D&D General Why are so many D&D articles *garbage*?

[Minigiant]

In the non-theater entertainment world, there is not much journalistic integrity going around when clicks are major drivers.

 

[J.Quondam]

Welcome to the internet?

 

[niklinna]

The same is true for the You Tube channel version of this stuff. There is some great content out there, but you have to cut through a lot of chafe sometimes to find it.

Sometimes it seems YouTube is nothing but chaff.

 

[Mordhau]

I've noticed for a while that the paid journalism on D&D is generally of lower quality than free blog posts by hobbyists.

But the OPs examples are all basically examples of the genre of 'listicles' which are pretty much always trash.

So if you reverse the question it almost answers itself.

Why are bad articles now being written for D&D players?

Because there is now considered to be enough to drive clicks.

 

[Mordhau]

Sometimes it seems YouTube is nothing but chaff.

Also unrehearsed blather. You have to sit through 25 minutes of blather to get 5 minutes of chaff.

 

[Mecheon]

Sometimes it seems YouTube is nothing but chaff.

I remember the old days. Back when Youtube was just, whatever. Kids stringing together a narrative between different video games, just random good stuff

Tribute to Anomalocaris inexplicably becoming trending again was a beautiful wonderful window into a good time that we all deserved more of

 

[el-remmen]

Sometimes it seems YouTube is nothing but chaff.

Between my various D&D, terrain crafting, and cultural criticism channels, I probably watch more You Tube than any streamer.

 

[TerraDave]

Its the mainstreaming of D&D!

So you get D&D advice of the same quality that you get on everything else.

 

[Ogre Mage]

It is a positive sign that D&D is now so popular that websites/content creators are trying to use it as "clickbait." As someone who was young in the 1990s this was not always the case.

As for there being a large amount of garbage content, I see that on all topics. I read/view personal finance content and there is a lot of what Jane Bryant Quinn dubbed "financial pornography" -- "GET RICH QUICK WITH THIS PLAN!" "10 HOTTEST STOCKS TO BUY NOW!"

What would "D&D pornography" be? That's probably a question better left unanswered.

 

[Charlaquin]

Or, the writers of these articles aren't writing about optimization, and are speaking to fairly casual or roleplay focused fans, which between the two outnumber people who care about optimization.

Such articles are definitely plentiful too, but I don’t think they’re the “garbage” @Ancalagon is talking about.