Future of Dungeon/Dragon magazines

[Man in the Funny Hat]

It's nice that a whole thread can be spent with complaining about the news without discussing the actual contents .

One more time... The complaint is NOT with the content. It is with the presentation of the content in raw, unprofessional form by both the author and the EDITOR who is responsible for ensuring that an authors work is up to at least MINIMAL STANDARDS. At the very least, if for some pointless reason it was DESIRED that the information be presented as crudely as possible, either the author or editor ought to have placed a disclaimer at the top of the article explaining the otherwise inexcusable poor quality of the presentation and more importantly WHY neither author or editor was passing along an article that exibited even a basic level of concern for appearance much less a minimal quality of work.

 

[Ranger REG]

Sheesh! All of the English major students have come out of the hiding all of a sudden. Where were you when WotC, Mongoose, and all other publishers needed editors, eh? Pbbt!

Let's not talk about academics and just get to the heart of the topics here, shall we?

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Given that more than one person has posted that they did understand it, I'd say it has.

That's an amazingly low standard for writing and editing, then.

"Hey, two guys down the hall figured out what this says, it must be OK!"

I don't see any other industry sites posting such info as it happens.

That's probably the root of it: They put up stuff like this because there's nowhere else for people to go.

Lord knows the big comic book sites do a significantly better job of this with their convention news, because there's quite a bit of competition in that sector.

 

[ColonelHardisson]

That's an amazingly low standard for writing and editing, then.

"Hey, two guys down the hall figured out what this says, it must be OK!"

Yet those were the same standards you used in determining how awful the editing and writing were. "Hey, a couple guys online said they couldn't understand it! It must be universally so!"

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Yet those were the same standards you used in determining how awful the editing and writing were. "Hey, a couple guys online said they couldn't understand it! It must be universally so!"

Yes, I will err on the side of trying to make things more clear, rather than just accepting them as they are.

See, when I write (and I do write, for a living), I want them to be read by the widest audience possible. In other fields, this would be thought of as customer service. In writing, it's called doing your job properly.

 

[Turjan]

Yes, I will err on the side of trying to make things more clear, rather than just accepting them as they are.

The point is that I honestly don't believe anyone here who tells me that he cannot understand the article. It might be hard to read in some places, but still. English is a foreign language for me. I understand that article. That's why I have the feeling that all these "I cannot understand half of the article" postings by native English speakers is some kind of exaggeration that's just done in order to prove a point. And this point is made over and over...

Ladies and gentlemen, I think everybody got the message. The article would be better with some edits. I propose that we move on .

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

The simple fact is: did they need to put it up within 30 minutes of the seminar ending? Couldn't they have at least taken another half-an hour or so to make it legible? Geeze.

Not having even been there I did just that to prove the point. The original author certainly could have punched it up just as I did in about a half hour, an hour tops:
http://home.earthlink.net/~duanevp/rewrite.htm
All the editor would have needed to do is check spelling and grammar, maybe do a little formatting. If _I_ can do it then any monkey with a keyboard can do it - and bloody well should have. Heck, I should have them replace the original with mine and pay me.

 

[Ranger REG]

Dude, even I have posted couple of news bits on GamingReport.com, most of them having to do with updates to WotC's SRDs. And I'm not a paid employee.

Despite all your grammer criticisms, GamingReport.com still remains my #1 news source for RPGs. I go there before I visit ENWorld.org every day.

 

[Erik Mona]

I thought it was cool that a representative from Gaming Report was on hand to report on the seminar. Yeah, a little more polishing would have been appropriate (I am enjoying visions of Gary Holeanth in Castle Maurey), but it doesn't seem too difficult to understand what the writer was trying to convey.

If anyone has any unanswered questions about the topic of the seminar, the Future of Dungeon and Dragon Magazines, I'd be happy to answer them on this thread.

--Erik Mona
Back from Gen Con

 

[Belen]

I thought it was cool that a representative from Gaming Report was on hand to report on the seminar. Yeah, a little more polishing would have been appropriate (I am enjoying visions of Gary Holeanth in Castle Maurey), but it doesn't seem too difficult to understand what the writer was trying to convey.

If anyone has any unanswered questions about the topic of the seminar, the Future of Dungeon and Dragon Magazines, I'd be happy to answer them on this thread.

--Erik Mona
Back from Gen Con

I would like to hear what you want the magazines to achieve in the next few years, whether there will be any changes in direction, and what excites you about the future of the magzines.