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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Majoru Oakheart" data-source="post: 7651489" data-attributes="member: 5143">Ahh, yes.  Then I agree with you.They are a basketball team.  Though, that's the extent of my knowledge about them given my complete lack of knowledge about sports.  My point was that in Sports Fan circles in the US, not knowing that would be a big deal.  We're not in those circles, so it doesn't matter.I think at this point the internet has created a kind of global geek culture.  It isn't about the jokes in my circle of friends.  It's the same jokes you'll see Wil Wheaton make in a speech at GenCon or reference in an episode of Tabletop.  It's the same jokes Leo Laporte will reference on This Week In Tech.  It will be referenced in every YouTube video, on message boards all over the internet, and on Big Bang Theory(I believe it has referenced both the "arrow to the knee" joke from Skyrim and the "Cake is a lie" joke from portal at this point).Sure, there are some regional differences.  However, in this age of high speed communication most geek culture disseminates very quickly.  A video game becomes very popular, it gets great reviews.  By the end of the week there are articles on websites talking about how experiencing the game is a MUST HAVE experience.  Tech news shows are talking about its release and what it means for the industry.  People, sucked in by the pressure of knowing that a number of their friends will want to discuss the game and that spoilers will be appearing all over the internet force themselves to complete it as quickly as possible so as not to be left out.  Within a couple of weeks, you are seeing people dressing up in costumes as characters from the game at conventions.I used a video game as an example.  But the same thing happens with big geek movies.  I can assume that nearly 90% of the geeks I know will have seen Iron Man 3 by this point.  The slightly less geeky ones that put more focus on the non-geeky portions of their life will have skipped it.  However, nearly everyone else will have gone.  Most because they really wanted to see it.  The rest because they didn't want to be left out of the conversation.Once a geeky movie, tv show, or video game comes out, it enters the geek culture almost immediately these days.I think this is where the disconnect is.  There is a strong, core geek culture that is always keeping up to date on geek culture.  They check gaming news sites nearly daily, they spend weekends attempting to finish the latest game, they have a couple of conventions a year picked out.Meanwhile, there is a more "cottage industry" geek community filled with people who might self identify as a geek but geekdom doesn't really affect their daily lives.  They might go an entire week without having anything geeky affect their lives.  Their lives are filled with work, taking their kids to soccer practice, watching a hockey game on tv, going out to dinner with their non-geek friends and discussing taxes and weather.  These people often pass as perfectly normal most of the time.  Most of their friends may not even know about their geekiness.The conflict tends to happen at places where the two camps of geek meet, like conventions.  The core geeks gather together to revel in being around people who are as obsessive as they are.  And often, male geeks see conventions as one of the only places to meet women who share their likes.  A number of women are "cottage industry" geeks.  It can come across as fake.  Many geeks feel that geekdom isn't something you make time for once a month or once a year.  It's what you do every day.I'm not condoning it.  I'm just explaining what I see.  I know it can be extremely disappointing to see a woman at a convention wearing a pikachu costume and think "So, they are likely a video game player AND an anime fan and a pretty obsessive one at that to wear a costume...I'll go talk to them"; only to find out that the only video game they've ever played has been Pokemon, they've never seen the show or any anime and the costume was their friends idea.  So was coming to the con.  But they are finding it very interesting seeing all the people in their....Space Trek costumes and playing strange games they've never seen before.It can feel like our private place has been invaded by outsiders.</blockquote>

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