Who are the coolest geeks?

why, it can only be sports geeks :D

Train spotters! "Hey, that's the 45EF76! It's been repaired!" "What?"

Sex geeks. Poetry geeks. Birdwatchers.

book collecting geeks. of the rare and beautiful kind.

Theatre/dance/opera enthusiasts

^^^these get laid the most regularly, but they also like Rocky Horror. Push.

Music geeks - annoying cuz they think they're cool

Computer geeks/hackers - i suppose we wouldn't even have computers n shit without these fellas, so props

Gamers - not so bad

Movie buffs - even more annoying and self-righteous than the musos

Role-playing game geeks - sad

LARPers (Live Action Role-Playing game) - really fucking sad

Comic geeks - i was kinda one as a kid, sad if you're over 14

Sci-fi/fantasy/horror fans - sci fi & horror are ok, fantasy is lame

Theatre/dance/opera enthusiasts - dunno if these people are necessarily geeks, morelike snobs

Mathletes - props for the hilarious name

Board game geeks - wtf

Numismatists/philatelists - got no beef with these dudes

Card collectors - pointless

Toy collectors - sad/creepy

Other collectors (specify) - whatevs

Furries - need to see a fucking shrink

Historical reenactment folks (Renaissance fairs, Medievalists, etc.)- mega sad

Some other type of geeks (specify) - comedy geeks? religious geeks? trolls? general aspieness?

i voted for mathletes, btw

math l33ts

Based on my experience, LARPers get more laid than other geeks, because LARPing requires at least some sort of an outgoing personality, plus the gender ratio is pretty much 50/50. I've even heard rumours you can get laid within a a game. Not that this is any reason to become LARPer, because they also tend to be the most obnoxious and elitist among geeks, even worse than music geeks.

being a music geek has absolutely got me laid at least once

No car geeks, no cr..etccetc

You forgot manga/anime fans and cartoon geeks.

Gamers ftw.

why, it can only be sports geeks :D

-- Just got offed, Friday, 28 December 2007 08:27 (5 hours ago) Bookmark Link

RONG. Yer hardcore sports geek's assumption that everyone is just as fanatically interested in talking at great length/detail abt football, horse racing or w/e as they are, added to the assumption that if yr NOT interested it's only because you haven't been BORED INTO SUBMISSION YET renders yer hardcore sports geek EVEN LESS COOL THAN "FURRIES".

I voted for opera/theatre/dance.

Based on my experience, LARPers get more laid than other geeks,

There's a bunch of LARP-ers who do battle in the forest near our house. The times we've seen them out, we have noticed the near 50-50 m/f ratio, and have heard that if yr in w/that crowd, there's plenty of action, so to speak. They do look ridiculous, though.

I wonder why geekery seems to be mostly a male thing? Out of the groups I've listed, I think only LARPers and theatre/dance/opera fans (manga fans too, probably) have 50% or more women. Maybe because geekery usually requires an obsessive, inrovert mindset, something which is more often encouraged with boys?

i love this site:

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/newuser.php

i know NOTHING about these fancy board games, and I will never ever play them, and yet I can read these dudes talking about them forever.

i think i'm a geek collector. how cool is that?

Pashmina OTM

Sports geeks are actually the worst kind because they're the only kind of geek deemed to be socially acceptable by the [non-geek] world at large. An obsessive interest in sports strikes me to be equally as freaky as an obsessive interest in dressing up as a large cuddly animal...

http://i101.photobucket.com/albums/m77/fairbanksf/Stuff/larp.jpg

Also, no cosplay option?

I thought the cosplay thing is just a part of comic/manga geekery. Thouh I admit the whole thing's mostly a mystery to me.

I voted for historical re-enacters, because they're outdoors the most, even when it's chilly

(see what i did there)

(SEE IT)

I thought it was very funny!

You did need to point it out though. It was in the puzzled re-reading that the light went off. "Ah!" I said in my head "because it's cold out! Cold, cool!!"

Music because it happens to be at least somewhat socially acceptable (though not so much as sports). Computer geeks can translate that into making $$$, unlike almost everything else on the list, but it's still not cool.

The sports geek has never been socially acceptable, it usually equals 'Statto' or 'pub bore'.

