It's election day in the USA, proof that I rhyme when I've got the time. That said, I'm not dead, and to the voting booth I go to tell those politicians what I know.
A New Decision Making Paradigm
Imagine a game developing world where the players were given the right to vote on the different spells and talents that their favorite toon has. Wouldn't all Warriors want an attack that could one-shot all raid bosses and feel justified in receiving such a spell? Of course they would, Warriors are arrogant elitists, every single one of them, right? Alright, they are not all like that, but no doubt if Warriors or anyone else had a say in what spells they had every toon would be running around with 100 action bars with 12 spells on each totaling 1,200 spells/abilities/talents.
But if the voting process was highly regulated, like sports betting is in Las Vegas, could there be an instance where player voting could directly determine gameplay in a way that was beneficial? Let's assume that we're all Mages. In my limited experience in Magedom I recall that I got the Blizzard spell fairly early on, around level 20 or thereabouts. Now, Blizzard isn't available to Mages until level 52 (I think). What if this went up for a vote? When would a Mage want Blizzard?
The logical answer is I WANT EVERYTHING AT LEVEL 1. And if not logical then at least predictable. So let's add constraints to the voting equation. You may learn Blizzard at 20, but you will have to give up another damage spell until level 40, which are you willing to give up? Frost Bolt or Fire Bolt? Of course this is just an example, but if you give someone the option of gaining a spell at 20 or 30, I believe 100% will want it at 20. So, you make the voter make compromises, or choose to leave things how the developers want to reshape them. This may or may not work, I don't know exactly, it's just a thought.
Same principle applies to talents. 'At what level do you want Living Bomb'? Well, uh, let me think...LEVEL 1, duh! No, for talents we'll keep certain restrictions that devs place on them, but the option could be that a talent can be moved up higher in the talent tree only if it's accompanied by a nerf to the spell. The vote is yours, and if you choose to move the talent you must accept the consequences.
Interestingly this would create imbalances, and those would be the fault of the player. Despite that, however, players would still find ways to blame the devs for creating a system that gave them, the player, the right to make direct changes via their voting systems, thus the fault still lies with the devs for allowing stupid people to create the game instead of smarter people that it's fun to disagree with.
Voting in changes to spells and talents would be similar to real life voting. With everyone given the chance to vote, people both informed and ignorant, we accept a system that has consequences both good and bad. Then again, some of those consequences are relative, and I'm sure it would act the same in a game. Some people would like the changes, others would hate them. But all would have to accept them to a degree because the system would allow direct player input into the decisions.
How it is now can be useful. Smart people give quality feedback and the devs to their best with it. WoW, just as in RL politics, will always have proponents and opponents, people who like the resulting changes and others who hate them and call for all kinds of changes. I for one am glad I don't have a vote in direct spell or talent changes. But the reason isn't what you think it is. I'm glad because if we, the players, did have a say, I would be angry with some idiot who was able to get enough people fired up over something stupid and influenced them to vote in a direction that I would disagree with. But then that's sorta how I feel about real life voting. I'm glad everyone has the right in my country (over 18 years of age), but I wish that a few of those would just stay home. Not because I disagree with them, but because they are too stupid to know even the names of the people running for office. How I would hate it if trolls had a say in my talent tree.
The system may not be perfect, in life or WoW, but both serve their respective populations well. In WoW it's better to keep the players involved but not given direct control. In RL it's good to give everyone a voice, no matter how stupid or uninformed they are. You see, in a game it does not matter if there is a Big Brother, because that super power is not bent on destroying my will to choose. The devs really are trying to make a good game, whether we think it's good is another quesiton. They try because they love to make games, it's what they do. In life, if my voice was taken away and Big Brother established, making ALL my choices for me, my life would have little variety, no creativity and even less meaning. Both systems work well...well enough.
I vote to have no vote in the games I play! Give me a voice, but don't make it binding.
Political (Tangent)
Youngin' people 18-25 will only vote at a 30% clip this election season...if we're lucky. Young people just don't care, coupled with the fact that they don't know as much as they think they do. Oh, don't look at me that way, but the reality is that the longer you live two things can happen: 1) Biases become more biased, you become entrenched in traditions for the sake of tradition, or 2) Experience shows you the differences between rehtoric and reality. From that position we base our decisions and we vote accordingly. So even though young people are free to fight for what they believe, often they lack perspective of those who have actually lived through more years. That's what I think and I'm sticking to it.
Showing posts with label Politics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Politics. Show all posts
Tuesday, November 2, 2010
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Idea Ownership - Doth it Matterith?
A while back, I don’t exactly remember when, Tesh (From Tish Tosh Tesh) asked me a profound question:
“Does idea ownership matter? Is it not wise to consider ideas on their own merit rather than dismiss or validate them based on their source?
