An Idea I have . . .
I don't really have time to be doing this. I presently have 50+ pages left to read this afternoon. In addition to that I need to read an additional 130 pages and write a paper about said pages by next Tuesday, and that is just one book for one class. So let's call this harmless little blog post, badly needed study break.
So I had an idea a while ago, and it is one that I keep coming back to in my thoughts. I want to create a website. As you can no doubt guess the main topic of this website would be video games. While that is not a shock, I believe that this hypothetical site will fulfill a niche that is not actually available on the internet (several niches actually).
The meat of my site will be video game reviews. The unique element is that for each game there will be two reviews: A parent review and a gamer review. There are practically zero resources for non-gaming parents who buy games for their kids. These reviews would attempt to tell the parents what they want to know: Mainly will my kid like the game, is it apporpriate for them, and is it worth the money. The gamer review would then be the more traditional game reviews that can be found elsewhere, but people read reviews for informed opinions so adding one more informed (and hopefully well written) opinion to the Internet would not be a bad thing. The second main element of my website would be a deposit of ways to use games in education. This would of course include both secular education and religious education. Nearly all published resources for using video games in ministry (and there are despertly few) are awful, as gaming becomes more and more mainstream in teenager culture (especially for guys) there is a need for a website of this nature. The last element of my website would be a community aspect, and this would not focus on the forums that most communities huttle around (though there would be forums to support these other aspects I am about to describe). The first community aspect my site would have is a collection of well written, regularly updated blogs. There are numerous popular video game blogs that focus on items in video games such as game news, games in politics, or game development. These blogs would all focus on the experience of being a gamer and playing games. There would be four blogs a Xbox focused one, a Playstation focused one, a Nintendo focused one, and a parent focused one. The other community element my site would have is a collection of creativity. My site would allow people to submit and host their works of fan art and fan fiction. While this is done other places I would work to better organize it and try to find ways to give away monthly prizes to foster community. Along with this would be a treasry of new game ideas that people have had and submitted to the site. Now ideally, upon creating this mythical site I would at least be able to get google ads, or some form of advertising. I would not expect the site to be a financial source, but it would be nice if it could pay for a subscription to gamefly (game rental service) and any prizes to give away.
Of course there are multiple problems with this whole idea. First, I need a server to host a website on, and that requires money that is not in the budget (because remember kids, the budget is law!). Second, even I had a server, I do not know anything about building a website. My HTML knowledge does not expand beyond like five tags, so I would have a TON to learn. Which leads into the third problem, my complete lack of time! With going to Seminary full time and working part time, I do not have a lot of time left over. Not enough to learn how to create a website anyway. Updating the site regularly would not be as hard because there are enough game journalism enthusist who would contribute to the site (reviews, blogs, etc) even without financial any sort of financial compensation. So I guess really all I would have to do is find someone who thinks my site sounds like a good idea, and has the technical know how to put it together (and if they had an extra server laying around to host it on, well that would be nice too). While it would be nice to magically bump into someone like that, this idea will have to stay just that an idea. Maybe in three years after I finish seminary I can come back to it.
So I had an idea a while ago, and it is one that I keep coming back to in my thoughts. I want to create a website. As you can no doubt guess the main topic of this website would be video games. While that is not a shock, I believe that this hypothetical site will fulfill a niche that is not actually available on the internet (several niches actually).
The meat of my site will be video game reviews. The unique element is that for each game there will be two reviews: A parent review and a gamer review. There are practically zero resources for non-gaming parents who buy games for their kids. These reviews would attempt to tell the parents what they want to know: Mainly will my kid like the game, is it apporpriate for them, and is it worth the money. The gamer review would then be the more traditional game reviews that can be found elsewhere, but people read reviews for informed opinions so adding one more informed (and hopefully well written) opinion to the Internet would not be a bad thing. The second main element of my website would be a deposit of ways to use games in education. This would of course include both secular education and religious education. Nearly all published resources for using video games in ministry (and there are despertly few) are awful, as gaming becomes more and more mainstream in teenager culture (especially for guys) there is a need for a website of this nature. The last element of my website would be a community aspect, and this would not focus on the forums that most communities huttle around (though there would be forums to support these other aspects I am about to describe). The first community aspect my site would have is a collection of well written, regularly updated blogs. There are numerous popular video game blogs that focus on items in video games such as game news, games in politics, or game development. These blogs would all focus on the experience of being a gamer and playing games. There would be four blogs a Xbox focused one, a Playstation focused one, a Nintendo focused one, and a parent focused one. The other community element my site would have is a collection of creativity. My site would allow people to submit and host their works of fan art and fan fiction. While this is done other places I would work to better organize it and try to find ways to give away monthly prizes to foster community. Along with this would be a treasry of new game ideas that people have had and submitted to the site. Now ideally, upon creating this mythical site I would at least be able to get google ads, or some form of advertising. I would not expect the site to be a financial source, but it would be nice if it could pay for a subscription to gamefly (game rental service) and any prizes to give away.
Of course there are multiple problems with this whole idea. First, I need a server to host a website on, and that requires money that is not in the budget (because remember kids, the budget is law!). Second, even I had a server, I do not know anything about building a website. My HTML knowledge does not expand beyond like five tags, so I would have a TON to learn. Which leads into the third problem, my complete lack of time! With going to Seminary full time and working part time, I do not have a lot of time left over. Not enough to learn how to create a website anyway. Updating the site regularly would not be as hard because there are enough game journalism enthusist who would contribute to the site (reviews, blogs, etc) even without financial any sort of financial compensation. So I guess really all I would have to do is find someone who thinks my site sounds like a good idea, and has the technical know how to put it together (and if they had an extra server laying around to host it on, well that would be nice too). While it would be nice to magically bump into someone like that, this idea will have to stay just that an idea. Maybe in three years after I finish seminary I can come back to it.
posted by SeanXor at 12:10 PM
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