Theatre/opera/dance geeks definitely get the hottest women, computer geeks probably get all the money these days and that helps. The thing about theatre geeks is they operate almost entirely in their own closed bubble which happens to contain lots of women. Consequently they're either blissfully ignorant or just plain not bothered with how annoying they are.

i voted larpers. none of these people are cool in any way so i voted for the most distilled geekery there is

I believe 'Theatre/opera/dance geeks' are better known as 'nerds'

Poetry geeks is a romantic notion, I'm not sure I've ever come in contact with one. I love art geeks. They are my people.

The sports geek has never been socially acceptable, it usually equals 'Statto' or 'pub bore'.

In the UK, maybe.

http://www.nbc.com/Identity/images/penn_jillette.jpg

there are definitely sports geeks in the US

I think the question is "how geeky are we talkin'?"

"Poetry geeks is a romantic notion, I'm not sure I've ever come in contact with one."

The Poetry Thread

Poetry Thread, part two: A Game Of Chess

Resurrection: The 2006 Poetry Thread

a new poetry thread, on being unable to find the old one

"I think the question is "how geeky are we talkin'?"

for sports it would have to be at least fantasy league geeky to be at all geeky.

But poetry appreciation has been specialized down to a point where having any realistic interest in it at all = "poetry geek"

i mean, lots of people know stats about their favorite teams and sports. it has to be pretty all-consuming and/or semi-consuming to be qualified as geekdom.

yeah, if you actively BUY poetry in actual book stores, then you probably qualify as a poetry geek.

I like a bit of poetry from time to time.

I think I'll take a look at those threads.

I voted "some other" because Mythbusters is the best show on television

really though this thread title might as well be "who are the jewishest muslims"

come on, there are lots of dudes who think that their sportstatscox compensate for their otherwise undifferentiated uncoolness

Heterosexual theatre/opera/dance geeks have the math all in their favor.

I am a decently credentialed baseball geek -- fantasy is too prole for me -- and it has not gotten me laid a single time.

anyone who has actually read this entire thing is king geek in my book:

http://images.amazon.com/images/P/0743227220.01.LZZZZZZZ.jpg

I've read lots of it (both editions). I have also gone to Cuba on a flimsy pretext to watch baseball.

I may have a date with a Yankee fan tonight, but gay seamheads can't be choosers.

Baseball is basically a long stream of statistics in search of a sport, right?

NO, you evil man

as opposed to a long stream of zings in search of an original thought?

Really, it all comes down to whether the geekery in question is shorthand for 'erudite and sophisticated' or 'never leaves own bedroom, in mother's house'.

geekery in question is shorthand for 'erudite and sophisticated'

oh *that* kind of geekery

Sometimes I get paranoid that "Passantino" is Italian for "free time," and "Dom" is Italian for "too much"

"Dom" is Italian for "scarf," and "Passantino" means "too long"

Mine was better

as opposed to a long stream of zings in search of an original thought?

-- El Tomboto, Friday, 28 December 2007

POW

*sulk*

Domenico "of the Lord", Passantino: archaic Sicilian term meaning "Ferryman"

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/graphics/2007/03/03/bmferry103.jpg

Baseball: America's Passantino

ha

yeah sadly in this new century the generally accepted assumptions regarding the term geek have been exploded to contain basically anybody who wants to be seen as hip for being knowledgeable about any topic e.g. "oh I'm a huge * geek"

which being the grumpy reactionary that I am I find disingenuous at best and despicable at worst since a perfectly good descriptive term (occasionally derisive, yes) has been co-opted by people who really have no business calling themselves anything more than consumptive dabblers. Hence my comment above about the thread title - nobody who has a snowball's chance in hell of being "cool" (sociable, popular, laid back, never overly concerned) should be able to meet the criteria of "geek."

Although perhaps the word has acquired a new function as described above, in separating said dabblers from genuine obsessives, who will generally all have their own name for themselves.

"...of being "cool" (sociable, popular, laid back, never overly concerned)"

see, now i think this is funny cuz a lot of people try to push this image of themselves so hard they end up looking like the biggest saddoes ever.

we should knock on wood that "cool" still means anything at all in any context

it's very sad when people look like saddoes

sad is as saddoes

http://www.toyvaulttoyclub.com/New%20Logos/Other_Pics/gaming/Plush_20_Sided_Dice%20-%20Small.jpg

you never know what you're gonna get

i remember at school everything was "sad". then, a year later everything was "gay"

geek type missing that's more femme-centric:
http://craftzine.com/images/craft/covers/05.gif

^^^overlaps with LARPers and goths

the fanatics and obsessives that i find the coolest are the ones who never lift their heads aboveground to see what's going on outside of their realm. they just keep digging holes. hole after hole. and they fill those holes with their love and their panic and the desperate knowledge that their work will remain forever unfinished.

but that's just me.

