Category: WWdN in Exile

After I gave my keynote at PAX last year, tons of fellow gamers began repeating my "Don’t be a dick!" motto. Several people suggested to me that we put it on a T-shirt.

I was unsure, but on the last day of PAX, I worked up all the courage I could muster, and asked Jerry and Mike if they’d be into doing it.

"What do you think about doing something like, "Wil says, ‘Don’t be a dick.’?"

"We’re totally into that," Jerry said.

"Yeah, just talk to Robert and we’ll do it." Mike said.

What I said was, "Awesome," but what I heard was, "Chopper, sic balls."

Wait. That’s not right. Let me try again.

What I said was, "Awesome, " but in my in my head, I was running laps around the room like my dogs do when I come home from a long trip.

I talked to Robert, and over the next few months we put the whole thing together. Yesterday, they put the T-shirt into the Penny Arcade store:

This is a really exciting thing for me. Being drawn by Mike is a huge honor, and spreading the Don’t be a dick meme is pretty awesome, too.

I worry a lot. It’s in my nature, and my doctors tell me that if I can’t stop worrying so much, I’ll have hypertension and high blood pressure. In fact, I’m already on my way there, and it’s one of the main reasons I felt so lousy while I tried to recover from sinus surgery.

More than anything else, I worry about my ability to support and provide for my family. This isn’t just about paying bills and putting food on my children; it’s about health insurance and college tuition and retirement saving. You know, all those things that grown-ups have to worry about.

Two stories came across Bloglines this morning that were encouraging to me, and seem to support my belief that I can continue the life of indie publisher and occasional actor for at least another few years. In fact, after looking at these two stories, I have a great deal of hope that the way I’ve been doing things since I first published Dancing Barefoot is the right way to do it — and will become the predominant way creative people make a living in the future.

Story number one tells us that Nine Inch Nails earned at least 750,000 in two days with the Creative Commons release of their new album Ghosts I-IV.

Mike Linksvayer, the CTO of Creative Commons, runs the numbers of Nine
Inch Nails’s Creative Commons download experiment and discovers that it
only took the band two days to exceed the typical net from a
massive-selling traditional CD release. The band sold $750,000 worth of
"limited edition deluxe sets," plus an unknowable further sum from
sales of the regular CDs and merch.

I was thrilled to grab the first CD — legally — off bittorrent, and I was doubly thrilled to see the best download speeds I think I’ve ever gotten in a .torrent file. Not even new Linux releases were as widely-seeded as Ghosts I was. I liked what I heard so much, I bought the two-disc set, which included an instant download of the entire album.

Clearly, I’m not going to make 750K at one time, ever, but NIN’s and Radiohead’s success in directly engaging their fans and audience via the Internet both validates the way I’ve chosen to sell and market my books, and gives me hope that there is, indeed, a viable future for creative people who choose to reach their fans directly, without doing things "the old way."

The second link addresses that directly, and is especially relevant to me, personally. It comes from Kevin Kelly, and is titled 1000 True Fans.

Other than aim for a blockbuster hit, what can an artist do to escape the long tail?

One solution is to find 1,000 True Fans. While some artists have
discovered this path without calling it that, I think it is worth
trying to formalize. The gist of 1,000 True Fans can be stated simply:

A creator, such as an artist, musician, photographer,
craftsperson, performer, animator, designer, videomaker, or author – in
other words, anyone producing works of art – needs to acquire only
1,000 True Fans to make a living.

A True Fan is defined as someone who will purchase anything and
everything you produce. They will drive 200 miles to see you sing. They
will buy the super deluxe re-issued hi-res box set of your stuff even
though they have the low-res version. They have a Google Alert set for
your name. They bookmark the eBay page where your out-of-print editions
show up. They come to your openings. They have you sign their copies.
They buy the t-shirt, and the mug, and the hat. They can’t wait till
you issue your next work. They are true fans.

To raise your sales out of the flatline of the long tail you need to
connect with your True Fans directly.  Another way to state this is,
you need to convert a thousand Lesser Fans into a thousand True Fans.

