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[Guert]

Oh no... I'm not going to GDC or on IRC... What am I gonna do? 

[sega]

Oh no... I'm not going to GDC or on IRC... What am I gonna do? 

Come to IRC!  or both!

[ravuya]

What happens if you are on IRC while at GDC?

[BenH]

You turn into Cliffy B

[frosty]

I'm an amateur indie.

I'm so amateur, I... oh never mind.

[moshboy]

Well I'm an amatuer groupie I guess.

[Chris Whitman]

The big difference is that indies are in it to make money and further business like a normal person, while amateurs are in it because they are deviants who care about things.

This is common all throughout the art (or 'design,' or whatever) world, as many of you know. Monet, for example, being a real artist, was known to invite hosts of people to his studio to view a nearly finished work, where he would prance around like a simpering cheerleader with parenting issues asking if there was anything about his paintings anyone found too difficult or simply wanted changed so they would 'like him more.'

You see, actually caring about things is dangerous for business. If people decided to start doing things they wanted instead of things we wanted them to do, we might lose the ability to take their money and give them nothing but shoddy, broken garbage in return.

And that, gentlemen, is unacceptable.

[Alevice]

And that, gentlemen, is unacceptable.

[Inane]

Is that like, Nazi samurai M. Bison?

[Alevice]

Show respect to the commisar, or dare to be executed as an example to the troops.

ie: It's an Imperial Guard Commisar, from Warhammer 40K. the particualr screenshot si from Dawn of War. Imperial Guard officers have a fame of totalitarian regime disguised in the form of patriotism to the Imperium of Man. A famous catchphrase goes mlike "it is better to die for the Emperor, than live for yourself"

[the_dannobot]

Is that like, Nazi samurai M. Bison?

To you, he is a samurai nazi.  But for him, it was Tuesday.

[Chris Whitman]

And Tuesday is Dress Like Nazi Samurai M. Bison Day at his place of work?

Are they hiring?

[team_q]

The commissar?

Der Kommissar!

[jeb]

This article sounds somewhat like Steve Pavlina's old self-improvement articles. The word "indie" doesn't mean anything anyway. Well.. it should mean "independent", which means you're so loaded with money that you don't have to care any longer. Like Bungie. And maybe Bit-blot

[LThenton]

Nothing wrong with making money while caring about things.  People need money to live, and the best artists, writers, and craftsmen throughout history have been the people who devoted their entire lives to their work.  How can you devote your entire life to making games if you have to work a full-time job 9-5?

The bullet points in this article are really stupid, true, and he does an awful lot of generalizing and labeling, but a lot of the article itself is still pretty accurate.

[PHeMoX]

Lol, one of those frustrated and lonely IT managers again or what? He tried really hard to label everything indeed, which is exactly where he fails. A shame because he's really spreading some misinformation there. 

"Indies try to create buzz by launching a Flash-based website with game media releases; Amateurs try to create buzz by launching a Geocities site with lots of flashing blink tags"

That's só 1998-ish.... everybody knows you should go with Freewebs instead now.   :D

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

Oddly I didn't and don't do *any* of the things listed, either on the indie side or the amateur side. I suspect that's true of most of us here.

[Chris Whitman]

Nothing wrong with making money while caring about things.

Of course not, but personal development, working hard to achieve something you believe in, is occasionally at odds with income, in which case, what do you do?

As an example in computer world, don't forget Babbage bankrupted himself in his attempt to create the Analytical Engine, which he never finished as a result of his constant tweaking and adjusting of the design (sound familiar?), but he made computing history anyway for designing the first Turing complete computer years before Turing was even around. He cared about the accomplishment more than the money.

The fact is, while ideally everything worth accomplishing would be salable and reflect a reasonable turn on investment, this isn't always true. The question isn't whether it's okay to make money -- that's clearly a straw man version of the argument -- the question is whether you shelve the things you actually care about when it turns out they don't offer a return. I can't imagine venture capitalists would respond well if you told them you were looking for investment on an idea so ahead of its time no one would buy it.

The bullet points in this article are really stupid, true, and he does an awful lot of generalizing and labeling, but a lot of the article itself is still pretty accurate.

If the bullet points, generalizing and labelling are wrong, what is left in the article to be right?

[LThenton]

Nothing wrong with making money while caring about things.

Of course not, but personal development, working hard to achieve something you believe in, is occasionally at odds with income, in which case, what do you do?

As an example in computer world, don't forget Babbage bankrupted himself in his attempt to create the Analytical Engine, which he never finished as a result of his constant tweaking and adjusting of the design (sound familiar?), but he made computing history anyway for designing the first Turing complete computer years before Turing was even around. He cared about the accomplishment more than the money.

The fact is, while ideally everything worth accomplishing would be salable and reflect a reasonable turn on investment, this isn't always true. The question isn't whether it's okay to make money -- that's clearly a straw man version of the argument -- the question is whether you shelve the things you actually care about when it turns out they don't offer a return. I can't imagine venture capitalists would respond well if you told them you were looking for investment on an idea so ahead of its time no one would buy it.

Well, it all depends on what you care about, doesn't it?  But seriously, I think there is a market to sell almost anything one could be really passionate about--it's just a matter of reaching it and expending enough effort on whatever you're creating that people actually think it's worth paying for.

Doesn't mean you'll get rich or famous doing it.  But why would you get into game development to get rich?

The bullet points in this article are really stupid, true, and he does an awful lot of generalizing and labeling, but a lot of the article itself is still pretty accurate.

If the bullet points, generalizing and labelling are wrong, what is left in the article to be right?

Quite a bit actually.  In particular, I agree with the idea that somebody trying to create a salable product will typically expend much more effort in making it well-constructed and presentable, and in getting the word out about it to the market.

[the_dannobot]

Amateurs always choose... poorly.
Indies know that it should be the cup of a carpenter.