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[Kay12]

I don't think the media today is objectively worse, I just consider that most of the stuff produced today is lame compared to the products of better times... of course, that's just the classic case of nostalgia, but... Kurt Vonnegut, Isaac Asimov, Robert A Heinlein, Tolkien - all these marvellous authors are dead. The Beatles is gone, Queen is gone, <long list of other good music ensembles> are all gone, and no living legends in sight to correct the situation.

Then again... collective memory supports nostalgia. There were a bunch of crappy bands back then as well, and plenty of crappy commercial junk novels as well. We just don't remember them, because they weren't good. We remember the best of the past years. I think 2000's will slowly start getting some nostalgia value on them. People will start remembering how the civilized nations were united against terrorism, how the Harry Potter books shaped a generation, how cool the rudimentary CGG in LoTR looked back then... memories grow sweeter with time.

About movies, I never watched many, but one thing I can say objectively is that their role has changed a lot. At least here in Finland, before television was common in every household, movies were really, really, REALLY big. More than half of our population saw The Unknown Soldier. Perhaps the increasing competition is affecting the production values...

[Duke 2.0]

About movies, I never watched many, but one thing I can say objectively is that their role has changed a lot. At least here in Finland, before television was common in every household, movies were really, really, REALLY big. More than half of our population saw The Unknown Soldier. Perhaps the increasing competition is affecting the production values...

 Ah, this is an interesting angle to go at it.

 The movie industry grew very quickly into a very large thing. There are massive logistical elements to worry about when producing something of the quality expected of modern cinema, and it takes a lot of effort for everything to work out. When dealing with stakes that high things are less run for traditional quality and more for making sure you can pay for the tools and talents needed to make these things work. You can't take risks or hundreds of people are out of the job and the industry grows weaker.

[Kay12]

Yeah, clarification: when I say that movies were big, I didn't mean the effort put into them but rather their role in entertainment world. Makes sense, of course - what could've competed with them before television became the King?

[GlyphGryph]

Okay, I know I've said I wasn't going to be posting in this thread anymore, and by god I tried, but...

Whats this badmouthing of today's entertainment industry? There's tons of amazing stuff out there.

and no living legends in sight to correct the situation.

This is because our culture is becoming increasingly divergent, not because Media is any worse. You want some living legends? Heck, I'll stick to names you're likely to be familiar with even considering the awesome people you've probably just never experienced. Lets just stick to those who've created something impressive in the last decade as well...
G.R.R.Martin, Laura Faust, Terry Pratchet, Johnathan Coultan, Andrew Hussie, Scorsese, Miyazaki, Pixar, Chris Nolan, Joss Whedon, The Coen Brothers, and I haven't even touched on music yet. The number of amazing bands out there - it's daunting to everyone try to list them, to be honest! Will any of them ever get as wide a following as the Beatles did? Probably not! No company has the clout and power to create another band like that in today's environment.

It's not that today's media is worse, it's that it can be a little harder to find. Its a bit more diverse. A lot of it is better, better enough that it actually takes some ground and history to fully appreciate just how good it is (and that's going to kill its popularity when there are so many still quite great alternatives!). These are all the people that are popular, right now - throughout history, most artists haven't been properly appreciated until they were gone. If anything, the problem is that there is too much stuff now, and we no longer have those centralized tastemakers that can say "Okay, everybody in the country, THIS is the movie you're going to watch, now go do it" nearly as easily.

There are plenty of things to complain about, but I don't really feel that "the state of modern media" is one of them...

[Kay12]

GG, you misunderstood my point, so I'm not going to reply any further. I have no desire to defend a point of view I don't support.

[G-Flex]

Leave it to the Internet for someone to mention fucking Homestuck when iterating through a very abridged list of impressive entertainment figures.

Whats this badmouthing of today's entertainment industry? There's tons of amazing stuff out there.

