Kickstarter Too many Kickstarter projects? Is Kickstarter the new d20 glut?

w_earle_wheeler · Jul 30, 2012

I like the idea of Kickstarter projects, but I don't think they should be in the "News" category.

gamerprinter · Jul 31, 2012

w_earle_wheeler said:
I like the idea of Kickstarter projects, but I don't think they should be in the "News" category.

I don't know. RPG Kickstarters tend to be about new products for gamers not yet in existence - sounds like news to me. And as I mentioned further up, most of the other 'News' items other than Kickstarters aren't very 'new-sy' to me.

Everyone has a different perspective on it, I suppose.

Anthraxus · Jul 31, 2012

I'd prefer to see a bunch of them collected on the separate site, and not in the news feed. I do like the idea of *some* of the kickstarters, some are really cool, and a majority I'm not interested in at all. But I'd still like to see them in one place!

Morrus · Jul 31, 2012

Anthraxus said:
I'd prefer to see a bunch of them collected on the separate site, and not in the news feed. I do like the idea of *some* of the kickstarters, some are really cool, and a majority I'm not interested in at all. But I'd still like to see them in one place!

Well you got half your wish! They're all on the separate site. It's just the inclusion here that's at question.

The idea of just having the [in my opinion] cool ones here will mean me effectively saying "no, yours isn't cool enough" to a lot of insistent people who will get really pissed at me. Not that I'm not used to that, but it's another factor.

And putting them in a separate forum here on ENW is - let's all be honest - the same fate as not covering them at all.

Tricky little thread to tread.

Mark CMG · Jul 31, 2012

Morrus said:
Well you got half your wish! They're all on the separate site. It's just the inclusion here that's at question.

The idea of just having the [in my opinion] cool ones here will mean me effectively saying "no, yours isn't cool enough" to a lot of insistent people who will get really pissed at me. Not that I'm not used to that, but it's another factor.

And putting them in a separate forum here on ENW is - let's all be honest - the same fate as not covering them at all.

Tricky little thread to tread.

Yeah, it's a fine line. Do you want to be a full-coverage news site with little to no appearance of bias or a site that gives the opinions of yourself and a select few as to what is newsworthy? Ultimately, there's no real conflict in being either provided you are up front about what kind of site it is. Where it would be problematic is in professing to be the former but becoming the latter. I still advocate for roundups with breakouts based on the traction they gain in the community. It also allows you as first citizen of the community, so to speak, to keep things tidy, cover all of the cool stuff, and not miss the things that the community finds cool even if it doesn't necessarily appeal to you on first blush. Seems like the best of all worlds.

prosfilaes · Aug 1, 2012

Mark CMG said:
Yeah, it's a fine line. Do you want to be a full-coverage news site with little to no appearance of bias or a site that gives the opinions of yourself and a select few as to what is newsworthy?

I'm not sure I see the distinction. Any news site shows a limited number of articles selected for newsworthiness by a small group of people.

Mark CMG · Aug 1, 2012

prosfilaes said:
I'm not sure I see the distinction. Any news site shows a limited number of articles selected for newsworthiness by a small group of people.

Naw. In a niche market (or industry) where there's a limited amount of actual news a "full-coverage" site has the luxury of not needing to pick and choose, nor editorialize based on their own likes/dislikes etc. Another way to go is to focus on the few large companies in the field, and a handful of personal favorites from the broad field below the big companies, but that can have the effect of causing those looking for news to divide their time between numerous sites to get the full range of news. Covering too few of the sites overall, and folks looking for news will go direct to the source of the few being covered, particularly if there isn't much perspective given beyond the straight news itself. This site has one advantage in that a lot of discussion happens here in the forums, which helps bring folks around.

The advent of mirroring threads between the news forum/front page and the other forums has done much to revitalize the front page after a period where Morrus seemed concerned that too much traffic was skpping the front page and only using the forums. There's still no guarantee that such mirroring will continue to have that desired outcome if the news/front page doesn't have enough additional material as a drawn in its own right. Right now I can imagine there are some folks, those who are only interersted in 5E information, frequent the 5E forum and don't bother checking the front page because much, if not all, of the info they want exists in the 5E forum as mirrored threads from the front page without the need to wade through other news items (items that also don't retabulate based on how lively they happen to be). That might be one of the downsides of this mirroring. Plus, of course, there aren't new 5E products or reviews of same yet to draw 5E-only folks toward the front page.

Anyway, the broader the news coverage, the more likely folks will use EN world, and its front page, as their main andpossibly only news source for RPGs and related items. That's my own opinion anyway.

Anthraxus · Aug 1, 2012

Morrus said:
Well you got half your wish! They're all on the separate site. It's just the inclusion here that's at question.

The idea of just having the [in my opinion] cool ones here will mean me effectively saying "no, yours isn't cool enough" to a lot of insistent people who will get really pissed at me. Not that I'm not used to that, but it's another factor.

And putting them in a separate forum here on ENW is - let's all be honest - the same fate as not covering them at all.

Tricky little thread to tread.

In that case, Morrus- It's not that bad reading through all the kickstarter announcements on the news page. You can ignore them at your leisure. And I do like the separate site that shows all the RPG focused kickstarters. There's a bunch I would have missed that I am interested in, if I had not seen them collected on the separate site!

IronWolf · Aug 4, 2012

Mark CMG said:
I still advocate for roundups with breakouts based on the traction they gain in the community.

This seems like a nice compromise to me. A digest for kickstarters, link off to the Tumblr site which can have more details. As some seem to get more attention by buzz on the social networks or other places, then possibly a more highlighted news entry.

Mark CMG · Aug 4, 2012

IronWolf said:
This seems like a nice compromise to me. A digest for kickstarters, link off to the Tumblr site which can have more details. As some seem to get more attention by buzz on the social networks or other places, then possibly a more highlighted news entry.

Yup. The "more details" can come in the form of a critique/editorial, discussing the potential merits of the product, the history (if any) of the producer, perhaps even how well presented the actual Kickstarter page/video happens to be. There can also be a running followup to see how some of them turn out.