The Big Picture: Baggage

[medv4380]

MC and RT don't do statistics

They post Averages which, if you've never taken a statistics course, is basic statistics. Meta Critic even goes as far as showing a critics deviation from other critics. If you've ever bothered to look at the profiles. Which is good to see if a critic is obeying regression towards the mean, but you probably wouldn't understand why you'd even want to know that because you're clearly not a statistician, or involved in research.

Averages aren't holy.

They aren't meaningless ether. Unless you're as nieve as Galton in 1906, and refuse to recognize averages because you want to commit the sin of confirmation bias because it contradicts your world view.

If you were right then a simple look to see if average scores of an individual would prove it. If I'm right then the average of their scores for what they reviewed would approach the overall average, and if you're right it wouldn't. Though you have to check users with a sufficient sample. I've check on several occasions. The data is public. Go verify for yourself.

 

[Abomination]

Do I really need to hear some feminist race theory analysis of a movie to figure out if id enjoy that movie?

If those kind of discussions are necessary/relevant/encouraged enough by the film to get the full experience of what it was trying to achieve, then the answer is...Yes. It is important to lay it out there to figure out whether you'll get anything out of the experience or not. Whether you're consciously self-aware of it or not, things like that WILL paint your perception of the film in question...

I think your hypothesis is further from the truth than you realize.

Sometimes a fellow just wants to know if the movie does what it says it is going to do in the trailers. While feminism is important in the real world an analysis of it for a single movie is really not something that many need to hear.

 

[startrekmike]

I don't really get his angle here, I mean, he is essentially saying that one should not critique a film, game, book, etc based only on the subject at hand and instead should use that review as a soapbox for personal or political opinion that may or may not have any direct relation to the work being reviewed in the first place.

Let me put it plainly, I watch 'Escape to the movies' because I want to see a film reviewed on it's own merits first and foremost and up until about half a year ago, that is what Bob did pretty well, I watch 'The big picture' to get his commentary on the state of life, the universe and everything else, 'The big picture' is his soapbox and I will watch it with that in mind but in all honesty, why even bother with both shows if they are going to be one in the same?

A good critic has the ability to take those personal biases and focus them, to use them to frame a review without sacrificing the overall quality of the review itself, a bad critic talks about the work and then (seemingly out of nowhere) says something like "I liked GTA V's gameplay but it's lack of a playable female main character is distracting and highlights a obvious flaw with the industry", you might agree with the statement but it adds nothing to the review because it is obviously no longer about the product in hand but instead takes the next exit into political/moral soapboxing for the sake of political/moral soapboxing.

Your review of 'Ender's game' was the first review where I really felt like you barely even reviewed the film at all, it was like the review was a afterthought that you hurriedly added at the end of a 'The big picture' episode. I walked away from the review barely even knowing anything about the film or it's overall quality other than that you clearly did not like it and I could not tell how much of that dislike was because of Card himself and how much could really be blamed on the film itself.

To be blunt, I think if you keep going the way you are going, you are going to lose a lot of the viewers who just want a review and not yet another platform for you to show how socially progressive and anti "normal" you are.

Seriously, if I want social commentary, I watch 'The big picture' and I enjoy it for what it is, if I want a film review, I watch 'Escape to the movies', if you are going to deliver the same content in both, why have two shows?

 

[Viredae]

The one problem I have with this particular video is Bob using Anita as an example to bolster his point, it's like using the Nazis as a point to bolster you point about transhumanism.

P.S. Yes yes, Godwin's Law, I give zero fucks.

 

[Floppertje]

snip

They aren't meaningless ether. Unless you're as nieve as Galton in 1906, and refuse to recognize averages because you want to commit the sin of confirmation bias because it contradicts your world view.

If you were right then a simple look to see if average scores of an individual would prove it. If I'm right then the average of their scores for what they reviewed would approach the overall average, and if you're right it wouldn't. Though you have to check users with a sufficient sample. I've check on several occasions. The data is public. Go verify for yourself.

