Actually, no I defend the system as it stands, I just wish game designers didn't have to go through coders to get their visions realized. Then you wouldn't have games that could have been brilliant but were total failures due to bugs or your programmers' limitations of skill.
well, ok, to be fair, game designers usually start out as coders, and there's a certain correlation between the strict logic of programming and the rules of a game. But in today's world, you have hotshot designers (Chris Taylor, Warren Spector, Sid Meier) that design or conceptualize a game, and they document it and give it to a producer to implement. Strictly idea men. Most of them earned their way to that level. But they're not coding anymore.
Coders don't write games. They just implement the rules in a PC format. (that may be the only implementation - whatever) The true writers of games are the guys that wrote the articles. Being a coder ain't shit.
You expected ethical behavior from businessmen who founded a corporation to administer a database? Business people just do not behave altruistically. There is ALWAYS an angle.
what if the ETs broadcast in visible light space and see the Radio wavelengths? Assuming life is going to be like us in any way is kind of... arrogant, don't you think?
Programming is art about as much as my turds are sculpture. One does not express one's emotions (except maybe greed or obsequiousness) through code. Therefore, it cannot possibly be art.
It's also not engineering. Bridges do something that directly improves the world. Most programming just exists in order to funnel money from one corporation to another. You can do that with checks or briefcases full of cash, though that would require that people actually leave the office and workers cannot be treated as humans that need the contact of anything other than a CRT and CPU and kb/mouse, since they are weak-minded and would thusly cause the stock price to drop.
I'm a programmer. I accept that my job isn't like anything else and is fundamentally useless and in fact detrimental to society. Why can't all of you? Human society ran for at least 5,000 years before the invention of the computer. These damn things are ruining our lives.
In my opinion, no. Not while the Middle Eastern religions still exist. Those religions put a moral limit on how much autonomy man can give his creations by making it a sin to create free will ala Yahweh/God/Allah.
If the scientists don't believe in that, then the government and the ignorant people do and they will be forced (maybe at gunpoint) to stop their research just before robots/AI can have free will.
Re:Speaking of the 3 laws of robotics.
on
Will Smith as I, Robot
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· Score: 5, Interesting
Asimov seemed to think that robotics/AI could lead to a purer form of humanity. Clarke knew that AI was fundamentally flawed since it was a human creation. I like the spirit of the first, but the second is true as of right now.
Programmers who can code games are a dime a dozen. It's game DESIGNERS that are so rare.
Back in the day, which is probably where most of the guys you all idolize came from, designers and programmers used to be one in the same. Richard Garriot sat down and WROTE Akalabeth and the early Ultimas. Sid Meier (arguably the first "superstar" designer) wrote reams of code for Microprose in the 80s. Will Wright coded and designed the original SimCity. None of the above are coders now. (Garriot is out of the industry now, but his last few years of work was in design)
I know a guy that worked on Daggerfall (ok, so that's not a great accomplishment seeing as it was so buggy, but damn it he was a game coder), and I know a guy that worked on Everquest. They're coders. They didn't have anything to do with the design of the games.
If you can code a physics engine from scratch, great. John Carmack can. But iD hasn't released a game that was innovative in its design in years. John will sell the [insert name + Roman numeral here] engine and buy his Ferraris. But when LucasArts gets it and writes Jedi Knight II using that engine, THEY created the game, not Carmack. Carmack didn't do anything more than build a toolkit for other people to use. In another world he would have worked on libc or the C++ STL or on a tax calculation library or in Core Services for a financial institution.
Stop worshipping the programmers, go and seek out the best designed and written games, and the industry can be saved..
I was a jump-in-and-hack coder (self-taught, used to program as a hobby, etc.) and they finally convinced me that design works. The only problem with a lot of patterns is that they don't apply that well to a non-OO language. Hence, the rise of Java, which is designed, as a language, around patterns.
I still call myself a programmer, though, not an "engineer". Engineers build bridges, I just write programs.
Being a former comic book fan I'm a sucker for a crafty plot even if the dialogue and characters suck.. Tom Clancy, for example, his characters are dull (except in "Without Remorse", DAMN that's a good book) and his dialogue is basically all support for his politics, but he can come up with some cool plot twists. However, some of the authors you mentioned have created truly memorable characters. How can you not remember Randall Flagg:) this all just comes down to pure talent.
I don't think you necessarily need a "where do we go from here" angle to make good sci-fi. Look at Phillip K. Dick - he rarely gave any kind of solution to the conflicts he raised, he just pointed them out. In fact, offering solutions comes off as pedantic a lot of the time.
It still starts with the characters, though. A book full of generic Han Solo clones is boring as hell even if the plot is great.
Really, it's the same thing that makes any story good:
1) GOOD CHARACTERS 2) Good plot 3) Well-written imagery and narrative
Too many sci-fi writers seem to forget those rules. They take a gadget or a concept or an individual occurrence and try to stretch it into a novel, because it's sci-fi and "people who read sci-fi" (insert Trek convention stereotype here) will buy it no matter how shitty it is. They don't even TRY to be good writers.
Also, and even good writers can be guilty of this, they write into the genre rather than letting the genre be a non-factor. They don't develop a plot or a character in a logical way because that's "not sci-fi enough." You can always tell when a writer has shoehorned something into what they percieve as a sci-fi limitation.
Slashdot Mirror
but there's nothing cool about doing coke.
