I know… I know… I’m an old unit and, as usual, fashionably late to the party, but this week I finally created an Instagram account. It’s all very exciting.

The truth is, I’ve never been particularly good at community building, even though this site is now approaching its 12th anniversary. There are a lot of reasons for that, but I think the biggest one is simply the amount of work involved.

Writing, editing, photographing games, maintaining the website, and keeping everything running takes a surprising amount of time. It’s something I essentially pay for the privilege of doing. Don’t take that as a complaint; I genuinely love writing, and I love running this blog. But between financing the Lord of the Rings CCG Database, hosting, domains, and the other little expenses that come with keeping a website alive, it all adds up. It’s not outrageously expensive, but it certainly isn’t free either.

There are definitely perks. Getting review copies of games is always exciting, and I’ve had the opportunity to chat with a few game designers over the years, which has been genuinely rewarding. Most of the time, though, running a site like this feels a bit like a second part-time job that I volunteer for. It can be surprisingly lonely.

A while back I decided to open the comments section on the blog, and that’s actually turned out to be one of the better decisions I’ve made. Readers occasionally stop by to share their thoughts, point out things I’ve missed, or offer a different perspective. Sure, there’s the occasional bit of criticism, but honestly, I think that’s healthy too. Overall, it’s been a really positive experience.

That’s really the goal behind creating this Instagram account—and some of the other social media experiments I plan to try over the coming year. I’d like to build a little more interaction with the people who read the site and, maybe, just maybe, find a sensible way to monetize some of the time and effort that goes into keeping GamersDungeon alive.

I’ve experimented with Google Ads before, but I never liked what they did to the look and feel of the site. I made a conscious decision that if I ever monetize GamersDungeon, it won’t be by plastering random banner ads all over the place. Sponsored partnerships or carefully chosen affiliate links? Maybe. Generic ads everywhere? That’s probably never going to happen.

So what can you expect from Instagram?

Honestly… I’m still figuring that out.

The plan is to share a few behind-the-scenes glimpses of what’s happening at GamersDungeon, quick gaming news, works in progress, convention adventures, new arrivals on my game shelf, and whatever other interesting things I think are worth sharing. It’ll probably evolve over time as I discover what works and what people enjoy.

So if you’d like to follow along on the journey, I’d love to have you there. After nearly twelve years of mostly talking at the internet, I think it’s about time I started talking with it.