dogged me. I now, since starting reviewign at TWG, tend to review and develop arguments about anything i am reading/watching/playing at the time. But i just cannot work up the effort to actually type them down.
I have no real interest in which direction TWG goes in. It'll never make a difference to me. But more professional = more people = more annoying forum idiots. Which i hate, which is the reason why TWG is pretty much the only forum i even look at. But more professional = more people = more interesting discussions, more articles and more newbies to slap down. ;)
We need new blood. When i joined, mustard wrote a tabletop article a week. Now, the only tabletoppers active at TWG are me, Mr P and fell, none of whom write reviews for that department. I'm too lazy, dont play and recently quit, Mr P is too busy, Fell doesnt play and so doesnt review. So the problem is this. We need to attract foaming at the mouth tabletoppers to review/write for us. But to attract them, we need to have active tabletop articles. (And most tabletoppers are morons online btw. Check out portents forums).
I could definitely deal with SEs 3 week thing. That would be good. SE, fancy doing that contract with Armageddon 2089 from Mongoose?
At the end of the day, TWG is a fun place to read and chat, we have a solid forum crew now (sounds like a R&B band: "The Forum Crew") and i talk too damn much.
-
Ok, yeah, I've been a slacker with mongoose. I'll tell Fell I'm doing it so we have it on the master list of contacted sites, and once he says he hasn't tried before. I'll send the email. Incidentally, if you have a phone number you can find for them, that'd be great, I feel guilty faxing them using the company resources. Also, email me your address, since they're in the UK, it's probably best just to have them sent straight to you
-
I'll get those sent in an email soon. You have a work email right?
-
[email protected]
I probably won't be able to call till monday though, and that's IF Fell responds to me by then.
-
oh yeah, its saturday isnt it.
Forgot that.
-
Unlike a few others in other threads I must respectfully disagree with the notion that TWG should stick with just game reviews and not branch out into other areas. To stick with the old familier would be slow and agonizing suicide.
My reasonining is 3 fold.
1. There are thousands of Review sites availible at the touch of a button, some much more developed and established than TWG, sure TWG makes a good product when it comes to reviews but even RPG.net has other focuses.
2. Originality keeps readership. We arn't the NY times and frankly Im glad of it. People who come to a review site for just a review might never come back. Likewise an all article TWG wont keep packing them in. If we give readers interesting content on a week to week basis and have a little for everyone we improve our credibility and circulation. What could be better.
3. People don't love critics. I've always had the sneaking suspicion that Tom Shales of the Washington post hates movies. He regularly rips apart everything that is laid before him because he thinks its his duty to the public to save them from film that isn't up to some unattainable standard. Thats why there are relatively few books filled with page long film reviews.
When people read a review they want to know two things "Is it any good?" and " How much does it cost?".
Even if staff picks or weekly fiction, or recipies aren't your cup of Tea deciding not to publish them if they are well written would be shortsighted to say the least.
-
I never said we should only stick to reviews. What I said is we need to stick to game releated content. Doing other things that have nothing to do with games will hurt us in the long run. Do what floats your boat, just keep it in theam with what TWG is: A gaming site.
I strongly disaagree with fiction as I've stated before. Even if it's about gaming. I don't think it will be a draw since on-line fiction is still a laughing stalk of the net. And I think SE's talents would be better suited elsewere. Maybe I'mjust being overly cynical, and I know this will upset some of you, but I see this push for fiction at TWG as way for somepeople to say "Hey I'm a published author" in resumes and publishing persuits. And I find this very decietful and disingenuous.
-
But it's not strictly a gaming site. And while it first started as a way of getting "free stuff," I don't think it was ever meant to be restricted to only games. We have a movie section, TV discussions, book discussions.....
And I do think you're being cynical. And assuming too much about motive. Why would I write fiction just to say "i've been published" when I can already say I've been published here. I've written tons of reviews and articles.
-
Yeah, we could be like RPG.net, or gamegrene, or Pen and Paper, or we could distinguish ourselves from the pack of literally hundreds of review/game related sites out there.
