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It’s not too often I actually write an article but I felt the urge to discuss this and get your feedback. This is more like an editorial, much like those that Mark Rosewater writes every Monday on www.magicthegathering.com. As I’d hope you’ve noticed, I have posted a few blurbs the past month and a half about www.alexa.com. In just two months MDV jumped up from #10 to #8 and now to #7. For your information, Alexa’s ranking is based on traffic. What really gets me about this is that Alexa has MDV listed under Fan Pages. Is Magic Deck Vortex just a ‘fan page’ or is it much more? 10/10/06 - Note: MDV is currently #3 as of the reposting of this article. Oh an MDV has been around for four+ years now. *grin* ~Streetz~ My Answer is "No!" Magic Deck Vortex has been around for almost three years (3 years come August) and has come a long way since I first established the site on the web. I would think that MDV was a fan page site when I first started things. However, in the first year alone MDV evolved and evolved and kept evolving. Things were added... the deck clinic was started and finished, the first few features were posted, contests were run and so on. I worked diligently to get MDV's name out there on various sites and eventually all of my hard work payed off. Now MDV has articles, a huge traffic base, better navigation, more features, a forum, most likely one of the best deck databases on the web. I would like to think that all of my work paid off to establish Magic Deck Vortex as something more than just a 'fan page'. I had already started a thread in the forums and here is what a few people had to say about this big question:
While these are all valuable comments, these opinions might be biased mainly because I converse with all of these people regularly in the forums. However, from my perspective, these comments are all true (and flattering). When I think fan page I think of something small that hasn't been updated in a long time and that looks tacky and/or unprofessional. However, this brings me to the big question: What exactly is a ‘fan page’ site? Let’s see what www.google.com pulls up for “Fan Pages”… … Nothing yet. Perhaps www.askjeeves.com? … What.. there’s a fan page for ‘fans’!? Hmmph. Still trying… … Perhaps www.webcrawler.com, www.yahoo.com, or www.altavista.com? ... ... ... OK. I have had absolutely no luck finding a ‘fan pages’ definition on the web. Perhaps I’m not looking hard enough but 15 minutes of searching through every search engine that exists should be enough. If you can’t find what your looking for online in less than 15 minutes, you might as well stop looking. And so I have. Let’s see if I can get a definition through looking at other ‘supposed’ fan pages on Alexa but deducing my own definition based on what I see.
This link will take you to the top 'fan pages' for Magic the
Gathering sites on Alexa. Next up is in the list is Jesse’s Magic: the Gathering Site. Hmm. This looks like an old site that hasn’t been updated in a while. But hey.. there are recent comments from people. The site looks to be one page… with a blurb on combos, a deck, and some other stuff about Abundance (the card). Ok. This is a bad example of a Fan Page… it hasn’t been updated is a long time and it looks to be this guy’s first site (which he has plainly posted at the top of the page). Perhaps, just based on this site, a fan page is a site that has few to one pages that is laid out plainly and that has limited, un-updated information. That’s a start. Number 3 is DD Magic Cards. This site is also linked to in my links section of the site. Looks good. It has a nice banner at the top and lots of links off to the left. Wow. It’s been around since 2000 (two years longer than MDV). Hmmph. There are only 10 registered users. This site has one article, a banned and restricted list, a few combos, fan cards, fan decks (just one), a forum with less than 50 posts, about 230 card pics, and a bunch of other limited stuff. While the home page of the site looks nice, the rest of it looks like what I would expect to see for a fan page. It doesn’t look to be updated much and it seems limited by it’s own content and lack of substantial updates. Perhaps the definition of a website should be “Fan Page – a relatively small website with limited information which provides information on a particular subject (such as Magic: the Gathering) with a small traffic base”. Moving along… Next up is the Illusion Zone. OK. This looks much better than the past two… it looks nice and gives you a professional feel in terms of it’s layout and how it fits together. It looks to be updated regularly (every few months or more). There are only 10 decks on the site and lots of personal blurbs about going around different Magic tournaments and personal happenings. This site overall really seems like a personal collection of this webmaster’s Magic life among other things not relating