Fallow said:
Every 'genius' being 25 years old. No buddy, that's not how the world works. There's a reason that all the experts, veterans, Nobel laureates, and Turing laureates are old and experienced.
Every super-programmer of late being 25, female, chatty/hypersocial, and dressed up like a retard/alternative combo. I have met over 3,000 programmers and not a single one of them matched anything even close to that profile. The awesome programmers are old, experienced, and calm, rational people.
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I can see what you mean, but I'm fairly against fiction being required to adhere to the rules of the real world. Not just because that would mean we couldn't have crazy future tech or conveniences, but because if we were to REALLy adhere to the real world, dialogue would also change. There would be a ton of "uuhm" between sentences, awkward pauses, stuttering, irrational or short-sighted quips going back and forth without anything really happening etc, something I don't think needs to be taken done in fiction, just because it would be more "realistic".
Also to hell with calm and rational characters, I say! What good story has ever been told were the characters were just perfect little things that never had any flaws, never messed up and never had did something wrong? Very few I gather. I'll always take characters with some spunk in them, who trip over chords and start civil wars out of petty grievances, who yell at the mailman for delivering the letters too early. That's what good drama is made out of.
That's also how I prefer to look at people in the real world. I prefer the ones with clear flaws and that make mistakes, because these are people that are imperfect and are willing to show the world just that, and don't try to cover it up or look like they're made of stone.