I remember one year when the world could "get fucked." then a year later the world could "eat shit."

there are loads of female nerds, they're just into things like knitting and collecting beanie babies rather than rpgs or heavy metal or whatever.

none of these groups has the obnoxiously high-self regard as do lifehackers

uh... move that hyphen one word to the right

http://www.weimax.com/images/SF_Intl_Wine_2007_Michael-Feil.jpg

i remember at school everything was "sad". then, a year later everything was "gay"

it's good that everyone found their bliss like that

old school geeks for me -- the ones who bite off chicken heads in the circus

*board games with scott* rules by the way:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=JPi_uNWUJy0

http://www.lib.umd.edu/RARE/IMG/HardBoiled/alley.jpg

I think this current application of geek is getting out of hand, ever since I read a review referring to john coltrane as a jazz geek. i wanted to grab the critic and say "motherfucker JC was a virtuoso you're the geek."
anyway I digress - carry on.

i actually own the hardcover copy of nightmare alley with that cover. i am way cool.

that's what tobot was talking about above, i think. the word geek just gets thrown aound too easily these days.

tombot

The coolest geeks have a doctorate in an -ology and can be found toiling away in the sub-basement of an enormous natural history museum when they aren't out on a dig.

http://indiana-jones.navajo.cz/indiana-jones-2.jpg

http://img2.timeinc.net/ew/dynamic/imgs/070503/scifigallery/backfuture_l.jpg

yeah, if you actively BUY poetry in actual book stores, then you probably qualify as a poetry geek.

What if, say, you've run and emceed a reading series for the past five or so years?

And if you have a BoardGameGeek account?

Anyway, there weren't foreign language geeks, so I went with the mathletes.

You know, I was going to make a joke, but it occurs to me that there might actually be such a thing as a "sex geek."

And it's, like, not cool.

slashdong.org

o rly?

xpost

to the tune of sex dwarf, obv

anyone whos taken a greek or roman or medieval lit class knows the coolest geeks are the CLASSICS geeks

dude, no.

i know a guy who MADE HIS OWN CHAIN MAIL

haha, i went to high school with that guy (possibly not the exact same guy)

Chain mail = not a classicist. I did forensics with that guy

Classics geeks are okay; I have yet to see them step it up and combine LARPing, war re-enactment, and Homer, so that's a point for

uggggh

Results 1 - 10 of about 333,000 for "geek chic". (0.08 seconds)

USATODAY.com - Geek chic
We used to shun them, mock them, give them wedgies and snicker when they played Dungeons & Dragons. Those loser days, however, are as over as Dumb and ...
www.usatoday.com/life/2003-10-22-geek-chic_x.htm - 59k - Cached - Similar pages - Note this

i know a guy who MADE HIS OWN CHAIN MAIL

throw the book at him

I guess the Iliad would be more war re-enactment, the Odyssey would be more LARPing

Venn Diagram = Goth Geeks and Sex Geeks.

goth geek = someone who is not a goth but is really into them?

goth = geek

i don't know if geek is quite the right term for goths

^^ geek geeks ^^

nah...c'mon, its probs the geekiest youth sub-cult ever

i'm too old and/or too urban to really grok goths

goth = geek
rong

forensics geek making chain mail = classics geek in disguise

http://www.unitedmaskandparty.com/Halloween/images/the_crow_15720.JPG

in fact, 90% of fantasy/rpg/larp geeks = classics geeks (some of them just dont know it yet!!)

the only goth 'geek' i know is a girl who does make-up & gore sfx for theatre & film, which does require at least a bit of technical proficiency

rite

all fantasy geeks descend from the ur-classics geek, HRH jrr tolkein

biggest classics geek I ever knew went from being a total wigger in high school to a devout eastern orthodox christian in college

other classics geeks I knew really didn't qualify next to him. dude was straight outta byzantium

nah...c'mon, its probs the geekiest youth sub-cult ever

i know what you mean, but isn't "geek" meant to mean, like, an excessive interest in and knowledge of something? corsets and anne rice novels is different (but may intersect many of the above).

other noted classics geeks: nietzsche, st. thomas aquinas

biggest classics geek I ever knew went from being a total wigger in high school to a devout eastern orthodox christian in college

