UncleBear.com - the ongoing discussion

[Berin Kinsman]

Okay, before the loss of job, divorce, and move to a foreign country there was a Master Plan. Said plan was not abandoned, merely delayed, and now that I'm getting my feet under me and RinCon is over I'm getting back on track.

I'm doing this here because my Paladins give me good feedback.

Rebranding
I've been saying it for a while, one day you'll wake up and unclebear.com will redirect to berinkinsman.com. UncleBear is a roleplaying blog, but I want to be doing so much more than that. I'm trying to promote myself and my projects, rpg or not. The new site will be UncleBear.com

The Blogs
I'm not sure yet if there will be multiple blogs, aggregated on the front page, or one blog with separate RSS feeds for each ongoing feature. I don't like that UncleBear is currently all over the place. I don't like that I have multiple blogs in multiple places. I want to provide the option to one-stop shop. Here's the breakdown.

RPG Toybox with Berin Kinsman
This blog will focus exclusively on worldbuilding and GM advice. And Imagination's Toybox, but that'll be stealthed in there. The idea is to be able to gather up blog posts by theme into PDFs and print-on-demand books for sale. Yes, that means the quality of writing must go up. No more off-the-cuff blogging. It will pretty much replace the existing UncleBear blog.

ROLPUNK with Shakabuku Hyde
I'm at a point where I have to fear offending people, especially industry pros. I can't be acerbic and cranky like I used to be. My alter ego can. Pairing Hyde with ROLPUNK was Entrebat's idea.It's going to be the Op/Ed column, but very over the top and tongue in cheek. Again, I'm looking at the potential to collect posts as PDFs and POD books.

Examiner.com
This will continue to focus on Arizona's gaming scene, but it's also where rpg news and reviews will go.

Game Company Feed
It's up in the air whether the company will remain UncleBear or if (as I intended) it will have another name. I know a lot of people want me to keep it UncleBear, but this may end up as a partnership or co-op, in which case there will be other people with say. I'm fine, so long as it gets me my stuff published. The company will get a blog or feed to announce releases and company news.

Personal Blog
My personal blog won't be so personal. For obvious reasons. It will focus on non-rpg stuff as well as very infrequent non-Hyde rpg opinion. One more time, I'm looking at features writing that can be collected for PDF and POD.

PDF Downloads
A lot of the things that I used to write as blog posts will be released as free PDFs. The Star Wars/Warhammer 40k stuff, for example, would make a neat little netbook. The idea is to produce interesting free stuff as "samples" so people will take a chance on the for-sale material.

For Sale
PDFs will be sold through OneBookShelf/ DriveThruRPG/ RPGNow. Print on Demand will be via Lulu and possibly one other vendor.

I think that covers the bases. Question and comments welcome.

[Xose Lucero]

1. This all sounds really complicated. That's not necessarily a bad thing, I'm just saying.
2. Making Shakabuku Hyde your personal Kelvin Throop is genius.
3. I'd be sad (ok, I'm exaggerating) if you go with a company name other than Uncle Bear. It conjours a great image and it's so atypical of RPG company names, which usually strike me as cape-wearingly pretentious or hippy-dippy pewter dragon figurine-y, that it really stands out. So I wouldn't be sad but I think you'd be passing up an interesting, eyecatching, recognized name for...something else.
4. Free PDF Downloads of off-topic material is a neat way to keep your blogs focused. Nice idea.
5. Kind of far out but have you thought about doing all this as a Ning site, paying the extra fees so it appears at your domain with your ads, and handling all the different blogs / topics / hats as separate "users" all owned by you? Maybe that's a little clunky.

So, yeah. Rock on.

[Berin Kinsman]

Not all that complicated. Going with the one blog/multiple feeds, there would be a "universal" feed to catch everything, then separate feeds per feature so people only interested in my personal blog could just follow that and ignore the rest, and so on. It would all be on one page, but you could link to the category to get a page that only served that feature.

WordpressMU (multi-user) would allow setup of a different blog for each feature, with separate feeds, and then I'd aggregate on the main page. Same net affect, different way to do it. Not complicated once it's set up.

I have thought about Ning, but it has certain limitations and can be clunky to work with behind the scenes. My first choice would be using Zope and Plone, but that takes sKillz to configure that I don't have time to learn. Wordpress FTW, if for no other reason than it has a gazillion plugins that allow it to be customized to suit nearly any need.

[Xose Lucero]

Ohhhh, I get it. Yeah, hard to explain but easy to use. Nice.

[Berin Kinsman]

Re: Shakabuku Throop: Exactly. I like to think of him as the geek's answer to Ed Anger.

And as a pseudonym, I can get people to guest/ghost under the name.I'm working with a known artist to do his portrait for the page. When that deal's done, I'll reveal who.

[Ruminator]

It'll be a somewhat sad day when UncleBear is no more. Isn't there some sort of "brand" recognition with the whole UncleBear moniker? Is there a reason you don't want to keep that?

[Berin Kinsman]

Wrong type of recognition. UncleBear is thought of as a blog, and blogs are generally considered amateur efforts. Making the leap from blogger to publisher using the same name brings baggage and obstacles. People also expect stuff on blogs to be free. With the few things I've released, I've already bumped up against a perception that I'm charging for what "should be" free blog content.

[Hank Harwell]

Hm. What about using Dire King somewhere in the new 'branding'?

[Berin Kinsman]

See "personal blog"

[Xose Lucero]

Okay, your explanation makes a lot of sense. Therefore I shall ignore it. Why can't you just use UncleBear for your brand???





:)

[matholwch]

Man, you moved to another country? I've have been gone far too long. Am I too hopeful that you are now in the UK?

The move to a more professional and serious approach is to be welcomed, if you need to make a living from our 'scene'. However, the majority of your friends here respect you for who you are, the big, brave and above all honest Bear. Don't lose that.

[Berin Kinsman]

The Dire Cafe will continue to be my retreat. No changes there, ever.

Oh, what did you miss? I got sick, wife got really sick. Wife got better, I started getting better. Wife asked me for a divorce, I lost my job, I got better. Moved from Arizona to New Mexico*, living with Cameron Goble. Trying to get back on my feet without losing momentum on various things.

*Is New Mexico a State? Some Americans Don't Know
*One of Our 50 is Missing

[Andrew Modro]

Wife asked me for a divorce, I lost my job, I got better.

I'm seeing this as causation, not just correlation.

So yeah, I thought you were being hyperbolic about "moving to a new country". People really don't know New Mexico is one of the 50? Yeesh.