Think about why dragon magazine constantly outsells dungeon (made by the same company and ostensibly about the same things) Dragon has a variety of articles widening its readership and making it more accessible to gamers while Dungeon is pretty much only about adventures. Dragon has fiction, comics, rviews, campaign information, interviews and articles about the industry and gamerdom, as well as some surprising writing.
I must respectful disagree about you opinion of net fiction. You are in fact dead wrong.
Net fiction is not reguarded as universally bad any more than paperback books are. Bad net fiction however just like bad paperback books or bad television can be a put off.
So we just need to strive to publish good fiction and leave the bad stuff out.
You keep saying that we are only a game related site, but miss that we have book reviews too. While all the books have been fantasy novels so far, a precident is there to review history works (potentially game related) and sociological works as well as books about mythology and anthropology.
Just a copper phenning or two.
-
That's differnet then fiction. If you're willing to set up a group to read every story as you did with TLE, and have several people that make the finial descision (all who have worked in the industry before), and make sure none of them publish articles then I'll stop voiceing opposition to this. It's a matter of standards and credability. Once one person that uses TWG and a souce for haveing had fiction published then we loose all crediablity with our readers and everyone else. 'Cause if we're willing to publish anyone becasue they're a friend or acuantince then what's to say we haven't been giveing some things good reviews beacause of someone from that games company got us to. True TWG isn't that big of a site and most people don't care about us, but I do care about it and haveing my name assoicated with an honest publicated. If you do this you're just opeing up a can of worms.
-
why do we lose credibility? Your logic seems incomplete. X does work we publish, X uses TWG as a reference and we suffer?
Im afraid I don't get it.
What about bad reviews then, TWG has had its share, heck I've written a few.
Will that cripple the site?
Everyone has hits or misses. Generally bragging about where you were published generates a buzz rather than scares people away. I bet we scare away more potential readers by focusing solely on games than we would if we expanded our article base.
-
What's next after fiction? Gardening tips? You're not getting any of my points. #1 is the credibalty, Yes we've had some bad articles. But Fell's finaly started setting a decent statndard. Why do you think he sends things back to people to have them work on their articles. He's only started to do that. If you want to build a base you need consintincy as SE has stated. There has to be mesures/guide lines for the articles. Right now with articles we are following how the industry does it. So if we start doing fiction we need to follow that industry's standards.
and #2) We cannot even keep up with our normal article subjects. Again we can do non review peices but we need to keep our site consistent. We can't change what we are or do with every whim. One month a fiction site, on month a gamming site, the next a hair style site. People will be confused. We need to prove that we can be consistent with our gamming articels before we add anything else.
-
What's next after fiction? Gardening tips?
You're not getting any of my points.
And your actively trying to not get mine.
The credability of TWG has nothing to do with publishing fiction or not. It also has nothing to do with reviewing movies (which incidentally arn't game related) or music, or writing about food. It also has absolutely nothing to do with someone claiming credit for themselves on a resume. TWG's credability has to do with how professional the standards are for reviewing the submissions and the quality of the work that gets onto the web site.
#1 TWG has a base. It has regular articles and reviews, thanks to people like Fell, Saint, Gemm, Slant and Me. For the last few months readers can look forward to more than 2 reviews or articles a week. There is enough archived content to keep new readers busy and the writing is being edited quite effectively.
TWG would be better served by following its own standards rather than the standards of Baen books, or Tor, or any of the other publishing houses.
If a story isn't polished and Fell, or whoever is reading the story finds more than a few spelling errors and typo's then they should continue to do what they do. Send em back with notes and wait for a re-write.
#2) We can and have kept up with normal articles and subjects. At least I have. You seem to think that the moment we add a new concept to what TWG is that we wont do any of the things we already do. No one ever suggested that. What was suggested was expanding our focus to include other related things that gamers enjoy reading. Where you get Hair Styling and gardening is outrageously exaggerated, since people are talking about adding what you term to be game related subjects.
Plus saying there is never a time for articles about hairstyling and gardening is short sighted even for a gamer. A larper or GM might be interested in victorian Hairstyles and A Swasbuckling campaign could benefit from an article on hedgemazes.
I agree that fiction should be reviewed by a panel of people rather than just Fell or just Saint but its inclusion won't automatically hurt TWG.
