I started up a roleplaying commentary blog on Live Journal awhile back... http://ravenx99.livejournal.com/ I occasionally do brief movie and book reviews (just one so far), but my primary focus is on gaming, writin gaming stuff, and things in and around gaming that are of interest. (Like complaining that I don't have time to play City of Heroes.) To keep this from being just an ad for my blog, I'll bring up something that I've been thinking about... How do blogs affect discussion group (mailing lists, web forums, newsgroups) traffic? Blogs that accept user comments are a lot like a web forum where only one person (or a limited set of people) are allowed to start conversations. But I think those are like Slashdot... lots of people make comments, but how many of them go back and read any comments made after the initial visit? They don't seem to sustain conversation. There is cross-pollenation of blogs.... I respond in my blog to posts or essays in Gamethink (http://gamethink.blogspot.com/) and The 20 x 20' Room (http://www.20by20room.com/), for instance. But the authors and readers of those blogs may or may not come read my blog. But does any of this reduce list traffic? It probably does... I'm posting short articles on my blog that I'm not posting here, for instance. Is this good or bad? On one hand, it limits conversation and exchange of ideas. On the other hand, it means nobody has to listen to the masses discuss something... you pick the blogs you want to read and you can ditch those you have no interest in. (I hope mine is interesting. I started reading the blogs of some gaming industry "names" and I find them dull... in most cases, because they're not specifically about gaming, and I don't want to know what game writers think about politics and general stuff. That's why I keep my LiveJournal blog focused. If you want to read about my experiences with Netflix or Drumcircles in Kansas, you'll have to find my other blogs. :) (I maintain a couple blogs through Blogger that I host on the Phoenyx. I can see what kind of traffic I'm getting there. I chose my LiveJournal account for my gaming blog, and I'm not sure that there's a way to see how many people are reading it. Kind of a drawback.) -- Carl D Cravens (raven@phoenyx.net) Old immortals never die, they just... don't. ---------------------------------------------------------------- GAMERS Home Page: http://www.phoenyx.net/gamers/
On Thu, 20 May 2004, Carl D Cravens wrote: CDC>How do blogs affect discussion group (mailing lists, web forums, CDC>newsgroups) traffic? Blogs that accept user comments are a lot like a web CDC>forum where only one person (or a limited set of people) are allowed to CDC>start conversations. But I think those are like Slashdot... lots of CDC>people make comments, but how many of them go back and read any comments CDC>made after the initial visit? They don't seem to sustain conversation. Which is why Gamehawk will support blogs-as-mailing-lists, along with blogs-as-wikis and wikis-as-mailing-lists and blogs-as-wikis. Or something. CDC>There is cross-pollenation of blogs.... I respond in my blog to posts or CDC>essays in Gamethink (http://gamethink.blogspot.com/) and The 20 x 20' Room CDC>(http://www.20by20room.com/), for instance. But the authors and readers CDC>of those blogs may or may not come read my blog. Well, that's what Trackback's for, if you've got 'em (does anything but MT?) -- Karen J. Cravens silver@phoenyx.net ---------------------------------------------------------------- GAMERS Home Page: http://www.phoenyx.net/gamers/
Karen J. Cravens opened its mouth and moved its tongue and so spake to me and said, On 21-05-04 06:44: >On Thu, 20 May 2004, Carl D Cravens wrote:>CDC>There is cross-pollenation of blogs.... I respond in my blog to posts or >CDC>essays in Gamethink (http://gamethink.blogspot.com/) and The 20 x 20' Room >CDC>(http://www.20by20room.com/), for instance. But the authors and readers >CDC>of those blogs may or may not come read my blog. > >Well, that's what Trackback's for, if you've got 'em (does anything but >MT?) crschmidt of LiveJournal actually wrote a patch for it (I believe the LJ clone Plogs.net employs it), which he actually just recently wrote about: http://www.livejournal.com/users/crschmidt/252710.html -- Freso # Jabber ID = freso@jabber.com aka Frederik S. Olesen # PGP/GPG key = 0xAF0D01D6 Web: http://freso.dcginternet.co.uk // Personal info, misc. LJ : http://freso.livejournal.com // Diary, thoughts DA : http://freso.deviantart.com // Writings File attachment stored: http://www.phoenyx.net/gamers/files/signature.asc ---------------------------------------------------------------- GAMERS Home Page: http://www.phoenyx.net/gamers/
On Thu, 20 May 2004, Karen J. Cravens wrote:
> Well, that's what Trackback's for, if you've got 'em (does anything but
> MT?)
MT's put out a generic implementation, but Trackback usage isn't
widespread and too much trouble to use.
--
Carl D Cravens (raven@phoenyx.net) Gamers List Owner
[ Trim Your Quotes! ]
I sue you, you pay me, Lit-i-ga-tion's fun, you'll see.