Just a thought…”
I finally have a good answer for him, not my incoherent ramblings from my first attempt. This is something I have thought about constantly for a few months now. So I hope in this attempt I can make my answer perfectly clear. To the question “Does idea ownership matter?”, I say:
YES
“Does idea ownership matter? Is it not wise to consider ideas on their own merit rather than dismiss or validate them based on their source?
Just a thought…”
I finally have a good answer for him, not my incoherent ramblings from my first attempt. This is something I have thought about constantly for a few months now. So I hope in this attempt I can make my answer perfectly clear. To the question “Does idea ownership matter?”, I say:
YES
AND
NO
(If you’ve come here for WoW stuff, hang in there, for me it all comes back to another question about Blizzard that I don’t have the answer to. Moving on…)
Idea Defined
My answer is 100% contingent on the definition of “Idea” that we’re talking about. If we were to discuss a theme or subject of unknown authorship, of general public knowledge and/or interest such as Taxes, Immigration, Slavery, Communism, Capitalism, then NO, idea ownership does not, or at least should not matter. Who came up with the idea of slavery anyway? I don’t know. But over time it’s evolved into a subject of debate and consideration (SDC). That’s right, I just made up my own acronym!!! Who had the bright idea that governments should tax its people? I sure as heck-fire don’t know. These are ideas of a special kind, SDC’s that have no known authorship and are debated in public forums or even privately among friends and acquantences.
There are difficulties, however, in debating these general subjects. One problem I see is that no or very few subject(s) is presented by an impartial spokesman, so any information shared will be tainted by biases too difficult to mask completely, if any attempt to mask them at all has been made. Other difficulties are the variables that become part of the equation: An individual's communication skills (listening, speaking, phraseology, use of common fallacies), personal experiences, personality, temperament, education, and the list goes on and on. The ideal is that these subjects should be considered on their own merits and idea ownership does NOT matter. Too bad the world isn’t ideal.
A Bright Idea
The other definition involves an idea that has a known author, which idea is an actual entity (a thought, conept, sensation, or image) that is actually or potentially present to consciousness. Combined with that are ideas which can be considered “plans of action”.
For example: I have an idea for a new TV show. A little alien, only about 2 ½ feet tall (who, by the way, likes to be called a small, but just as smart, person) with magical powers travels from world to world saving the galaxy in which he lives from evil glowing balls of gas and fire. It will be called “Sun Killer, The Irony of Misunderstood Heroism”.
Would you watch a show about a Gnome who accidentally destroyed all the suns in a Galaxy, believed himself to be a hero but everyone hated him, but due to his utter ignorance kept on doing what he thought was heroic? Maybe, maybe not. Are your opinions changed knowing who the author of the idea was? If, for example, the show was put into production, should I (the author) receive credit for the idea? Does idea ownership, in the above example, matter?
Let’s say you’re on Safari in Africa and fall into a pit with 10 cobra snakes and your grandmother and uncle Vinny. Someone needs to come up with an idea, a unique and specific plan of action fit for the situation or you're all gonna die. "Quick, take granny's shawl and toss it onto that tree root, we'll use it to pull ourselves up!" Or let’s assume that you are a blog writer, a novelist, or a poet? Did anyone else come up with the idea of Harry Potter or was it JK Rowling who had that idea? Maybe you had something similar, but you suck at writing, so you scrapped it. Oh well, no billionaire ball for you!
This definition of idea is clearly different than the first I presented. It implies that the idea is a creative thought or concept designed to answer a question or serve a purpose or make someone's life better, etc, etc, etc. Given this definition of Idea, to answer the question, “Does idea ownership matter?” I say without hesitation…YES.
To prove this I point to some popular social and legal norms. Plagiarism is illegal and unethical in just about every civilized nation I know of (excepting communist or dictatorship states). In science, education, the workplace, if you copy someone’s work and pass it off as your own, that’s bad. Why? Because idea ownership matters!
Many nations, including the US of A has enacted copyright laws to protect original authors of their ideas, or intellectual property.
“Copyright is a form of protection provided by the laws of the United States (title 17, U.S. Code) to the authors of ‘original works of authorship,’ including literacy, dramatic, musical, artistic, and certain other intellectual works. This protection is available to both published and unpublished works…[The laws] generally gives the owner of the copyright the exclusive right to do and to authorize others to do the following:
http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ1.pdf
(See link for more details)
A scientist who bases some part of their new and groundbreaking theories on somebody else’s work MUST reference all his/her work or that scientist will be unemployed and will have to find a job teaching Junior High School somewhere…if they are lucky. Why? Because idea ownership matters. It matters so much, in fact, that breaking copyright law can land you a hefty fine or even up to time in jail. Ouch!