-
I think Dragon Magazine is a good example. they always include a fiction piece and at least a spread's worth of comics in each issue.
They have primarily articles on their own system, but at one time they even had a monthly feature on a system their parent company (TSR) didn't even publish.
-
EUOL Posts
Be Afraid!
It's amazing how such interesting topics can pop up without my even noticing them. Let's talk about a few things. First, I feel a need to explain to all of you why exactly my article writing declined starting in September of last year.
Originally, I was on track for two-to-three articles a week. This was a large work-load, even when I wasn't in school. I kept it up for a year or so, however, building our webcomic base--which appears to still be one of our sections that gets the most outside notice. There was one big problem with webcomics, however--I read them when I had discretionary time. Writing a good webcomics article required a huge time investment, as it required one to read through much (if not all) of the archives in order to have a good view of the comic as a whole.
When I entered grad school, I discovered I just didn't have time to read webcomics. This goes double for drawing my own, which just demanded too much of my discretionary time for me to justify when compared to my writing career and my schooling. This left Magic, which to be honest, I felt that our input on this area was relatively unwanted, since we didn't play to the community that would read Magic articles. (Fell and I had several good discussions about this.) Unfortunately, this left me with only the 'free stuff' section, which never really had a strong identity in the first place. Therefore, my article writing languished.
I tried to combat this by jumping to a new section--one that I knew I would be involved with no matter how busy my life became: books. I consider myself a professional author, and may very well soon have some legitimacy to the claim. I figured that this was an area that I actually had some credibility in, as opposed to webcomics, which I just kind of jumped into. So, I suggested Evil Storytime--which I still think was a great idea. I also suggested the 'build an RPG' series of articles because I thought that it would add some interesting and original content. I didn't think I'd be any better at building a paper-based RPG than anyone else, but I thought it would be a series of original articles that would inspire repeat readership, and when it was done would offer a downloadable product (which is always good--people love free stuff.)
Unfortunately, Sprig already pointed out what happened here. I really did feel that I had no support for what I was trying. Evil Storytime died because Fell refused to read the book that we were supposed to be reviewing. The RPG series received little attention, and I was politely informed that it was hardly original, that many sites offered free RPGs, and that I really didn't know enough about the genre to have anything relevant to say.
Now, those things very well might be true. I didn't take them with any bitterness--in fact, my inborn laziness said 'Great! Now I don't have to write anything.' This obviously was not the best response, but hey, at least I tried, right?
Yes, TWG is a hobby for me. However, pretty much everything except my writing (including grad school) is a hobby for me. I would like to see TWG progress. I’ve kind of moved beyond the ‘free stuff’ aspect of the site, though I do use it on resumes. I also see something in the future that will, perhaps, better tie me to TWG and increase its readership. As has been discussed, I’ll probably be releasing a book with TOR sometime next year. It has been recommended to me that I begin thinking about my own professional website as an author. Most have them, you probably know.
I would likely link to TWG from my site. In fact, I would probably tell them that I write book reviews and frequent the forum at the TWG. Rather than having my own forum, I might ask Fell if I could have a section at the TWG. I’m not sure how many hits authors sites get, I expect it has to do with their popularity, but I could see this siphoning some new readership to the TWG (if, in fact, Fell wants the association.)
-
Btw, tell me when your book gets published so I can pick up a copy.
Which reminds me... there is more than an offside chance that I could get Orsen Scott Card to join the site and pop in with a couple of hundred words about SF fantasy or writing from time to time. He was in my and Saints ward back in Greensboro (Summit if your interested) and he once told me that if I ever needed a favor in the publishing dept I should look him up. In fact I had a couple sessions with the missionaries in his dining room. Would people be interested in something like that? Not promising anything, but I could try...
-
Now, an actual response to what you’ve been discussing. It is very nice to see these topics being bantered about. Some thoughts:
First, I’ve come to grips with the fact that Tage has to change the forum/TWG format. I really like the post-count idea. I would try and find a way to incorporate it into a new forum, if possible. However, Tage is the coder. He knows what the site needs, and maintenance needs to be the first consideration. I may be alone in this, but I STILL think that individual home pages for the various sections is better than one uniform section. The RPG section looks amazing. 42 did an excellent job with it. That kind of professional artistic vision could really help the site if it were applied to the other sections as well. If we had just a few more original graphics for the various more-used sections, then I think we’d really have something that looks keen. We could have a standardized format for the ones without original layouts, but I highly recommend not throwing away that RPG section art.
