To appease my new friend BuckF1tches, here's a post you won't find on PS3 Attitude... ;-)

Often times I find that I'm drawn to a particular story because I feel that, as a gamer, the balance of the story is wrong. It might be overly aggressive towards Sony, Microsoft or Nintendo and not give a balanced argument.

Of course because I am involved with a PS3 website, I tend to notice the anti-Sony stories first since they show up in my Google Alerts etc.

But I don't leap all over every story. Just the stories that really deserve a proper response.

And then along comes a commenter who says something like "trust a Sony fanboy to say that". They use it in the context of dismissing the entire counterpoint to the story by simply mentioning the word. After all, if you're a 'fanboy' then your opinion must count for nothing, right?

I'd like to think that by providing a proper, balanced viewpoint to a story it gives gamers the opportunity to think about things more broadly. I've said, time and time again, that lately with all the excellent games and announcement that have come around for all of the new platforms it is gamers in general that are winning. I've put my money on the PS3, but others have chosen to go elsewhere. And that is fine by me. Many of you have multiple platforms... I prefer to stick my investment in one place.

So - a call to all. Please stop saying the word 'fanboy' as if to simply dismiss the conversation. Think about what you're saying in response to a post or a story and then provide a balanced alternative viewpoint. Fanboyism is fine by me if that's what you like, but using the word fanboy instead of thinking of a proper response is just lazy and pointless.

And yes, I'm ready to ignore the obvious first comment to this post - I know it's coming.... go on, knock yourself out and say it! ;-)