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Gone fishing…

July 27, 2004

This past week at Dead End Days, we’ve pulled something of a switcheroo. At the same time as Jay finally arrived in Toronto to join in the action first hand, Matt and I were whisking away to our respective homes. Matt, being the dynamo he is, went to help his mother move and after that to direct/stage manage The Imponderables as they made their appearance in the Montreal Just For Laugh’s Festival. I went just to remind myself that, despite the fact that I rarely get to see them or talk to them, my family does indeed still exist. Oh, and to get a nice healthy dose of unpolluted air.

This means that for the past week, I have not only been out of the loop, but have been in an entirely different province than the loop. And Brad, for the week, is filling about sixteen pairs of shoes, rather than his usual eleven. (Someone cue the ‘Charles In Charge’ theme song please) It’s strange, having been in the thick of it for so long, to see things coming together without my helping hand. It feels a bit like stepping off a bullet train while it’s still moving at full speed.

So as the project whizzes past me, what can I do? I can admire the paint job. I can see where the tracks might be getting a little rickety. And I can talk to a few of the people in the station. (Of course, I know most of the people in the station, but their opinion still counts, despite that.)

It has been an interesting experience, getting in-depth reactions to Dead End Days, and having my wits about me enough to take them in a little better than usual. There are a few opinions that seem to be universal:

1. Sam and Bridget are pretty darn cool.
2. Bruce sure is a nice young fellow.
3. Something big is about to happen, and if that something involves Bruce being hurt even the slightest bit, we will all be lynched.

Nice to know the characters are coming across so well, and I can’t say I disagree with any of the points. But as nice as it is to get compliments, that isn’t necessarily what I wanted. As always, however, it took a little prodding to get anything negative from my ever-supportive family and friends. But prod I did, and one small worry came up time and again:

We sure do talk a lot on our main page.

Which is something I never would have thought to consider as a problem. Aren’t most websites plagued with a lack of updates? The more the merrier, right? Besides, we’re all articulate, intelligent individuals. We have valuable opinions to share, don’t we?

Well, yes, but isn’t the central focus of the website the episodes?

Which, when you think about it, is a valid complaint. Sure we have a ‘First Time Here’ button, and the most recent episodes flagged at the top, but how much of our front page is really devoted to Dead End Days? Perhaps less than makes sense. Especially considering many of my friends have told me that they’ve spent a good couple of hours on our site, and never downloaded an episode. (Then again, maybe my friends are just lazy)

It’s a problem that comes up in almost any long-term endeavor. When you work on something long enough, it becomes very comfortable. And if you’re like me, the place where you’re most comfortable often becomes the place where you’re most cluttered. (Walking into my childhood bedroom was something like swimming upstream in a river of library books and underroos)

So, do we keep the soapbox on our front stoop, or move it further inside the house? And does any of this matter considering right now, Sam & Bridget have a contract to kill everyone’s favourite zombie?

Either way, remember that the reason we’re all here taking up bandwidth is for the sake of Dead End Days. So if you’ve only gone this far to date, make sure to press that ‘First Time Here’ button and see what we’re really all about.

[Shane raises an interesting point. The front page conceit is very much borrowed from the Webcomic convention invented by a certain Danish Astronomer. It's pretty much a given on comic sites that the front page blogs are superfluous to the actual "main" content, and are provided as a service to those looking for a little more "behind the scenes" insight into the making of said content, but also the issues the creators have been thinking about, the works they've been enjoying... that kind of thing. It also lets us regularly update more than once a week, for thos who need a little added incitement to keep us bookmarked. Much like the forums I don't think we ever expected even a small portion of our viewership would take part... but they're nice features for those who like that kind of thing. Then again, if people are actually offended that we've filled up the empty space under the "new episodes" section at the top of the page, I'd be interested to know about it. - Brad]

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