CANNOT WAIT FOR THIS ALBUM

isn't "geek" meant to mean, like, an excessive interest in and knowledge of something?

not necessarily, social ineptitude, innit. it's just that they often come as part of a package.

i liked the classics geeks i knew in college. the weirdest dude had a pet lizard and different colored eyes. the geekiest ones met weekly for beers and only talked in Latin (!).

xpost - Oh wait, no: that would just be like a Judgment Day rap-metal thing, except with System of a Down, wouldn't it

jordan those are exactly the kinds of kids im talking about!!! they RULE!!!!

i wish i knew what happened to my freshman year latin TA (would date A++)!

pc user: while there is some deviation in usage, geek does imply highly-specialized knowledge about a perticular subject

britishes

in the taxonomy of the socially inept, which we might comprehend in a sort of binomial nomenclature wherein geek is the container family, there are two primary (but by no means mutually exclusive) genera roughly corresponding to 'excessive interest' and 'excessive apathy/disinterest' that apply to the individual geek species

shut up u geek

wait which are the excessive apathy ones
I assume the other is nerd
or are you just typing shit

no, the excessive-apathy kids are 'smart kids with lots of potential' and the 'lazy stoners' and those who will 'never made anything of themselves'

i need graphs

e.g. there are nerds-by-investment (e.g. D&D players with big, expensive and hard come by sword collections they work hard to maintain) and nerds-by-default (D&D players who raid the medicine cabinet for phennies and end up walking next door for pizza and into the smack-dab center of a month long campaign against Ricven the Chaotic Evil Half-Orc Loremaster.)

i was a mathlete.
it was not very cool.

http://rrrojer.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2007/07/lindsayweir.jpg

anyways this is missing lots of kinds of geeks. where are the popular mechanics/electronic hobbyist radioshack geeks? or other kinds of science geek? none of these geeks even wear lab coats, and they look really cool.

that's why I voted "other" and said "mythbusters"

basically, adam savage and grant imahara ftw

Linda C A+++

http://bestuff.com/images/images_of_stuff/210x600/doctor-bunsen-honeydew-4994.jpg

i like how all the guys of ilx are gonna vote mathlete because they wanna bang lindsay wier.

i was an other geek too: i wanted to be

http://www.joodiff.com/images/articles/std001.jpg

and

http://aarkangel.files.wordpress.com/2007/01/oscar-wilde.jpg

and

http://content.answers.com/main/content/wp/en-commons/thumb/a/a0/225px-Breton.jpeg

haha, i went to high school with that guy (possibly not the exact same guy)

-- elmo argonaut, Friday, December 28, 2007 4:04 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Link

^ tell

i like how all the guys of ilx are gonna vote mathlete because they wanna bang lindsay wier.

-- bell_labs, Friday, December 28, 2007 6:25 PM (11 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

Dude, I'll post that picture of your boyfriend where he looks like her.

lol I have seen that photo and remember the thread about it

Do not us QUIZZERS count as geeks then? ;¨;?

+ humbleness
- arrogance
+ arrogance
- humbleness
0(+) humbleness & arrogance independently distributed relative to actual capacity.

erm...
i would say the ones who can get me the best drugs = winner.
(that would be music nerds)

Also medieval geeks != classic geeks, ffs!

Oops "classics". They do equal classic!

Goths are often fantasy/horror or comic or RPG geeks, but I agree that being a goth doesn't per se equate being a geek.

You know, I was going to make a joke, but it occurs to me that there might actually be such a thing as a "sex geek."

What would he/she do to show his geekery then? Have a complex system of notating, grading and analyzing people he's fucked, in what positions he's done it, in which locations, etc?

there's definitely a such thing as a sex geek. it's like bondage people, people who use elaborate outfits and latex, that kind of thing. they can usually be found on craigslist casual encounters, hbo's real sex, and at burning man.

i'm sure you could come up with something, xpost

actually maybe it's more like a sex nerd. sex geek sounds like something that would be in a soft cell song.

and, they are not cool.

but a sex geek could also be someone who knows the entire history of bondage equipment and has a vintage collection of bondage accessories that they have never actually used.

like that Museum of Mentruation guy. total tampon geek:

http://www.mum.org/visitMUM.htm

sports geek backlash = envy

and it's not about being a statto, it's about having a photographic memory for LOTS of sporting action.

sex geeks are those flabby people you see on HBO's Real Sex shows swinging on bungee cords while they paint the walls with their nude bodies or stick themselves in candle wax and play accordions while they fuck and shit

good lord i hate the human body

the human mind is much more worthy of that sentiment

sports geek backlash = envy

and it's not about being a statto, it's about having a photographic memory for LOTS of sporting action.

