Victor Barreiro on Journalism, Criticism, and Debate

"You furnish the pictures and I'll furnish the war."~~William Randolph Hearst

My good friend Victor "Stillwater" Barreiro asked my opinion on a piece he wrote for Rappler a day or two ago. He's concerned about his neutrality and integrity as a games journalist. (He also has a blog over at Games and Geekery):

As Rappler editor at large Marites Vitug wrote recently, it’s been suggested that as many as 9 out of 10 [Filipino] journalists are corrupt, with the extent of their corruption varying in degrees. The problem appears to be something caused by a number of factors, such as vested corporate interests, a lack of editorial independence, the need for money to survive, a desire for acceptance among corrupt peers, or simply not knowing whether an act is wrong because it has become common practice.

If the need to survive is an indicator of corruption, then pretty much the entire human race—and several other species—are guilty of corruption. I realize that people can behave unethically, but I don't believe that is our default setting. No offense, but journalists have an overinflated sense of neutrality that can lead to false concerns over "corruption." There are corrupt journalists, to be sure. I am also sure Victor is not one. Meanwhile, critics have an ever expanding outlet for trolling people they disagree with:

A short time after [a corruption scandal broke] I was also accused of being on the take. . . The simple reason was that I wrote an opinion column about my excitement for a game’s reboot based on the information provided by various sources.

I was reading last night about incidents of corruption over the past decade or so at the American Red Cross. Some cases were patently unethical, if not illegal: embezzlement, theft of goods, sexual misconduct. Other cases were occasions where I feel the ARC was correct, or behaved ethically, then was criticized unjustly. For example, the organization was warned against appearing to endorse corporate donors, like Coca Cola and Anheuser-Busch, who donated bottled water in support of Hurricane Katrina disaster relief. What was the ARC supposed to do, not accept the water? On other occasions they had donations in excess of what was needed to accomplish their mission for a given disaster, but were prevented from diverting those funds improve their ability to respond to future relief efforts. Then they were criticized for being unprepared. Heads rolled. The whole reading riled me up almost to Hulk levels. Just ask Sctrz.

Anyway, back to Stillwater's dilemma. When journalists, whether in the games industry or not, express their opinions in good faith, they need not worry about baseless criticism and accusations of corruption. If you report something that is false, but in good faith, all you can do later is set it right by reporting the truth. As long as you weren't lying in the first place, intentionally misleading your audience, you have done nothing wrong. You're biased, but if you're honest about your bias, write on.

I want to be criticized for my opinions and my representations of entities in my writing. This is not because I can adequately defend myself, but because it makes me accountable for the things I say and the facts I write, and if new information comes to light, I must work to ensure my writing remains accurate. This is because journalists work to inform the public.

Journalistic integrity is admirable, and to be sought after. Journalists need to be accountable for their writing. But journalists are human, with human foibles. Except for Andersuperman Cooper.

But what do I know? I'm just a damn dirty blogger.

Scarybooster: Blogger Extraordinaire

I has a sad. No, seriously, I'm a little emotional here.

Today marks the last official post from one of my earliest blogging friends, an insightful man with an inimitable way of reminding me and all of his other readers what is really important about gaming. Amazingly, he has written pretty much every post from his fruity smart phone, something I tried a couple times before giving up. His stories and parables humorously illustrate the foibles of the self-appointed MMO critics of the blogosphere and skewer the cynicism of a jaded playerbase. He even had the opportunity to write for MMORPG.com, where, unfortunately, a wider audience just didn't get it.

In the spirit of said anti-cynicism, Scary brought us Developer Appreciation Week, which tradition I plan to continue. Feeling the slow drag of the blogosphere has finally gotten to him, and he is discontinuing his blog for a while. In the meantime, his blog will still be up, so you can peruse his work. He said he may still post occasionally between now and the expiration of his current domain lease, but we won't getting anything regularly from him. I personally hope he gets bit by the writing bug again sooner rather than later.

Another NaNoWriMo, Another Year Without a Book Written

I'm calling it now. I completely ran out of steam on National Novel Writing Month about Day 10, after having written practically nothing for more than a couple days before that. I've never been great with long term projects, preferring and excelling at the pressure cooker of timed tests and essays. I really wanted to get something "on paper" this year, mostly to say I had done it, but also to get Scrivener at a big discount. It's on my wishlist this year for Christmas. I guess I'll have to pay full price for it. I love Scrivener, having used it last year, as well.

While I was a little better organized this year—and had more time, in theory—I just didn't have inspiration to fill in all the details of my plot outline, much less the level of detail required to fill 50,000 words worth of story. Sctrz says I am much better at essays than stories as far as she can tell, and I can't deny it. At the beginning of this month, I wrote almost a thousand words extolling the virtues of a movie, and barely got twice that in scenes for my book. Then I posted false word counts on the NaNoWriMo site to avoid the embarrassment. Who cheats on a for-fun creative writing project? This guy! :\

So the Great American Novel won't be rolling off this keyboard anytime soon. I'm good in short bursts, but found that even the lengthiest short story I've written for this blog was agonizing to finish. I read somewhat slower than many, and write even slower than that. I'll think I've included plenty of detail in an action sequence or description, only to realize that I have a few paragraphs instead of a chapter. Do I need more action, or more detail?

At 382 words, even this post is turning out longer than I'd anticipated. I'd like to think I have a good story in me, maybe several. But I fall down in the details of it. Maybe 50,000 words in a month is too much for my writing style. I'd be interested to see professional authors go through their writing process. As John Scalzi pointed out on Halloween, for him and many other authors, every month is Novel Writing Month.

President Schmesident! We Have a Known WoW Player In the Senate!

The Maine State Senate, that is.

Just following up on my post about Colleen Lachowicz, the candidate who was outed for playing WoW—and making "offensive comments" back in 2004—has defeated her incumbent opponent to achieve a seat in the Maine legislature's upper house.

What Is an Ocean . . .

. . . but a multitude of drops?

I've never been in a "battleground" state for a presidential election. So in the past I've often wondered what the point of me personally voting is. The vast majority of other voters for one candidate or the other will overwhelm my one vote either way. In light of one theme of Cloud Atlas, though, is that even in a vast ocean a single drop makes a difference, however small. And eventually the tide changes. So I voted.