to Magic. Perhaps the definition should be revised to “Fan Page – a relatively small website with limited information and/or which uses the personal perspective approach to elaborate on a particular subject (such as Magic: the Gathering) with a small traffic base”. For the record, I enjoyed my stay at this site. It was easy to navigate and looked good. This site is more of like a personal page where the webmaster just talks about their travels while playing the game. Definitely a “fan page” site. Magic the Gathering Mega Info. This site hasn't been updated since 2001 and based on the comments on the home page... the webmaster has no intention of updating it ever again. For the record, any MTG site that is hosted on Geocities is most certainly a fan page. While this particular site seems to have some worthy content, it is no use for anyone playing magic now since there is nothing but old information. Magic has evolved greatly since 2001 and thus this site is just reminiscent of the game. That's all. The layout is old and plain, the content hasn’t changed in four years and the content that was there seems worthy at the time the site was created. “Fan Page – a relatively small website with a low traffic base that elaborates on a particular subject (such as Magic: the Gathering) that has limited and/or personal related content for other fans of the subject to peruse that may be rarely updated.” That’s enough of looking at other sites. I think I have a decent description of a ‘fan page’ although mind you this is based off the four sites we looked at above. I think the 'small traffic based' comment needs to be 86’d since there are fan page sites that do have a large traffic base like http://elitefanpages.com... who has a traffic rank on Alexa similar to mine (under 200,000). Note: The lower your Alexa Traffic Rank, the better. Yikes, and this site is huge… although it is a gateway to other Fan Pages. Perhaps that was a bad example. Here’s my current “Fan Page” definition:
May I remind you this is my subjective definition of it. After all that, do you think Magic Deck Vortex fits that definition, that it’s a ‘fan page’ site? MDV has a very large traffic base, regular content through combos, decks, submissions, comments, features, and so on. The layout, in my opinion, fits together well and looks professional and the site navigates well through the 1000’s of pages within it. While some older features such as the top 10 lists aren’t updated, other parts of the site like combos, decks and mechanic features such as Lands and +1/+1 counters are updated with each new set or as often as I can update them. While I do offer commentary of various happenings in Magic: the Gathering, MDV is not based on my personal experiences with the game – in other words I’m not blogging to you about the last tournament I went to every time I go (which is rare since I’m a casual player) nor am I talking about my cats or the house next door. Magic Deck Vortex is more like a haven to anyone that plays MTG. It has lots of information and lots of reference for the game that will either help you play better or increase your enjoyment of the game. A fan page doesn't do all that. The other categories that Alexa has for Magic: the Gathering sites are:
If I was to choose one category for MDV to be put into ... it would be either Reference or News and Media… (or possibly even Virtual Cards since I have Celixia and all on the site). You see, MDV has so much to offer that it really doesn’t fit into any one category.. especially not Fan Pages. Reference is certainly the closest to what I envision MDV to be. Other sites in the Reference category include Magic Rarities, Crystalkeep and Magic-cards.info. I would be happy to be in the same category as them. While Magic Rarities is all about the oddities of the hobby, CrystalKeep (while no longer updated) was all about the rulings of the cards, MDV could be the all around general Encyclopedia for Magic the Gathering combos, decks, and so on. What do you think about all this? Please vote in the
following poll: Before I sign off from this article, I will leave you with a deck I just put together - it uses MEasure of Wickedness and Faith Healer (two cards from the SOK combo page). Other than that, I think you'll figure it out:
I would like to know your opinion of this matter. Please post your comments in the forum about this linked here. I hope you enjoyed this brief look into what a fan page might be considered and why I think MDV isn’t a fan page. I would hope that everyone agrees with me.. but we'll have to see. BTW, if you vote YES in the above poll, please add your comments to the forum thread. I would like to know why you voted that way. Thanks as always for visiting Magic Deck Vortex and also for offering your voice in this matter. ~Streetz~ You can discuss this article in the MDV forums here. Articles
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MDV
is not a fan site.dec