Monday 10 August 2009

The website is dead ... long live the blog!

Having run a website devoted to Colonial Wargaming for quite a few years – and having been a regular blogger since September last year – I decided that the time had come for me to create a specific blog for my Colonial Wargaming.

Unlike my other, more general wargaming blog – Wargaming Miscellany – this blog will only contain entries that are devoted to colonial wargaming in particular and colonial warfare in general. There may be some duplication of entries – notably if I am explaining how I have designed a particular set of colonial wargame rules or how I conducted a play-test of those rules – but my intention is that this should be the exception rather than the norm.

Happy reading!

8 comments:

Bluebear Jeff said...

Bob,

*grin* . . . I actually follow your other blog for the Colonial posts (and usually skip the other periods) . . . so I am glad that you will be starting this "Colonial only" blog.

I too have noticed that many of the old Colonial sites have fallen into dormancy . . . but they are still of value because I do go to them to check on information or to look at their campaigns.

Please do transfer much of your website material here . . . and put links to appropriate posts into your "side boxes".


-- Jeff

Gallia said...

Bob, Best wishes with your new venture - the blog.
Good luck and satisfaction for you,
Bill
Gen. Pettygree's blogger

Robert (Bob) Cordery said...

Jeff,

You should have said!

I have had a long think about what to do and my plan is as follows:

1. Continue to run the website, updating it about once every two months. It will remain an online resources, but will not be as 'current' as my blog.

2. Use the new blog to deal with such things as new rules I am writing, battle reports, and general stuff. If I make a substantial addition to the website, the blog will be the 'gateway' to it.

This seems to be the best course of action, as it means that the time and effort expended on the website over the past few years will not have been wasted, and it will be easier to blog some of the stuff I had previously added to the website.

Keep reading ... and enjoying your wargaming,

All the best,

Bob

Robert (Bob) Cordery said...

Bill,

The way in which the adventures of General Pettygree have been told via your blog are one of the reasons why I have been thinking long and hard about what to do with my website.

Thanks for your kind words of support,

All the best,

Bob

Anonymous said...

Any blog which adds to the hobby as a whole is OK by me. Keep it up Bob, I'm always on the look out for new ideas.

Steve.

Robert (Bob) Cordery said...

Steve,

I intend to do just that.

All the best,

Bob

DestoFante said...

Bob, congratulations on the new endevour! Since the colonial period is probably my favorite wargaming topic, I am very excited about this development!

Also -- I tried to post a reply to the discussion you have started on the colonial list, but somehow I managed to lose my message in the yahoo system... at risk of running a duplicate, I re-posting here my observations.

***********

Bob,

sorry to be late in the discussion, but I want to add my two cents.

First of all, your website is a real gem, a true treasure! I may visit it less than I visit your current blog(s), but the information and ideas it provides are just invaluable. I would dare to say that, along with Major General Tremorden Rederring, it is one of the most fundamental online contributions to colonial wargaming. I confess that your Mirkat Campaign has been an inspiration for years, and without it there will be no Captain Agesilao Fantoni at DestoFante!

Second, I see blogs and websites as providing different functions, and as such more complementary than alternative. A blog is a daily diary, where ideas are sketched, projects are tracked, information disseminated in bites. A website shows the final product, a concluded narrative, the summary of best practices. A blog is a daily newspaper; a website is a history book. We need both.

Personally, I envisioned DestoFante as a source of materials for what, hopefully soon, will be my website. I am getting closer, but I feel I need more stories, more rules reviews, more good pictures, better painted miniatures(!), more narratives to go online with a website. In the meanwhile, the blog collects the preliminary work.

Finally, a recommendation. The best way to bridge the gap between a blog and a website is proper labelling of the blog entries. "Wargaming Miscellany" does it very well, and I try to do my best at DestoFante. Not everyone follows the practice, though -- which make me fear that some good content may get lost in the archives, sooner or later.

Long live Colonial Wargaming (the website), and Colonial Wargaming (the blog)!

Adik
destofante.blogspot.com

Robert (Bob) Cordery said...

Adik,

WOW!!!

What a lovely set of compliments you pay me; I only hope that I really deserve them!

As you have no doubt gathered, I intend to run both the Colonial Wargaming website and the Colonial Wargaming blog ... as well as they other blog and websites that I run!

I see the role of the blog as a way of doing my 'thinking' in public, with the website recording the final summary of what I have done. The blog will 'feed' the website, and will link through to it whenever it is appropriate.

Good luck with your current African Colonial campaign (which I am following with considerable interest) ... and good luck with your growing family.

All the best,

Bob