Jake

Idle Thumbs 154: Super Good

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This episode and last has made me awfully curious about how the podcast is put together. Maybe Chris could enlighten us on some of the work that happens behind the scenes to bring us a super good episode like this one?

Do you have a question in particular? I'm not sure what you mean when you say "bring us an episode"--do you mean how do we determine what to talk about? Or how is it edited? On the former, we just individually talk about whatever we want; we never agree on topics in advance beyond "oh I played AC4 this week, I can talk about that on the cast." On the latter, there's generally almost no editing; usually the only editing is to insert the ad reads we put in, and to excerpt some dumb hopefully funny bullshit from the break. But we don't edit the main discussions for content. The main exception to that is if someone lets slip something that is under NDA or they realize was told to them in confidence.

Also.. I hope Chris is ok with being called a hipster, because nothing says hipster like responding to a recommendation of a game with "Oh I was invited to a bar in New York City by someone on Twitter and they showed me this game... whilst in development."

Well, whatever. It's a thing that happened to me, not a thing I actively pursued.

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It's a thing that happened to me, not a thing I actively pursued.

I'm not sure if that makes you more or less of a hipster.

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If any of you have ever had your own work recommended to you (especially instances where superlatives were used), I would love to hear how you managed a response. I can't imagine how the awkwardness could be avoided.

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I'll be so happy when "hipster" disappears from modern discourse. Its meaning has become so diffuse at this point that it says almost nothing about the person being described (but in my opinion, it says a lot about the person who uses the word).

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But that's why I like the word. It's so meaningless! Don't take away my fun. ):

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If any of you have ever had your own work recommended to you (especially instances where superlatives were used), I would love to hear how you managed a response. I can't imagine how the awkwardness could be avoided.

What do you mean by this?

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What do you mean by this?

 

Like if Jake was at a party and mentioned he worked in the games industry and someone told him excitedly that he should play The Walking Dead. At least that's how I take the question.

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Cool cast! The robot news segment was hilarious.

 

Also.. I hope Chris is ok with being called a hipster, because nothing says hipster like responding to a recommendation of a game with "Oh I was invited to a bar in New York City by someone on Twitter and they showed me this game... whilst in development."

 

This might be the most bizarre description of what being a hipster means (or entails) that I have encountered so far.

 

Edit: Ok, got the idea. I still don't find Chris' statement any more hipstery than someone mentioning that he was a beta tester for a game.

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I'll be so happy when "hipster" disappears from modern discourse. Its meaning has become so diffuse at this point that it says almost nothing about the person being described (but in my opinion, it says a lot about the person who uses the word).

Maybe it's a west-coast/east-coast difference. The typical usage I see is exemplified by this example:

Person 1 says "Have you heard of [band-name]? They are awesome!"

Person 2 says "I used to listen to them before they got famous."

Person 1 says "You are such a hipster."

Maybe it's different on the west-coast, either way I love the word "hipster". In the 50's there there were Beats. In the early 21st century, there are hipsters. It's used as a pejorative by the muggles, but some of us (i.e. "Hipsters") own the term and take pride in it. It basically means "tastemaker" to me, but people have differing reactions to the concept of tastemakers existing.

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What do you mean by this?

Badfinger nailed it.

I was thinking of what a more extreme example of being in a circumstance where someone would be accused of being a hipster would be, like if someone told Buckminster Fuller to check out Spaceship Earth.

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I don't think I've had that happen. I've had a weird inverse thing happen often, where I'll meet someone in circumstances in which it seems neither of us previously knew of the other at all, then deep into the conversation they will reveal that they're a big fan of Idle Thumbs or some other thing. That's always a bit jarring.

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This might be the most bizarre description of what being a hipster means (or entails) that I have encountered so far.

 

Edit: Ok, got the idea. I still don't find Chris' statement any more hipstery than someone mentioning that he was a beta tester for a game.

 

Did you know that in Assassin's Creed 4 you play a hipster named Max Level?

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Maybe it's different on the west-coast, either way I love the word "hipster". In the 50's there there were Beats. In the early 21st century, there are hipsters. It's used as a pejorative by the muggles, but some of us (i.e. "Hipsters") own the term and take pride in it. It basically means "tastemaker" to me, but people have differing reactions to the concept of tastemakers existing.

