I think I am more than clever enough, but yes, back to the topic at hand.
Your view of the world is twisted. And BYOND is not the world. Therefore it does not and should not follow the same rules.
History is full of people who spend years learning a specific skill or trade and teaching it to others. Whether it is a father teaching his son how to ride a bike, or a college professor teaching mathematics to the next generation of scientist, we see this happening all of the time. In SOME examples we see people doing so to get paid, but sometimes being paid is just a perk to that exchange of information.
I am not asking for a hand out. I am also not saying that experienced developers should do this for free. As I have mentioned many times in this thread I believe people should get paid for there work and time. What I am asking for however is a exchange of information by members of the same community who have similar interest, not only because they will in turn get something out of it (such as money) but because it is a way to help the community in general. Even if they still request money to do it.
You know Silk, if you spent less time coming up with snappy comebacks and trolling post on the forum and more time helping the community then who knows how much BYOND could advance. I notice people like you who always have an opinion about the quality of games on BYOND and how we need better developers, but when given the chance to actually make a difference you would rather complain then help.
Lets put the ball in your court. Instead of commenting on this post. Take the couple of days at 1 hour per day to come up a detailed tutorial on how to start developing a game. You probably waste more than 1 hour a day flipping through channels on TV or trolling the forums when bored so this shouldn't waste any of your "valuable". Then when you are done, show it to a developer buddy of yours that you know to have decent skills and ask him/her what he/she thinks and if there is anything that should be added. Pass it around for a few days and possibly come up with a larger more detailed design (with your friends help) for how to start your very first world tutorial. Then send it off to a few people you know who want to be developers but just need a boost in the right direction, get there feed back and you and the developers you worked with could fix/change the tutorial accordingly. Again only doing this for an hour a day. If you are to busy then skip a day but try to be consistent. Lets say this takes about 2 weeks. at an hour a day that's 14 hours. So a little more than half of a whole day you have spent making and perfecting this tutorial (Now in reality this could take a lot longer or a lot less depending on how detailed you are and what not). At the end of the day you would have wasted a little over half a whole day but now you have a finished working product.
If at least 1 person reads that tutorial and learns how to program or is at least started on the right track with correct practices, then was it worth the time you put forth? If 15 or 30 people are helped by it, is it still worth it? If you charged $5 per-person to view it because you did still put in all that hard time and effort and should be paid according, would it make it any more worth it? Sure you would be getting paid now, but at the end of the day you accomplished something more than just making money. You helped someone. And that is how BYOND should work. People of the same community working together to help others whether it be for money or for the challenge or for the pride of doing something nice for another.
So why on earth wouldn't you do this? Because your time is to valuable? What if you were sick and you went to the doctors but he told you that he didn't feel like helping you because his time was better suited else where. I mean I am sure there are other people in the world sicker than you. And in reality he doesn't have to treat you, he could do a basic job that is inconclusive take your money and boot you without any thought. But the do treat you, not because you are paying them, and not because it is there job (because again there are others who are more sick then you, they don't have to treat you when others out there need them more), but because they have a responsibility to at least try, because if you aren't treated you could be driving home and die and crash into his family or kill countless other people by mistake. (Of course it is not the responsibility of Experienced developers to help newbies but it would help the situation if they did)
(Now you are probably wondering what that has to do with BYOND, but if you think about it, if the doctors are the experienced developers, and the patient is the newbie. If they don't get "treated" then you have an out break of rips or low quality games. And sure the patient could have used Web MD to try and treat themselves but without medical knowledge they probably wont do it nearly as well as the doctors would and it could just cause more issues and/or accidents.)
Now I live in reality and I don't expect everyone to jump up and start doing this, just like you don't expect me to cut you a check for $200 to teach someone else how to program. But if just a few members on BYOND who have the knowledge and the ability got together and did this and it helped people to start making quality games, it would help BYOND immensely.. WE might finally be able to attract other good programmers to BYOND to make more top quality games, which bring in more members which allow for Tom to be able to hire more staff to better the BYOND software faster and more efficiently.
Moussiffer wrote:
Your view of the world is twisted. And BYOND is not the world. Therefore it does not and should not follow the same rules. I think I might have just had a seizure. Anyway, Moussiffer, why don't you take the time to learn DM then start tutoring people rather than demanding everyone else do it? You're just going around pointing fingers at people for not being productive yet you have nothing to show for yourself. I don't understand how you can talk down to Silk even though he's done more than you probably ever will simply by crafting a few quality games. I guess it's just easier to demand things of others while you're in no position to meet those demands yourself. | |
You either choose to ignore reality, or you just don't have the ability to comprehend it. This will be my last reply.
