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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Tav_Behemoth" data-source="post: 1563766" data-attributes="member: 18017">The distribution pathway leading through brick and mortar stores does largely act to keep newbie publishers out. Unfortunately, this doesn't mean that it keeps out cruddy products by established publishers. So Ryan's point (as I understand it) is that some FLGS are starting to act as quality filters. By going to a store that has a good crud-barrier, you can be sure that whatever you see will be decent. But because any store also has a distribution barrier, you won't be seeing the best of what d20/OGL has to offer. Many great releases by PDF or small-press publishers won't get past the distribution barrier and onto shelves.The big problem for newbie publishers is that, as far as I can tell, no one is filtering out the crud from their sales channels. And since it's so cheap to release a PDF, those channels are getting choked even quicker. Nevertheless, every online retailer I've seen seems to be thinking that, since virtual shelf space is unlimited, they should fill it all with whatever comes along. The result is that even if J. Gamer figures out that there's more out there than brick and mortar stores are carrying, as soon as J. steps into an online gaming store they're smacked with a faceful of crud. IMHO, the best thing that could happen to the independent wing of d20/OGL publishing would be the creation of an online store that only carried the best. Start with only Ennie winners, or products that have received only 4-star or better reviews (minimum of three). Give each one of the products space, explain why they're great in a way that makes sense to J. Gamer, and make it clear that anything this store carries is guaranteed to rise above Sturgeon's Law.In fact, I think this would benefit the community as a whole more than quality barriers among FLGS. The role of a local store should be organizing a local community; it's too much to expect for them to also be experts in picking the best of a crowded market. Even if there is a store that can attract and keep staff with such discriminating tastes, you and I probably don't live near it!  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f641.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":(" title="Frown    :("  data-smilie="3"data-shortname=":(" /></blockquote>

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