so whats the deal here?

M

magicman_moe

Guest
exactly whats goin on with the internet basically killing off almost all the major sites concerning mtg?
has the ptc and the cc got ahold of them? have they run out of things to bitch about so theyre goin after this?
just wonderin thats my conspiricy theory.

mebbe wotc is tryin to get rid of us and make jokemon popular again!
its just that ive been hearin mtgnews and dragon studios goin down for awhile. man if molt and this site go down thats it for mtg! really, we are the last few remaining hardcore mtg'ers left. heheh we are all but a dyin breed!

what are yalls thoughts on this?
i say if mtg goes we just riot! just bring about the end of the earth hahahahaha!

oh well what do you guys think of this?
 
M

maraud234

Guest
I'm begginning to see this tread too, but I don't think it is as bad as it seems. Magic is still a very popular game, and even though pokemon is fast catching up, pokemon is mainly for little kids, and I don't think anybody would be stupid enough to get rid of this site. And if they did I would riot and blow up the Earth.... well, no I wouldn't, that's where I keep all my stuff!
 
M

MumboJumbo

Guest
It's definitely a different internet than when I first started playing Magic.

Once upon a time, The Dojo was "what to read" and it was run by one man in his spare time. Now your mileage may vary, but I know of few sites that can be run by one person, in their spare time, and remain current and interesting. The Dojo got turned over to Psylum, and when Psylum folded, so did the website.

I've certainly noticed problems with StarCityGames.com, and MTGNews isn't exactly warranting a daily check anymore. I imagine it's a combination of economics and time. Good websites aren't cheap, in terms of both money and time. Not enough people clicking on your banner ads? You lose your sponsors and can't afford to keep the site going. Not enough time to keep the site updated and interesting? People won't stop by anymore (which means fewer clicks on your banner ads, which means you lose your sponsors and lose the site anyway.)

That's a bit simplistic I'm sure, as I've never run a website, but a good Magic website certainly must be draining in terms of the time committment required. Very few people can work a day job and come home to 2-4 hours of website updating/maintaining.

If the current websites go, new ones will appear. People will find message boards or newsgroups to continue discussing the game. I suspect that long after the game itself is gone, there will be places to read about and discuss the game.

So don't sweat it. And let's be honest, most of us could do something else with the time we spend scanning Magic websites. There's an awful smell coming from my cats' litterbox, and yet here I am without a scooper anywhere in site. My cats would be appalled if they could understand what I'm doing!

MumboJumbo
 
B

Baskil

Guest
While most of what MumboJumbo is correct, there are some other issues that have lead to this.

Back when TheDojo was the major site, before Psylum, it was run by one guy, and was mostly adapted newsgroup posts. Then, when Psylum came over, it became about money. Writers were getting paid, etc. Then NewWave started their section, and so on and so on. At this point (pre-first Dojo death), the articles were for the most part fresh. Most of them were totally uncharted ground as far as stategy goes, and you'd never see anything like them today.

After the second Dojo death, when StarCity and MindRipper came into their own, a funny thing happened. Suddenly, submissions weren't being promoted to the front page. Or, if they were, it was because they were written extremely well. Seeing this, a lot of people decided that writing was probably not for them, and that they couldn't possibly be a featured writer on those sites. Then, there was a massive exodus of writers. People either quit the game, made the tour, or just stopped writing all together. Thus, when people logged in, instead of seeing the 30+ articles a day, we're stuck with around ten. Thus, the sales from each website started to dip. Banner hits started to lag a little. So what we are left with is a bunch of non-active writers just sitting around, and a handful of sporadic ones. I'd say there's a core of probably 60 or so writers that write on a semi-weekly basis. That may seem like a lot, but it isn't spread over seven different websites.

So with the decreased revenue that was coming in due to the lack of profits, cheaper services were used, and connectivity problems have been occuring. Or, as in the case of YavipaiOpen and MTGCampus, they just shut down.

So what can you do to help out? Write. And then pick a site that you want to submit to. Be it the CPA, CCGPrime, StarCity, MindRipper, it doesn't matter as long as your opinion may be heard. Oh, and write reports. I couldn't stress this enough. People need to write reports even if they do poorly. You don't know how many people have asked me after I inquire about a report "You can write a report about a losing record?"

Hell, and it's not like there isn't incentive. One person got a box over at CCGPrime, there's $25 available every monday at StarCity, ect.
 
R

Ransac

CPA Trash Man
Now, writing isn't something I don't like. It's the unneeded, published critism that comes with it that I don't like (Refer back to the "HAVE YOU SEEN THIS??!" thread in General CPA back in December for further details). I feel that the barrage of displeasure shown on that thread started a lack of enthusiasm from the people here that write articles on other sites (not the hard-core writers, just some of the once in a while guys). I feel that with people wouldn't care about an article I wrote because there are so many better writers out there. And, like you said, baskil, a lot of people have this feeling, too. If there were less critism, there would be more writers and less sites in danger of closing.



