Good morning, one and all. Unless is isn't morning where you are. Good whenever, perhaps?
Newho, that kind of leads in to what I want to talk about today; the internet and its affect/effect on the hobby. Now, this may come as a shock to some of the younger members of the community, but the internet hasn't always been. In fact, it is only a few months older than me. The World Wide Web (essentially the system http:// and www. that we all use to access webpages) is even younger, by around five years. Having attended the University of Southampton, I have actually met and spoken with the man who created it all those years ago. Might have even had a lecture from him, I can't quite remember. My point is that once upon a yesteryear, you couldn't just log on to you computer/phone, google Bell of Lost Souls and draw out hundreds of examples of rock hard tournament army lists, rumours about releases six months down the line and, most importantly to me, thousands of examples of beautifully crafted and painted miniatures. Or any of the many other fine forums, blogs and dedicated websites. Allow me a moment to reminisce.
When I started out in the hobby, the internet was still in its infancy. You would be lucky to have it at your business, a few schools in city centres had it and unless you were quite rich and tech savvy you almost certainly wouldn't have it at home. Hell, at that time very few of my friends had computers in their homes capable of anything more than word processing and some very basic, 2D, 80's arcade style games. Naturally, geeks being the rulers of this new dominion, there were instantly forums for gaming, though in general you were limited to text only unless you were reasonably talented in HTML coding. Even then, images were very low resolution and often only computer generated images were possible. The digital camera was not a consumer product as such and taking pictures of miniatures on a film camera was more or less a waste of money; you wouldn't know if the shots were good until a week later once they had been processed, the odds you would get what you wanted in focus slim to non-existent unless you had a professional set up and even if you did, all you could do would be to physically show the pictures to someone. Well, you might as well take the model with you anyway right? Even if you did do that (because you had a money tree in your back garden) you probably didn't have a scanner at home, so couldn't actually put that picture anywhere for the masses to see it. You could post it in to White Dwarf perhaps, but it was a smaller rag back then. A few pictures might make it in, but your chances were very slim, unless you happenned to paint like 'Eavy Metal did.
The essence of what I am saying is this; if you came up with a new style of army list or a particularly nice conversion or paint scheme, no one beyond your immediate gaming group would be likely to see it. Ok, there were a few tournaments, so maybe another hundred or so people might see it. There was also Games Day, where it would be worth taking an army to show off, if you were part of a club or store doing a gaming table and didn't mind people playing with your models. And of course Golden Daemon, but you actually had to be good to get into it back then.
Slowly, things started to change though. Home internet became more widely available with cheaper deals and more data allowance. As such, more people could access more things. Initially, only text articles; rules started to be debated and army lists discussed, analysed and optimised. IF you were lucky enough to own a scanner or a newfangled digital camera (0.5 Mega Pixels! Wohoo!) you could put up a low resolution, small picture to show off your nicest models. Only one or two though, or else people wouldn't be able to view the whole page. Perhaps they would reach their download limit and not be able to use the internet again for the rest of the month. I actually remember seeing threads deleted by moderators because they had too many images and it put people off using that particular forum. Games Workshop even made their own, impossible to navigate and far too complicated website. Exciting times, so long as no one needed to make a phone call, as the internet shared the phone line and mobiles weren't a thing unless you were a business man in London or New York.
Slowly, things began to improve with greater download allowances and speeds. A polite convention of putting "Pic Heavy" or similar in the title of your thread became popular (and still exists to this day to a lesser extent, though it is all but defunct). Home computing became more powerful and common place, digital cameras finally got good enough to show the detail of miniatures with macro modes, and the internet started to explode. Facebook happened and became a quick and easy way to share photos. Forums started to pop-up covering a wider range of hobby oriented topics in more depth, blogs started to appear and certain authors became mini-celebrities within the community; moguls for one particular codex or style of army. The net lists started to form, from the raw processing power of so many minds working in conjunction on the same problem. Rather than designing your army list just to beat your friends' lists, suddenly you had to have a list that could take on almost anything and if your didn't conform to that view it was considered wrong. I think we have now learnt to deal with the worst of the haters and trolls in that regard, but there are certainly a few who sneer at anyone not using an optimised, internet approved army list. There almost certainly always will be, so long as there is a competitive element to the game...
