Hi guys, there's countless blogs and websites out there for all of us to go an volunteer for, get paid nothing and get little benefits... Free games are great, but they don't pay the bills. Now I for one enjoy writing about games, it helps me clear my head, gives me a way to get my ideas across and I like to think that if just one person reads my review of a crap game and chooses not to give in to marketing bull, then I've succeeded. On that note, who wants to help me?

I quite fancy making a website aimed at promoting journalists as much as it does the games. Each journalist would have their own page with all of their reviews and posts on there, there could be multiple reviews for the same game with a voting system to the best reviews are posted near the top.

To make it a unique concept, I want to try and offer tailored advertising, so you directly benefit from the money made from the site. For example, if you post a review up which becomes popular, you get 70-80% of the revenue generated from it?

The site could feed in news from other sites via RSS, which would make it easier to manage news updates.

The idea would be simply this, it's a site designed to benefit the journo as much as it is the main site. The navigation would be massively simplified so there's no clicking about all over the place just to get to a game review, it would be as much a visual experience as a design web site (I like quirky websites with something different :) ) and reviews would just be posted whenever we play a game. If you review for another site and there's no exclusivity, post it on this site too with a link to the original.

I want it to be a nice online portfolio which actually generates some money for the journo, even if it's not a lot, I appreciate that every little helps!
What do you guys think? would any of you be interested in helping to set something like this up? would you use it? Or am I just spouting nonsense?

Think of this as a website design by committee.

Answers on a post card... or below, your choice.

The question that comes from this is how would you tailor each reviewrs post. It seems like you would be mired in convoluted code which would leave complexities that could leave the system open for alls of unethical conduct. Of course you could do it manually, but it isn't long before human nature takes over, and people start accusing you of stealing the minute they feel something is off.

You need to go look at Examiner. I was just there the other day and happened to like their option to "sponsor this author" (or something to that effect). I clicked it to see if there were any good ideas to borrow, and it looks like you can directly advertise in an author's name, possibly giving some kind of commission?

http://www.examiner.com/sponsor/

The other stuff you talked about has pretty much all been done. The reviews written by individual authors and showcased on their profile is on my site, even :) The voting system, a favorites system, it's all out there. I do like the sponsor idea though, but you need a very rich webmaster... hehe.

Yea there's the issue of trust, but I already have a free freelancers that trust me and likewise I trust them. I'm aware that a lot of sites allow multiple reviews of the same game, generally by the public. I want to make this more of a niche site so only aspiring journalists can post. This would also guarantee a little higher quality than those other such sites.(or so I'd like to hope!)

As for the coding, I'm a web developer, so it's as much a chance for me to make something a little more advanced than my usual, so I'm happy to dedicate some real time to this, if the concept is feasable.

I realise there's the element of trust which is going to be a major issue, as for working out who gets what, I wanted to keep this as a small community of writers, so a quick reference to google analytics could easily provide statistics for how many page views an author has had and the advertising pot can be shared out as percentages. it's only an idea in it's infancy, but it's something I'd love to persue.

I've looked at the examiner site, it seems like a similar concept, I just wanted to make it slightly more automated.

automation calls for bugs man...would need a ton of testing. Spam is an issue. And content serialization and quality is another.

well not automated in that sense, but more automated so the site isn't sitting waiting for people to "sponsor" a writer.

I like the idea, but don't believe there'll be any money in it, beyond a tiny bit occaisionally, that I wouldn't be fussed about recieving eitherway.
I've always wanted to do a website for reader-submitted reviews, however, so I feel we could be on the same wavelength.

This could make money. If the main concept is that readers come to the site to read specific writers then you've got something there. However, it won't work with unknowns... It will work if your writers are already established and your site acts as a collection point for all their work on all sites and subjects they write about.

Which is where you're going to run into trouble. Sites won't want to give you copy they own, established writers won't want to give you copy for free. Work out a way to keep all parties interested and you'll have yourself a site. I would certainly visit since having a one-stop for writers I enjoy reading would mean I'd see pieces I'd not normally see on sites I don't visit.

Nice concept - fantastic if it had more than games journos...

I was imagining a portfolio site. Would make applying for work easier, if you didn't have to create your own blog, but could...er...essentially do what we're already doing on Gameleon via the WORK tab of our profiles, but if work was the sole thing you saw, and could be seen by anyone online without having to log in, and you just log in to update and create your profile...kinda like a twitter account full of links to published work, instead of what you had for tea in 140 characters, =P. But, er, of course, that's my overactive imagination again, and not what you've actually described, =P.

lol, Yea the idea is that your work would be visible for all to see. I'm not expecting to make millions on this, It would just be nice for a few aspiring journos to have a chance to make a little bit of money from their work. Not to mention if you're getting paid for it, we'd be more eager to promote it, more people on site means more money for everyone. Again, the idea is to keep it small and simple.

As for other media, I definitely don't want to limit it to just games, I know a lot of games writers are massively interested in other entertainment medium especially films and music, so there's definitely scope for a bit of everything.

The basics of it are simple, I have a server which isn't doing much, I have the skills to make a site, I want to keep this as a hobby project, that way I can keep it fun. It will take a while to finalise a design and perfect the concept, but it seems like there's enough people here who like the idea to make it worth a go... If nothing comes of it, then I'll have had some HTML/CSS/Javascript practice so it's no big loss :)

I'll think of a name for the site and start a group to poll ideas shortly (I'll post links to it all in here)... Watch this space!