Raistlin's Round 3: Welcome to the Frontlines
And by that, of course, I mean the frontsite.
The Good
First, I'll give the positives. I like the integration of the site and the forums. It seems to work smoothly and, most importantly, makes it much, much easier for non-Editor members to help out. I remember a couple of years ago when I was trying to help out tuh by coding my own FFXIII stuff, and it was an extra hassle that the new system has all-but eliminated for a variety of the most common submissions. Now, any clueless dimwit can create an article on the frontsite, and a staff member can publish it with the click of a button.
The Bad
Now, for the bad. This morning I noticed there was a new Letter from the Producer for FFXIV, and so keeping my promise to help out with that stuff, I wrote up a piece for the frontsite and had BoB promote it. Just now, I Google'd FFXIV info posted within the last day, and the first couple of pages are devoted to the latest news, but... nothing from EoFF.
EoFF is not a legitimate news source. It's just not. I'm not sure how many people outside of the forum read EoFF's news, but I doubt it's very many. I think that is the biggest hurdle EoFF faces right now, and the staff needs to address it.
For that, I think there needs to be more Editors actually doing work. Lately I've seen Freya posting a bit of everything and BoB posting the occasional FFXIV stuff, and that's been it. That's not nearly enough.
I think there needs to be more Editors who are more focused. Editors could still be free to write about anything, but I think it might be best if an Editor had a focus on one category of FF/Square news. For instance, someone could be the MMO guy, the FFXIII + spinoffs guy, the KH guy, etc. You could require each Editor to have a Google alert for their category. And, of course, maybe 1 or 2 Editors who focused mainly on articles. Focusing Editors helps keep their workload someone limited to prevent burnout, while also better ensuring that the specific news will be reported by making each individual responsible for a certain area.
This would require a fair number of Editors, but I think running the frontsite is a more pressing issue than running the forums right now, as it's the most important aspect of getting new members. There should be more frontsite staff than forums staff, to be honest.
Game Content
There's also the issue of FF game content. This is a tougher issue to tackle than doing the news, because we're entirely dependent on volunteered, user-generated content. I think one big thing to do when a new FF comes out is to start working on stuff when they first start playing the game, whether it's a full walkthrough, a boss guide, or an overview of a sidequest or minigame. I know I was personally kicking myself when I didn't start working on my now-mostly-completed mark guide in FFXIII when I first started doing marks.
Encouraging this is obviously difficult. But maybe a little event could be held, like a Let's Play, except not for just a month, where the people that play the game and submit content can compete for certain little prizes or titles or privileges awarded to the people who submit the best content (both quality and quantity).
And now I'm starting to ramble on and on, so I'll stop here.
EDIT: Jesus, that is longer than I thought. I'll break it up into sections so it's not such a wall of text.
streme Wheelie
Master of the Fork
How many people want to be an editor? Not many. How many want to be a Ck? Loads! By having this round as the third, not only do I have the people who worked hard to get here but also who would care about the site. At that point having them do something FOR the site shows if they'd be willing to help me out when in staff. 
Originally Posted by Raistlin