:)
Fuck the hell out of the naked women, yeah, just don't do coke. Bad news.
ok, carry on
Actually, no I defend the system as it stands, I just wish game designers didn't have to go through coders to get their visions realized. Then you wouldn't have games that could have been brilliant but were total failures due to bugs or your programmers' limitations of skill.
well, ok, to be fair, game designers usually start out as coders, and there's a certain correlation between the strict logic of programming and the rules of a game. But in today's world, you have hotshot designers (Chris Taylor, Warren Spector, Sid Meier) that design or conceptualize a game, and they document it and give it to a producer to implement. Strictly idea men. Most of them earned their way to that level. But they're not coding anymore.
Coders don't write games. They just implement the rules in a PC format. (that may be the only implementation - whatever) The true writers of games are the guys that wrote the articles. Being a coder ain't shit.
where did the whole "In Soviet Russia" thing come from, anyway?
You expected ethical behavior from businessmen who founded a corporation to administer a database? Business people just do not behave altruistically. There is ALWAYS an angle.
I wasn't totally serious. My story really isn't that much like it when I think more about it. I know I couldn't copyright an idea..
I had a similar idea for a story 3 years ago. Should have copyrighted it.
it already does, using me as its avatar
you said best-of-breed. That invalidates your opinion completely.
Hinckley? You missed!
what if the ETs broadcast in visible light space and see the Radio wavelengths? Assuming life is going to be like us in any way is kind of... arrogant, don't you think?
Programming is art about as much as my turds are sculpture. One does not express one's emotions (except maybe greed or obsequiousness) through code. Therefore, it cannot possibly be art.
It's also not engineering. Bridges do something that directly improves the world. Most programming just exists in order to funnel money from one corporation to another. You can do that with checks or briefcases full of cash, though that would require that people actually leave the office and workers cannot be treated as humans that need the contact of anything other than a CRT and CPU and kb/mouse, since they are weak-minded and would thusly cause the stock price to drop.
I'm a programmer. I accept that my job isn't like anything else and is fundamentally useless and in fact detrimental to society. Why can't all of you? Human society ran for at least 5,000 years before the invention of the computer. These damn things are ruining our lives.
In my opinion, no. Not while the Middle Eastern religions still exist. Those religions put a moral limit on how much autonomy man can give his creations by making it a sin to create free will ala Yahweh/God/Allah.
If the scientists don't believe in that, then the government and the ignorant people do and they will be forced (maybe at gunpoint) to stop their research just before robots/AI can have free will.
they probably already have that in germany
Asimov seemed to think that robotics/AI could lead to a purer form of humanity. Clarke knew that AI was fundamentally flawed since it was a human creation. I like the spirit of the first, but the second is true as of right now.
and this applies to reality how?
Programmers who can code games are a dime a dozen. It's game DESIGNERS that are so rare.
Back in the day, which is probably where most of the guys you all idolize came from, designers and programmers used to be one in the same. Richard Garriot sat down and WROTE Akalabeth and the early Ultimas. Sid Meier (arguably the first "superstar" designer) wrote reams of code for Microprose in the 80s. Will Wright coded and designed the original SimCity. None of the above are coders now. (Garriot is out of the industry now, but his last few years of work was in design)
I know a guy that worked on Daggerfall (ok, so that's not a great accomplishment seeing as it was so buggy, but damn it he was a game coder), and I know a guy that worked on Everquest. They're coders. They didn't have anything to do with the design of the games.
If you can code a physics engine from scratch, great. John Carmack can. But iD hasn't released a game that was innovative in its design in years. John will sell the [insert name + Roman numeral here] engine and buy his Ferraris. But when LucasArts gets it and writes Jedi Knight II using that engine, THEY created the game, not Carmack. Carmack didn't do anything more than build a toolkit for other people to use. In another world he would have worked on libc or the C++ STL or on a tax calculation library or in Core Services for a financial institution.
Stop worshipping the programmers, go and seek out the best designed and written games, and the industry can be saved..
I was a jump-in-and-hack coder (self-taught, used to program as a hobby, etc.) and they finally convinced me that design works. The only problem with a lot of patterns is that they don't apply that well to a non-OO language. Hence, the rise of Java, which is designed, as a language, around patterns.
I still call myself a programmer, though, not an "engineer". Engineers build bridges, I just write programs.
I would have voted for "[kin_korn_karn] do me now"
Darwin liked turtles
Newton liked apples
Bohr liked bees
Freud liked his mother
Being a former comic book fan I'm a sucker for a crafty plot even if the dialogue and characters suck.. Tom Clancy, for example, his characters are dull (except in "Without Remorse", DAMN that's a good book) and his dialogue is basically all support for his politics, but he can come up with some cool plot twists. However, some of the authors you mentioned have created truly memorable characters. How can you not remember Randall Flagg :) this all just comes down to pure talent.
I have +1 so hopefully this will help preserve this post as the great wisdom it is
I don't think you necessarily need a "where do we go from here" angle to make good sci-fi. Look at Phillip K. Dick - he rarely gave any kind of solution to the conflicts he raised, he just pointed them out. In fact, offering solutions comes off as pedantic a lot of the time.
It still starts with the characters, though. A book full of generic Han Solo clones is boring as hell even if the plot is great.
Really, it's the same thing that makes any story good:
1) GOOD CHARACTERS
2) Good plot
3) Well-written imagery and narrative
Too many sci-fi writers seem to forget those rules. They take a gadget or a concept or an individual occurrence and try to stretch it into a novel, because it's sci-fi and "people who read sci-fi" (insert Trek convention stereotype here) will buy it no matter how shitty it is. They don't even TRY to be good writers.
Also, and even good writers can be guilty of this, they write into the genre rather than letting the genre be a non-factor. They don't develop a plot or a character in a logical way because that's "not sci-fi enough." You can always tell when a writer has shoehorned something into what they percieve as a sci-fi limitation.