I've been writing film reviews since 2009. I say this to pretty much everyone I have a serious conversation with about my reviews and what I do. As of today, I write for three sites on a regular basis: my personal website, Influx Magazine, and The Baconation. My reviews also occasionally appear on the UK-based website Rock n Reel Reviews. Since 2011, I have been cross-posting my reviews to websites like IMDb, Letterboxd, and even Rotten Tomatoes (Flixster) as of recent, meaning I copy and paste my review into the respective section of that site so regular users of that site could read my reviews there, as well. Sometimes, before a huge update overhauled the site and eliminated the special reviews section, I cross-posted to the streaming site MUBI, in addition to RateYourMusic.
For years, I've spread my reviews thin, ostensibly ushering in a wider audience, but also unknowingly cheapening the writing. In one sense, by cross-posting your work to multiple different outlets, you're democratizing the reach for your audience while simultaneously corrupting any shred of exclusivity your work has. You make it easier for people to find you, and provide them with multiple sources where they can find you, but you become a pancake in that you spread yourself thin and don't have any respective specialization or concentration for your work. I presume it's like the "oh, this again" reaction to seeing an often-anthologized poem like "We Real Cool" by Gwendolyn Brooks in yet another compendium of outstanding poems. After a while, you must ask, are you looking to get the widest audience possible or are you looking to become a respected writer with syndication on a few major publications?
With all this taken into consideration over the month of March after a conversation with a film critic friend of mine, younger than myself, who has recently become a big-shot at screenings and the film criticism industry itself, I have made the decision, effective April 1st, 2016, to discontinue publishing my reviews on IMDb, Letterboxd, Rotten Tomatoes, and RateYourMusic. From now on, you can only find my reviews on The Steve Pulaski Message Board, Influx Magazine, and The Baconation.
The Steve Pulaski Message Board will be the central location for all my reviews except for new releases; you can still see that I posted reviews of new releases, but will often be linked to either Influx Magazine or The Baconation upon finding the film (CLICK THE LINK FOR AN EXAMPLE: http://stevethemovieman.proboards.com/thread/5097/batman-superman-dawn-justice). Influx Magazine and The Baconation will house the reviews for films released in theaters in North America on a given weekend; usually two to four reviews will be posted by me over the course of the weekend. Every time I post a review of a film, except for reviews of pornographic films, you can find the link on my Facebook and my Twitter.
With that brief description alone, you can tell how ubiquitous I am. Over the last four years, I've taken huge, somewhat risky steps in the name of cautious self-promotion in that I wanted to become a bigger, more prominent force with my brand without alienating people or becoming too much of an enigmatic person. I'm not one for changing my ways in terms of how I interact people; if people email me or shoot me a personal message on whatever site, I try to be quick and plentiful with the response. I don't expect that to change if my popularity increases. I would be happy to take days off from my work and my writing if I had an inbox full of questions and personal letters. Fan/friend interaction is so important to me and it's what I've predicated my brand on for the last few years.
I've made business cards for my work, in addition to t-shirts; to this day, I've passed out well over four-hundred business cards and have sold more than fifty t-shirts to everyone from die-hard fans to casual supporters. The response has been overwhelmingly positive and helpful. Now it's time I make sure that there are a few places where you can read my content rather than a dozen with no kind of specialization or clarity as to where my "main page" is.
Some will see this as a minor change; I have a hunch most devoted readers of my work don't check my IMDb or Letterboxd page, as those pages are ultimately geared to attract more readers and usher in new fans. This will probably be the one negative to come with this change, but it also helps in keeping my work organized and more reputable. By the end of the year, I'd like to take a few days to finally build a website to eliminate all these external sources and have one source for film reviews. It would take almost a week to transfer over 2,100 of my reviews, in addition to formatting them and adding images, but it's something I eventually want to do.
In the meantime, like I said, you can still find all my reviews on The Steve Pulaski Message Board, in addition to reviews of new releases on Influx Magazine and The Baconation. My Letterboxd account will be used to link potential readers back to one of those sites and my IMDb account will still be used to post links to my reviews under the "External Reviews" tab. Perhaps once in a while I will post a review to the website. Rotten Tomatoes will be dropped entirely except for the feature that allows me to assign a simple star rating to the films I've seen. This will not effect the output of my reviews.
I'll gladly answer and questions to this move in an email, the comments, or a personal message on any one of my social media sites. Below are links where you can read my reviews or follow me at your leisure.
Warm, personal regards and I will see you at the movies,
Steve Pulaski
The Steve Pulaski Message Board, http://stevethemovieman.proboards.com
Influx Magazine, http://influxmagazine.com
The Baconation, http://thebaconation.com
My movie-watching schedule (updated daily), https://mubi.com/lists/2016-not-another-year-s-worth-of-film
My IMDb page (defunct April 1st, 2016), http://www.imdb.com/user/ur23483288
My Letterboxd account, http://letterboxd.com/StevePulaski/
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