Are you deliberately missing the point?
Obviously, since I disagree with YOU, I must have a confirmation bias.
I'm not saying averages are meaningless, I'm saying they're meaningless here. fanboys bombing or praising a work is NOT representative data of the population, ergo all statistics derived from that data are not indicative of the general opinion. Claiming that they are is like saying the views of the tea party are representative of every caucasian american.
and yes, of course the the average score of individual users would approach the overall average if you take a large enough sample, that is the definition of average!
as for your final remark: you're either talking out of your ass or you have way too much time on your hands. you're not going to convince me that your hobby is collecting data from metacritic to see how much individual users differ from the average. that would be both boring and pointless in equal measure.

 

[Psychobabble]

Well first, nice dissertation on the history of criticism, Bob. I found it both entertaining and educational.

However, I have to ask what's really going on here? Is this an open minded look at how criticism by it's very nature relies on the critic's opinions and emotions to be distinct and interesting, let alone meaningful? Or is it just a long-winded justification for your complete lambasting of Orson Scott Card in your last video?

Honestly, I feel it's a bit of both. Don't take that to mean I take any issue with your personal feelings on the man, or even disagree with them. It's just I feel you went out of your way to make your comments about him into a personal attack rather than a calm review of what you, me, and a plethora of others dislike about his politics, and the controversy those politics have stirred up around this film. Why does that annoy me as I don't like the guy either? I just feel you are above that kind of behavior.

 

[Viredae]

Do I really need to hear some feminist race theory analysis of a movie to figure out if id enjoy that movie?

If those kind of discussions are necessary/relevant/encouraged enough by the film to get the full experience of what it was trying to achieve, then the answer is...Yes. It is important to lay it out there to figure out whether you'll get anything out of the experience or not. Whether you're consciously self-aware of it or not, things like that WILL paint your perception of the film in question...

I think your hypothesis is further from the truth than you realize.

Sometimes a fellow just wants to know if the movie does what it says it is going to do in the trailers. While feminism is important in the real world an analysis of it for a single movie is really not something that many need to hear.

IF IT'S RELEVANT ENOUGH TO THE FILM AT HAND.

And as a "just sayin'" side not, you probably shouldn't trust trailers [http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/NeverTrustATrailer] all that much either. Advertising a movie is a totally different beast with its own rules and mechanics than the process of making the movie itself. Hell there are scenes made up SOLELY FOR trailers that never show up in the final movie but are advertised like it's one of the big setpiece moments. I mean, just look at this year and Iron Man 3's trailers. Those were INTENTIONALLY misleading in order to swerve you with its twist. And the Bridge to Teribithia [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3SvqEIKP4t8] is infamously misleading. The movie is nothing like the trailer, but since Chronicles of Narnia was popular at the time, that's how they were able to sell it. The movie didn't say what the trailer said, but that didn't make it a bad movie by any means.

And that's the thing, was (for instance) the mention of Card's political position relevant to the movie? Considering that the movie in and of itself does not, in fact, carry any of the mentioned "political" issues.

 

[Redd the Sock]

It isn't objective vs subjective that people take issue with (though the words are used, and like a lot online, incorrectly) it's what's being subjectively viewed. Many other products, if I looked for reviews, I'd see things limited to functionality. Is the new phone easy to use, or cumbersome. Does the ipad work, or break down easily. Does the kitchen appliance work as advertised, or fail to do what the commercial claimed. Opinions might differ based on personal experience, expectations, and some elements of taste, but they're made to measure performance in things that others can measure.

Entertainment on the other hand really only gets the measure of "did I like it" because "personal likability" is the only barometer people seem to think is applicable. We can't like bad movies. We can't not like good ones. When this slips into reviews, we get problems. A game series you don't like is poisoning the industry if it doesn't innovate beyond what it is, while another you like is a perfect game for not innovation beyond what works. Favoritism in that regard drops the value of a review to how entertainingly it's delivered as I know what you're going to rave over and what you're rant over even before you play or watch it. Factor in politics and we get real trouble, and not just in the sense of I came to ask how the movie was, not what you think of a big name behind it. Creative projects cover a wide range of messages, and you just come off as closed minded when you come off as saying something is superior if it promotes values I like, and inferior if it promotes ones I don't. Now I really can predict your opinion and find it even less useful because it's less a measure of quality of the work than it is praise or derision for supporting or not supporting the cause sight unseen.

