Well, I normally write this blog, but between illness in my family, being really busy with work, and being worn out (and therefore unable to survive on 3-4 hours of sleep) from recovering from my illnesses and all the work, there hasn't been a whole heck of a lot of writing going on over the last week or so.  

But anyway, if you weren't aware, BoardGameGeek started up a new feature recently that lets users create their own little blog within the larger context of the BGG monolith.  And one fleeting thought that crossed my mind as I read about and explored this new feature was whether or not I should be "worried" about all the possible influx of new bloggers.  After my initial moment of concern, though, I realized that it wouldn't make even a little bit of difference to me and my site. 

Mostly, it's because I don't compete with BGG and its content.  It certainly does a few things really well, as in, better than anything else in the world.  It's a database more than anything, where you can look up almost any game (of consequence) in existence, find out all about it, and get information and other resources for it.  Among all this, there are some wonderfully insightful articles and reviews, and now I'm certain, even blogs.

Unfortunately, these gems of information and opinion are more the exception than the rule.  Instead, the vast majority of all that is generated at BGG is total crap.  I subscribe to the new reviews RSS feed, and most of what comes across is completely unoriginal, poorly written, and/or virtually pointless.  I think that this is a symptom of a few things inherent to BGG.  First, it's open to almost anyone to join and contribute content.  Second, everyone is enticed to contribute by the lure of GeekGold, regardless of whether or not they actually have something to say or know how to say it.  And lastly, many of the contributors are new to writing, so they're still "learning" (which is a nice way of saying that they suck).

There's also no commitment needed to add something to BGG.  You can pop in and pop out whenever you want, taking as much time between contributions as you like.  There's no cost, even in the aforementioned GeekGold, to add content or even establish one of these new blogs.  

A "real" blog, however, is very different.  It requires at least some level of commitment both to get started and to maintain.  If you register your own domain and upgrade your hosting, you actually have to spend money.  And to get anyone to notice and read you, you have to post with some consistency.  Unlike the blogs at BGG, many of which I expect to be abandoned after 10-20 posts, a blog like GamerChris.com really has to become a hobby of its own in order to survive.

And then the most important thing about a blog is that it gives its writer the chance to develop their own individual voice.  At BGG, there's this constant background noise from the massive amount of content generated there all the time.  And some of it may even be pretty okay, except that it gets lost in the noise, with only a very few managing to rise above and get noticed, usually due to the thumb system.  But even thumbs are a poor solution, because the number of thumbs an entry gets often has a lot more to do with how popular the game is it's related to than how good it actually is.

But on a blog, it's a lot easier to find and appreciate what a writer really has to offer.  There's continuity and consistency, where you can get to know them and their likes and dislikes, and can then use that to help you evaluate whether or not you might feel the same way.   Bloggers have a freedom to do and write what they want, and their personality can really start to shine through as they get more and more experienced.

Some blogs are certainly better than others, and I have some strong feelings about what boardgame bloggers do could do better (which I'll not get into right now), but the ability to build some sort of relationship with a blogger both through reading and commenting is just too valuable for me to ignore.  Recommendations from my favorite bloggers and podcasters always have far more weight with me than any random review at BGG, and I doubt that the blog system there will change this.