Magic Deck Vortex: Words from the Streetz: The Writers Guild of MDV is on Strike!

I just don’t get it. One moment I’ve got a great team of writers all about the site and writing for it, and then the next thing I get is an email from Tynion telling me that all of the writers, the members of the Writers Guild of Magic Deck Vortex, are on strike!

Just when things started getting organized and more efficient here, they decide to go on strike? As I mentioned already, I just don’t get it. There were about twelve articles in the works, or the ‘concept’ stage, as we like to label them, and now nothing. These twelve article babies won’t be worked on, developed, edited or more importantly finalized until something happens. What that something is, I’ll get to in a minute. In the meantime, you have to keep reading.

Looks like I’ll be reprinting old articles until I can get a handle on this catastrophe. Reprinting articles is nice and all, as it gives newer visitors a chance to check out some of the good, older articles of MDV. You know, the articles they may never have known existed or were too lazy to dig for (not that’s it’s that difficult to find them). However, reprinting old stuff isn’t what keeps people visiting MDV more often, right?

Visitors, whether new or old, need to see new articles, new combo pages, new visual spoilers, new features and other new and/or updated content. And if you couldn’t tell, over the last year the majority of the new content is in our articles section. I was very happy to start posting articles back in April of 2005 and to see that possibly crumble two and a half years later breaks my heart. We have worked so hard over the last two years to bring more articles to you and more importantly, quality articles to you.

If you take away the articles of the site, there are still other things that can be updated. For instance, below is a list of the other features and facets of the site that have been updated and/or completed over the past three months:

That’s a lot of different stuff in two month’s time. However, that doesn’t fill the gaps. There are only so many things I can update and post before I, the owner and webmaster of the site, grow numb to the workload. I can’t very well post ten art catacomb updates a month (although I have enough art to do that). Nor can I post a new combo page every week. That’s a lot of work for me and having a team of writers writing for the site is crucial so that you have exciting new content every day. One person can only do so much. With the Writer’s Guild doing what they do (or what they did...), it took a lot of the load off me and ultimately brought you content that keeps you coming to the site.

Note that I can’t make YOU numb to the site either. Having the same boring updates can take a toll on you as a visitor. Creature Visual Spoiler updates and Link Features are great and all, but that doesn’t make you excited to visit MDV, does it? Would you be happy to see just a new deck of the day or do you look forward to seeing new articles? By posting the non-article content all the time, I envision your interest in MDV waning. That and isn’t the red background crippling enough? [I like red, I’m sorry not all of you do… but you are reading this, aren’t you? *grin*]

Articles are the beef of the site. Without articles, you would only see one update a week or maybe two in certain scenarios. You could always just visit the forum and play forum games and post rules questions every time you visit the site. Would that make you happy? Of course, how many of you actually visit the forum? There are anywhere from 3000 to 5000 unique visitors visiting the site every day but only about 200 of them are active in the forum. The forum is a great community but not everyone that visits MDV looks to the forum for entertainment and mental stimulation. Although you should think about it...

Which brings me back to the Writer’s Guild. What can we do to end the strike? And if I don’t resolve this big problem, what are my options? I could write an article a week but I don’t have Tynion or Death_By_Beebles to find my grammar and rules errors. Nor is Aneximines going to be there to catch my bombo. The other people in the guild won’t even be able to give me their opinion before I post it.

Let’s assume for a moment that the Writer’s Guild continues to go on strike. What are my options?

As I mentioned earlier, I don’t want this to be an option. While the site existed for its first few years without new “article” content and grew without it, MDV has grown even more with the article content. And thus, I don’t want the popularity of the site to decrease because I can’t follow through and post new articles.

I could completely trash the writers currently writing for the site and take in new writers. Unfortunately, this would mean no more Raiding the Dollar Bins, no more First Impressions, no more Clockwork Manor, no more If I Worked for R&D, no more Memories of an Old Magic Player…

You would still have One Card to Rule Them All and other series I’ve written for and possibly, completely new series depending on who is interested in writing for MDV. This could be exciting and all the while disappointing because some of the staples you have come to love are no longer here anymore. That and the personality of a writer can be a powerful thing. Look at how much popularity writers like Chris Millar, Mike Flores, the Ferret and William Spaniel have gained from writing for various websites. People flock to their articles no matter what website they write for.

However, whether or not I resolve this mess, know that I am always looking for more writers. I prefer that you submit an example of your writing to me via email. If OK, I will ask you to write an article and put it through the normal process of the Guild (assuming it will still exist) and once posted, you could be a member of the Guild.

Perhaps I should call it something different like the Justice Inscribes & Writers of the Site. Or maybe not.

