The Social in analogue games

I'd like to point you to this thought provoking post on social gaming on designer site Gamesbrief. It is about computer games, but I think the golden question is: can miniature and board game companies use these same techniques? I think they can, and they should. The technology is there.

From Gamesbrief

It seems analogue game designers are too busy designing mechanisms rather than building a product to make money. And apparently, analogue publishers are still behind the video game, movie and music businesses.

Obviously the technologies involved have to be different than for video games, but it shouldn´t be too hard to develop a multimedia strategy to promote a game. Fans have shown themselves to be only too happy to contribute.

So if you design miniatures, why not set up a Pinterest or Instagram page where people can post their efforts? Why not reward them? Why not bring them together?  Why not offer them workshops?

Or if you design games, use your fans to test play. Challenge them to 'break' the game. Invite them to promote your game (like Too Fat Lardies does). Incorporate their story lines in a universe of stories around your game.

Of course, that means you delegate some of the control over your creation to others. That's nothing new in RPGs, so why not do it? Games Workshop could have had all that, but they left that huge social gap up for grabs. Who is going to jump in it?