Matt Colville's Community

[TheAlkaizer]

To those that are a bit put off by the length, I'd say that the first half is the most relevant to the current discussion about topics, roughly 30 minutes of it if it helps. Once he starts talking about Price, it swerves into a slightly different lane (not that it's not interesting, the price of things is something we've discussed here too)

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

But this are not the problem community members they were talking about who are negative only, without constructive criticsm.

No, Matt also talks about the people who want to scream down anyone who disagrees with their orthodoxy and police community standards. We have a good number of people for whom even a mild criticism of WotC -- "I wish they would stop doing X, or at least explain it better" -- leads to pages upon pages of being yelled at.

It's less overtly toxic than threadcrapping, but it's definitely gatekeeping and intended to drive away anyone who doesn't praise WotC and nothing else.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

To those that are a bit put off by the length, I'd say that the first half is the most relevant to the current discussion about topics, roughly 30 minutes of it if it helps. Once he starts talking about Price, it swerves into a slightly different lane (not that it's not interesting, the price of things is something we've discussed here too)

Yeah, the target audience for it is explicitly for people who want to create and sell a thing online. (His theory is you start by being a community member, before you start selling something.)

I found the whole thing really interesting. One of his best non-Playing the Game videos, for my money.

 

[overgeeked]

No, Matt also talks about the people who want to scream down anyone who disagrees with their orthodoxy and police community standards. We have a good number of people for whom even a mild criticism of WotC -- "I wish they would stop doing X, or at least explain it better" -- leads to pages upon pages of being yelled at.

It's less overtly toxic than threadcrapping, but it's definitely gatekeeping and intended to drive away anyone who doesn't praise WotC and nothing else.

I think it’s more toxic. One poster doing a drive-by isn’t that big of a deal compared to page after page of yelling from multiple posters.

 

[Umbran]

1) You can't generate a productive discussion unless the participants are all willing to be swayed from their starting position.

You can. But not if you frame it (even if just to yourself) as an attempt to sway folks from their starting position!

Not all discussion has to be about changing other people's minds!

 

[LordEntrails]

If writers hate the act of selling, or the act of community building, I can easily see how some creators are their own worst enemies within their own communities. But there's also a good amount of community building that revolves around constant inside access...and that just always seems like trouble to me.

I think this is common in many "artists". I have a family member who is a great artist, but they refuse to "sell themselves" thinking their art should speak for itself and people should flock to them. As you may have guessed, they are not a financially successful artist.

Criticism is good, and life wouldn't be worth living without disagreement.

Criticism can be good. There are many ways of and type of criticism.

 

[Morrus]

I think this is common in many "artists". I have a family member who is a great artist, but they refuse to "sell themselves" thinking their art should speak for itself and people should flock to them. As you may have guessed, they are not a financially successful artist.

The sad part is that reach and marketing are far more important than quality when it comes to sales. You can make the best thing in the world, but if nobody knows about you can't sell it (and vice versa).

I was very lucky that my little publishing company got a reach boost from being associated with this site. Not big leagues reach, not compared to the big YouTubers or the large corporations, but enough of one that made a real difference. Not everybody has that starting advantage, unfortunately.

Sadly, "if you build it they will come" may be a great (misquoted) tagline from a movie, but it means nothing in the real world.

 

[Umbran]

No, Matt also talks about the people who want to scream down anyone who disagrees with their orthodoxy and police community standards. We have a good number of people for whom even a mild criticism of WotC -- "I wish they would stop doing X, or at least explain it better" -- leads to pages upon pages of being yelled at.

Here's an important point to remember in large online spaces: To any given reader, in some ways you aren't an individual. The generic reader has their family, their friends, and a bunch of people at work that they keep track of as individuals at some level of detail. Eventually, their ability to do that gets filled up, and then people have to start abstracting to keep things even vaguely straight.

So, while you think you are giving a single, mild criticism of WotC, to them you are part of THE WALL of criticism of WotC they are exposed to overall. And that criticism generally bleeds into at least implied criticism of the fans as well. They think of your input as part of the pages upon pages of them being yelled at, by people telling them they are wrongity-wrong-wrong, with wrong sauce, for liking the thing you are criticizing.

And WotC is only an example - this isn't actually about WotC - the point generalizes. If you are talking to a fan of X, and you want to criticize X, it pays to think about how you are going to approach that.

 

[TwoSix]

You can. But not if you frame it (even if just to yourself) as an attempt to sway folks from their starting position!

Not all discussion has to be about changing other people's minds!

Sure. But then it’s not productive, certainly not how I think of the term.

Productive discussions are iron sharpening iron, finding erroneous facts and weak extrapolations, and replacing them with true facts and and stronger extrapolations.

You might find a certain joy in discussing why The Last Jedi is the best or worst Star Wars movie, but that pleasure hasn’t made the discussion productive.

Talking about how your favorite pizza is pineapple, and the other person’s is pepperoni might be a fun conversation and exchange of biographical information, but also isn’t really what I would call productive.

Or the 20k-ish pineapple pizza thread. Fun to post to, sure, certainly not productive. As opposed to the 30k conservatism thread from a few months ago, which was definitely acrimonious but also highly productive.

 

[TwoSix]

Criticism can be good. There are many ways of and type of criticism.

Yep. I think dueling criticisms, especially over aesthetic judgments which don’t have obvious points of compromise, don’t really have a lot of value.