Review objectivity is simply about moving beyond judgement based on you and into judgement based on what something wants to be. A good reviewer is someone that can say "this pushes all my like buttons, but here's what it cold still improve on", and "I find the values of this abhorrent, but it's well put together and even well argued."

 

[Gorrath]

A few thoughts about the video here. Firstly, I agree with Bob's overall message. Criticism cannot and should not occur in the void of "objectivity". It is far more important that the audience find a critic that shares a similar lens to their own. As Bob says, there is no "normal" and so it follows that there is likely a reviewer who shares your bias and will give you an idea of whether you'll like a piece of media or art. If you view the world through a modern feminist lens, you may find yourself likely to have similar thoughts and opinions about a movie that are shared by critic who is also a modern feminist. Since we are talking consumerist criticism here, going to people in your echo chamber is likely the best possible choice.

This also means that it is a far greater waste of time trying to argue with a critic who does not share your lens, than it is for you, the viewer, to simply find one who agrees with you. That is unless you are a hard-headed jackass like myself who enjoys arguing for sport of course, in that case carry on.

On a different note, I've seen a few people suggest in this thread, and out, that Mr. Card might be homosexual himself because of some of the imagery in his books. While I won't claim to know anything about the man's actual sexual preferences, I think it is absolute folly to try and figure it out based on his work. I've written quite a lot of fiction that has included some rather sexual imagery involving men. I do this because I feel it is fair game for me to write about characters in this way and it has no bearing on my actual sexual preference. I consider myself 100% heterosexual (discarding the notion that we are all likely somewhat bi-sexual, which I think may be true) and I would consider it quite asinine if someone claimed they knew anything about my sexual preferences or habits based on some homosexual romance scene I've written or the way I described a man's musculature.

 

[Ragsnstitches]

OT: I'm glad you touched on the topic of Objectivity bob. For years I used to think that objective critique was the purest form of criticism, but recently I've found it to be a pipe dream. How can you be objective about something unless you are highly knowledgeable of the processes that came to create the piece being critiqued? You can't. The more comprehensive a review, the more it has to dip into subjectivity as the reviewer must use his own personal opinion to make calls on aspects that they don't understand.

Smud boy was able to make an objective review of Dragon Age 2 and the Mass Effect series without having to know anything about the processes used to make any of these games and didn't need to use subjectivity to explain things. He was able to do this by analysing each part of the story, then determining whether the actions each character took was logical based on what we knew about them. So it seems that you can be an objective critic if you're prepared to do a lot of analysis.

https://www.youtube.com/user/smudboy/videos

Even Mr Plinkett is able to be an objective critic, as he's able to provide valid reasons why the Star Trek and Star Wars movies either made no sense or involved characters acting completely out of character.

http://redlettermedia.com/plinkett/

That's cute, you think Plinkett is objective.

Look, I love Redlettermedia and plinketts reviews and I agree with them pretty much completely. They are insightful and very entertaining. But they aren't objective. For the most part they do critically break down the problems the prequels and star trek films have. But they always do it while holding some other piece THEY prefer up for comparison.

They constantly go to and fro from prequels to Empire, since they cream their pants about empire. A lot of the major points they bring up is how differently they handle things between Prequels and Original Trilogy. Heck, the last half-hour of the Attack of the Clones review is based entirely around how they screwed the depiction of Yoda.

That is PURELY subjective, even if I feel as strongly as they do about it. They are using a subjective quality of one film, to guage the quality of another. PURE SUBJECTIVITY.

In the Star Trek reviews they constantly go back on the TNG series as their point of reference. Essentially, because the TNG movies weren't like the TNG series, the TNG movies are bad (there are other reasons why they are bad, but they mostly fall on subjective grounds). I forget which movie it was they reviewed, but they did the same thing with Picard as they did with Yoda, criticising the Picard from the movies, for not being like the Picard of the series. And while that is objectively true, that Picard was different in the movies, it's not an objective criticism of the movie. If you watched the movie but not the series and like that picard, then watched the series and didn't like that picard, would that mean that Picard of TNG is objectively worse then the movie Picard?

