7 Excellent Online Board Game Resources

I'm sure there are hundreds of board game themed websites, blogs, podcasts and the like, but the following are my personal favorites. If you think I'm missing out on some great ones, by all means drop me a line!

1. Board Game Geek If you have anything more than a casual interest in board games you owe it to yourself to visit this site! The most extensive compilation of board game knowledge on the web, board game geek has pictures, reviews, rules, strategy tips, discussion, and news about almost every board game ever. The two features I find most useful: 1. User-voted "best with __ number of players" goes beyond the publisher suggested number of players to tell you a game's sweet spot. Just because a game says it supports 2-5 players doesn't mean it scales well along that range. 2. Especially for popular games,BGG acts as a compilation of user reviews. Being able to read 15 reviews of a game rather than one goes a long way toward accessing how much you might enjoy one particular title.
2. Yehuda is a gentleman who authors a board game blog out of Jerusalem, Israel. He engages in lots of deep thinking about board games, so many of his longer posts will keep you thinking for quite some time. He also maintains a thoroughblogroll of current board game blogs, which is certainly a valuable resource and much appreciated.
3. Skip Maloney: The Board Game Examiner Skip is a contributor to Games magazine and has been writing about games for quite some time. This experience shows, both in his excellent writing and his vast knowledge of board games. His site features reviews of many types of games from strategy to word to party games, and insightful commentary about the hobby.
4. Tom Vasel: The Dice Tower Tom is a missionary, a math teacher, and has a wealth of knowledge about board games. He co-hosts The Dice Tower podcast with SamHealey , produces a video podcast, has written hundreds of board game reviews, and more recently begun to tape video reviews of board games. Certainly Tom is one of the most visible members of the worldwide board game community.
5. Scott Nicholson: Board Games with Scott Scott produces excellent video reviews of board games. The production values are great and most of his reviews are very thorough. If you want to take a look at gamecomponents and see examples of play before you buy a new game, definitely check to see if there is an episode of Board Games with Scott about the game!
6. Board Game News This is a site I've only begun to explore. Numerous contributors to the site author articles covering all aspects of the hobby. Also,BGN maintains a page called 'Gone Cardboard' that keeps track of all board game releases that have been announced for the coming year.
7. The Spiel - Stephen Conway & Dave Coleson I just listened to my first episode of this excellent podcast yesterday, and boy was I blown away! The production values here are just tremendous: so good in fact that The Spiel would not feel at all out of place on mainstream radio (except for the geeky subject matter, of course). The hosts are extremely knowledgeable, well spoken, and enthusiastic. Some of their game reviews are so thorough and descriptive that I could almost skip the rules and dive right in to playing the game in question.