Assume conservatively that your True Fans will each spend one
day’s wages per year in support of what you do. That "one-day-wage" is
an average, because of course your truest fans will spend a lot more
than that.  Let’s peg that per diem
each True Fan spends at $100 per year. If you have 1,000 fans that sums
up to $100,000 per year, which minus some modest expenses, is a living
for most folks.

First off, I’m not crazy about the term "true fan," because that seems to imply that unless you’re willing to spend $100 a year on someone, you’re not a True Fan. I’d prefer "diehard fan" or "core customer" or something like that, probably because I consider myself to be a True Fan of several different artists, and I don’t know if I’d spend $100 a year on a bunch of merchandise. I think it makes sense to compare these people to season ticket holders, if that makes any sense. Well, it does to me: I love the Kings and the Dodgers. I can’t afford to be a season ticket holder any more, but I don’t think that makes me any less of a True Fan. Maybe I’m overthinking this. Let’s move on.

But about Kevin Kelly’s number: $100,000 a year from my work? That’s more than "modest" for me. I’d love to earn $100,000 a year from my work. I’m not entirely sure if I can pull it off, though, because at the moment, I’m not putting out $100 worth of new stuff each year, and I don’t think I’ve hit the 1000 True Fan threshold, yet. 300, for sure (and for the win!) but I think my number is probably closer to 400 or 500, considering what I publish, how frequently I publish, and various economic factors. I’m not sure if I can double that number before the end of 2008, but Kevin Kelly is absolutely on to something here (Jonathan Coulton agrees with him, and JoCo is doing with music what I hope to do with words) and I’ve got a goal to aim for now: double that number, and increase the amount of stuff I’m putting out there every year so it’s worth at least $100 a person.

I don’t know if I can do it, but I’m going to do my best to make it happen.

I just found out that Gary Gygax died. He was only 69.

I failed my save vs. stunning blow, so forgive me if this isn’t the most polished thing in the world.

For most geeks, RPGs are a huge part of who we are, and many of the games I’ve loved — and continue to love — probably wouldn’t exist as they do without Gary Gygax. The news reports are calling him "the father of D&D," but he was really the father of all role playing games, whether they were played with dice and paper, a deck of cards, or on a computer. Yeah, wargames existed before D&D, and fantasy existed before D&D, but D&D is the game that introduced fantasy gaming to my generation.

I didn’t know him, and never met him, but his impact upon my life can’t be overstated.

To honor his passing, I’d like to share an excerpt from A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Geek, from Happiest Days of Our Lives:

December, 1983

I sat on the floor in Aunt Val’s house and opened up her Christmas present to me. It was a red box with a really cool-looking dragon on the front of it. Inside, there were a few books, some dice, a map, and a crayon to color in the dice.

“That’s a game that I hear lots of kids like to play, Willow,” she said. “It’s dragons and wizards and those things you liked from The Hobbit. The back says you use your imagination, and I know what a great imagination you have.” My brother played with Legos and my cousins played with handheld electronic games. I felt a little gypped.

“Wow,” I said, masking my disappointment. “Thanks, Aunt Val!”

Later, while the other kids played with Simon and Mattel Electronic Football, I sat near the fireplace and examined my gift. It said that I could be a wizard or a fighter, but there weren’t any pieces that looked like that. There were a lot of weird dice, but I had to color in the numbers. That seemed silly, but at least it was something to do, so I grabbed the black crayon and rubbed it over the pale blue dice, just like the instructions said.

Aunt Val (who was my favorite relative in the world throughout my entire childhood and right up until she died a few years ago) walked into the living room. “What do you think, Willow?”

“I colored the dice,” I said, and showed her the result. “But I haven’t read the book yet.”

She patted my leg. “Well, I hope you like it.” She moved to the other side of the room, where my cousin Jack poked at a Nintendo Game and Watch.

I opened the Player’s Guide and began to read.

February, 1984

It was afternoon PE in fifth grade, and I was terrified. I ran and jumped and ducked, surrounded by a jeering crowd of my classmates. The PE teacher did nothing to stop the attack – and, in fact, encouraged it.