They do use objective analyses at points. The deconstruction of plot holes (episode 1 is full of them), the poorly written characters (like that sequence where Obi jumps out of the window after the drone when it would have made tons more sense for Anakin to do it) and the terrible narrative structure (having a dozen things happening at once in Phantom Menace towards the end). They are all, for the most part, objectively bad qualities. However, in their entirety, the reviews are unambiguously subjective, sometimes purely for the sake of humour.

I watched the first 15 minutes of Smudboys Bookend of Destruction analyses. Immediately I agree with him and what's more, he is definitely being objective. However it's not a review. It's an analyses. A review is an evaluation of the complete package, an analyses is the breakdown of a specific topic, in this case the narrative.

Heck he never calls his own stuff a review. How have you not noticed this?

 

[babinro]

My issue with the Ender's Game review was one of style.

I've seen a lot of 'Escape to the movies' episodes and this one stands out to me like a sore thumb. It doesn't reflect Movie Bob's critique style and comes across entirely out of place and as such unprofessional for the show.

After watching the episode I'm left asking myself. Would he have done the same if the Director of The Avengers had vocal anti-gay views? What if it was the writer of Pacific Rim? These are movies he loved and he heavily promoted that we see in theaters. Particularly Pacific Rim to support more work of this nature.

Would Movie Bob have spent the first 90 seconds of the Pacific Rim review calling out an anti-gay employee involved in the production, reminding you of your right to boycott, and then proceed to praise the movie and recommend we support it so we see more in the future?

Is this Movie Bob's new style for the show?
He has every right as a critic to do the show in this style. If it's not, then the Ender's Game review comes off as more of a personal attack than a review. Why give others in the industry a pass on their personal social/religious/political views?

Bottom line is that The Big Picture was a perfectly appropriate avenue for you to discuss that subject since it was suitable for this show's style. Which is basically talk about anything you feel like because it's on your mind. People don't go to 'Escape to the movies' to hear that sort of thing because it immediately impacts their view on the movie for reasons that have nothing to do with the quality of the film itself.

 

[MrBaskerville]

I'm pretty much disagree completely. Thrusting stuff into the review that doesn't belong there isn't mature at all. It isn't a question of thinking about things from a different perspective, as much as forcing a certain perspective on to something. Ender's Game made no attempt to have an opinion on the issues Card himself has associated with. In my opinion, boycotting because of Card's stance is just being butthurt. In the end though, I respect people's right to not see or see whatever they want. It's their opinion; they can have theirs as long as I can have mine.

I might be wrong (quite likely), but doesn´t Card use the money he earns to campaign against Gay marriage and stuff? If that was the case then i would say it´s relevant in a discussion of the film. If you are indirectly supporting something that you don´t really agree with by watching his stuff, then a boycut might be in order imo and it would be relevant in a review.

If he doesn´t use the money to promote his beliefs and if he doesn´t include his stances in the themes of the movie, then i don´t really see it as a problem. I can listen to Burzum, the man is a highly racist bigot and a downright terrible human being, but it isn´t reflected in his music and he isn´t politically active outside of blogs. Same goes for Roman Polanski, probably a terrible person, but it isn´t really reflected in his movies.

 

[Gorrath]

My issue with the Ender's Game review was one of style.

I've seen a lot of 'Escape to the movies' episodes and this one stands out to me like a sore thumb. It doesn't reflect Movie Bob's critique style and comes across entirely out of place and as such unprofessional for the show.

After watching the episode I'm left asking myself. Would he have done the same if the Director of The Avengers had vocal anti-gay views? What if it was the writer of Pacific Rim? These are movies he loved and he heavily promoted that we see in theaters. Particularly Pacific Rim to support more work of this nature.

Would Movie Bob have spent the first 90 seconds of the Pacific Rim review calling out an anti-gay employee involved in the production, reminding you of your right to boycott, and then proceed to praise the movie and recommend we support it so we see more in the future?

Is this Movie Bob's new style for the show?
He has every right as a critic to do the show in this style. If it's not, then the Ender's Game review comes off as more of a personal attack than a review. Why give others in the industry a pass on their personal social/religious/political views?

Bottom line is that The Big Picture was a perfectly appropriate avenue for you to discuss that subject since it was suitable for this show's style. Which is basically talk about anything you feel like because it's on your mind. People don't go to 'Escape to the movies' to hear that sort of thing because it immediately impacts their view on the movie for reasons that have nothing to do with the quality of the film itself.

