Follow Your Passion: Upcoming Changes for iGame Radio
I’ve been running iGame Radio, believe it or not, for seven years. In Intarweb terms, that’s almost a lifetime. Considering that I obtained my first email address in 1987, it doesn’t seem that long to me, but still (and yes, you may get off my lawn, n00b).
In all that time, the core of iGame Radio has been podcasting, from its days when I still did live Internet radio broadcasts (ah, those days!). Over the recent years, though, I’ve become more and more disillusioned and unhappy with working with iGame Radio. I ask myself, why? I love games. I love writing about games. I love gaming on Macs, iPhones, and iPads. I love talking to developers and publishers about their games. I love talking to gamers about what makes gaming fun. So, what’s my problem?
News. I really, REALLY, hate posting about news. And yet I seem to be doing that more and more. I spend my days reading about news so that I can post about news and have content on my site, then try to squeeze some gaming and writing reviews in there somewhere. iGame Radio is supposed to be a site about games, game development, and how games turned out in the moment. Instead, I’ve been transforming it into a site that gives a daily overview of what’s been happening. And I’m ill-equipped to do it, too. Man, my focus has really gotten botched.
I’ve decided it’s time to reevaluate my purpose with iGame Radio. It’s a good thing I can’t fire me, because I wouldn’t be very happy right now. Then again, maybe I would be more understanding about me and recommend a reevaluation of my purpose in life?
iGame Radio is going to change. I’m not exactly certain how much change it’s going to experience, but one big change is that I’m not going to post news articles anymore. There are PLENTY of other locations to get Mac and iOS gaming news. MacLife, Macworld, Inside Mac Games, Indie Game Mag, iPhone Life Magazine, iTouch Arcade, 148Apps…these are just to name a few. Why reinvent the wheel? They do a great job already.
I want to focus on what I do a good job on now. I do reviews, I do interviews, I do podcasts. I really enjoy talking about games and telling people about games. I look at reviewing as a kind of critique, like writing critiques, that are meant to help developers make better games, not tell them that their games are great or suck.
I’ve got some ideas of where I want to take this…several avenues, actually…so I would love to hear back from you about what you want to see here. What do you need in a Mac/iOS game site that is not being covered well, or at all, anywhere else on the web?
Some of my ideas:
- Focus the site on Mac and iOS game developers only
- General site with subscription-only section for developers
- Part of a hub of Mac/iOS gaming, connecting multiple sites in the industry
- A hub of Mac/iOS gaming info, pulling in podcasts, news, game info from multiple locations as a resource
- Ditch iGame Radio entirely and become a consultant
Having a site like this doesn’t mean anything if you’re not creating the content your fans want to read or listen to, so what do you think? Post in the comments below or email me your thoughts.
Comments
4 Responses to “Follow Your Passion: Upcoming Changes for iGame Radio”
Admittedly I rarely pay attention to the web site updates. I do have it on my Safari RSS and at least glance at new posts. But for me I’m more into the podcasts and these are some things I like:
1. Interviews – it’s interesting hearing other industry people (developers, company people, other journalists, even peripheral people) talk about their passions.
2. Commentary – if you don’t have an opinion you probably don’t need to mention it at all since it would just be a news item. But I like it when you’re passionate about something and want to say how great or evil something is (even though I might not agree with you).
3. Reviews (sometimes) – Nowadays I skip the review podcasts. Part of it is you review good and bad games and it seems more clinical/sterile. When you used to do a game review during the podcast the review was longer and I feel had more passion. “This is a great game and this is why it’s great” (and maybe there were reviews of bad games but I don’t recall any). Personally I’d rather have an occasional review of “this is a great game that you may not have heard of and here’s why I love it” rather than a bunch of reviews of mostly good (or worse) games.
To give this a perspective: I’m a middle-aged gamer but don’t play that many console/computer games (and I mostly play Mac or iOS games), maybe an hour a day on average. I don’t go to gaming sites to keep up on the latest news so iGameRadio is it for me. I guess my feeling is that I don’t have the time or desire to keep up with everything so I’m more into an information source that filters out the chaff and presents a few good things about Mac/iOS gaming.
Anyways, I’ve been listening since Gamesome Mac and want to thank you for sticking with this.
Kevin, thanks so much for your response. That is really helpful to better understand what kinds of things iGame Radio fans want out of the site and the podcasts. I really appreciate you taking the time to comment.
Hey!
I have to say, I only recently discovered your site so I haven’t seen the “evolution” you are talking about.
I am a mac and gaming fan too and it is true that not many sites cover the convergence between the 2. I even started a mac gaming blog of my own.
Point been, I enjoy your site and I use it as one of those places to keep up with the latest news.
What I would like to see (as a follower, not a blogger), is that you filter a little more.
Instead a covering all news and every game, focus in more in-depth, detailed posts about the big news, the “great” games, the industry and the behind the scenes insights: what developers are doing, what they plan for mac gaming, and also what gamers want and expect for the future.
My 2 cts… Anyway, I enjoy your site and it is definitely impressive that you have been taking care of it for so long!
Cheers
Hi, Ric, welcome to iGame Radio! Thanks for chiming in. I really appreciate your comments. It will all help; I’m creating a survey to get some more in depth info before making some more big changes. Hope you’ll participate.