An Update on Beyond the Brick

Yes, we have more site news already. As mentioned a month ago (already?), the new website we promised to merge this blog into has not yet come to pass. Surprisingly, we've gotten to the bottom of the issue and determined that it's simply not viable to launch a combined website. Although Beyond the Brick probably looks like a simple video channel to many people today, the truth is that it is a complex and sophisticated organization with lots of connections and ongoing projects. Bringing in so many big names in the LEGO company and LEGO community requires considerable effort, and the priority is to continue building on the exciting videos they've been releasing lately. Additionally, much of the original podcasts and posts we had planned to integrate into the site are the property of NetCast Studio, and could not be made available on the new site (since the original idea was to combine those posts and LMOTD posts into a combined site, our original concept for the website is entirely moot). Now that it's clear that a combined website wouldn't work, we will return to operating separately. In this blog's case, that also means that we are once again open to suggestions and interested in trying to combine our efforts with other blogs to create something more useful to the LEGO fan community. All of that said, we're all on good terms - this is an amicable split caused by circumstances and limited resources. The decision was mutual and primarily the result of all of us realizing that our original vision for a shared website simply isn't a viable option. You're still likely to see us hanging out together at conventions. Matthew will continue to appear as a regular contributor on the videos and as an occasional contributor on this blog. Since the YouTube channel is actually newer than when we backed off of LMOTD to work on the new site, we hadn't really plugged it before, but expect us to plug their videos from time to time going forward. For the foreseeable future, you can find the classic Beyond the Brick Podcasts at NetCast Studio. Beyond the Brick's flagship YouTube channel can still be found at brickpodcast.com - if you haven't been keeping up with them, you should at least check out their most recent video, featuring Kevin Hinkle, a friend-of-the-blog and The LEGO Group's Senior Community Coordinator for the Americas (In the weeks to come, I'll be covering more of Kevin's support of projects in our neck of the woods). The classic audio-only episode of Beyond the Brick (then known as "A Look at LEGO") where I (Dan) and Matthew (before he was a co-host) were interviewed on air can be found at http://netcaststudio.com/lego-with-mathew-and-danny-from-lmotd/ ...and we'll let you know if/when LMOTD relocates to somewhere besides lmotd.blogspot.com