In Bob's defense (as if he needs me to rush to it, I know) his preface of the review was likely written because there was already wide-ranging discussion about the topic. If he had been the one to light the fuse so to speak, I would probably agree with you, but it was quite topical at the moment and so he felt he should weigh in on it then and there. I thought he did a good job of making sure his thoughts on Card were separate from the review. Sure, he might not do this for every movie, but every movie doesn't have this issue cropping up in half a dozen threads. If there had been an ongoing controversy regarding the writer of Pacific Rim, I find it likely he might have weighed in on that too, but there wasn't.

 

[hentropy]

I think the idea that reviews SHOULD be very much opinionated is one that can't be understated. I hate it, especially in game reviews, where reviewers seem deathly afraid of deviating from the nuts and bolts of the game. On the other hand, most reviews aren't like that, but the issue here is simply politics. If I say "the characters in GTA V suck" then there might be people who disagree with me, even vehemently, but they won't accuse me of gross misconduct in most situations, they just think my opinion is wrong.

The problem isn't that reviewer are opinionated, it's that they often can't come up with valid reasons for giving games a good/bad score. If a game gets a bad score it should because of poor design, not because the reviewer didn't like the way one of the characters looked.

Mixing politics in with it, though, changes things dramatically. In the end, "this game is sorta sexist in these ways" is functionally no different from "this game has a bad story/characters", but because it challenges something about their politics, it's more than just civil disagreement.

Saying that a game is sexist isn't the same as saying it has a bad story/characters. Reviewers usually claim something is sexist when they lack a real reason for explaining why they didn't like a game, which is why most gamers object to reviewers giving games a low score for being sexist. By contrast problems if there's a problem with the story or character the reviewer usually goes into detail explaining why it's bad, so the gamers are less likely to complain because it's clear what the problem with the game is.

There are some people who seem convinced that misogyny and sexism no longer exists in any significant form, so suggesting that it exists in something they actually like isn't just disagreeable, it's worth much more outrage.

Sexism doesn't exist in any significant form in most developed countries as women can now vote, go to university, or become CEOs. Care to provide some evidence that there are still significant forms of sexism in the USA.

Even though I was just stating my opinion, I'm not in the eyes of those people, I'm "forcing" it on them like some sort of Clockwork Orange treatment. Really they're just afraid that the way of thinking might "catch on", and they clearly don't want it to.

You're defending game reviewer who base their reviews on whether a game meets their arbitrary moral criteria, rather than whether the games were good or bad. That's why gamers dislike you.

You're making an awful lot of unfounded generalizations, particularly about reviewers. Can you show me an example of a critic that wrote a review that simply said "that's sexist" and moved on with no explanation as to why? The truth is that it's always delved into, just as other aspects of the game are, your kind simply invalidates their opinion that something was sexist based on your own flawed ideas of what sexism is and what role it plays in society. Your kind who believe that because our black countrymen had equal rights under federal law since 1869, that means there was no significant amount racism that existed after that date.

Personally I am also entirely against numerical reviews for anything, it's one thing to do a general "positive or negative" aggregate like RT, where the criteria for a fresh rating is simply the reviewer saying "go see it". I get it, I'm a nerd and I like numbers too, but not everything can be quantified. Some people like good story and characters so much that, even if a game is fun and mechanically solid in other areas, the lack of a decent narrative might drag it down from a 10 to a 6 for some people, while for others it might have no effect. This is why they are meaningless, it is much more valuable to say "the story in this isn't very good for (these reasons)... but if you're just looking for mindless fun, you'll probably still enjoy it." This is a common thing in reviews, and something complex enough that you wouldn't be able to express it through numbers. This is one of the reasons why I like The Escapist so much, because while they still use numerical reviews for some things, many of their main critics refrain entirely from using them.

Activists within the game industry who want to change the way women are used in these games are not trying to get laws changed, they just want people to think differently about some of the stereotypical and potentially damaging ways women are treated in otherwise very good games.

