The State of Gold-Making Blogging As 2011 Closes

After adding another new gold-making blog to The World Of Warcraft Gold Blog Directory (as well as updating the activity levels on the directory) I had to stop and take a bit of time to write a little about the tremendous blossoming of gold-making blogs we've seen over this last year.

There has never been a better time to be a player looking for information on how to make gold in World of Warcraft. Frankly I'm often overwhelmed by the amount of new information coming out of gold-making blogs (both old and new) on a daily basis. Keeping up with my RSS reader often feels like trying to take a drink out of a fire hose.

Read on after the jump for a few of my thoughts about where gold-making blogging has been and where it's going.


Who Is Your Daddy And What Does He Do?

While it may seem silly to think of 10 months as a long time that is about how long Power Word: Gold has been around. In February of this year I decided to take the plunge into to blogging about gold-making. At the time Marcko from Just My Two Copper was encouraging people to start gold-making blogs. I decided to take the opportunity to learn how to blog and started Power Word: Gold.

At the time there were a few prominent blogs around. The ones that come immediately to mind are Just My Two Copper, Cold's Gold Factory, Altos Goldish Advice, Capped By Cata, Nerf Faids and Warcraft Econ. I was lucky enough to have these bloggers take me under their wings and welcome me into the gold blogosphere. I got to know them all fairly well and I couldn't have had a better bunch of bloggers showing me the way. (Special thanks to The Gold Queen who gave PW:G it's first review and let me know my original layout left something to be desired.)

Attack Of The Blogs

As time went on I started to see more and more gold-making bloggers popping up. While it was very exciting to have more gold-making blogs to read I quickly realized that keeping all these blog and bloggers straight was going to get out of hand quickly. It was with that idea in mind that in April, 2011 I started The World Of Warcraft Gold Blog Directory. (See "Introducing The World Of Warcraft Gold Blog Directory".)

My vision for the directory was for it to be a place not only for me to keep all the gold-making bloggers straight (which it certainly is) but as a place for people new to gold-making to be able to find other other gold-making blogs. I added "activity levels" to the directory to allow players to quickly find out which blogs had up-to-date gold-making information

Why Can't I Read All These RSS Feeds?

The first day I put out The Directory there were 32 total blogs listed with 18 listed as "Active". Today there are 76 gold-making blogs listed in the directory with 30 of them listed as "Active". Think about that for a second.

In the last eight months (or so) since The Directory was first released there have been 44 new gold-making blogs have been added. 44. That averages out to just over five new blogs added per month. More than one per week. For eight months straight. Wow. A poet once said: "You're gonna need a bigger boat."

(It should be noted that while I stated earlier that my RSS reader seemed like fire hose of information I'll take that over a slow trickle any day. If you run a gold-making blog keep those posts coming!)

The Journey Of A Thousand Gold Starts With The First Copper

So where do we as a community go from here? As someone who has had a fairly unique view of the gold-making blogosphere my prediction is that new gold-making blogs will continue to be created. Players will continue to share their own tips and techniques for making gold in World of Warcraft.

For those of us who have been around here for a little bit and remember a time when we could read over our blogroll in a few minutes the deluge of new information may seem a bit overwhelming. New faces. New names. New blogs. All I can say is that new faces, new names and new blogs bring with them new gold-making ideas and (perhaps most importantly) a renewed enthusiasm for gold-making.

The those just starting (or considering starting) a gold-making blog my best advice is this: Do it. Just do it. We want to hear what you have to say. We want to share in your enthusiasm. Your voice is unique and wonderful. (If you do decide to take the plunge you might spend a few minutes reading over my previous post "10 Tips For Starting A Gold-Making Blog".)

To 999g99s99c and Beyond

The current state of gold-making blogging is the best it has ever been. We have new blogs such as The Golden Crusade, marketsforgold and Twitchie Enterprises to name a (very) few just getting started. We have strong gold-making blogs that have started since The Directory was first introduced such as Gimps Gold, Khalior's Tentacular Junkpile, and Critical Goblin.

My advice to anyone reading this is to take a good long look at the blogs listed in The World Of Warcraft Gold Blog Directory. Head to some of the blogs you haven't yet read. Read them. Leave comments. Encourage the writers you find to be exceptional. Ask them questions. Add them to your RSS readers. Add them to your blogrolls. Follow them on twitter.

It's Always About The Community

We have a fantastic gold-making community bloggers and readers alike. We are all united in a single purpose: To make Gold In World of Warcraft. That said, I have made genuine friends in this community. People I will most likely keep in touch with regardless if I was playing World of Warcraft or not.

That is the real power of a community: bringing people together. For those of use who have been here for a long time and those who are just joining us thank you. For those who write and create thank you for taking the time to share with us. For those who read and participate thank you for the encouragement and support you show. Thank you for being part of something so fantastic.

UPDATE: While It should go without saying, I only mentioned/linked to a handful of gold-making blogs in this post. As I stated in the post there are nearly 80 blogs listed on the directory and 30 active blogs at the moment. If your blog wasn't mentioned in the post please don't take it as me not thinking you're awesome. I think all gold-making blogs are awesome. I loves all my bloggers and community members!

If you're reading this and you have a favorite gold-making blog I didn't mention please let everyone know which blog and why you love them in the comments below.

---

Like this post? Get even more Power Word: Gold - Read our Free Gold Guide, subscribe via RSS, subscribe to the Podcast via iTunes or RSS, follow us on Twitter, "Circle" us on Google+, "Like" us on Facebook, subscribe via Youtube and join us on reddit.

---