Ideas in the Business World
In business…oh, business. Here is where I begin my decent into Blizzard and World of Warcraft. I’m a businessman, oh yeah. I got to business meeting and have business luncheons, and dress up in business attire, and have a business office. I’ve also had a business idea of mine stolen by a co-worker, which ended up in their promotion and my ultimately having to leave the company. If ever I were to resort to violence to solve problems, that would have been one instance where violence was justified. But that was a long time ago, when I was ignorant and foolish and trusting of, you know, other humans. I’m more guarded now and make sure that I protect my business ideas very, very carefully.
Idea ownership is king in business. It can bring you into the position of CEO or land you in the unemployment line. I imagine if you’re a game developer and come up with a really crappy idea for a game, it may be hard to keep your job or find work in the future. But if you develop a really, really, really great idea and that idea takes off, you could benefit from it in major ways.
Which brings me to my final question, one that I do not have an answer to.
WoW Dev Team – Group Rewards or Individual Recognition?
Does anyone know how much the devs who create all aspects of WoW actually work together vs how often they work alone? Who initially thought up the concept of talents? Did they get a raise? How about 31 point talents? Did that person get a promotion? Or are the ideas that flow within the development team considered “shared” ideas?
Legally, I know ATVI owns all the ideas, it’s how all good businesses protect themselves and their intellectual property and investments. Technically there are things I created at my previous jobs that are legally “owned” by those companies, but I know that I created those programs or processes, etc. And they know it too. But the work I did while there legally belonged to them, as do the ideas belong to ATVI.
But the practices of reality do not always reflect the legality of things. In practice, I wonder if individual devs get credit internally for their work or for any great ideas or concepts that they design? If 10 people are in a room and at the end they decide to go with 31 point talent trees, who gets credit for it? Does anyone? Does everyone? Does idea ownership matter within Blizzard’s development team?
Maybe that question can only be answered by Blizzard, or maybe someone out there has insight that can ease my troubled mind. If I were working on WoW, in some developer capacity (which will never happen, I’m an accountant, remember?) I think that I would enjoy personal and individual recognition of some things, and also be happy for the success of others and as a whole team. But to be void of any individual recognition, to be told that ownership of ideas didn’t matter when I was the one who created the LFD tool (just an example) I think would hurt, ya know, emotionally. How motivated would I be if I never received recognition for the ideas that helped build a really great game? I, Gronthe, would definitely lose some motivation, if I were being honest with myself.
How many used to watch Saturday Night Live in the 1990’s? There was a skit, I can’t remember who did it, I think it was Al Franken, who would have celebrities look into a mirror and say: “I’m good enough, I’m smart enough, and doggonnit people like me.” It was especially funny when Michael Jordan did it at the height of his popularity. But I’m afraid that in business, in the workplace, self-affirmations isn’t enough. I know I’m smart, but I need my boss to know it too. I depend on his opinion for my living. Without it, I lose job satisfaction.
I’m hoping that Blizzard does both, recognize people and teams, and they probably do. But I don’t know for sure. I hope they do because Idea Ownership, when discussing thoughts and concepts of original authorship, DOES MATTER in society, as evidences by our norms and our laws.
All other general subject ideas, SDC’s so to speak, idea ownership DOES NOT MATTER. I should not validate or invalidate an idea, or a subject matter, because a biased source delivers the topic in a way that is leading and not 100% objective. It may be difficult, but the ideal still stands, it does not, or at the very least should not matter. In reality, however, I'm afraid that it does, that people get tainted by a biased opinion that is difficult to uproot. But alas, a discussion for another time...
So to Tesh, who’s questions have tortured me the past few months, I hate you!!! No, I really don’t, I thank you for making me think about this more. For making me delve into my own opinions, for making me look around me in the world and consider the applications of these questions.
I know this wasn’t your typical World of Warcraft post, it was an attempted expression of thoughts that I tied into WoW, somehow. Anyway, I’m tired, I think I want to take a nap. Until next time…
(If you’ve come here for WoW stuff, hang in there, for me it all comes back to another question about Blizzard that I don’t have the answer to. Moving on…)
Idea Defined
My answer is 100% contingent on the definition of “Idea” that we’re talking about. If we were to discuss a theme or subject of unknown authorship, of general public knowledge and/or interest such as Taxes, Immigration, Slavery, Communism, Capitalism, then NO, idea ownership does not, or at least should not matter. Who came up with the idea of slavery anyway? I don’t know. But over time it’s evolved into a subject of debate and consideration (SDC). That’s right, I just made up my own acronym!!! Who had the bright idea that governments should tax its people? I sure as heck-fire don’t know. These are ideas of a special kind, SDC’s that have no known authorship and are debated in public forums or even privately among friends and acquantences.
There are difficulties, however, in debating these general subjects. One problem I see is that no or very few subject(s) is presented by an impartial spokesman, so any information shared will be tainted by biases too difficult to mask completely, if any attempt to mask them at all has been made. Other difficulties are the variables that become part of the equation: An individual's communication skills (listening, speaking, phraseology, use of common fallacies), personal experiences, personality, temperament, education, and the list goes on and on. The ideal is that these subjects should be considered on their own merits and idea ownership does NOT matter. Too bad the world isn’t ideal.