This is not an option. Men don’t cry. Men play Magic. And in some cases, Women too.

However, it would save me a ton of time and money… and get rid of my favorite hobby: running this site.

Perhaps I could finally become affiliated with TCG Gamer or Londes or Star City Games, have my content connected to their content, and still be able to update my features and references while they provide all of the articles.

This is a last ditch effort. I have had several other websites ask for affiliations of this type in the past and I was never keen on them then. I can’t say I am keen on it even now but if it helps the well-being and growth of the site, I’m open for discussion.

Let’s assume for a moment that I am going to fix this Strike and the Writer’s Guild will be back in business. It’s going to take a lot of work, but unfortunately, this work is something I can’t control. Based on the letter I received from Tynion, the Lead Writer of the Guild, I can’t say this really rests in my hands. Or does it?

Quoting: Chris (Tynion), 1/7/08 @ 10:15pm

Dear John Streetz,

On behalf of the Writers Guild of Magic Deck Vortex, I would like to advise you that due to the poor working conditions, long hours, and minimal rewards, we are going on strike until these things improve on Magic Deck Vortex. The recent strike that our brothers, the Writers Guild of America, have undertaken has inspired us to take the steps necessary to keep ourselves safe in the work place. We have been talking about this privately for some time and now seems to be the right time for action.

We are exhausted. We are distraught. We are upset. We feel under appreciated. We are a lot of things. Without changes to the way things are done, we cannot continue in our working relationship. Therefore we are striking; effective immediately.

We work our butts off writing for Magic Deck Vortex. We work our butts off making your crazy deadlines. We work our butts off to make your site a better site. And what do we get in return? Nothing, or as close to nothing as possible.

Sure we are getting exposure on a popular site that we might use in the future to write for better things, but we really feel empty currently. It’s not the money, although more money would be better. I mean, you are paying us nothing to write for the site. While we write for Magic Deck Vortex because of the love the site and more importantly we love the game, there are deeper things here that are moving us into such an extreme position.

What it really boils down to is the lack of reader response we get. Your visitors aren’t responding to our articles as often as they should. If we are going to get better as writers or if we are going to increase our reader base or if we are going to post more applicable articles for the audience of Magic Deck Vortex, we need comments. We need emails. WE NEED SOMETHING!

Sure, a pat on the back and a ‘good job, good article’ from visitors is fine, but why can’t we get some more in depth analysis or more replies in our comment threads? Two comments per article is completely unacceptable. How are we supposed to keep writing if there is near-to-no audience reading our articles? With the supposed thousands of visitors you get on your site, why are less than .01 percent of the visitors posting comments? We know people are reading our articles if they post comments in the comment thread and we aren’t getting enough of those.

You need to do something to remedy this. Whether it is providing more visibility for the new articles or doing some ad campaigns on other sites to bring more people in or handcuffing people and threatening to tickle them to the brink of death with a feather – we don’t care how you do it. Just make more people provide insight and comments on our articles.

Until you can prove that more visitors of Magic Deck Vortex will give us more feedback on our articles, we are on strike.

I know you are a good guy and I have a lot of respect for you. I know you can do this, John. However, we cannot stand this lack of communication from your visitors. Perhaps we should all go write for Star City or MTGSalvation so we are guaranteed at least 10 comments per article.

We want to do better and we want Magic Deck Vortex to succeed, but we can’t keep spending hours writing for your site until we know people are going to acknowledge our work.

With that in mind, I hope you can improve the conditions for your Writers Guild. I have faith in you, John. Please make this happen, I don’t want to have to go to TCG Player to write an article just so I can get the response I expect. The same goes for every other member of the guild, editors and all.

You can email me with your efforts of negotiation, and I will be in touch with our collective bargaining chips.

Sincerely,

Chris Newton

When I opened that email up on Monday evening, I was floored. How I am supposed to control you guys and gals? I can’t force you to post comments on peoples articles!?!

I can’t really say any more on this issue. If you guys are truly reading this, I ask that you please post in the forum thread for this and let the Writers Guild of MDV know that you are here. Let me know you are here.

I was going to talk about the MDV Blog and answer a few more reader questions, comments and suggestions, but I feel my time is out. This strike has really put a dent in my plans for this article so I guess I will end things here. Should I continue posting articles on Magic Deck Vortex? Should I devote all of my time to non-article content only? Should I join with the ranks of another website? Or should I cry and quit the website?

I think the answer to each of those questions is up to you. Please help me out and get the Writers Guild back. Thanks you, as always, for visiting Magic Deck Vortex. Despite the Writers Guild, without you, a visitor of MDV, this site would be nothing.

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