“Get him!” someone yelled as I fell to the asphalt, small rocks digging into my palms. I breathed hard. Through my adrenaline-fueled flight-or-fight response, the world slowed, the jeering faded, and I wondered to myself why our playground was just a parking lot and why we had to wear corduroy pants in the middle of a Southern California heat wave. Before I could offer any answers, a clear and loud voice spoke from within my head. “Hey,” it said. “You’d better get up and move, or you’re dead.”

I nodded my head and looked up in time to see the red playground ball, spinning in slow motion, as the word “Voit” rotated into view. Pain exploded across my face and a mighty cheer erupted from the crowd. The PE teacher blew her whistle.

I don’t know how I managed to be the last kid standing on our team. I usually ran right to the front of the court so I could get knocked out quickly and (hopefully) painlessly before the good players got worked up by the furor of battle and started taking head shots, but I’d been stricken by a bout of temporary insanity – possibly caused by the heat – on this February day, and I’d actually played to win the game, using a very simple strategy: run like hell and hope to get lucky.

I blinked back tears as I looked up at Jimmie Just, who had delivered the fatal blow. Jimmie was the playground bully. He spent as much time in the principal’s office as he did in our classroom, and he was the most feared dodgeball player at the Lutheran School of the Foothills.

He laughed at me, his long hair stuck to his face in sweaty mats, and sneered. “Nice try, Wil the Pill.”

I picked myself up off the ground, determined not to cry. I sucked in deep breaths of air through my nose.

Mrs. Cooper, the PE teacher, walked over to me. “Are you okay, Wil?” she asked.

“Uh-huh,” I lied. Anything more than that and I risked breaking down into humiliating sobs that would follow me around the rest of the school year, and probably on into sixth grade.

“Why don’t you go wash off your face,” she said, not unkindly, “and sit down for a minute.”

“Okay,” I said. I walked slowly across the blacktop to the drinking fountains. Maybe if I really took my time, I could run out the clock and I wouldn’t have to play another stupid dodgeball game.

January, 1984

Papers scattered across my bed appeared to be homework to the casual observer, but to me they were people. A thief, a couple of wizards, some fighters: a party of adventurers who desperately wanted to storm The Keep on the Borderlands. But without anyone to guide them, they sat alone, trapped in the purgatory of my bedroom, straining behind college-ruled blue lines to come to life.

I tried to recruit my younger brother to play with me, but he was 7, and more interested in Monchichi. The kids in my neighborhood were more interested in football and riding bikes, so I was left to read through module B2 by myself, wandering the Caves of Chaos and dodging Lizard Men alone.

February, 1984

I washed my face and drank deeply from the drinking fountain. By the time I made it back to the benches along the playground’s southern edge, I’d lost the urge to cry, but my face radiated enough heat to compete with the blistering La Crescenta sun.

I sat down near Simon Teele, who, thanks to the wonders of alphabetization, ended up with me and Harry Yan (the school’s lone Asian kid) on field trips, on fire drills, and in chapel. Simon was taller than all of us, wore his hair down into his face, and really kept to himself. He was reading an oversized book that sort of looked like a textbook, filled with charts and tables.

We weren’t officially friends, but I knew him well enough to make polite conversation.

“Hey,” I said. “Why don’t you have to play dodgeball?”

“Asthma,” he said.

“Lucky,” I said. “I hate dodgeball.”

“Everyone hates dodgeball,” he said, “except Jimmie Just.”

“Yeah,” I said, relieved to hear someone else say out loud what I’d been thinking since fourth grade.

“Hey,” I said. “What are you reading?”

He held up the book and I saw its cover: a giant statue, illuminated by torches, sat behind an archway. Two guys were on its head, prying loose one of its jeweled eyes, as a group of people stood at the base. One was clearly a wizard; another was obviously a knight.

“Player’s Handbook,” he said. “Do you play D&D?”

I gasped. According to our ultra-religious school, D&D was Satanic. I looked up for teachers, but none were nearby. A hundred feet away on the playground, another game of dodgeball was underway. I involuntarily flinched when I heard the hollow pang! of the ball as it skipped off the ground.