A Bright Idea
The other definition involves an idea that has a known author, which idea is an actual entity (a thought, conept, sensation, or image) that is actually or potentially present to consciousness. Combined with that are ideas which can be considered “plans of action”.
For example: I have an idea for a new TV show. A little alien, only about 2 ½ feet tall (who, by the way, likes to be called a small, but just as smart, person) with magical powers travels from world to world saving the galaxy in which he lives from evil glowing balls of gas and fire. It will be called “Sun Killer, The Irony of Misunderstood Heroism”.
Would you watch a show about a Gnome who accidentally destroyed all the suns in a Galaxy, believed himself to be a hero but everyone hated him, but due to his utter ignorance kept on doing what he thought was heroic? Maybe, maybe not. Are your opinions changed knowing who the author of the idea was? If, for example, the show was put into production, should I (the author) receive credit for the idea? Does idea ownership, in the above example, matter?
Let’s say you’re on Safari in Africa and fall into a pit with 10 cobra snakes and your grandmother and uncle Vinny. Someone needs to come up with an idea, a unique and specific plan of action fit for the situation or you're all gonna die. "Quick, take granny's shawl and toss it onto that tree root, we'll use it to pull ourselves up!" Or let’s assume that you are a blog writer, a novelist, or a poet? Did anyone else come up with the idea of Harry Potter or was it JK Rowling who had that idea? Maybe you had something similar, but you suck at writing, so you scrapped it. Oh well, no billionaire ball for you!
This definition of idea is clearly different than the first I presented. It implies that the idea is a creative thought or concept designed to answer a question or serve a purpose or make someone's life better, etc, etc, etc. Given this definition of Idea, to answer the question, “Does idea ownership matter?” I say without hesitation…YES.
To prove this I point to some popular social and legal norms. Plagiarism is illegal and unethical in just about every civilized nation I know of (excepting communist or dictatorship states). In science, education, the workplace, if you copy someone’s work and pass it off as your own, that’s bad. Why? Because idea ownership matters!
Many nations, including the US of A has enacted copyright laws to protect original authors of their ideas, or intellectual property.
“Copyright is a form of protection provided by the laws of the United States (title 17, U.S. Code) to the authors of ‘original works of authorship,’ including literacy, dramatic, musical, artistic, and certain other intellectual works. This protection is available to both published and unpublished works…[The laws] generally gives the owner of the copyright the exclusive right to do and to authorize others to do the following:
http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ1.pdf
(See link for more details)
A scientist who bases some part of their new and groundbreaking theories on somebody else’s work MUST reference all his/her work or that scientist will be unemployed and will have to find a job teaching Junior High School somewhere…if they are lucky. Why? Because idea ownership matters. It matters so much, in fact, that breaking copyright law can land you a hefty fine or even up to time in jail. Ouch!
Ideas in the Business World
In business…oh, business. Here is where I begin my decent into Blizzard and World of Warcraft. I’m a businessman, oh yeah. I got to business meeting and have business luncheons, and dress up in business attire, and have a business office. I’ve also had a business idea of mine stolen by a co-worker, which ended up in their promotion and my ultimately having to leave the company. If ever I were to resort to violence to solve problems, that would have been one instance where violence was justified. But that was a long time ago, when I was ignorant and foolish and trusting of, you know, other humans. I’m more guarded now and make sure that I protect my business ideas very, very carefully.
Idea ownership is king in business. It can bring you into the position of CEO or land you in the unemployment line. I imagine if you’re a game developer and come up with a really crappy idea for a game, it may be hard to keep your job or find work in the future. But if you develop a really, really, really great idea and that idea takes off, you could benefit from it in major ways.
Which brings me to my final question, one that I do not have an answer to.
WoW Dev Team – Group Rewards or Individual Recognition?
Does anyone know how much the devs who create all aspects of WoW actually work together vs how often they work alone? Who initially thought up the concept of talents? Did they get a raise? How about 31 point talents? Did that person get a promotion? Or are the ideas that flow within the development team considered “shared” ideas?
Legally, I know ATVI owns all the ideas, it’s how all good businesses protect themselves and their intellectual property and investments. Technically there are things I created at my previous jobs that are legally “owned” by those companies, but I know that I created those programs or processes, etc. And they know it too. But the work I did while there legally belonged to them, as do the ideas belong to ATVI.
But the practices of reality do not always reflect the legality of things. In practice, I wonder if individual devs get credit internally for their work or for any great ideas or concepts that they design? If 10 people are in a room and at the end they decide to go with 31 point talent trees, who gets credit for it? Does anyone? Does everyone? Does idea ownership matter within Blizzard’s development team?
