There was a conversation going around the independent game developers' community a couple of months back concerning the reasons for game publication. The idea was that, with the accessibility of desktop publishing opensource programs and the ease in which one could post these creations online for free, then there was a dwindling need to actually publish and charge people money for said games.

I mulled it over for a long while. Was there a reason to create my game and publish it within the tried and true standard model in which people needed to pay me money to read my book? I came up with some answers as to why I wanted to publish but none of them seemed to hit it on the nose.

Finally, I discovered two. One was the proceeds-forwarding aspect of the book's sales to the Star C. Foster Writer's Prize. That one, well... that's pretty obvious.

Then there's the other, and that's the creation and propagation of a community. There exists right now a community of independent creators that develop their own games, publish them, and then use those publications to further redefine, re-examine, and grow the gaming community as a whole. Publication is another avenue of availability. In the current model on which the internet works, finding e-publications that are outside of specific search parameters is nearly impossible at best. Having an existing hard copy that can be stumbled over, found as part of a collective publishing model, or passed around from member to member of a community is another avenue in which the information can be examined and imparted.

Simply, I believe that I have something important that can be added to the discussion and, through that, the community. I think that I'm doing something. That's the second reason I want to publish.

This message has been inspired by this little video right here of a man named Clay Shirky being impossibly intelligent. View and enjoy.





(thanks to Mr. Warren Ellis for the edification)