Ransac, cpa trash man
 
G

Gizmo

Guest
I don`t see how in any way the number of people who write Magic articles would affect why a computer programming company`s website has ended.

It`s simple capitalism in action - there are always more startups than the market can support. The small ones (ie, bad, because they failed to attract users) will die.
 
D

DÛke

Guest
...agree with Gizmo.

I think most everyone would agree with me when I say that the CPA is attractive. Right? Also, it's not the CPA writers that make the CPA attractive, though, they could have helped...but surely, not the main center of attraction.

Writers have not much to do with it...but style, attitude, and personalities associated with the place sure do. That's why, I predict the death of MTGnews. It's mostly a hype...and bad users infect that place all day long (average of 2 reported posts per day!).

As long as we keep Chaos Turtle in the front page (he does add style to it), some moderators on the forums, and keep every member happy...we'll have the style and the attitude that'll outlast most anything.
 
S

Spiderman

Administrator
Staff member
Didn't we talk about this just last month or February? I guess it's just one of those things...

Gizmo: Your last sentence kinda ties in with your question in the first. Sometimes, the small ones who fail to attract users do in part because of bad/not enough writers. That's the relationship.

All: I personally don't think it's articles that make or break a site (although it seems that way now), it's just news in general. Back in Frank's day on the Dojo, like Baskil said, it was mostly a central point to read interesting news/issues from OTHER newsgroups (who knows, he might be pulling stuff from here if we were around then ;)). I guess articles and reports are nice, but I like news. Maybe I'm in the minority though...

Ransac: While I agree with you that the criticism may have caused some people HERE to have second thoughts, I question the "unneeded" part. When used correctly, criticism can be used to improve and frankly, some of the stuff being sent in here around that time WAS crap. Same with dopey tourney reports having one line for eac round saying "I don't remember the game, only I got my combo/kill method and slaughtered him." And some people's writing styles can be improved no matter what... If people take the criticism personally and see no way to improve, then perhaps those kinds of articles don't need to be written anyway. I'd rather read two GOOD articles than 10 bad ones, trying to find the two buried in there.
 
B

Baskil

Guest
Originally posted by Gizmo
I don`t see how in any way the number of people who write Magic articles would affect why a computer programming company`s website has ended.

It`s simple capitalism in action - there are always more startups than the market can support. The small ones (ie, bad, because they failed to attract users) will die.
Click to expand...

I don't see how you're disagreeing with me. Let's look at it this way: A good front page sells cards. A place like SC can afford to somewhat charge more for its cards because of the volume of sales. Now if SC did not have articles on the front page, your target market will stop going to your site, and only the desperate will buy off of you. It is pure economics. You don't provide a purpose for your customers to come back to your site, they will move on to another place that provides this service. This is especially true of Magic Websites that didn't have a storefront business fronting the bill for them. The reason SC, New Wave, and others are so sucessful is because they have a store front that is supporting the income from the site in the beginning. Without that sort of financial backing, the stock that is needed for internet purchases has to come out of your own pocket.

To sum it all up: Without content, you can't compete. And when you front the entire bill (like sites like YavipaiOpen, etc), you will eventually run out.
 
G

Gizmo

Guest
Yes, I agree.

But what ahs that got to do with Dragonstudios going down? people are complaining about a 'rush of closures' when they in fact mean 'Yavapai'. How does one site = a rush? I`ve never even heard of MTGCampus until right now.
 
S

Spiderman

Administrator
Staff member
Who mentioned MTGCampus? All I can see is MTGNews...

I think magicman_moe just started this thread in reaction to dragonstudios going down, and expanding it to the seemingly rush of other Magic sites going down. That's all.
 
C

Chaos Turtle

Guest
Baskil did.

And as far as Dragonstudios is concerned, they have been gone. Since the online play sites have been offering Apprentice on their own sites, and doing their own updates for it, there hasn't been any reason to even go to Dragonstudios' page.
 
S

Spiderman

Administrator
Staff member
Ah, I found it.

Still no guesses to my question? If other sites are doing their own updates to it, why don't they re-zip Apprentice with the updates also so newcomers get it?
 
V

Vasco_da_Gama

Guest
the reason folks worry about a 'rush' of closings is the following:

Dojo closes.
Yavipai closes.
Starcity gets recurring server problems
MTGnews stalls out
Meridian updates erratically
Dragonstudios vanishes, although they weren't a factor long before, its still disheartening to see the site poof away
Mindripper currently offline

there's a bit of a cumulative effect from all that, to say the least.

But Starcity and mindripper should be stable again soon, and mtgnews is supposed to be back the 1st, and I've heard a rumor that Dragonstudios is hoping to resurface again this summer.

All will be well. There is/was an overload of magic sites, and its being pared a bit. But that's normal.
 
M

magicman_moe

Guest
hehehe i forgot about this thread

actually it was a combo of things on why i started this thread

1. i was noticing the trend of mtg sites closing down

2. i havent heard jack about mtg sides the pre release and well we all know how that went

3. was bored and figured we could use something to channel(hehe cool card by the way) our uhh aggresion?

oh well you guys decide.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top