Maybe that question can only be answered by Blizzard, or maybe someone out there has insight that can ease my troubled mind. If I were working on WoW, in some developer capacity (which will never happen, I’m an accountant, remember?) I think that I would enjoy personal and individual recognition of some things, and also be happy for the success of others and as a whole team. But to be void of any individual recognition, to be told that ownership of ideas didn’t matter when I was the one who created the LFD tool (just an example) I think would hurt, ya know, emotionally. How motivated would I be if I never received recognition for the ideas that helped build a really great game? I, Gronthe, would definitely lose some motivation, if I were being honest with myself.
How many used to watch Saturday Night Live in the 1990’s? There was a skit, I can’t remember who did it, I think it was Al Franken, who would have celebrities look into a mirror and say: “I’m good enough, I’m smart enough, and doggonnit people like me.” It was especially funny when Michael Jordan did it at the height of his popularity. But I’m afraid that in business, in the workplace, self-affirmations isn’t enough. I know I’m smart, but I need my boss to know it too. I depend on his opinion for my living. Without it, I lose job satisfaction.
I’m hoping that Blizzard does both, recognize people and teams, and they probably do. But I don’t know for sure. I hope they do because Idea Ownership, when discussing thoughts and concepts of original authorship, DOES MATTER in society, as evidences by our norms and our laws.
All other general subject ideas, SDC’s so to speak, idea ownership DOES NOT MATTER. I should not validate or invalidate an idea, or a subject matter, because a biased source delivers the topic in a way that is leading and not 100% objective. It may be difficult, but the ideal still stands, it does not, or at the very least should not matter. In reality, however, I'm afraid that it does, that people get tainted by a biased opinion that is difficult to uproot. But alas, a discussion for another time...
So to Tesh, who’s questions have tortured me the past few months, I hate you!!! No, I really don’t, I thank you for making me think about this more. For making me delve into my own opinions, for making me look around me in the world and consider the applications of these questions.
I know this wasn’t your typical World of Warcraft post, it was an attempted expression of thoughts that I tied into WoW, somehow. Anyway, I’m tired, I think I want to take a nap. Until next time…
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
Fancy Talk and Arguments
I am not a philosopher. I am not intimately familiar with the structure of a valid or sound argument. I know of many fallicies and can recognize some of them when used, but I am not close to being an expert. But I have 5 senses still, for which I am grateful, and I have instinct. With these highly imperfect tools I can sniff out, see clearly, hear with perfection the most ridiculous arguments that are intended to either sway my opinion or prove my opinion false.
Pardon me for getting just a little bit political, but politicians are perfect examples. I will tie this into wow, trust me. For those of you outside the US, we have a television channel here in the States called CSPAN. On it we can watch our congress hold hearings, debates, congressional sessions and votes. It's a wonderful opportunity to watch our fearless leaders debate the most important subjects.
My favorite to watch are sessions where they question our head of the Federal Reserve Bank. Many of there questions are phrased like this:
"Thank you Mr. Bernanke for being here today. I am sure that you saw, as well as I did, that the DOW (Dow Jones Industrial Average) had an intraday loss just yesterday of over 900 points. Does this not prove that President Obama is not managing our economy well and we need to lower corporate tax rates equal to the lowest in the world? You're a sensible man, I see, can you please explain what the President is doing wrong in a way that everyone here can understand?"
Can you smell it? Some say it's horse, I say it's cow dung. First of all, the question wasn't really a question, was it? No, it was a statement of opinion formed in a way as to illicit a desired resonse at best, and a display of political positioning at worst. The senator/congressman has no intention of having the question answered, he's just taking the stage to make a point with no supporting evidence for purely political purposes.
Admittedly this is just a blog, which I believe means that the opinions expressed here are my own and there's a good chance that I use illogical and unsupported arguments to make my point, just like any good or bad politician does on a daily basis. But some arguments just stink more than others, meaning some are so unfounded and ridiculous and unsupported by any fact that you have the right to put on your gas mask and run for fresher air on another blog.
I am not about to get into a fight with any other bloggers out there, so you'll just have to trust me that my comments here today are as a result of something that I've read elsewhere, but I won't demean myself by attacking that blogger, I'm not popular enough to do that just yet.
While reading through a few friendly blogs this morning I stumbled accross two conflicting points of view. I found both to be extreme points and both stunk of disdain for the other. But the disdain was overshadowed by the lack of thought or evidence that was placed into either of their arguments. I concluded that either both truly believed what they were saying or were arguing varying point just because they dislike each other.
We see this often on the official forums and even in our own trade chat in game. People make comments about gear, dungeons, raids, social activity, class balance, gold making, PUGS, and each comment is biased based on both the experience and belief of that individual. Sometimes comments are simply malicious because that's what the person wants to be.
There is no reason to say to somebody else that they are a &$@*$&^% retartd, is there? Why would you? And why would you do it in public? I can only guess that you would want to show yourself superior, show that you're right at the expense of another.
