Empire of Crust sounded an appreciated warning - as per their post On the Cancer of Creation for Others - a mere hobby blog such as this, must retain its utility to me. I make not a cent from this, it would be futile indeed to get trapped in some sort of content mill mentality *for free*.
Even assuming 2/3 of all traffic is bot-nonsense, traffic surges. Cloudflares boss thinks its 57% for all the internet.
On Writing
I was going to take this as an opportunity to cover off the 'why I write' prompt and then while I was travelling, things got spicy with A Knight At The Opera getting torched.
There were a few who commented on the 'who do you write for' topic - Dungeon Fruit started it, Roll to Doubt and Mightier Than a Sword contributed and I spent a good long time pondering. Mostly, I post that others may have the benefits I had in coming to the OSR blogosphere when I did. I missed G+ by a hair, so my entire experience was the blogs that preserved the thing that was gone. There were lessons learned, tips and tricks that lit a fire under me and so I resolved to chunter along as best I could that I might do likewise.
I recognise I am no genius game designer, nor have I the time to polish ideas up to A-grade on a regular basis. I can document table-fixes and ideas I come up with for my own campaign - the work-log of a journeyman DM - that it might help others avoid some pitfalls or - better yet - be inspired to do something they would never have otherwise come up with.
As part of this I try to fish out and preserve some of the torrent of ideas and discussion that sluice past in the digital abyss of discord - that they might be preserved against its ruin and better found and referenced today.
I had written *exactly this far* when I put down my pen, and between that and picking it up again, one of the great sites of the OSR was deleted (fair enough) and excised from the wayback machine (boo!).
I was very upset but I talked it through with an old friend, a musician, on the topic of a creatives control of their archive. By their views, since noone had paid a penny for any blog posts, none had any claim to them - freely distributed, freely taken back. To bad for those posts of mine that now lead to dead pages, more fool me for not saving down copies of everything. I have no right to any of those writings, I paid no money for them. It still feels like someone painted over a mural that enriched a community because they did not like the people taking selfies in front of it, or locked up a park because 'the wrong sort' were using it.
That blog succeeded in creating a vibrant patch on the internet, one worth visiting and revisiting. Whatever about declaring you were done and hanging a sign refuting those interpretting your works in a way you disapprove, blocking access to all with no warning is not cool, tearing all trace from the archives spites everyone who ever appreciated the place, not just the bad apples who so infuriated the creator. However the creators was/is well within their rights and I will swallow this bitter taste eventually.
One of the masters of our community of practice has been driven off. Now those who come after us will find less. Gems of gaming are still found on blogs ten years defunct or more. What we do not work to preserve, for the wonder and enlightenment of those who come after, will vanish.
I do not know why this has hit me so damn hard, I don't know Dwiz, he has no idea who I am. There is probably something in watching someone run a blog like I might aspire to in my wildest dreams - expansive, interesting, with useful things in there, throwing off ideas that spark inspiration in others - and to find it brought him *no joy*. Grim.
On Comrades
All the above makes me ever more grateful for the concrete evidence of folk who read this and decide it is worth their time by putting it on their own blogroll, my most sincere gratitude for that vote of confidence. Once more I must thank the following comrade-bloggers from whose sidebar blog-rolls readers find their way here.
Many have appeared before:
DIY & Dragons,
Nothics Eye,
Retired Adventurer,
Archons March On,
Shuttered Room,
Bruce Heard,
Lizardman Diaries,
Weaver.skepti.ch,
Chaudron Chromatique,
Ynas Midgard,
Uncaring Cosmos,
Kelvin Green,
Awesome Lies,
Spot Hidden,
Wierd Wonderful Worlds,
A Continent of Banalities,
All Wizards Are Bastards,
Advanced Mystery and Manners,
Prismatic Wasteland,
Beneath Foreign Planets,
Taskerland,
Tim S Brannan,
Spriggans Den and Sundered Shields and Silver Shillings
plus new appearers
Sable Mage,
Forrest for the Trees,
Bjork's blog,
Drama Dice,
Glass Candles,
Xenograg,
Archbrick and
Eldritch Fields
the folks at Gaming Tavern
and welcome new joiners Dungeon Fruit,
Explorer Design and
Patchwork Paladin.
Some new names turn up and that is delightful, that someone can stick me on their blogroll or link to me and it still cuts through the noise.
On Goals
The observant among you will notice that the 'downshifted schedule' survived just one month because G L Å U G U S T 2 0 2 6. Just when I thought I was out...
I will be testing the reduced schedule for the rest of the year, see does it clear space to feel more fun or will the lack of deadlines just mean things wilt with no compensation.
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