Recently, I’ve been mulling over starting something that has been popular among other “genre” bloggers, the Carnival. What is a Carnival? I’ll quote the description of the popular Carnival of the Vanities (from a recent edition of said Carnival):
The COTV is showcase of blog posts which have been submitted by their authors as an example of their best work. Each week a host is selected to compile these posts and present them to the blogosphere so that people who may not have known about them will get a chance to read them. It is a great opportunity to expand your horizons beyond the normal heavy hitters.
There are a bunch of interesting Carnivals out there, including the ever important Cat and Dog Carnivals! If cat bloggers can have their own Carnival, so can Video Game Bloggers! I think this would be a great way to expose your readers to other players that also blog about video games. I think video game blogs are on the cusp of something big here.
With that in mind, I propose the Carnival of Gamers. (That’s the working title, it can change if someone has a better moniker) I would host the first couple of Carnivals, since I have a vested interest in seeing this succeed. I’m not sure if weekly or bi-weekly would be the best format, but that would work itself out. Anyone interested in participating would submit their selected entry to me, by way of blog comments or email to “buttonmashing at gmail dot com”. Everyone that submitted entries would be included (barring any inappropriate content, my discretion) and I reserve the right to present the entries as I see fit. I would add commentary as needed but I would want the entries to speak for themselves. This is about bloggers and their writing, not my lame attempts at pithy remarks.
So before I/we start this, I want to gauge interest in this endeavor. If you have a blog about video games, would you be interested in participating? Would you link/submit/host the Carnival? Would you be thick-skinned enough to take the occasional bit of criticism that may pop up, over time? How often to do you think we should have the Carnival? Can fanboys get along? Do you have a better name for it? Should we call it the Carnival of the Fanboys?
So please, link to this post, comment, send me an email, whatever, if you think this might be something that we “non-existent” gaming bloggers can do.
Update 5/11/05 – 8:28pm: There has been a pretty good response to the idea of having a Carnival. Many have responded, both to participating and to helping out/hosting. Everyone seems pretty optimistic. Thomas mentioned (in the comments) that some Carnivals have the host choose the posts to highlight, but I like the format of the Carnival of the Vanities with the participants submitting their own posts, so I think that will be the format we go with.
I’m planning on holding the first Carnival of Gamers Thursday, May 26th. I think bi-weekly will be an appropriate frequency. Thomas has volunteered to host, so he’ll host the next Carnival June 9th. We’ll set up a schedule with other hosts after that. I’ll set up a submission page next week and we’ll start accepting submissions then. Everyone is welcome to submit, and I’d really like it if we had some submissions from bloggers who aren’t obsessed with games as much as we are. Look here for more information soon.
Update 2:Go here for submission instructions.
I’m in, sounds like it will be fun. I can’t host it but I will be sure to submit to it and link it on my blog.
I’m interested, and I could certainly host. Note that in the other carnivals I’ve seen/participated in (Carnival of the Skeptics, of the Godless, etc.) the host usually selects the entries in addition to preparing the index entry.
Sounds like a good plan. I’m so darn random that I can’t promise much, but I’d definately try to support it.
Is this usually a theme based thing? It’s hard for me to keep up writing about how much I’m a Nintendo Fanboy…
The great thing about the Carnivals is that they provide for the random and the dedicated alike. If your blog primarily deals with (say) DC politics and Chinese culture, but you make the occasional gaming post and you think you’ve got one that’s really brilliant, you send it to that week’s Carnival editor (the Carnival moves from blog to blog on a schedule). They assemble the best submissions, organize them, and host, then link to the next week’s host blogger.
It’s also a great way to find new blogs to read, or to get your work out there if you’re an intrepid “New Game Journalist,” whatever that means–I’ve found several interesting writers through the Skeptics’ Circle and Carnival of the Godless.
Seriously, buttonmasher, let’s talk about it. I think this is a great idea, and I’ll host the first one/take care of setting up the logistics for it. I also went ahead and tipped off Kotaku to try to get some more submissions.
I’m down for this, assuming you don’t post any more pictures of a shirtless David Spade. And that goes for the rest of you blog hags, too.
What about the fangirls, eh?
Think up a better name and you’ll probably intrigue me n’ the lasses..
A,