 

No it's the exact opposite of that, actually. The stereotype of the new pejorative basically means aggressively disliking or disregarding something that's gained common popularity, while being surrounded by things that are cool and popular (ie: bearded, scarfed hipster with iphone, starbucks and expensive designer glasses). If you can play the "liked it before it was cool" card that's a bonus, but that's certainly not something that came into its own with people calling themselves or being called hipsters. See: every 12 year old asking their dad if they've heard of this cool band Led Zeppelin.

 

It's essentially just the concept of yuppies from the 80s transplanted, but more flannel.

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I'm torn on how I want Civilization to feel. I am completely with Chris' on how on an instinctual level it feels rad it is to have a game that celebrates human achievement. I also remember Alpha Centauri as being my favorite Civ game precisely because it taught me that while history arcs towards justice along the way we make many mistakes and often become far too enamored with our own cleverness. Finding some space between those two would be ideal.

 

 

I land in the same place Chris landed on the last time there was a discussion about Civilization (and Civ 5 in particular) and it's optimistic tone - that although I don't want everything to be cheery and optimistic, and it's certainly not how I personally view and frame the totality of human history, I am really glad that Civ is there to simply celebrate human achievements. I think that's a valid and worthwhile artistic expression and vision even if it is necessarily partial.

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I land in the same place Chris landed on the last time there was a discussion about Civilization (and Civ 5 in particular) and it's optimistic tone - that although I don't want everything to be cheery and optimistic, and it's certainly not how I personally view and frame the totality of human history, I am really glad that Civ is there to simply celebrate human achievements. I think that's a valid and worthwhile artistic expression and vision even if it is necessarily partial.

Yes, this is how I feel. There are also plenty of works I enjoy that are unremittingly bleak and cynical, but I don't think that's an inherently more "correct" worldview.

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Man, I really need to actually play some Civ games so I can contribute meaningfully to this discussion.

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No it's the exact opposite of that, actually. The stereotype of the new pejorative basically means aggressively disliking or disregarding something that's gained common popularity, while being surrounded by things that are cool and popular (ie: bearded, scarfed hipster with iphone, starbucks and expensive designer glasses). If you can play the "liked it before it was cool" card that's a bonus, but that's certainly not something that came into its own with people calling themselves or being called hipsters. See: every 12 year old asking their dad if they've heard of this cool band Led Zeppelin.

It's essentially just the concept of yuppies from the 80s transplanted, but more flannel.

The new pejorative use sounds a lot like the old pejorative use; either way it's coming from squares. Hipsters are the spear-head of the mainstream. They are the first to recognize that the unacknowledged is actually cool. They do this largely because the currently popular does not satisfy them, so they seek out otherness. When music associated with black people was considered to be inferior, hipsters were the segment of the population that recognized that it was cool and eventually helped it gain popularity (they were tastemakers). Back then, "hipster" was both used by people-in-the-know to self-identify and by squares to demean. At least, that's what wikipedia says.

So basically, if you use hipster as a pejorative then you are a square. If you use hipster as a superlative, then you are a hipster.

Edit:

This sounds like a braggart-lie, but it just happened without me seeking it out (so whatever):

An 86 year old jazz-musician who I happen to know just came by and. I asked him what "hipster" means. He basically said "People that like jazz." I asked him if there was a racial connotation, he said "No." For the record, he is white.

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Man, I really need to actually play some Civ games so I can contribute meaningfully to this discussion.

Civilization 5 is so good.

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I'm excited for American Anthropology PhDs trying to explain the Dinosaurs TV show in 50 years.

 

I was reading/listening to something a little while ago that noted that today's children know the Flintstones purely as hawkers of cereal and vitamins. We're 50 years out from it airing on TV and 20 years out from the live action films. And with the wealth of content available, kids are less likely now to experience them on TV reruns, etc. They likely won't ever have any context for them other than "that fruity pebbles guy".

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I land in the same place Chris landed on the last time there was a discussion about Civilization (and Civ 5 in particular) and it's optimistic tone - that although I don't want everything to be cheery and optimistic, and it's certainly not how I personally view and frame the totality of human history, I am really glad that Civ is there to simply celebrate human achievements. I think that's a valid and worthwhile artistic expression and vision even if it is necessarily partial.

 

Yeah, I really love this part about the CIV games as well. I also suspect it fuels my just-one-more-turn-before-I-quit mentality quite a bit. Hearing the narrator just feels so damn good.

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