Questionable Pollution
Greetings, crickets and trolls. Welcome to another edition of the Friday Q&A. Thanks for joining me again. Each week, I demonstrate my intellectual superiority by examining some of the issues faced by Fark's Photoshop community. I do it because I care, and also am always right. Sharing my gift with the world is my gift to the world. Don't try returning it for something you actually want, I didn't save the receipt.
Q: Is there such a thing as too much Photoshop?
A: Some people will certainly tell you there is. There are those who would advise you not to enter every contest, or only post one entry per contest, and a variety of other dumb ideas that limit creativity. I try to maintain the perspective that we're doing this to have a good time, not create the next art exhibition. I won't begrudge anyone for getting a bit trigger happy and posting multiples.
Q: What about the overall quality of the contests?
A: The fact is that a bunch of low quality entries don't decrease the overall quality of the contests one bit. Quite the contrary, they are desperately needed to make the good stuff look better. The fact is that we are creating threads to entertain bored people on the Internet. The more entries, the better. I'm pretty sure people would be way less impressed with a thread if it only contained the top 10. Then they would view the entries quickly, and leave the thread. Pretty much the opposite of what you want to happen, especially if you like getting votes.
Q: What if my idea is used by someone posting multiples?
A: Then you probably had a pretty crappy idea. It was obvious enough for someone to think of something similar, so the amount of time you potentially would have worked on it would be better spent on something that's actually clever. Whether or not the person in question posted a bunch of other stuff is completely immaterial. Don't blame someone else for your lack of creativity.
That's all for this time, gentle reader. Thank again for stopping by. I maintain that Fark's contests are better served by having a wide variety of both low and high quality work. To this end, it's important not to make people feel like they have to limit themselves. Let every Fartist (new term, feel free to use it, but I get 10% royalties) spread his or her creative wings.
Stay tuned for more trite imagery from the Doctor!
Friday, September 16, 2011
Friday Q&A
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5 comments:
Q: What if my idea is used by someone posting multiples?
A: Then you probably had a pretty crappy idea.... more words...
Don't blame someone else for your lack of creativity.
Whoa, Doctor... have you been raiding your medicine cabinet again? Looks like you are just trying to pick a fight. Ummm.. TotalFarkers have the advantage of time over Liters so it's not an even playing field. Your answer is not fair.
Plus there are these behaviors called restraint and courtesy. You have a whirlwind of creativity? Great for you! Post your best 1-2 in the contest and keep the other 18 on your PC. Then after the contest starts, post them (assuming others didn't have the same idea) or post them unvotinated.
Fresh blood keeps Fark and places like it going. Blocking liters out because you need to hoard threads keeps the new blood away. And then you end up with a few folk who think it's cool to post a 6-year old internet meme over and over and over. In our Tech culture, 6 years is like a 1000 - ancient history.
If you keep this stuff up, I'll have to become your arch-nemesisisis. ;-)
Love & Peace
TotalFarkers have the advantage of time over Liters so it's not an even playing field. Your answer is not fair.
I didn't specify TFers or Liters because the illusion of advantage held by TFers is something I don't subscribe to. My experiences, anecdotal as they may be, indicate that a creative Liter stands just as much chance of scoring and even winning as a TFer who spent a lot of time on his or her entry.
Furthermore, the changes to Fark over the years have pushed back any semblance of advantage. Liters can now see themes well in advance of the live date. Widely-circulated pictures from topical stories are used in contests, and if a Liter is really determined they can get access to the contest images simply by having a TFer feed them to him as they come along.
You have a whirlwind of creativity? Great for you! Post your best 1-2 in the contest and keep the other 18 on your PC. Then after the contest starts, post them (assuming others didn't have the same idea) or post them unvotinated.
I don't agree with this at all. For one thing, a lot of us aren't that involved that we have time to sit and wait for the contest to come out to post the remainder. I honestly don't pay much attention to the live times, as I find myself more prone to avoid after-hours contests that way.
I also don't believe in coddling Liters. I love them, and they are the backbone of this community. But they are well aware of the availability of TF. If you can't afford to shell out 5 bucks a month, you probably shouldn't be wasting time on the computer anyway.
Fresh blood keeps Fark and places like it going. Blocking liters out because you need to hoard threads keeps the new blood away.
