Gephyrophillia #233

Originally Posted on 03/25/2011 by Jeff Harris

The thing about reviving a site is that you find yourself struggling about what to do, what hasn't been done, and what's already there. In the 12 years I've been working on The X Bridge, I have accumulated well over 500 articles, some are multi-paged articles. Apparently, I had something to say. The thing about that is you could see it in the two ways I've been looking at it lately.

Either I had a lot to say or I was big whiner who complained about every little thing under the bright yellow sun.

I don't want to regurgitate news. Any marmoset with a typewriter could do that. I should know. I've been there and done that. I also don’t want to be an unpaid corporate kiss-ass who readily posts anything a corporate entity wants me to. Again, been there and done that.

And more!

I feel you have to have a thought to survive in this new media world. One shouldn't be married to the facts, especially if they're handily provided to you by folks that want to set an agenda of their choosing. People need to pull away their fanboy blinders and think and examine what's really going on. If you like something, that's fine, let your readers know. If you don't like something, especially if it's from a company you like, that's even better. It makes your readers know you're honest.

I think that's why people still read The X Bridge today, all 17 of my loyal readers. Do you have to agree with everything I say? Absolutely not. Hell, I read some of my older columns and I'm thinking to myself "Good gracious, how naive was I?" When you've been in the game as long as I have, you're bound to have a few head-scratching columns now and then.

I think I'm a lot more mature than I was 12 years ago. I've made friends. I've made a few enemies. I have a couple of "frienemies" as well. I feel I'm at a place where The X Bridge can be more than just a sporadically-updated soapbox about how I feel about animation or express how moronic Cartoon Network was this week. What should I write about? What will the next decade of The X Bridge bring? These are questions that go through my mind as I ponder the next evolution of The X Bridge. I know I don't want to look backwards all the time. That makes my neck hurt. I'm still doing the comics thing, bringing some prose to the site, but columns are the bread and butter of what The X Bridge is all about, and I don't want to frack with my bread and butter nor do I want anybody else fracking with it. Guess I’m going to have to do what I've been telling my Twitter followers to do:

Keep creating.

Jeff Harris,
Creator/Webmaster, The X Bridge.