There are simple issues of debate, such as what class and sub-spec are OP and which are broken. It's obviously subjective and equally predictable that your class clearly isn't optimized, while the other person emphatically declares that you are not broken but indeed OP because you keep beating him in duels. Who is right? Probably neither, but the relativity of the argument is what entertains the two. Perhaps that is why people make such offending comments on a blog, forum or chat - they wish to be entertained by colorful debate regardless to the logic instituded in such a debate.
I've heard some say that until you truly PvP in a hardcore way you will never know everything about your class. Others claim that those uninterested in making wow gold are idiots, not uninterested. Still others believe that heroics can only be tanked by toons decked out in full T9 gear. These common arguments beg the question, why? Why do people feel the need to make these claims? Are they true? I think both you and I have our gas masks at the ready when we hear them, why? It's not because we have imperical evidence to counter the arguments, it's because we have multiple working humans senses and an instinct to not step in cow dung.
I've made the argument on this blog that the real life persona is "IN PART" transfered into the games we play. In what way do I mean? Well obviously I am not so stupid as to believe that I am a participant like those in the 1980's movie Tron where humans were literally digitized into a video game. Nor do I mean that I do what my animated toon does (i.e. slay dragons with swords or axes), it's a ridiculous notion and an insult to my intelligence to inply that that is what I mean.
What I mean is that a part of our personality and our attitudes we project THROUGH our character. Mainly it is via the form of chat or vent, where our real life voice is heard (or read). We speak things that we would in real life, often we say things that we would only say in real life if there were no consequences. Our voice is very real (excepting Role Players, of course) and most of the time we mean what we say and we cannot hide the portion of our personality that comes out in those words.
Example. I used to play with a mentally handicap person (before he server and faction transferred). Dispite his mild mental handicap, there were a significant amount of people who were rude to him whenever he lost control of his faculties. Sometimes he would say rough and even offending things, but it was mainly due to his handicap, not his personality. But in response people would get enraged and return offense in kind. Even when they knew of his handicap, they would respond to his outbursts such.
Now put all of us in the same room together, and in comes a doctor to explain what mental handicap person X has. No matter what person X says or does, how many of you do you think will exclaim "SHUT UP YOU #$%@%@#$% RETARD!" How many of you would say that to his face? Hopefully none, probably none...for fear of public appearances and scorn for treating the mentally handicap in such a manner.
But people blogging, posting on forums or in chat have no fear of any consequence or retribution. There is no accountability for what you say or how you say it. I guess for a blogger the worst is that people stop reading. But given the type of entertainment news that exists in the world and the high ratings that such gossip media gets, we can probably assume (based on that empirical evidence) that there are a lot of people who like it when they read a blog who states the everyone who disagrees with him/her is an idiot.
I fully admit that any examples that I used here are anecdotal, and not based on years of scientific research. Heck, even if they were many would likely reject it stating that the science was "probably" bad to begin with.
I guess what I'm trying to say is to watch out for politicians wearing blogger hats. Be careful not to be deluded into believing something just because somebody says it in a way that makes you laugh or illicits some strong emotion in you that you can't quite describe but you succumb to their tenants out of lack of any viable opposition.
We all enjoy a good argument, I as much as anyone out there. But please, if you're going to make a statement on your blog about the factual nature of something, I would appreciate it if you didn't resort to politician-like arguments and facepalming. Insults are not arguments, they are insults no matter what kind of dress you put them in and what kind of makup you splatter over their face. When you insult somebody it's an affront to their character and personality.
For the record I think that Enhancement Shamans aren't as strong as they should be, we run into too many periods were everything is on cooldown. We need to be buffed big time! And nerf the Pali, for goodness sake...all specs! If Blizzard doesn't do this they are total idiots!
Pardon me for getting just a little bit political, but politicians are perfect examples. I will tie this into wow, trust me. For those of you outside the US, we have a television channel here in the States called CSPAN. On it we can watch our congress hold hearings, debates, congressional sessions and votes. It's a wonderful opportunity to watch our fearless leaders debate the most important subjects.
My favorite to watch are sessions where they question our head of the Federal Reserve Bank. Many of there questions are phrased like this:
"Thank you Mr. Bernanke for being here today. I am sure that you saw, as well as I did, that the DOW (Dow Jones Industrial Average) had an intraday loss just yesterday of over 900 points. Does this not prove that President Obama is not managing our economy well and we need to lower corporate tax rates equal to the lowest in the world? You're a sensible man, I see, can you please explain what the President is doing wrong in a way that everyone here can understand?"
Can you smell it? Some say it's horse, I say it's cow dung. First of all, the question wasn't really a question, was it? No, it was a statement of opinion formed in a way as to illicit a desired resonse at best, and a display of political positioning at worst. The senator/congressman has no intention of having the question answered, he's just taking the stage to make a point with no supporting evidence for purely political purposes.