As for more readership/articles, I would not be opposed to making another once-per-week commitment to writing articles (in the books section this time) if I felt that we had renewed goals for the TWG. As I’ve stated, I have actual credibility in this area, both academic and professional. I also wouldn’t be opposed to taking a bit more of the administrative burden, assuming Fell tells me what he wants me to do.
Fiction: Don’t sell this idea too short, Sprig. Everything you say is right. Webzines are regarded fairly skeptically in the professional writing market. There are just too many of them, and most of what they publish has no serious competition. There are a few, however, that are now regarded with as much credibility as print magazines.
I wouldn’t be opposed to fiction, in theory. If we could find one really, really good story to publish every few months or so, it could be a great draw for readers. We don’t want to be publishing fanfics or other ‘fanboy’ sort of fiction. We also don’t want to be getting tons of submissions to read. We also don’t want to ruin our credibility (which, by the way, I agree with Sprig is a huge issue here) by becoming a fanzine. What to do then?
Fear not. EUOL has the answer. Why don’t we go back to a partnership with The Leading Edge? We sprang Athena-like from its head anyway. Every six months, when TWG publishes, we could try and get electronic rights to the best story in the issue. We could offer the author ten bucks or so to publish their story electronically, which would give them more exposure and a little more cash. That way, we could have a small, elite fiction section without having to deal with submissions or the other problems of being a webzine. We could even give an explanation that we have a partnership with a print magazine, giving TLE some more exposure, and giving ourselves a little more legitimacy.
As for article management, here’s the thing. It comes down to Fellfroshe. He needs to encourage people to submit. If he had come to me last year when I wasn’t writing articles and said “Hey, could you do this for us” or “Hey, we really could use a few more articles” I probably would have written them for him. It is difficult to keep motivation when the sole responsibility and accountability resides on one’s own shoulders. He would need to get commitments, then follow up on them. He would need to send emails saying ‘Article’s late. When can we expect it?’ Deadlines are a wonderful thing, folks. They push people onward. That sort of harassment can make some people annoyed, but it will get articles written.
-
Fell does indeed want the association, and thank you for offering. (In an interesting side note, combining our site with that of a professional fantasy author bolsters the idea that we should have fiction on the site.)
I think that Spriggan has some good points--colored by his biases, as always, but since he and I have similar biases when it comes to web-based fiction I find myself inclined to agree with him. Just because I don't like web fiction, however, doesn't mean that I'll never publish it. It's a subject that has to be looked at very carefully, and I see a lot of good coming out of it. The simple truth is that F/SF fiction audiences are quite often the same people as gaming audiences, and combining the two--if done correctly--would probably increase our readership. We just have to figure out how to do it correctly, and whether or not we'll be able to.
-
EUOL, no one disagrees that the individual department pages *can* be better than a uniform one, the problem is simply that the RPG section is the only one that got that kind of attention. If no one is actually going to manage them, we're better off with a uniform page.
I have no strong feeling about fiction being published on the site. I enjoy good fiction in any form, and I think getting electronic rights to good TLE stories is a fantastic idea.
Also, I'm starting to get a feeling for what TWG should, perhaps, be. Review sites are plentiful and much better funded than we are. However, we could be a community site, drawing people by word of mouth (and/or email or IM). We would serve the special interests of our community, which ranges from tabletop games to PnP RPGs to video games to books. Or maybe even original fiction, and online forum games. It's something to think about, at least.
-
on the uni-form webpages. EUOL we're useing PHP here, we can easly bring in graphics even if there aren't seperate pages. If the graphics are roughtly the same size pixel wise then when the page loads the graphics requested will load. It works basicaly the same way the text is pulled in.
And as I've said before If you get some good quality control for the Fiction I have no real problem with it, even though I have the problem with getting spread too thin.