“You’re going to get in trouble if you get caught with that,” I said.

“No, I won’t,” he said. “If I just keep it turned upside down, they’ll never see it. So do you play or not?”

“I have the red box set,” I said, “and a bunch of characters, but I don’t have anyone to play with.”

“That’s Basic,” he said. “This is Advanced.”

“Oh.”

“But if you want, you could come over to my house this weekend and we could play.”

I couldn’t believe my good luck. With a dodgeball to the face, Fate put me on the bench next to the kid who, over the next few months, helped me take my first tentative steps down the path to geekdom. He had a ton of AD&D books: the Dungeon Master’s Guide, which had a truly terrifying demon on the cover, and would result in certain expulsion if seen at school; the Monster Manual, which was filled with dragons; and the Fiend Folio, which not only had demons and devils, but a harpy and a nymph, accompanied by a drawing of a naked woman! with boobs!!

Simon’s parents were divorced, and he lived with his mom in a huge house in La Canada. His room was filled with evidence of a custody Cold War. Too many toys to count littered the floor and spilled out of the closet, but even though we were surrounded by Atari and Intellivision, GI Joe and Transformers, we had D&D fever, and the only prescription was more polyhedral dice.

Of all the things I do that make me a geek, nothing brings me as much
joy as gaming. It all started with the D&D Basic Set, and today it takes an entire room in my house to contain all of my books, boxes, and dice.

Thank you for giving us endless worlds to explore, Gary Gygax. Rest in peace.

My friend Kathleen introduced me to mental_floss magazine about a year ago. Since then, I’ve picked up a few of their books (I love the Genius instruction Manual) and I’ve become a daily reader of the mental_floss blog. I think a lot of WWdN readers will dig it, too, especially if you enjoyed the Intellectual Devotional book that I mentioned last year.

They run quizzes on their blog that always kick my ass . . .  until today’s WWF action figure quiz.

I loved these action figures when I was a kid. They were heavy, they were sculpted, they were totally different than any other action figure before or since, and during an era when wrestling video games didn’t exist (this is before Exciting Hour gave us the Insane Worrier and his pals) playing with them in the Sling ‘Em-Fling ‘Em Wrestling Ring was the closest we could get to recreating our favorite matches . . . or inventing our own stories and rivalries:

"The Iron Sheik would never team up with Hulk Hogan!"
"Oh yeah, watch this!"

Ah, youth.

This is probably one of those generational things, but if you used to
get up early on the weekends to watch Mean Gene and Jesse The Body
Ventura do commentary while The Hart Foundation took on The Killer
Bees, you’re going to love it.

I took the quiz this morning, and scored 86% (12 out of 14.) I would have scored 13 out of 14 if I hadn’t second-guessed myself on [redacted] when I should have just trusted my instincts. I do that a lot, goddammit. In my defense, there was one guy who I’ve never heard of, because he was, sadly, after my time. God, it kills me to say that. Why can’t wrestling stay preserved in amber, existing only from 1980-1986? Because we wouldn’t have Mankind and The Undertaker’s legendary Hell in a Cell match if we did, that’s why.

Hey, want to have some fun?

Take a look at your nose. See how normally-sized it is? Pretty small and stuff, right? Maybe a few centimeters across?

This afternoon, my doctor pulled two plastic splints out of mine, each the about one-and-a-half times the size of a silver dollar and shape of a smashed penny (I just looked at them again, because he sterilized them so I could keep them as a souvenir) When he was done, I had this overwhelming compulsion to get my ass to Mars.

I instantly felt 100% better, and when he told me that I can resume all
my normal activities (albeit slowly, over several weeks) – including the glorious consumption of Guinness – I
thought I was going to cry with joy and relief.

I know that my doctor has lots of patients, and I know that taking care of all of us is his job, but throughout this entire process, from my first consultation to the removal of my splints this afternoon, he and his entire surgical team and office staff made me feel like I was his only one. I’m an extremely lucky, happy, and grateful guy. Who can finally breathe normally. Though his nose.

Huzzah!