 

[sonicstormer]

A review with a bias
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/jimquisition/7196-Boob-Wars-and-Dragon-Crowns

A reviewer pushing their bias
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tropes_vs._Women_in_Video_Games

One uses thoughtful insight on the matter, the other twists and bends what they are reviewing to try to make the audience believe that what they are saying is the truth.

This, all of this.

This is how I feel about it. It doesn't really apply to just anyone, so it's not a statement of critique itself, but specifically about MovieBob. When I fired up MovieBob's Ender's Game review I was actually unfamiliar with Orson Scott Card for the most part, or how incredibly vocal he can be for his rather unpopular standpoint (Shocker, a mormon is against same sex marriage). I was sitting here thinking to myself, "Umm, neat and all, and I'll look at this later. Not what I came here for Bob. I want to hear about the movie, you have The Big Picture for this kinda thing." and I've found myself saying this in my head more and more often as of late. You are unique in that you have your own show for "This is what I think about certain societal aspects" so please utilize it more to quit distracting me from the point at hand, "Did Bob like this movie?".

Now for a more broad subject, I'm one of those immature people you mentioned. I really don't see WHY we can't just shut up and play video games. I don't find a single problem with Edward Kenway being WASPy as hell, I just wanna shoot up frigates with large amounts of cannons and occasionally eliminate certain peoples of interest from the local population. I mean Mario games aren't about saving a princess because she's a helpless little flower, it's about rescuing someone you truly care about. Just enjoy the ride! Not everyone can be represented in the best possible light because it just waters the whole experience down. In spite of what the Anita Sarkeesians of the world will tell you, not every game needs some one legged, feminine, transgender, multiethinic, midget from Idaho or whatever. We're getting so far up our own asses looking for these kinds of things in every, single new title that releases that we've lost that we're just talking about games. Yeah, we need much, much more diversity in games, but all the bitching and moaning is not the right way to go about it. It's sensationalism, and no one listens to you when you do that. You just go on with your day and try to ignore the "extremist" over there, even when that is not the case. Anyway that's my rant, now for Jim for the weather. Jim?

 

[n00beffect]

Bob is right. The idea of criticism hinges, in my opinion, on Barthes' notion of 'The Death of the Author' (it's actually an essay of his), in which he details (gross oversimplification) that it's no longer the author who decides what his/her work means or aims to do; so, in light of that, why do we have to stick to either an 'OBJECTIVE' view of a piece of work or a theoretical approach? Subjectivity is important, far more important (or 'honesty', if you will), but at least with the theoretical approach you can still keep that aspect, without having to think of an 'average' viewer in mind.

 

[Azhrarn-101]

Ok Bob that was a great Big Picture episode.
As an EVE player, that EVE Online for Kinect line had me laughing out loud for a good minute. That's one way to condemn a movie, and describe it in as few words as humanly possible.

As for the meat of the episode, I couldn't agree more. Purity of purpose (a desire to inform people about your thoughts on a given subject-matter) is what counts here, not purity of criticism (because as you rightfully remark, that does not exist).

 

[medv4380]

snip

They aren't meaningless ether. Unless you're as nieve as Galton in 1906, and refuse to recognize averages because you want to commit the sin of confirmation bias because it contradicts your world view.

If you were right then a simple look to see if average scores of an individual would prove it. If I'm right then the average of their scores for what they reviewed would approach the overall average, and if you're right it wouldn't. Though you have to check users with a sufficient sample. I've check on several occasions. The data is public. Go verify for yourself.

Are you deliberately missing the point?
Obviously, since I disagree with YOU, I must have a confirmation bias.
I'm not saying averages are meaningless, I'm saying they're meaningless here.

No, your confirmation bias comes form your proclamation that averages should be ignored without data to back up your opinion. Or are you not a statistician as you claim? Which is what Galton did when he was desperate to prove that people as a whole are stupid. Your view isn't that much deviant from his since you desperately want to prove that gamers who give their opinion are all "stupid fanboys". Your bias is clearly spelt out, and your reasoning for dismissing averages is not.

What, pretel, do you think is different a bunch of random people writing down how much meat a cow will produce after it goes though the butchers versus asking people what rating do they think a game is? I'll get back to this. Just think about it.

Since you're clearly incapable of doing the math to prove your point let me show you, and anyone else who happens to be reading in on how this works.