Admittedly this is just a blog, which I believe means that the opinions expressed here are my own and there's a good chance that I use illogical and unsupported arguments to make my point, just like any good or bad politician does on a daily basis. But some arguments just stink more than others, meaning some are so unfounded and ridiculous and unsupported by any fact that you have the right to put on your gas mask and run for fresher air on another blog.
I am not about to get into a fight with any other bloggers out there, so you'll just have to trust me that my comments here today are as a result of something that I've read elsewhere, but I won't demean myself by attacking that blogger, I'm not popular enough to do that just yet.
While reading through a few friendly blogs this morning I stumbled accross two conflicting points of view. I found both to be extreme points and both stunk of disdain for the other. But the disdain was overshadowed by the lack of thought or evidence that was placed into either of their arguments. I concluded that either both truly believed what they were saying or were arguing varying point just because they dislike each other.
We see this often on the official forums and even in our own trade chat in game. People make comments about gear, dungeons, raids, social activity, class balance, gold making, PUGS, and each comment is biased based on both the experience and belief of that individual. Sometimes comments are simply malicious because that's what the person wants to be.
There is no reason to say to somebody else that they are a &$@*$&^% retartd, is there? Why would you? And why would you do it in public? I can only guess that you would want to show yourself superior, show that you're right at the expense of another.
There are simple issues of debate, such as what class and sub-spec are OP and which are broken. It's obviously subjective and equally predictable that your class clearly isn't optimized, while the other person emphatically declares that you are not broken but indeed OP because you keep beating him in duels. Who is right? Probably neither, but the relativity of the argument is what entertains the two. Perhaps that is why people make such offending comments on a blog, forum or chat - they wish to be entertained by colorful debate regardless to the logic instituded in such a debate.
I've heard some say that until you truly PvP in a hardcore way you will never know everything about your class. Others claim that those uninterested in making wow gold are idiots, not uninterested. Still others believe that heroics can only be tanked by toons decked out in full T9 gear. These common arguments beg the question, why? Why do people feel the need to make these claims? Are they true? I think both you and I have our gas masks at the ready when we hear them, why? It's not because we have imperical evidence to counter the arguments, it's because we have multiple working humans senses and an instinct to not step in cow dung.
I've made the argument on this blog that the real life persona is "IN PART" transfered into the games we play. In what way do I mean? Well obviously I am not so stupid as to believe that I am a participant like those in the 1980's movie Tron where humans were literally digitized into a video game. Nor do I mean that I do what my animated toon does (i.e. slay dragons with swords or axes), it's a ridiculous notion and an insult to my intelligence to inply that that is what I mean.
What I mean is that a part of our personality and our attitudes we project THROUGH our character. Mainly it is via the form of chat or vent, where our real life voice is heard (or read). We speak things that we would in real life, often we say things that we would only say in real life if there were no consequences. Our voice is very real (excepting Role Players, of course) and most of the time we mean what we say and we cannot hide the portion of our personality that comes out in those words.
Example. I used to play with a mentally handicap person (before he server and faction transferred). Dispite his mild mental handicap, there were a significant amount of people who were rude to him whenever he lost control of his faculties. Sometimes he would say rough and even offending things, but it was mainly due to his handicap, not his personality. But in response people would get enraged and return offense in kind. Even when they knew of his handicap, they would respond to his outbursts such.
Now put all of us in the same room together, and in comes a doctor to explain what mental handicap person X has. No matter what person X says or does, how many of you do you think will exclaim "SHUT UP YOU #$%@%@#$% RETARD!" How many of you would say that to his face? Hopefully none, probably none...for fear of public appearances and scorn for treating the mentally handicap in such a manner.
But people blogging, posting on forums or in chat have no fear of any consequence or retribution. There is no accountability for what you say or how you say it. I guess for a blogger the worst is that people stop reading. But given the type of entertainment news that exists in the world and the high ratings that such gossip media gets, we can probably assume (based on that empirical evidence) that there are a lot of people who like it when they read a blog who states the everyone who disagrees with him/her is an idiot.
I fully admit that any examples that I used here are anecdotal, and not based on years of scientific research. Heck, even if they were many would likely reject it stating that the science was "probably" bad to begin with.
I guess what I'm trying to say is to watch out for politicians wearing blogger hats. Be careful not to be deluded into believing something just because somebody says it in a way that makes you laugh or illicits some strong emotion in you that you can't quite describe but you succumb to their tenants out of lack of any viable opposition.
We all enjoy a good argument, I as much as anyone out there. But please, if you're going to make a statement on your blog about the factual nature of something, I would appreciate it if you didn't resort to politician-like arguments and facepalming. Insults are not arguments, they are insults no matter what kind of dress you put them in and what kind of makup you splatter over their face. When you insult somebody it's an affront to their character and personality.
