fluffiestodin-blog

[fluffiestodin-blog]

Why I’m blogging.

In July 2019, the first Fortnite world cup was hosted in the United states and was played out across the internet and a number of US TV channels. Media attention was drawn to a many aspects of this suddenly highly publicized event, the prize pools on offer, the players progress and their journeys into competitive gaming were all featured. As expected, news outlets with comments sections and social media platforms all received much attention and a wide variety of perspectives were put forward by those wanting to have their say on the matter, this is all well and good and I personally loved the fact that so many people were getting involved. The increase in publicity was, in my view, absolutely fantastic.

However, there came a point where I just had to start correcting inaccuracies within a number of these comments sections. Yes, I can just see you shaking your head in disappointment at how I suddenly got sucked into this trap of never ending back and forth with people I’d never met, at one point I even looked at myself with something just shy of pity!! But I couldn't help it....

I’ve been a gamer for a long time, since about 1996 I’ve had some sort of tech that had a couple of flashing lights on it and challenged me to play it and complete some sort of challenge/objective, I’ve continued to game for the last 20+ years, got a degree in Computer Science and become a techie that builds his own gaming rigs. Through all this, people have been describing all the dangers of computers and gaming, to such an extent that by now I should be blind, obese, socially inept and looking like some sort of swamp monster that hasn’t showered for the last decade. Due to these inaccuracies, I’ve always felt the need to defend technology and especially the video games industry.

Returning to Fortnite, comments in regards to the esports industry, the fitness of players, their education, the support networks professional gamers have access to, their training regimes, government investment and so much more were all thrown around with little to no knowledge and attacked many innocent people and companies that had done nothing but show off a particular skills or create a product people enjoy using.

In the end, as you’d expect, I was forced to give up on my one-man information sharing crusade, I couldn’t read and provide answers backed up with the relevant research fast enough. But maybe I have a chance to change some minds and provide a balanced perspective in regards to video gaming, esports, and a bit of general technology through a blog that is a bit more permanent. I’ll update and post new stories regularly, backed up by proper research it will hopefully give people pause for thought on something they would usually just dismiss.