Blogs, Forums, web sites, what??

[Conquistador]

Okay, I think it would be fun to share with a few friends "across the globe"  the slowly increasing army/Company completions that are actually looking likely in the next 16 months.

Only... how?  A web site, a Blog, a forum... what are the advantages/disadvantages of each?  When is one better than the flickr/photobucket approach? Free is a requirement, not waivable...    "Easy to use" is really a valued quality. 

Wasn't there a thread about his at one time?  I tried searching but I must not be using the correct combinations of terms...

Gracias,

Glenn

[Major_Gilbear]

Why not just have a plog? That is, a painting log topic here in the forums; either one for each project, or one for all of your projects.
Pictures linked into it via photobucket or whatever hosting site you prefer.
Simple, free, and folks can comment directly on what you're doing.

[Alfrik]

BlogSpot.com   free photo hosting, easy to use. Maybe not quite as versatile as a website but easier to use than my wifes free website hoster. 

http://armoredink.blogspot.com/

[Conquistador]

MY Bad, I have flickr and Photobucket... I want "beyond pretty pictures only" but being able to post AARs/BatReps and discuss rules/systems - text posting plus pictures.

Hope that clarifies.

Gracias,

Glenn

[Major_Gilbear]

Is there any problem with the suggestion of a plog above then? Seems you can do both that way, and you already have the know-how to do it.

[Conquistador]

Is there any problem with the suggestion of a plog above then? Seems you can do both that way, and you already have the know-how to do it.

I have no idea what a plog is...

Online in a webinar now so can't easily go look at your suggestion.

Not exactly multi-tasking... at least not effectively...

Gracias,

Glenn

[Major_Gilbear]

I have no idea what a plog is...

Thank goodness I explained it earlier in the topic then!  

Why not just have a plog? That is, a painting log topic here in the forums; either one for each project, or one for all of your projects.
Pictures linked into it via photobucket or whatever hosting site you prefer.
Simple, free, and folks can comment directly on what you're doing.

[Conquistador]

Thank goodness I explained it earlier in the topic then!  

I am sorry but I don't think I really understand how this is different than a normal thread.  Threads drop off the main page of a sub-forum as other threads have posts added and may not be visible to someone coming to the forum "cold" which makes it less likely non-LAFers (as most of my gaming circle are by choice) would be willing to look for my posts.

I know that when I want to see what "B" (no real names for this example) is doing I can just drop by his blog and read about his love affair   with TS&TF.    If I wanted to find a particular thread on LAF which was not on the front page of the sub-forums I would need to search (either by paging through the sub-forum or using the search function of the forum - and knowing what terms to search on - and wading through all the "hits" manually.)  I do not consider the forums of LAF a good candidate for reaching the circle of war gamers I associate with most commonly.

I was looking for some clarity on whether a personal website or a blog or a forum format was the (better) tool I needed to use.  LAF, just like TMP, is not a good source in the respect of having an easily accessible format to communicate with the war gamers I meet with locally and within CONUS via the web.  Too much noise to signal ratio is the basic problem with LAF/TMP as a means to communicate with a small but widely (but not world wide) geographically dispersed (multiple states) collection of individuals.  LAF is great for finding information about the hobby and finding different viewpoints on a world wide basis about the hobby but it is not a good tool for communicating with specific circle of friends/associates.

Perhaps I am not able to clearly communicate what I am looking for and, if so, I apologize for my error.

Gracias,

Glenn

[Major_Gilbear]

... You know that you can subscribe to a thread and receive a notification everytime it's posted in, right?

So you and all those subscribed are alerted when a post is made and you can normally just 'click through' to the topic. You can also view the threads you are subscribed to in your account console and similarly click through to the thread you want. This is a usual feature of most forums.

Otherwise, it is just like a normal thread, yes. But it's easy to create, add to, and communicate in, and it's free too.

[fred]

With a thread you can also send the URL of the thread to people - as a 'hey look at this' kind of message.

Yes if you have a blog with a bespoke url people may remember it and be able to google it up.

I have a gaming website, which for a few years, I put a fair bit of effort into setting up and updating. But lately I haven't bothered so much - mainly as with changing computers and software I have struggled to find web editing software I like - and the whole editing of photos is a pain. The biggest advantage is that you have total control - you can setup pages focused on what you want, and organised them how you want - this is also the biggest downside, this is all work.