-- Just got offed, Saturday, 29 December 2007 00:59 (21 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

you are fooling NOBODY, statto.

very well, my vote for 'other' was a poetry/birdwatching geek vote. with a bit of cricket and footy thrown in. :D

without referring strictly to myself, birdwatchers are fucking chilled-out people on the whole. any sort of nature geek is worth knowing (usually).

aren't all academics inherently "geeks"? (serious question) or did academia lose its blissfully unselfconscious geeky soul and go to hell at some point in synch with the rise of the "hipster" grad student persona?

also add the tremendous number of people who are in grad programs now who have no business being in grad programs cf my comment about consumer/dabblers

"aren't all academics inherently "geeks"?"

some of them are just smart people with nothing better to do. or even dumb people with nothing better to do. they aren't all obsessed like people in the throes of geekdom are.

I think you could conceivably make the case that nearly all doctoral candidates are "geeks" but definitely not all, since I have known people who were pursuing ph.d's who really didn't give one whit of a smidgen of a fuck about their field of study beyond "more paper means more green" not to mention being totally outclassed by amateur blogger types working in the same arena

I like the turn of phrase "in the throes of geekdom"
it sounds like something walker percy might say if he ever said things like "geekdom"

I dunno, for what it is worth I feel that the "hands on a hard body"-style elimination contest that happens as you actually complete and file your PhD is a process that requires so much focus and commitment and (perhaps insane) self-belief that if you complete grad school you can't just be dismissed as a "dabbler". Not in this grim and hopeless job market, anyway. People can definitely waste their time and other people's time hanging out in grad school, but finishing a dissertation is another matter. That said, theory-inflected humanities has certainly birthed a "cool kids" pattern of identity that is at odds with the older "geek and proud" stance.

man, you should hang out in woods hole sometime. serious algae geeks. there is a woman on the island here who follows the skunks around all year. and she is REALLY into it. she ain't no faux skunk-lovin' poseur. she's the real skunky deal.

tom, you should look into a job in woods hole. lots of underground gov. psi-ops going on involving crustaceans.

http://www.whoi.edu/

where is the "nature" geek? like, only wears wool and other old-fashioned outdoorsy gear, listens exclusively to blue-grass and regularly throws 80s-themed dance parties?

"People can definitely waste their time and other people's time hanging out in grad school, but finishing a dissertation is another matter."

i would never discount the serious time/work people put into a pursuit like that. and i don't doubt that most people are really into what they are into. but there are definitely people who are just addicted to school. the end-game almost doesn't matter to them. i've known some. some just become full-time teachers eventually. most of them, actually. that i've known.

http://www.dartmouth.edu/~doc/www/images/clubs/DOC20040820-MooseMountainSh.jpg

nah, the nature geek goes out to nature reserves on their weekends and looks for plants and animals. the lepidopterists and birdwatchers are foremost in this field; butterflies and avians elicit that much more excitement. the real ultras draw pictures of what they've seen in their notebooks, habitat and all. often bearded, they can frequently be found with binoculars. rarely harmful. sturdy walking-boots, goretex mac.

the other night I was watching Dirty Jobs on the discovery channel and Mike Rowe was hanging out with this chick who had green hair and breeding mosquitoes in a lab. At the end Mike is all "I still hate the bastards, but you love 'em don'tcha" and the girl had him pull her shirt down in the back so the cameraman could capture this giant detailed full-color tattoo of an adult aedes aegypti on her left shoulder

she probably had a long drinking-straw and a stanley-knife about her person, mike can be pretty pleased he got out of there before things turned serious

re: grad school, my advisor for my master's told me about a lot of kids she sees going in (esp humanities) expecting to go find some easy tenure-track teaching job at a small college and getting screwed - and engineering/sciences kids turning in plagiarized shit for their dissertation, that she winds up catching because she's one of the only engineering profs who actually uses turnitin.com et al.

the nature geeks are probably a subset of sports geeks, at least the ones gbx is talking about. skiing, rock climbing, mountain biking, TOTALLY INTENSE WINTER CAMPING, etc.

there is a bird guy here who writes for the paper and who is on the local npr and he's great. he really makes you want to go out and do some birding.

outdoorsy types who aren't collecting and sketching and documenting everything related to a particular field of interest don't count
otherwise why don't we just call roger clemens a geek while we're at it

hunting enthusiasts secretly revealed to all be geeks

not this guy though. i hate this guy.

http://www.wgbh.org/cainan/article?item_id=2506480

maybe it's just his voice. he's so smug about nature. i wish he would get hit by lightning.

only wears wool and other old-fashioned outdoorsy gear

oh wait i missed this part. the outdoor sports nerds would never turn away a synthetic ultra-breathable waterproof shell and post-consumer recycled fleece pullover.

these i think are more people that take up outmoded sports such as telemark skiing and jeu de paume. in other words, canadians.