-
Theoretically, you could come up with a few different templates and still have a central set of variables that could be altered. But since I neither maintain site appearance nor code the php, I would have to say that ease is the greater virtue here. So skip the template step and just have one easily maintained page.
As for support: All I can say is that if the reason we feel we don't have support now is because the people who didn't get support before won't give their support now because they didn't have it then, well.... that'll be pretty darn sad. (If you follow that sentence, you get a cookie. My wife just made them, stop by and I'll give you a handful). Jeffe and I are both excited about developing TWG further, we talk about it a lot. We're also trying to suggest things that would be indiuvidual commitment, rather than needing a whole lot of people (ok, staff picks needs support, but I've already said if no responses come, it's bagged, and that won't stop me from other things).
Anyway, fiction:
I like the idea of co-opting some of TLE's. Who wants to be in charge of asking them (since 42 is an editor, he'd be a good one to liason).
Deadlines are good. And incidentally, hold me to this. I have 10 reviews to write, including Pendragon, Light Speed, and Buttonmen. I want at least half of them in this week.
-
Well how PHP works is when you request a page it generates it on the server then sends it to the browser. So we are useing a template, in simple terms, for the pages. The difference will be no hard copy, like how HTML works, on the server.
-
As for support: All I can say is that if the reason we feel we don't have support now is because the people who didn't get support before won't give their support now because they didn't have it then, well.... that'll be pretty darn sad.
It's a bit more complex than that, I believe. Those of us who tried new ideas were forced to confront the realism of the site. As it exists right now, TWG is more what Tage suggested above. A community resource, never intended to be anything other than marginal. Now, that's not to say it isn't fun and worthwhile. However, we just don't have the support and resources to become a leader in the field. A bigger problem is that I sense a lack of truly original content at TWG.
It isn't that we don't support you, SE. It's that we are wary of dumping a lot of time into the site, when the end result is going to make us feel like the title is a bit more appropriate than it should be. I'm more in favor of moderation.
So, I encourage and applaud your efforts. However, I am reluctant to commit to much, lest I over-extend myself.
-
The reason I've been so hard on you SE isn't that I;m bitter, or a jerk. But more becasue no one else was argueing the point of not changeing. True I don't care for the Ideas, but not that much. For the most part I've been playing devils advocite. True I did get mad at one of your posts (and poor Entropy had to put up with me ranting about it). I feel we shouldn't make any of these significant changes without everyone knowing the pros and cons of each thing.
So in my mind the fiction is done and now we need to move on to this idea of a community site.
When you say that I get this horrid picture of RPG.net. A place where morons hang out at the message boards and there is no quality control on submitted articles.
EDIT: And I agree with EUOL, lets take our time here and only add a few new things. If every thing goes well we can think of doing more after a few months. Not Jump out of the gate with all new content and more then we can manage. If we do that we're sure to fall on our faces.
-
Well, EUOL, that's good too, we don't want people promising anything we can't deliver.
Ok, so let's start slow.
Staff picks will be cake if people submit (so far no one has, but it's only been two days), so that's easy. So let's focus on regular content. Jeff and I can together get 2 (probably more, but I refuse to make promises) a week, so if the rest of the staff can get one, that would get us there. the step after that is ensuring that some of the content is more than just reviews. Leastways, that's my opinion.
-
sounds good. I've allready submitted a Palladium fantasty RPG guide like fells rifts one. And EUOL's allready posted somethign today.
-
I submitted a movie review in addition to my Castle Falkenstein review and I have two experimental reviews written for games I have just looked at (timeline and Champions Battleground)
-
Speaking of Timeline, it's a CheapA game, and so is Light Speed. They'll both be in today, and they're both short, so you might want to post them at the same time later this week.
-
Hey Tage since you're takeing new ideas into consideration might I suggest a change to the way articles are handled by deparment heads. Right now, as you know, when I post an article it automaticly 'approves' it so I either have to make it viewable to admins only or log out and then submit it that way. It would be nice to have the option to be able to send it to the article waiting section or to have it auto post.
-
I could easily make it so that all articles you post don't auto-approve (which would affect all mods. So you mods, you're articles wouldn't be auto-approved anymore). Making it so that you could choose would be much harder.