So? The industry still sucks, and actively works against people trying to create something great unless it's one of those one-in-a-billion things that is simultaneously great, marketable, and highly accessible. It's hard to even get a movie produced these days that isn't tied to some sort of existing IP.

There's plenty of great media out there, but the commercial industry surrounding them still sucks. Good movies exist in spite of the Hollywood machine, not because of it.

There are massive logistical elements to worry about when producing something of the quality expected of modern cinema, and it takes a lot of effort for everything to work out.

This is only true for certain very limited definitions of "quality". Take, I don't know, the Michael Bay "Transformers" movie: Very slick and and smooth and shiny and with what appear to be high production values, but in many other ways totally incompetent (from really bizarre continuity errors to, well, everything anybody has ever said about the plot or characters).

Hollywood expects certain things, but to say it "expects quality" is making an unnecessary value judgment and marginalizing the things Hollywood doesn't expect or value much.

[GlyphGryph]

Hey now, Hussie is pushing the medium. Homestucks not his only attempt at doing so, it won't be his last, the and the whole . Like him or not, he's pioneering new ground in multiple-media entertainment, and I have a feeling he's going to end up pretty damn famous (and like many famous people in history), not so much for what he did as what he inspired. But who knows the future, right?

But ignore all that, we all know the real reason is because I knew it would bother you.

Good movies exist in spite of the Hollywood machine, not because of it.

It's hard to even get a movie produced these days that isn't tied to some sort of existing IP.

Evidence? Are there fewer quality movies being released now than over similar spans of time in the past?
And yes, indie cinema and foreign movies count, you don't get to ignore them when you do the math.

[Kay12]

Good movies exist in spite of the Hollywood machine, not because of it.

It's hard to even get a movie produced these days that isn't tied to some sort of existing IP.

Evidence? Are there fewer quality movies being released now than over similar spans of time in the past?
And yes, indie cinema and foreign movies count, you don't get to ignore them when you do the math.

That's subjective. They have the right to consider modern movies to be worse.

[GlyphGryph]

That's subjective. They have the right to consider modern movies to be worse.

Bullshit. Its factual statement based on subjective opinions, and every time I've encountered it in real life, it's been flat out wrong, when taken in the context of that persons actual, subjective opinions. Is it possible it's true for any given person? Sure. But that doesn't mean I have to take the statement as true even when seen from the context of their own subjective values, because the odds are against.

Edit:
Urgh, staying up too late, shouldn't have given in. I'm done, let's hope I can manage to lurk for longer this time, hopefully indefinitely. -_-

[Kay12]

That's subjective. They have the right to consider modern movies to be worse.

Bullshit. Its factual statement based on subjective opinions, and every time I've encountered it in real life, it's been flat out wrong, when taken in the context of that persons actual, subjective opinions. Is it possible it's true for any given person? Sure. But that doesn't mean I have to take the statement as true even when seen from the context of their own subjective values, because the odds are against.

So, are you saying that no one has the right to consider modern entertainment to be worse than that of another period? Sounds ridiculous to me.

[Vector]

Cool it, would you?  He already said he wanted to leave the argument.

[Kay12]

Calling stuff "bullshit" is hardly leaving the argument.

[G-Flex]

Hey now, Hussie is pushing the medium. Homestucks not his only attempt at doing so, it won't be his last, the and the whole . Like him or not, he's pioneering new ground in multiple-media entertainment, and I have a feeling he's going to end up pretty damn famous (and like many famous people in history), not so much for what he did as what he inspired. But who knows the future, right?

I don't think he pushes envelopes nearly as much as you think. Homestuck is a sometimes-animated mostly-single-panel comic on the Internet, and that's basically it.

And yes, indie cinema and foreign movies count, you don't get to ignore them when you do the math.

Of course I don't get to ignore them. That's why I said they exist in spite of Hollywood.

[Vector]

More voting fraud revealed.

[Kay12]

More voting fraud revealed.

That's why they should use open source voting systems only...