In what way are they blocked out? They are perfectly free to think of another idea. Like I said in the post, anything that someone else also comes up with is likely to be unimpressive, regardless of how great you think it is in your head.
These attempts to level the playing field by pulling punches do not ultimately serve anyone well. The Liters remain unchallenged, allowed to push out whatever feeble first idea they have without the important experience of being sent back to the drawing board. TFers, forced to restrict themselves, can become further resentful of Liters.
My question for you is, why level the playing field? TFers pay money for the privilege of posting early.
Why should the paying customers limit themselves for the benefit of people don't chip in a dime towards Fark's operating costs?
As previously stated, 5 bucks a month is quite affordable. It helps keep the site running, and it buys Drew the occasional beer. Liters are still welcome to play and win, but they must make due with certain increasingly minute disadvantages. It seems like a decent enough model to me.
As for the offer of arch-nemesising, I'm afraid I have to decline. But you're welcome to stick around and share your opinions.
That $5 buys you time - that's the advantage. There is nothing in the rules that limits entries so technically it is ok. I just think it's a courtesy to limit posts**. There have been times I've opened a thread only to find 70% of entries by one person... it feels like a private party and well, I'd hate to impose uninvited. And so I don't post.
But that's my choice. I guess we'll have to agree to disagree because I would rather see 1-2 great entries by many than a load of pics by a few**. That former scenario was common when I 1st ventured into the Fark hinterlands. Now I would rather see 10 great pics than 40 average ones. And I know this view is shared... largely by folk who don't post on Fark anymore.
Honestly, I don't know why I'm even arguing because I stopped posting for votes awhile ago; I just love to chop. I recently posted an image that had 78 layers and took 5hrs to complete; it came in 15th... I could care less. Besides, I've won enough I'm willing to share now. Ha! ;-)
Also, I never said TFers should be "forced" to limit their entries. Please, please do not lump me into that kettle of "folk" (edited) who want to impose their will to create the Fark Chop Utopia. Fark is not a farking photoshop site for the 8000th time! Please chop-gods - go bust yer balls on Worth already!
No, I like Fark the way it is. It's an excellent place to grow and learn if you are inclined - or just goof off! - and no wanker decides if you are "worthy" to participate. Jeesh... it's farking pushing pixels people. Drew is not an idiot... do you realize that he's created a cottage industry of photoshop sites from all the folk who "aimed to make it better"? Drew Curtis, Father of Internet Photoshop! Haha.
Well, fwiw, I'm not aiming to 'make it better' at MS... I'm just sharing my love while I can. I don't think folk should give up on Fark... I'm still there! I think folk should be driven by desire not perception. But we get old and stupid. Post what you want - have fun! That's ALL it should be about. It's about the journey stupid...
**Life - the exceptions let me show them to you. I'm no one and no one should tell someone not to go crazy with posting if it's fueled by fun and creativity. Go for it...
I suppose there are always going to be people who go overboard. I'll agree that posting dozens of images does cross the line. But I've only seen this happen a few times, and only a few specific people that I know of go or have gone this far.
I still have no problem with posting a couple different images in a contest. Even four or five isn't bad. I'll agree that one should probably quit once they reach double digits.
But my original point from the post wasn't really concerned with the contests as viewed from our side. I'm more concerned with how the unattached viewer sees things. For them, the names are often meaningless.
The voters are bored people who want to be entertained. Once the thread ends, it's over. They go onto something else. Let's hold their attention for as long as we can.
I had a blast when Roger and I largerly populated the sheep or lamb or whatever thread. Of course, there were less than a dozen TF entries per contest for that brief time there, so I really didn't feel bad. We had so many votes and it was one of the few threads to go ape shit during that short span.
Sure some of my pics were "below par", but hell, it was a fun weekend of shooping, I'll say that. I've seen a few others go bananas, and I have a 50/50 mixed reaction. If the pics aren't THUMBNAILS, and have had at least a few minutes work done on some part, go fot it.
Meh.
I think there's been a lot of life in the threads lately, it's evident by the high vote counts on the PS browser. I remember QUITE a spell where NO threads saw 50 votes for ANY image. Now, 50-100 votes is again quite commonplace. GO FARKERS!
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