Along with the net lists came a bubbling spring of hobby enthusiasm and creativity. Ideas got shared, copied and improved upon. Rather than a handful of people, you could share your creation with hundreds, even thousands, from all across the world and have back-and-forth with them. Of course, it helped that GW and other miniatures companies were upping their game and producing better and better sculpts and models, but the growth in size and strength of the community globally has pushed it as much, if not more so. We also got third party companies making conversion bits and alternative models for our favourites games. I'm sure that a few existed before the Web, but they had a platform to sell their wares now, other than to just a few locals. Some of that is good, some bad. I won't go into the legal ramifications, as there is plenty of source material for that you can find yourself with a quick google search.
Additionally, the Indie tournament scene started to take route. There have always been small, local tournaments of course; they are a great way to get like minded people together and play as many game as possible, particularly against new people or those you don't get to see so often. However, much like the third party bits, now they had a platform from which they could shout and scream and get the attention of people living further out than the nearest town. If I had been starting the hobby at my age now back when I did, there is almost no way I would have known about tournaments on the South coast of the UK or up in the North. And yet, this very weekend I am off to Blog Wars 5 in Stockport, almost a hundred miles away. One day I would like to head over to the United States to take part in some of the big game cons over there, particularly Adepticon. Pre-internet, there is almost no way I could have found out about these events unless they were mentioned in White Dwarf, and I highly doubt GW would have covered them...
So what prompted this wall of text from me today? Those of you who frequent the BoLS Lounge may have seen my converted Stormtalon;
The day after posting it, I was really excited to see it had almost 400 views! It was then linked to on BoLS's facebook page and within a few hours had over 3,800! One of the things I strive towards in life is to inspire others. It's part of the way I was raised and if I can give someone an idea to step up on my shoulders and try to improve on what I have done, much as I have done to get to the ideas I have, it makes me feel great. When I started out in the hobby, there was little opportunity for anyone outside the GW staff, Golden Daemon winners and a few top tournament players to do that. I am so glad times have changed and can't wait to see what the future could bring.
With that said, I shall leave you on one final note: Once upon a yesteryear, we would be able to see perhaps a few hundred miniatures, maybe a few thousand if you went to Games Day, over the course of any given year. Now you can easily see that every day, with better conversions, more interesting paint jobs and fresh ideas almost as soon as the creator can think of them. What are you going to do with that knowledge and creativity? I'm certainly not going to leave it on a shelf.
Matt
Newho, that kind of leads in to what I want to talk about today; the internet and its affect/effect on the hobby. Now, this may come as a shock to some of the younger members of the community, but the internet hasn't always been. In fact, it is only a few months older than me. The World Wide Web (essentially the system http:// and www. that we all use to access webpages) is even younger, by around five years. Having attended the University of Southampton, I have actually met and spoken with the man who created it all those years ago. Might have even had a lecture from him, I can't quite remember. My point is that once upon a yesteryear, you couldn't just log on to you computer/phone, google Bell of Lost Souls and draw out hundreds of examples of rock hard tournament army lists, rumours about releases six months down the line and, most importantly to me, thousands of examples of beautifully crafted and painted miniatures. Or any of the many other fine forums, blogs and dedicated websites. Allow me a moment to reminisce.
When I started out in the hobby, the internet was still in its infancy. You would be lucky to have it at your business, a few schools in city centres had it and unless you were quite rich and tech savvy you almost certainly wouldn't have it at home. Hell, at that time very few of my friends had computers in their homes capable of anything more than word processing and some very basic, 2D, 80's arcade style games. Naturally, geeks being the rulers of this new dominion, there were instantly forums for gaming, though in general you were limited to text only unless you were reasonably talented in HTML coding. Even then, images were very low resolution and often only computer generated images were possible. The digital camera was not a consumer product as such and taking pictures of miniatures on a film camera was more or less a waste of money; you wouldn't know if the shots were good until a week later once they had been processed, the odds you would get what you wanted in focus slim to non-existent unless you had a professional set up and even if you did, all you could do would be to physically show the pictures to someone. Well, you might as well take the model with you anyway right? Even if you did do that (because you had a money tree in your back garden) you probably didn't have a scanner at home, so couldn't actually put that picture anywhere for the masses to see it. You could post it in to White Dwarf perhaps, but it was a smaller rag back then. A few pictures might make it in, but your chances were very slim, unless you happenned to paint like 'Eavy Metal did.