-
Well if it dosen't auto approve then we can just goto the artcile waiting sectoin and post them if we want them up right away. But I think right now that this would only affect me since you,Fell and EUOL are admins and I'm the only mod that submits articles with any frequency. And when you orignialy designed the system this way we were expecting deparment heads to manage and post artices, and that dosen't happen. Fell approves anyhting, and there's not much point to have mods post articles if we cannot place blurbs on the main page. I think to only time I'd ever post something directly to a deparment would be a TOC article. So I see no reason to have them auto post at all, even if we do get new deparment heads or the old ones come back (ie Kid, skar).
-
Fell? What do you think?
-
I love it.
-
This, however, leads back to the question of quality control--most specifically, in my mind, issues of grammar and spelling. I realize it's a bit hypocritical for me to address this issue, but it is something that needs to be raised. I've noticed some problems in articles posted recently, and would not be surprised to find them in my own articles as well. It would still be good if everything got a second read-over by someone with an eye for such things.
-
When Spriggan once linked me to a pre-release review he mentioned that fell would later spell check it and do the grammar thing before approving it.
-
Yeah, I keep thinking we need to go with the proofreading hting. Even though I myself rarely proofread my own, we should get some more control on that.
-
I allwayse spell check my stuff then come back the next day for a proof read. By then I've forgotten what I intended to write and find more typos. And I allwayse expect Fell giveing it a once over
-
And you just mispelled (misspelled?) "always" twice in the same paragraph in the exact same way. Nice one.
-
I could help proofread.
Credentials:
- BA in English, Editing emphasis
- Not too lazy
-
The auto-accept has been changed so that only articles from me or Fell are automatically posted. Everything else will have to be approved by one of us. And by one of us I mean Fell, because I never bother with that side of things.
Also, SE, you're now an RPG department head. You should see some of the admin functions now, if you didn't before.
-
I may use you MoD, if you turn out to respond quickly
Tage, I saw. I'm not quite clear on what to do with them, though, if Fell is doign all the posting.
-
Wow. I can just feel the pressure.
-
If I remember correctly, department heads are able to edit articles, as well as post blurbs to their departments. There was some other stuff originally, but as I mentioned before, no one was interested, so don't worry about it.
-
I will edit away then.
-
Well don't get to out of control. All you sould do is edit spelling and some minor grammer.
-
THE POWER! IT FILLS MY BODY AND MIND! THE POWER!
-
Well Tage changing it so articles mods submit go automaticaly to the waiting page has caused an unexpexted problem. Now when a mod edits an article, weither it be on allready posted or one wateing to be approved, instead of changeing the article it makes a copy of it and resubmits it to the articles waiting section. So if me or SE ever have a reason to edit somehting (I for one allwayse check articles meta tags) then there would be a real problem. If fixiing this is a pain you can just go back to the old way. It does bug me to have to log out to submit an article, but not that much.
-
I'll have to actually look at the code tomorrow.
-
I think that all link code should include _blank after the url. This opens up a new window to the amazon or other store page, or a company page. We don't want people to leave TWG when they click on our links. This should be any link on site even ones that link to other TWG articles. I know some people hate haveing new windows open up but again our goal is to keep people on site for as long as possible. A lot of times when someone clicks one of those links they'll forget or not care to come back to TWG right away.
I have no problem going through all the articles in the next few days and makeing those chages if need be.
-
A new content window is MUCH less annoying than a popup. this is done frequently.
I think you're right. We'll need to edit anythign that comes in though, because not everyone can be expected to know how to do it. I'll start doing it on all my new articles.
-
Well HTML has the default set to allwayse open up links in the same window. Is there a way (useing HTML or PHP) to change that default, that way we don't have to worry about it.
-
all you need to do is add
target="blank"into the link. Like:
<A HREF="http://wwww.happypage.com" target="blank">Go to my Happy Page!</A>
That will open a new window with the new page in it.
-
no I was talking globealy (ie the entire site), but I realised that with all the links there are that we don't want to open new windows in. So that would be a bad idea. and you can just plage _blank instead of target="blank"
-
oh, i see.