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GAMERS Home Page: http://www.phoenyx.net/gamers/
On Fri, 21 May 2004, Carl D Cravens wrote: CDC>MT's put out a generic implementation, but Trackback usage isn't CDC>widespread and too much trouble to use. Gamehawk'll have to have an internal version. That should be much easier to automate. It's on my wishlist: http://www.phoenyx.net/gamehawk/bryar.cgi/id_8 -- Karen J. Cravens silver@phoenyx.net ---------------------------------------------------------------- GAMERS Home Page: http://www.phoenyx.net/gamers/
Karen J. Cravens wrote: >Which is why Gamehawk will support blogs-as-mailing-lists, along with >blogs-as-wikis and wikis-as-mailing-lists and blogs-as-wikis. Or >something. It's a desert topping! It's a floor wax! :) Seriously, I suspect blogs and mailing lists are going to converge over time. I remember reading one or two disussions on blogs vs. wikis for maintaining game background information; there are pros and cons of the two approaches. Am I the only person using an MT blog to store Phoenyx game archives? -- Tim Hall Weblog: http://www.kalyr.com/weblog Photos: http://kalyr.fotopic.net/ ---------------------------------------------------------------- GAMERS Home Page: http://www.phoenyx.net/gamers/
On Fri, 21 May 2004, Tim Hall wrote: TH>Seriously, I suspect blogs and mailing lists are going to converge TH>over time. I remember reading one or two disussions on blogs vs. wikis TH>for maintaining game background information; there are pros and cons TH>of the two approaches. They've pretty much merged, in the new software. Not that I expect it to have too much influence on the net at large. That's Google's job... TH>Am I the only person using an MT blog to store Phoenyx game archives? Yep. Though I will probably do it with the Phoenyx Fantasy archives, which are currently in the wiki (well, partially so... I'm supposed to be updating them so we can move ahead...) Or rather, I'll be putting them in the wiki/blog merger when I figure out how it should work. ---------------------------------------------------------------- GAMERS Home Page: http://www.phoenyx.net/gamers/
Carl D Cravens wrote: >How do blogs affect discussion group (mailing lists, web forums, >newsgroups) traffic? Blogs that accept user comments are a lot like a web >forum where only one person (or a limited set of people) are allowed to >start conversations. But I think those are like Slashdot... lots of >people make comments, but how many of them go back and read any comments >made after the initial visit? They don't seem to sustain conversation. There are some weblogs that do have extensive comment communities around them; Teresa Nielsen-Hayden's "Making Light" is one that comes to mind, with comment threads of a hundred comments or more. But few blogs seem to have enough of a critical mass of regular readers for this to happen. Actually the web-forum-where-only-one-person-can-start-threads is the default way game fora are set up on Dreamlyrics; anyone can post, but only the GM can start new threads. >But does any of this reduce list traffic? It probably does... I'm posting >short articles on my blog that I'm not posting here, for instance. Is >this good or bad? I've been known to crosspost things both to my blog and to a relevant mailing lists. I don't know if this is gross breach of nettiquette, but I have no idea how much overlap there is in readership. >On one hand, it limits conversation and exchange of >ideas. On the other hand, it means nobody has to listen to the masses >discuss something... you pick the blogs you want to read and you can ditch >those you have no interest in. (I hope mine is interesting. I started >reading the blogs of some gaming industry "names" and I find them dull... >in most cases, because they're not specifically about gaming, and I don't >want to know what game writers think about politics and general stuff. I like the description of the Blogosphere as Usenet turned inside-out; it's sorted by user rather than by subject. >That's why I keep my LiveJournal blog focused. If you want to read about >my experiences with Netflix or Drumcircles in Kansas, you'll have to find >my other blogs. :) I went the other way; I considered that one blog covering multiple subjects was better than a bunch of infrequently updated individual ones. If readers want game content they will have to skim the postings about model railways or prog-rock music. >(I maintain a couple blogs through Blogger that I host on the Phoenyx. I >can see what kind of traffic I'm getting there. I chose my LiveJournal >account for my gaming blog, and I'm not sure that there's a way to see >how many people are reading it. Kind of a drawback.) With the growth of RSS aggregators I don't think there's any real way of knowing how many people read a give blog; a lot of readers won't show up in the server site access logs, because they're reading the RSS or Atom feed through something like Bloglines. -- Tim Hall Weblog: http://www.kalyr.com/weblog Photos: http://kalyr.fotopic.net/ ---------------------------------------------------------------- GAMERS Home Page: http://www.phoenyx.net/gamers/
On Fri, 21 May 2004, Tim Hall wrote: TH>Actually the web-forum-where-only-one-person-can-start-threads is the TH>default way game fora are set up on Dreamlyrics; anyone can post, but TH>only the GM can start new threads. The Phoenyx was supposed to have this feature in the *last* release, but I never got around to it. Wasn't enough demand... if anybody ran their game that way, they enforced it socially instead of technologically, which is good enough for a mailing list. TH>I've been known to crosspost things both to my blog and to a relevant TH>mailing lists. I don't know if this is gross breach of nettiquette, TH>but I have no idea how much overlap there is in readership. If it's a breach of netiquette, I'm committing the same thing right now. I'm planning to make that possible (and even the norm) in the new software. In fact, one of my thoughts is to make it possible, either on a message-by-message or group-by-group (or maybe both) basis to say "This message is both a blog entry" (which is really to say, a post to my personal forum) "and a forum post to" for example "GAMERS." TH>I went the other way; I considered that one blog covering multiple TH>subjects was better than a bunch of infrequently updated individual TH>ones. If readers want game content they will have to skim the TH>postings about model railways or prog-rock music. The Gamehawk model will have subtopics same as any other forum, I think. Bryar does that, but so far as I can tell it's all-or-nothing... the blog owner sets the depth that the main blog displays to. Mine's set to 1 (no sub-blogs in the main one), so if you want to read my other blogs (which are only experimental right now) you have to read them separately. Gamehawk'll work either way. And then you can read it with NNTP, with a *real* newsreader. Heh. TH>With the growth of RSS aggregators I don't think there's any real way TH>of knowing how many people read a give blog; a lot of readers won't TH>show up in the server site access logs, because they're reading the TH>RSS or Atom feed through something like Bloglines. Bloglines tells you how many subscribers there are in the referer line, so if your web log (the REAL web log, not the weblog) shows that, you can at least tell that much. Far as I know they're the only ones. -- Karen J. Cravens silver@phoenyx.net ---------------------------------------------------------------- GAMERS Home Page: http://www.phoenyx.net/gamers/