Lets take the first user who reviewed Sonic Lost World on metacritic who reviewed more than 1 game. Our lucky reviewer happens to be MrAwesome091 [http://www.metacritic.com/user/MrAwesome091].
The users scores are
9,8,3,1,8,2,6,7,6,8,10
and the overall user score for each game is
8.2,7.4,2.2,1.4,7.5,7.7,3.6,7.3,6.0,7.7,8.0

MrAesome091's average comes to 6.2 and the average of all the games he reviewed came to 6.09. Now I know you are under the nieve impression that is the definitions of average. You are incorrect. This only works if two statements happen to be true. MrAesome091 must be giving is own personal view of what the game should be rated as. If he was being paid to give positive scores this wouldn't work. Second the average scores for each game cannot be biased significantly by anyone being paid to give a good review. Though also the converse could be true with him being paid, and all the scores being biased by publishers and devs. However, If a score of 2.2 is what the publishers are trying to create they're insane. Logically publishers would really only pay for positive scores.

I've given sufficient proof that the average scores are not significantly biased by paid astro turf, and that MrAesome091 is a fairly honest reviewer.

Now what is the difference between
asking people their opinion on how much Meat a Cow will give
vs
asking people their opinion on how good a game is.

Outside of one is meat and the other is a game not much. Their both opinions, and can be averages if you get a score for "how good" something is. If in the opinion of the cow the average didn't matter then the average wouldn't come out to be anywhere near the actual result. It would be just as you paint it "meaningless".

You haven't got to Galton in statistics so you're still fresh, but do you now what his experiment to prove that people ware stupid when he took all their guesses at how much meat a cow would produce? The Crowd guessed that the amount of meat that the butcher would get off of a cow to be 1,197 pounds. Galton didn't want anything to do with averages so he used the data to claim that they were stupid. The cow generated 1,198 pounds.

Averages are the only way to remove the "fanboy" bias your so hung up on. You should probably brush up on your stats. Your students will be better for it.

 

[Terminal Blue]

I envy those of you that lived under a rock where the ENTIRETY of the Ender's Game discussion wasn't almost exclusively about "I don't want to give Orson Scott Card money to do shitty things, so let's all boycott this movie." The film itself didn't carry any of his more radical beliefs, true, but that wasn't where the controversy was.

I don't know.. I haven't seen the film, but there are some pretty big warning signs around the book.

I mean, by comparison to other science fiction classics (like Dune, or Starship Troopers) it's not particularly unusual, but those were written decades earlier when prevailing scientific consensus, not to mention popular ethics, was very different. You have to be a bit strange to seriously propose in 1986 that eugenics work and that complex attributes like intelligence are hereditary, even in fiction.

The whole thing about murder or genocide being essentially forgivable based on motivation is also kind of creepy in its implications. I don't personally know how I feel about the whole "Hitler hypothesis", but the fact that it's a compelling argument already indicates to me that there's something a little fucked up there.

 

[wulf3n]

Would he have done the same if the Director of The Avengers had vocal anti-gay views? What if it was the writer of Pacific Rim? These are movies he loved and he heavily promoted that we see in theaters. Particularly Pacific Rim to support more work of this nature.

Would Movie Bob have spent the first 90 seconds of the Pacific Rim review calling out an anti-gay employee involved in the production, reminding you of your right to boycott, and then proceed to praise the movie and recommend we support it so we see more in the future?

He calls out Roman Polanski for being a "total creep" but still finds Rosemary's Baby to be a great film. He'd easily be able to do the same if any of your hypothetical scenarios happened too.

But they didn't happen, soooooo...=/

Are we certain there was no one that earned money from the ticket sales of The Avengers of Pacific Rim that isn't going to use that money in the same way as card?


OT:

What I found interesting was Moviebobs reluctance to tell his side of the position. I'm assuming it's the pro-boycott given how Moviebob talks about it, and given that most of what he does is give opinions on issue[GameOverthinker, The Big Picture] it's strange that he didn't give his opinion on that.

There's also the conflict of interest in reviewing a movie one would otherwise boycott [note: assuming Moviebob would boycott] as it's accepting money to help advertise something thought to be wrong, potentially giving money to card that he wouldn't otherwise have gotten.