"hunting enthusiasts secretly revealed to all be geeks"

my co-worker, wally, loves guns, and i love to read his hunting/gun magazines. so fascinating. i learn a lot. about guns. and grouse. and all kinds of stuff. gun geeks are way up there in the geek pantheon.

outdoorsy types who aren't collecting and sketching and documenting everything related to a particular field of interest don't count

yeah, i'm not talking about intense bros; i'm talking about people that go to lumberjack festivals (ren faire in plaid) and plan long canoe trips that are "interesting" because they use the same route as the voyageurs

xp exactly!

they only telemark in leather boots

LJ = sex geek.

oh I agree, and classical archery geeks and etc but once again there is a line between the dabblers and the true geeks. I know several coworkers who like to take a trip to the firing range once in a while and then I know Mr. Gardner, who has gonzo licenses from the state so that he can have a massive firearms collection in his house full of all kinds of terrifying murderous oddities and historically significant killing devices

oh god what about "design" geeks. like want to talk to you about fonts and shit. ahhhhhhhh

xp falconry figures in there too

i could get into falconry, probably

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ken_Uston

^^^^ gambling geek par excellence

LJ = sex geek.

certainly a lot of potential energy in this direction

when i was young i SO wanted to be a falconer. i think when i leave uni i will get back into birdwatching big-time.

A good example (that I know of because it is my field) of academia gone wonderfully geeky is the blogging crew that creates Blogging The Renaissance. There are caption-contests for early modern engravings and woodcuts, precis of really obscure early modern plays, and fun "hands on" stuff, such as the backyard attempt to actually make ink according to period chemical recipes.

re: the academic job market- there are very very few tenure track jobs these days and fierce competition for them. The number of postdoc positions keeps growing and they're staffed with really smart people who just didn't land a tenure track job, and it makes for some heartbreak and frustration and a lot of shuffling. When I started grad school I had to acknowledge receipt of a letter from Berkeley that basically said "you realize that your chances of getting a job out of this are incredibly small, right?"- and making sure people realize these risks going in is the only honest thing that schools can do given this situation.

i heard about this falconry wedding that sounded nuts. the falcons swooping out of the sky and delivery the rings to the betrothed. so awesome!

yeah drew how did you even land the johns hopkins thing? matmos fans ex machina?

where is the "nature" geek? like, only wears wool and other old-fashioned outdoorsy gear, listens exclusively to blue-grass and regularly throws 80s-themed dance parties?

one of these does not go with the others?

anyway clearly the answer to the thread is geek-geeks, which we have all decided to become, apparently

here's where I would post the .gif of the "it is a mystery" ghost . . . but the dull and yes geeky answer probably has more to do with my dissertation. Boring but true. But now I have to go to dinner with the folks. . . .

"anyway clearly the answer to the thread is geek-geeks, which we have all decided to become, apparently"

well, yeah, that's why i said above that i'm a geek collector. cuz, really, i'm a dabbler, and i've always admired the people who really went for the gold when it came to their loves and obsessions. i admire them and i fear them a little. cuz i see myself in them and (in some cases) what i could have become in an alternate universe. but mostly i just learn a lot of cool stuff from them. and trivia. and i get a kick out of the mania of it all. i love the minutia.

that story in the believer about gary gygax and the whole game underground in the 60's and 70's. the phone tappers who became the hackers who became apple and microsoft. the sci-fi clubs in the 40's and 50's centered around the magazines and writers of the time. i LOVE that stuff.

forry ackerman. man, geeks don't get any cooler.

http://www2.netdoor.com/~campbab/kong/fjakk.jpg

dude scott you should post to my tolkein vs herbert thread. I was trying to start a discussion re: the relative popularity/success of sci fi vs sword & sorcery stuff in postwar america and if it dovetails with various chronic pathologies/the phenomenology of stress as they developed with ww2 vets coming home and their families + the ruthless march of technology

