Comments on: Culture, Community, and Nerdy Music

By: Jason Tocci

Jason Tocci — Wed, 09 Jan 2008 18:48:24 +0000

@ Matt S:
No, thank you! I would’ve missed that conversation entirely if not for you guys.

@ Z:
Do we know anybody who makes attractive yet affordable plaques and statuettes?

By: Z.

Z. — Wed, 09 Jan 2008 13:53:15 +0000

You know, Jason, I think we should call said award “The Church Tucker Award for Nerd Journalistic Excellence, One-Removed.” It has a ring, no? ;)

By: Matt S

Matt S — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 19:06:40 +0000

The distinction between culture and community is an interesting idea. It is one of those things that I think has been in my head, but never stated out right, thanks for taking that step for me.

For me, I think this is the money quote from this piece, “is it possible that nerdcore attracts those who have little interest in meeting other nerds?” That is a really important question that I hadn’t considered before and feel kind of silly for not doing so. I’m going to have to give that some serious thought before I can come up with a response, but this plays into some ideas that I’ve had that I’m still chewing on.

I knew getting Church to bring you into this discussion would prove to be a good idea. Thanks a lot!

By: Jason Tocci

Jason Tocci — Sat, 05 Jan 2008 16:08:08 +0000

@ Church:
I am all about tangential stuff.

@ Church again:
I believe you. I have noticed that you are so diligent about forwarding relevant links to geek bloggers that I think we need to come up for a special award for you, should bloggers ever have their own academy awards. (Do bloggers have their own academy awards..?)

By: Church

Church — Sat, 05 Jan 2008 03:21:03 +0000

Oh, and for the record, yeah, Matt S’ comment prompted me to email you. I will say that I was going to do just that earlier, but I wasn’t sure which forum the conversation would be actually followed up in until that point, so I wasn’t sure where to point you.

By: Church

Church — Fri, 04 Jan 2008 23:08:50 +0000

I like the culture vs. community distinction. I think my GF would fall into the same category as your friend. She likes science fiction etc., (we’ve actually had arguments that were only settled by dragging out the Franz Joseph Technical manual) but she generally avoids conventions, for example (at least once she hit high school.)

Thinking about that further, it may be that she just hasn’t found her ‘niche’ within larger fandom. She won’t go to a “comic book convention,” but she quite likes the Small Press Expo (which is pretty much a comic book convention.) There is a segment of comic book fans which find that perfectly understandable (and is probably why SPX exits) so she is aligned quite nicely with a subset of comic book fans, but she doesn’t realize it.

I guess my point is that there are folks who ARE geeks, but just don’t realize they’re geeks because they think of geeks as a different subset of geekdom. And because of that, they’re less likely to find similarly-minded folks.

Which is pretty tangental to the main discussion, I guess.