The essence of what I am saying is this; if you came up with a new style of army list or a particularly nice conversion or paint scheme, no one beyond your immediate gaming group would be likely to see it. Ok, there were a few tournaments, so maybe another hundred or so people might see it. There was also Games Day, where it would be worth taking an army to show off, if you were part of a club or store doing a gaming table and didn't mind people playing with your models. And of course Golden Daemon, but you actually had to be good to get into it back then.
Slowly, things started to change though. Home internet became more widely available with cheaper deals and more data allowance. As such, more people could access more things. Initially, only text articles; rules started to be debated and army lists discussed, analysed and optimised. IF you were lucky enough to own a scanner or a newfangled digital camera (0.5 Mega Pixels! Wohoo!) you could put up a low resolution, small picture to show off your nicest models. Only one or two though, or else people wouldn't be able to view the whole page. Perhaps they would reach their download limit and not be able to use the internet again for the rest of the month. I actually remember seeing threads deleted by moderators because they had too many images and it put people off using that particular forum. Games Workshop even made their own, impossible to navigate and far too complicated website. Exciting times, so long as no one needed to make a phone call, as the internet shared the phone line and mobiles weren't a thing unless you were a business man in London or New York.
Slowly, things began to improve with greater download allowances and speeds. A polite convention of putting "Pic Heavy" or similar in the title of your thread became popular (and still exists to this day to a lesser extent, though it is all but defunct). Home computing became more powerful and common place, digital cameras finally got good enough to show the detail of miniatures with macro modes, and the internet started to explode. Facebook happened and became a quick and easy way to share photos. Forums started to pop-up covering a wider range of hobby oriented topics in more depth, blogs started to appear and certain authors became mini-celebrities within the community; moguls for one particular codex or style of army. The net lists started to form, from the raw processing power of so many minds working in conjunction on the same problem. Rather than designing your army list just to beat your friends' lists, suddenly you had to have a list that could take on almost anything and if your didn't conform to that view it was considered wrong. I think we have now learnt to deal with the worst of the haters and trolls in that regard, but there are certainly a few who sneer at anyone not using an optimised, internet approved army list. There almost certainly always will be, so long as there is a competitive element to the game...
Along with the net lists came a bubbling spring of hobby enthusiasm and creativity. Ideas got shared, copied and improved upon. Rather than a handful of people, you could share your creation with hundreds, even thousands, from all across the world and have back-and-forth with them. Of course, it helped that GW and other miniatures companies were upping their game and producing better and better sculpts and models, but the growth in size and strength of the community globally has pushed it as much, if not more so. We also got third party companies making conversion bits and alternative models for our favourites games. I'm sure that a few existed before the Web, but they had a platform to sell their wares now, other than to just a few locals. Some of that is good, some bad. I won't go into the legal ramifications, as there is plenty of source material for that you can find yourself with a quick google search.
Additionally, the Indie tournament scene started to take route. There have always been small, local tournaments of course; they are a great way to get like minded people together and play as many game as possible, particularly against new people or those you don't get to see so often. However, much like the third party bits, now they had a platform from which they could shout and scream and get the attention of people living further out than the nearest town. If I had been starting the hobby at my age now back when I did, there is almost no way I would have known about tournaments on the South coast of the UK or up in the North. And yet, this very weekend I am off to Blog Wars 5 in Stockport, almost a hundred miles away. One day I would like to head over to the United States to take part in some of the big game cons over there, particularly Adepticon. Pre-internet, there is almost no way I could have found out about these events unless they were mentioned in White Dwarf, and I highly doubt GW would have covered them...
So what prompted this wall of text from me today? Those of you who frequent the BoLS Lounge may have seen my converted Stormtalon;
The day after posting it, I was really excited to see it had almost 400 views! It was then linked to on BoLS's facebook page and within a few hours had over 3,800! One of the things I strive towards in life is to inspire others. It's part of the way I was raised and if I can give someone an idea to step up on my shoulders and try to improve on what I have done, much as I have done to get to the ideas I have, it makes me feel great. When I started out in the hobby, there was little opportunity for anyone outside the GW staff, Golden Daemon winners and a few top tournament players to do that. I am so glad times have changed and can't wait to see what the future could bring.
With that said, I shall leave you on one final note: Once upon a yesteryear, we would be able to see perhaps a few hundred miniatures, maybe a few thousand if you went to Games Day, over the course of any given year. Now you can easily see that every day, with better conversions, more interesting paint jobs and fresh ideas almost as soon as the creator can think of them. What are you going to do with that knowledge and creativity? I'm certainly not going to leave it on a shelf.
Matt
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