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From: buzzard@world.std.com (Sean T Barrett)
Subject: Re: PrologueComp results
Message-ID: <GEr8JI.HnJ@world.std.com>
Date: Mon, 11 Jun 2001 07:23:42 GMT
References: <3b22ae44_1@dilbert.ic.sunysb.edu> <h8CU6.8919$ki5.123836@vixen.cso.uiuc.edu> <9fut4o$nib$1@cascadia.drizzle.com> <emshort-1006011334120001@user-2inikis.dialup.mindspring.com>
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Emily Short <emshort@mindspring.com> wrote:
>grignr@cascadia.drizzle.com (Adam Cadre) wrote:
>> we've *all* got hundreds of ideas.  The people who actually *are* willing
>> to put the work into fully implementing them should be the ones granted the
>> honor of using them first.  If one of the ideas I have on the back burner
>> were scooped by, say, a comp game, well, that's life.  But if it'd been
>> spoiled by a 2K text piece that someone cranked out in 45 minutes, well,
>> I'd be pretty darn ticked.
>
>I remain unconvinced that someone's little prologue, however apparently
>similar in intent, would be enough to spoil a full game of yours.
>Nonetheless, I see the point.

I agree with both these comments. I can sympathize with the annoyance
factor (one week after I started working on "A Storm Brought About By
A Moth's Flapping Wing", several years ago, someone posted the premise
to r.a.i-f); but on the other hand, comparing the idea to the full-fledged
work is a little odd. Should we be critical of the author of "The Garden
of Forking Paths" (not the Garden*burger*) for writing so many stories
about never-written books, thus "using up those ideas" so authors can't
write the actual books? (Well, the ones that aren't impossible.)
What if somebody cranked out a SpeedIF game in two hours that anticipated
one of your plots? Less likely given the typical SpeedIF rules, but
still possible.

I think the prologue competition was a very useful exercise, and
I learned several things from it: the importance (to some people)
of a good prologue; what things a variety of people think makes
a good prologue; and that I can get my writing moderately competitive
if I spend 5x as long on it as certain other people--all lessons
I'm not sure I could have learned as well in any other way.

SeanB
