US NERDS XD - People trying so hard to be nerdie™ to be different, and are only faggots

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Trilby said:
I suppose for me it's rather sad to see such institutions kinda go the way of the dodo like that. I suppose I'll have a nice story to tell my grandkids one day of a world they'll never see at all.
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Indeed. Digital downloads are a big double edged sword. On one hand you don't have to worry about carrying several boxes and CDs or run out of places to store them. On the other hand it can have a bad effect on shops. Sadly it seems selling nerd merchandise is more out of necessity to keep a store from dying out.
 
SnowBall said:
Indeed. Digital downloads are a big double edged sword. On one hand you don't have to worry about carrying several boxes and CDs or run out of places to store them. On the other hand it can have a bad effect on shops. Sadly it seems selling nerd merchandise is more out of necessity to keep a store from dying out.
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I still miss the days of tangible permanence. The more they take that way, the less I care about things simply not working once it's gone.
 
I wonder if the whole e-sports push thing is a way to try and get more regular people into nerdy stuff. Seriously I don't even know where the money comes from for e-sports. They must be running at a loss all the time. Have you seen the social media feeds? They hire out stadiums and are flying people around the world constantly. Heading over to sponsored events and partying.

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I also see a lot more stuff lately about trying to create a "safe space for women gamers" "reducing toxicity" as well as bringing in "community managers" and stuff like that. Probably because if they have a community around a game viewed as being "friendly" they can lure more Women in who are more likely to buy gamer swag and stuff like that, I bet they have a whole bunch of metrics showing Women gamers are more likely to buy RL merchandise related to the game they like and show it off on social media.

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Medicated said:
I also see a lot more stuff lately about trying to create a "safe space for women gamers" "reducing toxicity" as well as bringing in "community managers" and stuff like that. Probably because if they have a community around a game viewed as being "friendly" they can lure more Women in who are more likely to buy gamer swag and stuff like that, I bet they have a whole bunch of metrics showing Women gamers are more likely to buy RL merchandise related to the game they like and show it off on social media.
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They effectively want the counter-cultures 'safe' (or more accuratly the illusion of safety-actual attempts to police will most likely be minimal since that costs actual money and might actually help), conveniant and sanitised. Like a pleasent all-packiged Holiday or netflix. No commitment, no need to integrate or accomidate. It'll be just like the shit they pump out on ads and the pleasent veneer that covers our actual culture.

https://www.facebook.com/Feminist40K/

https://www.overthinkingit.com/2014/10/28/gentrification-geek-culture/

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the real question isnt weither or not your efforts are actually for the benifit of women (because their's a good change they don't) or if anything is actually made better on any level for women or the subculture (because we all know the answer to that). The actual question is if counter-cultures are permitted to breach contempory social values or define themselves by their own standards.

If the answer is no then you have no right to complain about how isolated you feel when you've integrated every facet of yourself into buying shit and you've pimped your political and social stances to ammoral neo-liberal capitalism.
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Welcome to your future, enjoy your fucking starbucks while listening to some shit indie folk band on your ipod on your way to d&d in a world which matches contempory values on woman, minorties, religion and men but still has serfdom and evil wizards.

I'm sure it provides comfort when your in an underpaid dead end job, serf.
 
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Emperor Julian said:
They effectively want the counter-cultures 'safe' (or more accuratly the illusion of safety-actual attempts to police will most likely be minimal since that cost actual money and might actually help), conveniant and sanitised. Like a pleasent all-packiged Holiday or netflix. No commitment, no need to integrate or accomidate. It'll be just like the shit they pump out on ads and the pleasent veneer that covers our actual culture.

https://www.facebook.com/Feminist40K/

https://www.overthinkingit.com/2014/10/28/gentrification-geek-culture/

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the real question isnt weither or not your efforts are actually for the benifit of women (because their's a good change they don't) or if anything is actually made better on any level for women or the subculture (because we all know the answer to that). The actual question is if counter-cultures are permitted to breach contempory social values or define themselves by their own standards.

If the answer is no then you have no right to complain about how isolated you feel when you've integrated every facet of yourself into buying shit and you've pimped your political and social stances to ammoral neo-liberal capitalism.
parents-hold-babys-hands-happy-family-in-park-evening-picture-id588959064


Welcome to your future, enjoy your fucking starbucks while listening to some shit indie folk band on your ipod on your way to d&d in a world which matches contempory values on woman, minorties, religion and men but still has serfdom and evil wizards.

I'm sure it provides comfort when your in your underpaid dead end job, serf.
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This scree.
 
Emperor Julian said:
the real question isnt weither or not your efforts are actually for the benifit of women (because their's a good change they don't) or if anything is actually made better on any level for women or the subculture (because we all know the answer to that). The actual question is if counter-cultures are permitted to breach contempory social values or define themselves by their own standards.
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There have always been Women in gaming and "nerd culture" since the beginning but even though there is this whole push to get women into the gaming industry, do you think those advocates could name some of the Women pioneers of gaming? Roberta Williams of Sierra? Anne Westfall of Archon? Carol Shaw of River Raid?