More recently I have tended to post my progress on a thread on a forum, mainly Pendraken's as most of my stuff is 10mm, and they are pretty cool about people showing other manufacturers stuff on their forums. The big plus with this is that you get chat and comments. The downside is that there is little organisation - you just have a big long list of stuff (this can be cool to scroll through to see what you have done, but it's hard to find a particular unit you painted.

I haven't tried a blog - it feels like it would be a more constrained form of a website - also I can't be bothered to work out how I want to organise my gaming stuff - but that is to do with too many projects not any particular form of website.

A simple photo hosting solution isn't enough - you can't really add any text or organise stuff useful. But photo hosting can be really useful for hosting pictures, and then linking to these from forum posts.

[Major_Gilbear]

Something else in a plog that goes over a few pages is if you edit the first post to include links to key areas within the thread. Common, easy to do/use, and lets new visitors jump straight to the "good bits" rather than wading through the whole thing (although folks who like your output may well do anyway).

Yet another point - you can also just bookmark the thread in your browser!

[eilif]

I highly recommend an actual Blog. Our club uses Blogspot and it works quite well.  It's the central repository for our club gaming reports, reviews and most of our member's projects, though a few members have their own blogs as well.  
http://chicagoskirmish.blogspot.com
  Blogspot (as well as most other blog sites) gives you the ability to use keywords to make it easy for folks to find what they're looking for on your blog as well as a sidebar with links to your posts organized by date and a search function.

A plog is nice, and if Lead Adventure is your sole gaming forum, it's probably the way to go However a Blog will get you a wider audience. Then when you update your blog, you can post about it on the various forums you frequent.

A bit of advice though. Just posting to a forum with your blog link and a sentence asking folks to visit will not get you goodwill on most forums.  Be sure to give a description of the link, a bit of background and even share a few photos.  That way you're sharing at least some of your content with the Forum and not just using them as a link holder.  Most times i try to include enough information -on forum posts about blog posts- that someone reading it will not feel they have wasted their time, even if they don't click on the link. At the same time, I try to hold back enough good stuff that folks who do click on the link to visit my blog don't feel like they wasted their time. It's a balance that you learn, but an important one.

[Argonor]

A bit of advice though. Just posting to a forum with your blog link and a sentence asking folks to visit will not get you goodwill on most forums.  Be sure to give a description of the link, a bit of background and even share a few photos.  That way you're sharing at least some of your content with the Forum and not just using them as a link holder.  Most times i try to include enough information -on forum posts about blog posts- that someone reading it will not feel they have wasted their time, even if they don't click on the link. At the same time, I try to hold back enough good stuff that folks who do click on the link to visit my blog don't feel like they wasted their time. It's a balance that you learn, but an important one.

Yup, a few pics and a short description of your latest topic(s) on your blog is what makes me click on the link. I try to do the same whenever I have posted a big lump on my own blog - that way i have my musings collected and sorted the way I want, and at the same time I can share parts of it in the corresponding sections of the forum, when I feel like it (I don't link to everything, as I'm mainly writing my blog for my own sake, to keep track of projects, and have a painting log ready when I want to re-create a specific colour effect, etc.).

And if peeps find you stuff sufficiently interesting/good/funny/whatever, they can sign up to 'following' the blog and get notifications of updates.

Posts with just a teaser headline and a link, I don't bother with.

[Eric the Shed]

Having blogged for almost three years it's become for me like a diary of my hobby. I post up aal my terrain builds, battle reports and other musings.

As has been mentioned already I do use the forums to sign post new posts. These always include pictures. I soon ran out of free photo capacity on the blog so now pay a subscription to host photos with photo bucket. Mind you one of the big draws on my blog (so I am told) are the pictures.

The shed wars blog has in its own right become a new hobby. I am learning all the time about what works an what doesn't and it has become a great pleasure.

Good luck with whatever you choose

[Argonor]

I soon ran out of free photo capacity on the blog so now pay a subscription to host photos with photo bucket.

You can actually run out of space on blogspot?? Jeez...