^^^ thesis proposal

i was just reading bill bryson's book about growing up in the 50's and he talked a little about how the fear of mass destruction was everywhere, but also how excited everyone was about it and how the artwork in magazines that depicted nuclear destruction of the u.s. in the 50's was so EXCITING and somehow appealing to people. then, later tonight, i was reading leslie fiedler and he was talking about how the people in the u.s. had ALWAYS been waiting for the end of the world. the "endless waiting for the end of humanity" is how he put it. made me think.

um, i don't know if that has anything to do with the vets and the popularity of sci fi. but atomic power and the power to destroy the planet and what happened during ww2 had a LOT to do with the popularity of sci fi/comic books/etc.

yeah but why now is it that AD&D harry potter sub-conan foofaw is all over the place? when did that arise? I hypothesize that the bomb got boring and people just want to get the fuck away from cellphones and e-mail at this point

the apocalypse is a nice thing to think about because it's the last big change. after most of the world blows up, you don't have to put up with the meaningless grind anymore, no time clock, no insipid office chattering, no brand new piece of machinery you have to learn to deal with every 14 months

most adult males in america after ww2 ended were perfectly used to thinking of their own survival minute-to-minute. it was busywork in offices that got all up their ass and made them want to drink constantly

imo

might have been some guilt involved too. half the world blown to bits and GIs come home to the land of milk and honey where the bluebirds are always singing. part of them might have wanted to see things go boom. bryson talks about how many test bombs got detonated in the 50s. and how people would line up in the desert to watch them blow. laughing in the fallout!

"part of them might have wanted to see things go boom."

or expected them to go boom. either by alien attack or the russians.

hey office jobs suck for the ladies, too!

it's funny how that sunny mickey mouse smile can hide the deep deep deep millenarian streak running thru the u.s.

can it all be explained away as religion(s)? or people just can't believe that something so big and vast and (for the most part and for many people) good can last? people have always ALWAYS bemoaned progress in this country as a harbinger of future destruction even though this country has always been defined by its progress!

the harry potter foofaw is like all previous british childrens' cottage fantasy chewed up and spread between the leaves of many greater intact novels.

it is so inoffensively palatable, average and omnipresent as to create nostalgia in anybody who has enjoyed better fantasies in dahl, nesbit, wynn-jones, lewis, carroll/dodd, ransome, kipling, etc.

oh god what about "design" geeks. like want to talk to you about fonts and shit. ahhhhhhhh

ahaha, i had a girl show me her favorite fonts in a font book recently. it was kinda hot actually.

jordan a pimp 4 life

http://static.tagmy.com/fonts/pimp.gif

http://www.pimpmyfonts.com/

I voted for 'other', thinking of course of poetry geeks, of whom I am a prime example.

design/font geeks, and craft geeks, they are so hip and smug i want to smack them and their readymade magazine/bust/design sponge blogs too

i will stick up for design geeks here!! there is a difference (i think) between design geeks (like, uh, my dad and my girlfriend) who honestly and innocently geek the fuck out about great design and have a top 10 font list and have arguments about, like, kerning or whatever and design geeks whose geekiness is this self-conscious cool-kid smugness

this distinction is not altogether different from drew's academic cool-kid geeks and the ren blogger geeks--my kneejerk classification is "people who care honestly/authentically about their field of geekery (design/crit theory/medieval studies)" vs. "people whose 'geekiness' is a consciously assumed identity constructed to remind everyone how cool they are" but theres probably a fair amount of blending at this point

yeah thanks max for ignoring my previous blunts

lit dick

what is a blunt

a post to an internet messageboard that contains a salient point, as referred to by an individual under strong influence of alcohol

do you need more help?

or was your joke just that bad?

no wait me being blasted is not your fault
hang on
ok
wait
ok
sorted

yeah

oh no i get it! sorry i didnt quite get that yr posts were on the same topic. i sort of skimmed down.

I THINK WERE IN AGREEMENT

mostly i just wanted to defend design geeks since many of my loved ones are design geeks, the cool/not cool thing came as an afterthought I STILL LOVE YOU TOM KEEP FIGHTING THE GOOD FIGHT

nah fuckit just gonna kill m'self

2 late brah

2 late

if anyone knows andi maybe you should call him to make sure he is ok.

i <3 this thread.