There are Women all over the place working in games and winning competitions, and you barely hear about them, you tend to hear about the Zoe Quinns. I'm not sure why. Those other Women thrived in the "hostile nerd/gaming culture" how come these others can't?

 
Medicated said:
There are Women all over the place working in games and winning competitions, and you barely hear about them, you tend to hear about the Zoe Quinns. I'm not sure why. Those other Women thrived in the "hostile nerd/gaming culture" how come these others can't?

[MEDIA=vidme]XBVPP[/MEDIA]
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Because they're actually nerds. "nerdy girl fits in with culture they're part off " isnt really as sexy to the news as hate mob sent rape threats to attractive young women who quite likes pokemon.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tZMjGwjCAuQ

-top quote on the video from one of the interviewees

Ms 5ooo Watts1 year ago
I'm honestly disappointed with how this turned out. I was approached to speak about women in gaming as a whole not to only talk about the negative side. Even during the interview I was asked to give my positive experiences with being a gamer as they didn't want this to be a one sided thing. None of my positive comments about my community and the gaming community as a whole were included at all. The initial email that I received asking for an interview said, and I quote "I’m working on a BBC3 documentary looking at the experiences of female gamers, how experiences are changing (and how the games themselves are changing)" No where in there does it say that the program will be about "the dark side of gaming" I never signed up to be some kind of warrior against sexism online, I was asked to talk about the experiences of women in gaming, how things are changing and how games themselves are changing to reflect women in gaming now being more represented. Not happy at all.
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(naturally Wu makes an appearance.)
 
Medicated said:
I wonder if the whole e-sports push thing is a way to try and get more regular people into nerdy stuff.
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From what I've observed that's pretty dead-on except with the endgame nerdy stuff being in-app purchases. The topic could probably support a really navel-gazey Medium article about the mechanics of the sunken cost theory being conflated with the idea of community and belonging, but instead have this cliffnotes paragraph version:

:powerlevel:

I played dota for year or two when the valve reboot came out of beta because I like to pick apart mechanically complex systems. It's a huge hive of autism and eccentricity that could probably support a thread (and also the infected tag) but the relevant part for this thread is a couple people I wound up friends with who were generally normal, chill people who just wound up overly obsessed with the game to the point where it was a lifestyle rather than just a diversion. These two would spend upwards of 2500$ per year on the tournament compendium (read: yearly 3-month event that gives you a quest-based leveling system where you can also give valve money for levels directly), buy all the tournament merch, etc. and just treat it as completely normal. This was in ~2013ish, and by 2015 everyone else I knew who played the game (myself included) had moved on. Those two still play daily and I worry about them.
 
ducktales4gameboy said:
From what I've observed that's pretty dead-on except with the endgame nerdy stuff being in-app purchases. The topic could probably support a really navel-gazey Medium article about the mechanics of the sunken cost theory being conflated with the idea of community and belonging, but instead have this cliffnotes paragraph version:

:powerlevel:

I played dota for year or two when the valve reboot came out of beta because I like to pick apart mechanically complex systems. It's a huge hive of autism and eccentricity that could probably support a thread (and also the infected tag) but the relevant part for this thread is a couple people I wound up friends with who were generally normal, chill people who just wound up overly obsessed with the game to the point where it was a lifestyle rather than just a diversion. These two would spend upwards of 2500$ per year on the tournament compendium (read: yearly 3-month event that gives you a quest-based leveling system where you can also give valve money for levels directly), buy all the tournament merch, etc. and just treat it as completely normal. This was in ~2013ish, and by 2015 everyone else I knew who played the game (myself included) had moved on. Those two still play daily and I worry about them.
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That just sounds like an addiction filling a void in someone's vapid life. If not the games, it would have been gambling, or sniffing glue out of a bag.
 
Pointless Pedant said:
That just sounds like an addiction filling a void in someone's vapid life. If not the games, it would have been gambling, or sniffing glue out of a bag.
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It definitely is. It's the near cultlike progression from presentation to addiction that gets me, as well as the way that it presents a really transparent money-grab microtransaction model immediately to people who probably haven't had run-ins with shitty microtransaction models before.

1. This is a fun group activity that is free
2. This is something I can engage with like a sport
3. I should buy merch to support my favorite team
4. Spending money to support the game I've had good experiences with is a good idea because [I want to support the game/All the pros do it/<generic microtransaction motivations>]
5. Uhh everyone else is playing <something else> but I've already got so much stuff here that I'll stay a bit longer.
6 GOTO 4
 
ducktales4gameboy said:
It definitely is. It's the near cultlike progression from presentation to addiction that gets me, as well as the way that it presents a really transparent money-grab microtransaction model immediately to people who probably haven't had run-ins with shitty microtransaction models before.

1. This is a fun group activity that is free
2. This is something I can engage with like a sport
3. I should buy merch to support my favorite team
4. Spending money to support the game I've had good experiences with is a good idea because [I want to support the game/All the pros do it/<generic microtransaction motivations>]
5. Uhh everyone else is playing <something else> but I've already got so much stuff here that I'll stay a bit longer.
6 GOTO 4
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So it's basically turned into the modern form of poker machines/gambling, except its more convenient and you can do it from home?
 
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