What's lacking -- aside from occasional threads on ENWorld and the like -- is an easy way to separate the wheat from the chaff and quickly and easily monetize it. Add WotC - level production values to get the most out of your Print On Demand item, and I can't help but think it would do quite well for itself.
WOTC is not intrested in looking over every 3PP product developed in order to find out what's good and what's bad. We, as a community, don't do enough to encourage/develop homebrew stuff. What do we need to do to ensure our great homebrewers get the kudos they deserve?
Well, mostly my fever-dream-vision has it being a community thing. Maybe some sort of social currency system like "Yoinks": you make something someone else wants, they "yoink" it. You like something someone else made, you "yoink" it. The most "yoinked" items rise to the top, and then maybe a WotC staffer looks at the top one each month or week or something and does a Pro Game Design revision on it. Works something like a Digg system or a Twitter system: the more people Following your work, the more your stuff is probably worth a look-see.
There's also a potential payment element. If your stuff get used in a PoD book, you get a little stipend for it. You might never make a living off of it, but $5 here and there might add up to free membership, or a free PoD book, or, heck, just an extra set of breadsticks for your gaming group this weekend.
There's a lot of ways out there in the internet world to measure what people are doing. Heck, a good chunk of 'em are right at the top of the thread.Facebook it, Digg it, Tweet it, Yoink it (okay, that sounds unbelievably sexual, but I think you get the idea), whatever. I know I'd be more active with 4e stuff if I got something out of it, be it community huzzahs or $5 maybe each month, or WotC themselves coming down, looking at it, seeing that It Is Good, and tinkering with it themselves.
Man, what's a guy gotta do to get a flame war around here?! If we keep this up, I may just go back to Usenet.Thanks for the reasoned, interesting discussions.
Well, mostly my fever-dream-vision has it being a community thing. Maybe some sort of social currency system like "Yoinks": you make something someone else wants, they "yoink" it. You like something someone else made, you "yoink" it. The most "yoinked" items rise to the top, and then maybe a WotC staffer looks at the top one each month or week or something and does a Pro Game Design revision on it. Works something like a Digg system or a Twitter system: the more people Following your work, the more your stuff is probably worth a look-see.
There's also a potential payment element. If your stuff get used in a PoD book, you get a little stipend for it. You might never make a living off of it, but $5 here and there might add up to free membership, or a free PoD book, or, heck, just an extra set of breadsticks for your gaming group this weekend.
There's a lot of ways out there in the internet world to measure what people are doing. Heck, a good chunk of 'em are right at the top of the thread.Facebook it, Digg it, Tweet it, Yoink it (okay, that sounds unbelievably sexual, but I think you get the idea), whatever. I know I'd be more active with 4e stuff if I got something out of it, be it community huzzahs or $5 maybe each month, or WotC themselves coming down, looking at it, seeing that It Is Good, and tinkering with it themselves.
Rather. Especially when you consider that their elephant actually exists.This thread:
Bogleheads :: View topic - No More Bailout or Credit Crises Threads
...reminded me of this thread.
I think their elephant in the room dwarfs ours, though.![]()