Jordan, not that goths are geeks, but goths can include many who fall under that earlier description (isn't "geek" meant to mean, like, an excessive interest in and knowledge of something? not necessarily, social ineptitude, innit. it's just that they often come as part of a package): sex geeks (subset: S&M geeks), Wicca geeks, Anglophile geeks, vinyl geeks. And these are Goth Geeks. Plus the really uncomfortable ones.

Music geeks – They are usually pretty big crepes to me

Computer geeks/hackers – You can play the Hackers 2 drinking game with them, big case of Hamm's, fun night

Gamers – It is pretty endearing when you ask someone what they're doing that weekend and they say "working on my character"

Movie buffs – If you find yourself seated next to one on a flight you will have a fun conversation that makes the flight go quickly (I just discovered this)

Role-playing game geeks – See this I think of as "gamers"

LARPers (Live Action Role-Playing game) – Harmless and nice people

Comic geeks – Can be totally cool to talk to abt comics BUT also tend to be crepes to me, random ones IRL anyway

Sci-fi/fantasy/horror fans – These ones get the worst tattoos

Theatre/dance/opera enthusiasts – Mean! Meanies.

Mathletes – These are my people.

Board game geeks – Really rad, quiet people who you can have a fun and chill evening with. They will also tell you about new board games if you ask.

Numismatists/philatelists – Stamp collectors? They are rad because they pop a million boners if a stamp says like "National Beast Cancer Awareness Month" or if it has two douglas fir trees on it when it is supposed to have four.

Card collectors – I just don't understand at all.

Toy collectors – Creepy collecting habits, weird fetishization of some hermetically sealed youth they never had.

Furries – They live harmless but very sad lives.

Historical reenactment folks (Renaissance fairs, Medievalists, etc.) – They spend too much money on their shit, which would make for an uncomfortable relationship. "You can't buy another silk jocard, honey, you overran your minutes."

Some other type of geeks (specify) – I can geek out with a lot of the geeks but the most satisfying geekout is with a flag geek, or an invertebrate geek.

I am changing my vote to "other: Teeny"

fashion geeks

A flag geek?

What is "Numismatists?" Probably those!

Coin geeks.

politics geeks. as in, know riding names across the country and know which of canada's 308 ridings are lib/con/NDP/likely-to-swing. also, knows congressional districts, which are swing seats, which are open seats?
lots of people know what's going on and have opinions, but politics geeks know the stats and the histories. i.e. when have canada and the US had concurrent elections?

these people are my favourite.

oh, um, reads political play-by-plays and biographies to wind down.

The word "Mathlete," is it a joke?

It's what Lindsey Lohan's math quiz team were called in Mean Girls! COME ON!

that story in the believer about gary gygax and the whole game underground in the 60's and 70's.

Scott, any idea where I can read this?

I guess we are now answering the question!

Where are the foodies?

In the company of film geeks, I always disparage our race, but I hafta represent here. I was almost inclined to vote for horror geeks, but too many of them are just adventurous Bruce Campbell fans.

Some other type of geeks (specify)

Where are the foodies?

-- Eric H., Tuesday, 1 January 2008 21:48 (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

Molecular gastronomists are easily the coolest geeks.

This poll will have a mirror images "least coolest," right?

no

http://nymag.com/images/2/daily/food/07/05/16_eggfiasco_lg.jpg

Guys who have to decide where to stop shaving, c/d?

Retrocomputing geeks.

We have the coolest, blinkingest toys, and we don't get asked to fix windows problems.

Yeah but there's nothing worse than being around two buds having a 15-minute conversation about who started out with the slowest internet connection.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

i think i'll go with toy collector

http://www.cyber-heritage.co.uk/bonnets/toys.jpg

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Yes, they are being so cool!!

Where is a face to be exhibiting one's SARCASM >_<

"Mathletes" now is continuing to be a good laugh! XD Good job MATHLETE! You have obtained a silver medal.

ILX in learning nothing from ILX shocker.

nah, the nature geek goes out to nature reserves on their weekends and looks for plants and animals. the lepidopterists and birdwatchers are foremost in this field; butterflies and avians elicit that much more excitement. the real ultras draw pictures of what they've seen in their notebooks, habitat and all. often bearded, they can frequently be found with binoculars. rarely harmful. sturdy walking-boots, goretex mac.

― Just got offed, Saturday, 29 December 2007 01:44 (6 years ago)

everything was boardwalked & the circuit could have been negotiated in carpet slippers today fwiw