I've been working more on the player cheat sheet and even the GM cheat sheet, mostly changing the font. I had tried Palatino Linotype before, but couldn't get the charts to look right or for all the player info to fit on one page, so I had futzed around with fonts in the previous version for far longer than I prefer. But this time around, I got Palatino Linotype to look right, even with 8-point for most of the text body and table content; in fact, I was able to re-arrange things nicer and add a little more information to the equipment and encumbrance section (and correct the misspelling of "encumbrance", even.)
But I haven't uploaded any changes yet. One reason is because I have to fill in movement rates for long-distance transportation still. However, there's also an issue with where to store the download. I've been using Google Docs, which is fine for rough drafts, but those obfuscated Google Doc URLs are not very good for distribution.
I looked into Scribd, which has human-readable URLs, but I've heard vague complaints about it. Nothing was stated clearly and objectively, but several people distributing RPG documents have said they switched to Google Docs. Vague things I have heard: Scribd URLs are filtered as spamlinks; Scribd somehow limits access to non-Scribd members; Scribd arbitrarily takes down material even when the copyright owner is the one who uploaded the document.
Are any of these true and documented? Does anyone know why Scribd would not be a good location?
I had several documents uploaded to Scribd. I liked the service and it gave me a way to track downloads and the popularity of the files.
ReplyDeleteThen I read this:
http://propnomicon.blogspot.com/2010/09/props-for-sale.html
And decided to do this:
http://swordandsanity.blogspot.com/2010/09/scribd-out-google-docs-in.html
I got a lot of positive feedback from the move, mainly because Google Docs does not require an account to download files. The downside is I can't see what people are downloading now. Maybe Google has a way to track this, but I have not found it if the option is there.
The most common complaint I have with Scribd, as a downloader, is that after some period of time (and I don't know how long, but it seems short), they move documents into the "archive" section, which is no longer freely available for download.
ReplyDeleteThanks, guys. I may consider using Scribd on the short-term... if I can ever find out how long it takes before docs are archived.
ReplyDelete@Shane: You have to use Google Analytics. I just now signed up, so I don't know much about how it works, but be warned that if you sign up for just docs.google.com, you will get an error at first; then, go to the dashboard to find your tracking code and follow the directions from that URL.
OK, I have everything setup for Analytics to track my Google Documents. Thanks for the brief tutorial.
ReplyDelete