For the record I think that Enhancement Shamans aren't as strong as they should be, we run into too many periods were everything is on cooldown. We need to be buffed big time! And nerf the Pali, for goodness sake...all specs! If Blizzard doesn't do this they are total idiots!
Friday, April 30, 2010
New Template & Politics
For all 3 of you who read my blog, this is still Deuwowlity. I was having some trouble with the font and how it affected the punctuation, etc. So I changed the template, made it a bit more clear. It's better this way.
I had a thought, I'm curious what responses would be. If a nation's government and political structure were forced upon the WoW community in-game, which would you prefer? No, you cannot say "leave it how it is", that's not an option. This is all hypothetical anyway, so it's all moot anyway. So, what do you think? What would be the best governemtnal/political structure for World of Warcraft?
I don't think I would choose a democracy. Much like the real world, there are too many people that don't know what they are talking about. It would be difficult to give them a voice.
A Dictatorship? I don't think so either. I know I would not play a game where I HAD TO FARM 6 hours a day in Sithilus. "Do it or you're banned!" No, Dictatorship definately wouldn't work.
Caste System? We would all be divided into our groups, Raiders, Trolls, Farmers, etc...but we wouldn't have choice there either. No, a Caste system wouldn't work due to the lack of choice.
Communism? See Caste and Dictatorship above.
Socialism? The thing is that there are many Socialistic societies that are democracies also (not the exact form of the USA, but democracies still). But in this system more people would share resources with one another. I'm sure that those people who play the gold game would definately not play then. Why should they have to share the money that they earned by undercutting everyone and creating a monopoly in their profession? No, even for the average player, I'm not sure that the sharing of resources would be fun for them.
Disclaimer: Please understand that I am making broad generalizations for the governments I list, it's all for fun, not political debate. Anyway, to continue...
Anarchy? Now before you say anything, I assure you that your definition of Anarchy is far different than the actual Anarchist political party that has existed and perhaps still does exist in parts of this world. Part of their beliefs is that given freedom, people will naturally form societies that work, where people help each other for the greater good while keeping a sense of independence. (If I got this wrong, please let me know, all I know about this political party I read in a book in college, so I might get some of it wrong).
I think in a way that's the world we live in right now, there are no people or guilds who control us, we're free to play the game how we want it. We raid or don't raid. We farm or don't farm. We chat or keep silent. We buy, sell, trade, all without the oversight of the SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission - in the U.S.) It's nice. It works.
I know there are many other kids of governmental stuctures out there that I didn't mention. I think in general we are all Anarchists already, and you know what? I can live with that. So despite my own warning, I guess I can say we should just "leave it how it is".
I had a thought, I'm curious what responses would be. If a nation's government and political structure were forced upon the WoW community in-game, which would you prefer? No, you cannot say "leave it how it is", that's not an option. This is all hypothetical anyway, so it's all moot anyway. So, what do you think? What would be the best governemtnal/political structure for World of Warcraft?
I don't think I would choose a democracy. Much like the real world, there are too many people that don't know what they are talking about. It would be difficult to give them a voice.
A Dictatorship? I don't think so either. I know I would not play a game where I HAD TO FARM 6 hours a day in Sithilus. "Do it or you're banned!" No, Dictatorship definately wouldn't work.
Caste System? We would all be divided into our groups, Raiders, Trolls, Farmers, etc...but we wouldn't have choice there either. No, a Caste system wouldn't work due to the lack of choice.
Communism? See Caste and Dictatorship above.
Socialism? The thing is that there are many Socialistic societies that are democracies also (not the exact form of the USA, but democracies still). But in this system more people would share resources with one another. I'm sure that those people who play the gold game would definately not play then. Why should they have to share the money that they earned by undercutting everyone and creating a monopoly in their profession? No, even for the average player, I'm not sure that the sharing of resources would be fun for them.
Disclaimer: Please understand that I am making broad generalizations for the governments I list, it's all for fun, not political debate. Anyway, to continue...
Anarchy? Now before you say anything, I assure you that your definition of Anarchy is far different than the actual Anarchist political party that has existed and perhaps still does exist in parts of this world. Part of their beliefs is that given freedom, people will naturally form societies that work, where people help each other for the greater good while keeping a sense of independence. (If I got this wrong, please let me know, all I know about this political party I read in a book in college, so I might get some of it wrong).
I think in a way that's the world we live in right now, there are no people or guilds who control us, we're free to play the game how we want it. We raid or don't raid. We farm or don't farm. We chat or keep silent. We buy, sell, trade, all without the oversight of the SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission - in the U.S.) It's nice. It works.
I know there are many other kids of governmental stuctures out there that I didn't mention. I think in general we are all Anarchists already, and you know what? I can live with that. So despite my own warning, I guess I can say we should just "leave it how it is".
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