Forums > Contributor Zone > [State of] Review of the Week, 2018, and you.

So. Review of the Week stuff.

Almost two years ago, we saw a big uptrend in review traffic which made us think that perhaps it might be worth reviving the old RotW topics, where someone reads through the submissions and picks out the top three. The idea behind this was that feedback topics have been waning for a while now and that perhaps the promise of feedback would be a decent shot in the arm to help motivate people to write more. It seemed to be working. I’m not so sure anymore.

I’m not going to turn this into a “Notice me, senpai!” deal. The thing is, putting these things together is a lot of work and a considerable time sponge. Topics are kicked out, a couple of one sentence replies might show up thinking judges for their places if they’re lucky – there’s RotW topics out there with zero replies.

I guess I’m mentioning this because the odds are we’ll stop producing RotWs at the end of the year. For one, the judge rota will be down to two people, OD and myself, who have both been churning these out nonstop since we revived it and (and I can speak only for myself) while I don’t mind carrying on, I’m not going to do so bi-weekly. So, to keep this going, we’re first going to need new people to add to the rota. Joe, Nightfire and Jerec have all been brilliant in their former roles and each done excellent jobs I’m more than grateful for and I certainly don’t begrudge their decision to walk away.

Thing is, I don’t see anyone wanting to step up. And that’s fine; as the year has rolled on, interest in the subject has waned, so this is probably the best stepping off point. If anyone wants to prove me wrong, great. If there’s interest out there that hasn’t manifested in topic replies and discussion, I’d be glad to hear it. If people want to step up and help, we’ll keep RotW rolling for as long as we can collectively carry it.

I throw the topic open to HTML tumbleweeds discussion.

For us. For them. For you.

My view is the same as EmP, essentially. I have no issues doing that and actually do kind of enjoy it, as this site does get a lot of good contributions, so it's fun to read a bunch of them and give my opinions. But doing it every other week would probably take a lot of the fun out of it. It was great doing it once every four weeks and is still cool doing it every three weeks, but more often would probably get to feel like a chore.

I'm not afraid to die because I am invincible
Viva la muerte, that's my goddamn principle

Review of the Week still serves a purpose, I think. A lot of people enjoy reading the comments--and seeing if they can win--but not necessarily replying. That's not terribly uncommon on the site or on the Internet at large these days. There are a lot of lurkers. Or some folks are pretty new to the community, and don't feel right about stepping up just yet. Or they're really busy.

None of those things mean the feature has to go away, or even that it's not appreciated. I would like to see it stick around.

In the past, I have mentioned to EmP and now I will mention here that I refrained from stepping into the RotW rota because in the typical week, I copy edit somewhere around half the content that comes through the site. And of course, I'm busy with a bunch of other stuff around the site, like many of the judges. But it's the fact that I'm copy editing so many of the submissions that has really kept me from participating. It seems a bit odd to me to rank a bunch of reviews, including a number that I edited myself and thus gave perhaps an advantage.

If that doesn't bother folks, though, I'd be ready to step into a four-person rota, if we find a person number three. That would mean anyone who participates as a judge would need to do so only roughly once a month. It's the contribution to the project I can offer right now, so I welcome discussion on whether that would be appropriate/fair or not, as part of the effort to keep the RotW feature going.

"Too often we enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought." - John F. Kennedy on reality

"What if everything you see is more than what you see--the person next to you is a warrior and the space that appears empty is a secret door to another world? What if something appears that shouldn't? You either dismiss it, or you accept that there is much more to the world than you think. Perhaps it really is a doorway, and if you choose to go inside, you'll find many unexpected things." - Shigeru Miyamoto on secret doors to another world2

Sorry, EmP, but I once took this over for about a year or two myself, and I know how much of a time sponge it is, especially when you're down to two or three people as I was at one point. Lately, I've just been too busy with real life to fully commit to this again. Otherwise I would gladly do so in a heartbeat because I do love what RotW does for the site. I hope you can find someone to help you out, though, as I do like seeing it in the forums. Believe it or not, I do still lurk around here on a weekly basis more or less.

[Eating EmP's brain] probably isn't a good idea. I mean... He's British, which means his brain's wired for PAL and your eyes are NTSC. - Will

For what it's worth from me, I think RotW encourages a good standard of quality in reviews and therefore has great merit. I do understand how time-consuming judging must be, however. If nothing else, perhaps the format should be altered to cover a larger timeframe than just a week (Review of the Month? Review of the Fortnight/Two Weeks?), therefore allowing judges more time to catch up with the incoming submissions. I would like to see RotW continue in some form, if for no other reason than having plenty of feedback, so I would not mind a compromise being made in order to make it enjoyable for all participants.

If we extend the amount of time/reviews covered in a topic, maybe make Review of the Fortnight or Review of the Month something the review writer needs to tick when submitting the review, or post in a topic, to say they wish to be included.

I can avoid death by not having a life.

I can jump back into rotation. I have more time for now, and I contemplated rejoining anyway.

The only thing my milkshake brings to the yard is a subpoena.

We've talked about making it a bi-weekly or monthly thing before, but I can't see it lessening the grind of judging by doubling or quadrupling to amount of submissions to run through as well as significantly lessening the chances of people getting mentioned.It seems to me like a lot of noteworthy reviews will fall through the cracks and the judge rota will end up just as exhausted.

In other news, this has been the worst bow out gracefully topic ever made, and you're all to blame. I'm happy to crack on for another year with a EmP -> OD -> Jason -> Joe rota if all involved are happy with that.

For us. For them. For you.