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Ok. So this article may be a bit too meta, considering Bitmob is in its infancy, but bear with me. It’s meant to be a suggestion to the whole Bitmob community.
As a preface, I’ve been coming to this site for little over a month now, and, unexpectedly, it has easily become my favorite gaming site on the web. Originally I came because I run my own gaming website with my roommate, and I already had a system of deadlines and responsibilities in place. It seemed a natural fit to maximize the output of my work and to get as many scraps of that much coveted “exposure” as I could.
Then something happened. I began reading articles that surprised and engaged me wherever I clicked. Sure there are the greats, from the comedic, WWE-infused pop culture shenanigans of Michael Donahoe to impeccable copy-editing of Greg Ford, but what has truly hypnotized me over the last month is the splendid, vibrant community springing up around Hsu’s and Linn’s brainchild. Participating in this site has become less about getting my own shit up – well, it’s still about that – and more of a fascination with the amount of unvoiced, untapped talent that exists on the Internet.
So, I had an idea.
Before that idea however, I would like to say right out that Dan Hsu and Demian Linn make no bones about the fact that the site is in in Alpha. It’s right there in the banner. A lot of the functionality present in bigger, multi-billion dollar networking sites (that shall remained unnamed) has yet to be implemented. This isn’t meant to be a put down – quite the contrary in fact, I am amazed that so much has happened in such a small amount of time – but I’m beginning to become a fan of certain members of the community without knowing anything about them. When I think about the death of EGM, perhaps the key factor in the end with regard to the adulation I had, and still have, for for the now-defunct/soon-to-not-be-defunct? EGM was the sort of personal intimacy that pervaded the entire publication. I loved and hated so many editors at that damn magazine, and to this day, I still lament its loss.
Here’s my suggestion: new Bitmob users and older, more prolific Bitmob users should, given the site creators’ blessings, create a profile article for themselves. For myself, I’ve become a devoted follower of Brett Bates, Brian Shirk, and, my personal favorite, Omar Yusuf. I’m not even sure which of these three Bitmobbers are community members or actual staff, all or none. Until such a time – and I’m sure it’s coming – that I can view a profile or subscribe to a specific author, this would be a fun and interesting way to circumvent the limited UI that Bitmob currently offers. Again, I must stress that this site is my current Internet sweetheart. The idea is so novel within the gaming community that I come here despite how young and limited certain aspects of the site are.
Anyway, onto the show. If this is my suggestion, then I guess I have to go first. Right?
Ahh… fuck. I’m not sure whether to go with first or third person here… First person is more personal whilst third person seems a bit pompous. Let’s do third. OK? That way it’ll be a bit more like a magazine’s editor bio.
James DeRosa
James DeRosa resides in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and is left-handed. His interests include, but are in no way limited to, videogames (no fucking way, really!?), film, mathematics, philosophy, prose fiction, and independent music. His personal genre predilections include JRPGs, FPSes, fighting games, and music games. He is twenty-seven and attends Temple University pursuing a double major in Mathematics and English with a minor in Japanese, a scholastic path he is reticent to discuss due to its utter ostentation.
He lives with co-conspirator and fellow Bitmobber, Aaron Rivers.
Together they run a videogame website called The Sophist and collect dolls. James however does not collect that stupid Warhammer crap featured in the photo. They also have a podcast eponymously called Sophist Radio. They don’t have much money, so the audio is below par. They are, however, funny, so the content is great.
Despite their abject poverty, they have an amazing living room/kitchen window counter.
James loves drinking carbonated swill and smoking Parliment Lights, much to the chagrin of his heart, liver, lungs, and stomach.
He is also so poor that he cuts his own hair.
He has a big game closet that, as a former carpenter, he built himself.
His most beloved possession is Panzer Dragoon Saga – but he also doesn’t like to attach himself too much to material possessions.
Lastly, and most importantly, he has a bum knee and loves to spy on his neighbors, essentially making him the Jimmy Stewart character from Rear Window.
End.
And that’s it. I hope that other Bitmobbers might pick up the thread here and do something similar. Put in a picture or don’t. Make them funny or don’t. Either way, I don’t live on the west coast, so I can’t attend the community gatherings, but I’d love to learn more about the people I’ve begun to feel like I’m writing beside.
Also, make sure to tag your intro article with Meet the Mob, and make sure to title it, Meet the Mob: “Your Name”, that way, if people look up the tag, we’ll all be there.
~James D.