Tuesday, September 02, 2003

Blog$shares 101 - Part Four: Summary

I mentioned Artefacts last installment. Artefacts are where the idea market and the regular shares market intersect. An Artefact is a status symbol with a bit of power. Once you own the Artefact for an industry, you can affect the share price of any blog in that industry. You can also force people to sell you shares of a blog in that industry (at an inflated price), or snatch the ideas a blog produces for an industry.

Once Artefacts were introduced into the game, a number of players got annoyed at them, as the people who hold Artefacts are able to manipulate stock prices, and do nasty buy-outs and such. But I'm not impressed with the complaints, for two reasons. One is that the rich and powerful have always been able to manipulate markets, and this just adds an extra dose of strategy to the game. The second reason is me. In less than three weeks I was able to aquire enough ideas to build artefacts, and if I can do it, anyone can. As of this writing I have 56 artefacts (including a Senator and a Journalist. Oooh). That's a lot, especially for someone who started playing the game less than a month ago.

In any case, if you don't plan on playing the ideas market, you need to be wary of Artefacts and their power over the price of shares. There are strategies for fighting them, but you'll have to learn those on your own. Luckily, there is a forum for blogshares players to share strategy (as well as complain about problems). Seyed (srazavi) is the creator of the game, and he hangs out in the forums. He is very quick to solve problems, but has little patience for people whining.

And really, that's all I have to say... ok, maybe a couple more thoughts:

One thing important to remember about Blogshares is that it's not only a game, it's a game still in the process of being built. The creator of the game is constantly adding and changing things, so to be a good player you must be flexible.

My original intention with the game was to buy up the shares in my own blog and leave it at that. I got addicted because I had a lot of time to kill while suffering from insomnia. And, while I may be posting these 101 posts, I've been at the game for less than a month and there's a lot about it I haven't yet discovered.

The best thing you can do is investigate it at your own pace, and have fun (do I really need to say that if you aren't enjoying it, you probably don't want to waste your time on it?). And if you need a loan, just let me know. I may have a bit of B$-cash to spare...

Part One, Part Two, and Part Three.

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