faetal on 4/12/2020 at 11:01
Life is fuck.
Gryzemuis on 4/12/2020 at 13:59
It's called (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consumerism) consumerism.
Of course we all know what advertisements are. We all know what marketing is. The goal of advertisements and marketing is that you buy a specific product. But there's more. There's also a (global) effort to make people just spend more. It's less important what they buy, as long as they buy something. Everyone should buy as much as they can, as quickly as they can. This artificial pressure results in people not even realizing what they are doing. Buying stuff becomes a matter of emotions, not longer a rational matter.
You deserve it.
The more expensive a product is, the better it is.
You don't want to look poor.
You don't want to miss out on what your neighbors, friends, colleagues, schoolmates have.
Shopping is a fun activity.
Buying stuff is the most fun thing in the world.
Buying stuff is fulfilling.
Luxury is an addition to your life.
The bigger your house, the more successful you are.
The more expensive your car, the more successful you are.
You should show off how successful you are.
What good is money, if you don't spend it (now)?
Growth is good.
Money makes the world go round.
I'm sure you all know more examples of this attitude. Please share.
You get my point. Being frugal is considered "old fashioned". You're a scrooge if you don't spend your money now. Saving money is considered dumb, lending money (for anything) is considered smart.
This attitude also existing in the gaming market. Why would you "pre-order" a digital product? Producers will never run out of copies for a digitally distributed product, like a game. Why buy a game today, if you might play it next month, or next year, or maybe never? I just buy games if I want to play them now. That saves a lot of money. Maybe I'm weird. I also don't enjoy buying stuff (online or shopping in the city). In my house, I try to have it as empty as possible. Less furniture. No junk.
An (
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zRNGV85kPbI&list=PLEdk1RRH1VocDh8zTWm2TqdabwloKUBp7&index=6) old jewish guy once said: "Property is nuisance". I fully adhere to that. He adhered to that 100%. His sole possession in the world where a couple of suitcases with clothes and a few books. I don't adhere to it 100%. I love my car. I love my dishwasher. 18 Years ago, I bought a house. I was very happy to own a house, in stead of rent one. But now that there's that plan to put 30k solarpanels in my backyard (literally), I'm suddenly not happy with my house anymore. It prevents me from running away from the problem. Property is nuisance.
heywood on 4/12/2020 at 18:10
When I was a youth, the opiate of the masses was cable TV. Even the simple gaming we had in the 80s was more engaging than spending hours passively watching MTV.
Now it's social media and YouTube. If we let them, my kids will sit and surf YouTube for hours, watching other kids & families play. They turn into zombies if you give them a tablet or Roku remote. On the other hand, if you let them play a video game, they are full on trying to beat each other, or working together to figure out how to clear a level or unlock something. They are active, jumping around, getting excited, getting frustrated, arguing, celebrating. It's easy to see that their brains are engaged. After a while they need a mental rest and will naturally move on to another activity, so I don't need to pull the plug on them.
For adults, most of us could use more physical activity, but games are still more engaging than watching TV or endlessly refreshing Facebook.
Thirith on 4/12/2020 at 18:18
Quote Posted by heywood
For adults, most of us could use more physical activity, but games are still more engaging than watching TV or endlessly refreshing Facebook.
Honestly, I kinda hate this tendency people have to make their hobby look better (or less bad) at the expense of others. Sure, you can watch TV like a zombie, but you can do the same with games. You can veg out in front of many games as much as you can veg out in front of some TV show. You can brainlessly consume either and you can engage with both more deeply. It's great that your kids are so active when they play games, but that's how they engage with the medium in question. It's by no means inherent to the medium.
froghawk on 4/12/2020 at 19:21
^yup. To me these distinctions are a bit silly. Feels like the same line of reasoning that says video games aren't real art, but used for the opposite ends.
heywood on 4/12/2020 at 20:02
Seems like you're arguing that any hobby can be as healthy or unhealthy as another, and that's just not the case. Objectively, there are significant differences in the level of physical and/or mental activity involved with different hobbies. It is always better for your mind to engage in an activity as a participant than a passive observer.
froghawk on 4/12/2020 at 20:44
Moderation is the key to all of it, no? If you're binging then maybe those distinctions are slightly more important, but there's no way sitting down inside all day is going to be healthy whether your brain is engaged or not. So if that's the comparison you want to make, I'd argue that hobbies which get you outside are better than any media, books included. But books can teach about the world in a way games and many outdoor hobbies generally don't, and some rare tv can as well. Then there's the productivity argument - perhaps hobbies which yield something to show for your time are superior. But these things don't all serve the same purpose. So to me, this whole line of reasoning is splitting hairs. You're trying to assign objectivity to something that comes down to personal value systems and, indeed, how you engage.
Thirith on 4/12/2020 at 23:02
@heywood: What I'm actually arguing is that your notion of passive vs active media doesn't particularly hold up. It's something we gamers like to tell ourselves - that gaming is an active medium and therefore so much more worthy than other, supposedly passive, media - but it simply doesn't tally with what's going on when people engage with these media. There are certainly degrees of engagement and cognitive activity going on, and these can differ from one example of a medium to another, but they're more likely to differ from person to person or from situation to situation. You can play the latest Call of Duty quite passively, going through the motions and reproducing learned reflexes, or you can engage with it much more actively, and the same is true for any TV programme or YouTube video, whether it's reality TV, The Wire or season 3 of Twin Peaks.
SubJeff on 5/12/2020 at 10:37
Quote Posted by PigLick
well for one video games (and games in general) are a very effective way to stave of the onset of alzhiemers and dementia.
Are they? I don't think this can really be provable.
I do believe that games are a fantastic learning medium though and I think they are dreadfully unexploited. Any of you nerds can drop into a new Thief FM, even after years of not playing, and know exactly what the score is. Imagine the cognitive hoops a WoW player, for example, has gone through to learn, develop, build and operate their character.
It's one thing I'd love to do - really, really explore how gamification of education would work out. I posted my idea for an educational game here many years ago. I've actually developed that idea a lot, and I even applied for patent for the core mechanics of a very, very flexible educational game framework. Not patentable in Europe though, but I'm on EU record as having applied so if I ever have the means to develop it I've got the date precedence over any US company.
If I had the means...
PigLick on 5/12/2020 at 11:13
Well as an educator this is what i have learnt at a tertiary level, whether its provable or not I am not sure.
also regarding gamification of education, todays 7 year old is way smarter than one from 10 years ago.