Friday afternoon tidbits

A small milestone to mark: Sometime today, if it hasn't happened already, this blog will serve up its 200,000th page view. That's not a large number by most blogs' standards, but it seems like a big one to me. Thanks for reading.

-It's the best thing I've seen this week -- Matthew Gallant's mash-up of "I'm on a Boat" with Wind Waker:



-News of Stephen Totilo's move to Kotaku seems strange to me, for reasons I haven't quite been able to put my finger on. Kotaku is good, but MTV Multiplayer is often great. While Totilo will unquestionably be reaching a larger audience, which he deserves, I am hoping that he brings Multiplayer's sensibility to Kotaku, and not the other way around. Kyle Orland interviewed Totilo for Crispy Gamer, and he says all the right things. I just hope that Totilo's reporting doesn't get lost in the hourly press-release snarking.

-Critical Distance is a new group blog dedicated to highfalutin' discussion of games. So far it's a mix of original thinkpieces, well considered links, and a brand-new podcast. They've gathered a good collection of writers. Can't wait to see how the site develops over the coming months.

-Finally, I've deleted a couple of comments this week, so I wanted to take a second to discuss this blog's commenting policy. Simply put: I will only delete comments that are pure spam, or that link to something that seems illegal. That's it.

I won't delete comments for disagreeing with me, even if it's vulgar or just plain stupid. I trust that the tone set by me and by the regular commenters here is enough to dissuade people whose only interest is starting a flame war. Comments provide much of a blog's value, especially when the commenters are as passionate and as intelligent as you guys are. I'd rather err on the side of more reader participation, not less.