User blogs

I have added a new question to your profile page, My blogs, vlogs, podcasts, websites.

So click on you avatar or username and add your stuff. These links do not have to be game related. Of course, if you have a gaming blog, vlog, or podcast we all want the link.

You can also post the link to your company if you are a publisher, artist, cartographer, writer or other creative.

Also if you post these links in Links on the top menu they will appear on the Main page until they scroll off. And they will appear in the sidebar on your profile page. These are good. But there's nothing quite as good as having your links front and center. Click on your name. See your links.

Starting a new project? Putting it on the web? Running a Kickstarter? Add the links.

Here's the link to my profile where you can see how this looks.

gamerplus.org/user/hairylarry

Thanks

Sometimes it's late at night and the house is quiet. You don't really want to play a video or listen to a podcast and wake everyone up. You just want to read some gaming blogs.

So I added a new feature, an RSS feed of just blogs written by Gamer+ gamers.

And you can find it near the bottom of the Blogs page. Click Blogs on the menu. Scroll down to the top of the footer. There it is.

If you write a blog, or post your art on a blog, or have a blog for your gaming company let me know. I will add you to this feed.

Email hairylarry@deltaboogie.com or message me on Gamer+.

Doseyclwn asks "Where is the appropriate place for me to place work on a module/adventure and get people to comment on it?"

If you click Blog in the menu and add a new blog with your module text and a request for comments that will appear in the Newsfeed and gamers will be able to comment. Then I would also go into the Writing Modules and Module Assets Group and post a link to the blog again asking for feedback. That would probably have a longer life in the view of those interested in writing modules. You can also message gamers you know who DM or work on modules and ask them if they would take a look and give you some feedback.

I think this can be generalized to many situations besides writing modules, basically anytime you are posting about a project hoping to get feedback.

Another advantage to posting as a Blog is that you can add tags which gives another search path to discovery for those interested.

I started writing this post on the Newsfeed but when I realized that it needed the tags, meta and help, I copied it and posted it as a blog.

Blogs also have the advantage of that Edit button making it the preferred way to post anything longer than two paragraphs.

There's always room for improvement, especially on any web project, but I have all 4 legs reaching the ground so I'll take a minute to explain our new aggregated RSS feed featuring always new content created by Gamer+ gamers.

Most blogs, podcasts, and video channels have RSS feeds. (or atom feeds, same thing but different) When people follow a podcast so they don't miss any episodes they often use the RSS feed so their podcast is updated in their feedreader or even auto downloaded to their device.

Many of the gamers on Gamer+ are content creators. I am, Carl is, The EvilDM is, and lots more. As you will see. So my idea was to find a way to promote their work right here on this site to make it easy for gamers to find the podcasts, blogs, videos, etc. that other gamers on Gamer+ are creating.

So I installed Tiny Tiny RSS and TheEvilDM and I have been busy subscribing to all the feeds we can find that other gamers on this site have available.

If we missed you let us know in the comments. If you start a new web project let us know. Even if it doesn't have an RSS feed let us know. We want to feature your stuff.

So the four legs of the stool are:

1. A scrolling auto updating display of all the new posts on all the feeds we have subscribed to on Tiny Tiny RSS. This is on the left above the banner in the footer.

2. A link list to the homepages of 12 of these creators that changes each time you load a page. This is on the right above the banner in the footer.

3. An auto updating link list to 60 recent posts from the Gamer+ creators. You can access this link at the bottom left of item 2 above, the bottom left of the right block just above the footer. There, is that confusing enough? I think I'll just post the link here.

View last 60 items here

4. A manually updated categorized link list of all the homepages of every feed we have added to Tiny Tiny RSS. This is on the bottom right just above the banner and also on the far right in the footer next to Mobile version. And here's the link for that.

Gamer's Homepages

Did you notice I said manually updated? No, I don't type this stuff in. I run a program I wrote on the exported opml file from Tiny Tiny RSS and the program types it all in. Still it's a thing that has to happen so it won't always happen just as soon as the RSS feeds are updated. And it might happen before the RSS feeds are updated because there is often a delay of about an hour before new posts are displayed.

I am not done working on this but I am happy with it. It's really good. It's all there. It could be better. What else is new?

Like I said, if you're on Gamer+ we want to add your stuff. And if you're not on Gamer+, join, so we can add your stuff. There's a lot of content on Gamer+ already and more all the time. But the amount of content in these feeds that you can easily access right from the footer on every page is more than you will ever have time to consume.

So, Enjoy! And add a comment below.

Ok, if you scroll down you can see what I've been working on right above the banner in the footer of each page. The left hand box is an aggregated RSS feed including blogs, podcasts, and videos made by Gamer+ gamers. The right hand box is a link list to the home page of these blogs, podcasts, or video channels.

There are so many creative people here doing so many things I wanted to feature their work. By reading, listening, and viewing what they do you will get to know them better than you can just browsing Gamer+.

I have ideas to make this better. I'd like to put up a page that's a categorized link list with all the links in one place instead of just 12 at a time. So if you're looking for something to read you can check the Blogs category, if you want to listen while you're cleaning your office (lol) you can check the podcast category.

If you have ideas to improve this project or others please post them below in the comments.

It's really a big world out there and nobody has time to check out all the creative work that even some of us do. I can't even keep up with what my kids do! So after you listen to a podcast or watch a video give it a mention here on Gamer+. That will give others an incentive to make that connection.

And if you have a creative gaming endeavor, even if it doesn't have a feed, please post in the comments. I am going to devise a way to include links to projects that aren't feed friendly like fiction, art galleries, or other major projects.