Moussiffer wrote: History is full of people who spend years learning a specific skill or trade and teaching it to others. Whether it is a father teaching his son how to ride a bike, or a college professor teaching mathematics to the next generation of scientist, we see this happening all of the time. In SOME examples we see people doing so to get paid, but sometimes being paid is just a perk to that exchange of information. I've already addressed this: SilkWizard wrote: You don't understand how people work. In the real world, people don't spend years learning something and then just give away their time and knowledge for no reason. If they do give it away, then they choose to do so for a cause that has meaning to them. Moussiffer wrote: You know Silk, if you spent less time coming up with snappy comebacks and trolling post on the forum and more time helping the community then who knows how much BYOND could advance. I notice people like you who always have an opinion about the quality of games on BYOND and how we need better developers, but when given the chance to actually make a difference you would rather complain then help. Shall we tally the score? Moussiffer's BYOND Accomplishments * Making a useless forum post appealing to other people to take action. Silk's BYOND Accomplishments * Created some of BYOND's best games * Brought in hundreds of new users to BYOND * (Automatically) given at least 10% of the thousands of dollars of Proelium/NEStalgia subscription revenue earned over the years to BYOND. * Has been a voice for positive change on BYOND by setting an example with original games. * And, as of today, has started to release valuable learning materials that will help developers make their games better. I've only touched on my "BYOND Accomplishments" to give you a bit of perspective on how unfortunate your position is. Let's be clear: my goal has never been to help BYOND. Helping BYOND has just been a natural side effect of doing what is good for myself, and not expecting others to do it for me. You should try it sometime. | |
SuperAntx wrote:
Moussiffer wrote: Honestly if I had the experience to do so I would. As of right now, I am still learning DM myself and don't think I would do anyone a favor by making a tutorial (which is also the same reason I don't go making half assed games and throwing them up on a hub, because I am still learning to make quality games). However, when others ask for help from my, I help them as best as I can or I direct them to someone or something that I know can help them. Just my way of trying to do my part to help the situation. I might not be able to do a lot but I do try, and unlike a decent amount of other people on BYOND I am actually taking the time to learn the language and good practices so that I may one day make quality games and help others do the same. Also, again, this is not a demand. This is a request. I am not trying to force people into doing this, just making a general suggestions. experienced developers can either take it or leave it. I am entitled to my opinion, and this is how I feel about the situation and my suggestion on how it could be solved. Or at least worked on in some way. | |
Moussiffer wrote:
So why on earth wouldn't you do this? Because your time is to valuable? What if you were sick and you went to the doctors but he told you that he didn't feel like helping you because his time was better suited else where. Comparing personal health to the creation of games is completely off. The big issue with your argument is you don't seem to perceive time as a valuable resource. And that flaws your own argument: If time is not a valuable resource, then the person wanting to learn could just as well spend an infinite amount of hours figuring things out themselves, instead of asking for help. Lets put time into perspective: I'm a badly paid IT freelance fellow, I usually charge $64 an hour (makes out to be 350DKK). If I spend 2 hours answering some guys questions, did I lose $128? Not in reality, I don't have a booked calendar full of IT support of this kind. But maybe I lost $128, in reality I'd never make that choice. But I did lose 2 hours which could be spent on one of the following: * Cleaning house / buying goods for house * Spending time with girlfriend * Working on University studies / bachelor * 2 hours spent at my part-time job, which nets me $21/hr Some people have lots of free time, and very rarely I do as well - And then I don't mind helping. But most people either don't, or would rather spend it elsewhere. That may not net them the good samaritan of the year award, but they're not saving lives here like a doctor - They're helping someone with a programming issue. And more often than not, one that stems from not spending more than a few minutes trying to find an answer. In reality the issue is more likely to be that the ratio of quality developers to asked questions is far too skewed; coupled with the usual ungratefulness of teenagers, you get the current situation. | |
After reading through all of this, i have a suggestion for YOU, moussifier, and this is not a troll post or the likes.
Make a guild. Call it Tutor's guild or something. Advertise it. Get people to join it, whether they are willing to tutor, or they want to be tutored. Set up a forum. Have two categories: Tutor applications, and tutor info. Use Tutor Info to allow tutors to put details of what they can tutor in, what they will charge, etc. Use Tutor applications to.. well, you get the idea. If you can do that, then you will have made an effort towards solving this problem. If it fails, then you know that either you didnt advertise it well enough, or people didnt like the idea. If it works, then you can stop getting on to other people to try this, because you will already have a bunch of people that will do it. Simple enough? | |
The money doesn't matter and the amount of time volunteered doesn't matter. What is ridiculous is the assumption that one-on-one tutoring is the best use of the experienced developer's time. Instead of spending a few hours teaching a small group of people you could spend the time making a tutorial, demo, library, or article that hundreds or thousands of people can benefit from.
I agree that people are generally selfish with their time (but you can't blame them, it is their time after all). However, the community can be set up in such a way that it promotes a better use of volunteered time. | |
Tiberath wrote:
For instance, there is far more teaching material on this website now than when I started messing with DM in 2003. There is definitely more material... The developer portion of the site is a mess for someone brand new. There is no hand holding, they're thrown in head first. They're bombarded by a page full of articles, demoes, and libraries, and there really isn't an obvious place to go. Assuming they make it to the "Getting started" page (which is just a link hidden amongst a blob of other random links),the actual resources listed on the getting started page? Wow, we just told them to read a 200 page book before doing anything else. There goes most of the people that may have had some interest... | |
I absolutely agree about the frequent suggestion to "read the guide". I'm not sure how that came to be a newbie friendly suggestion but it's a joke. BYOND is supposed to make game development easy, but I don't know many people who would ever use the expression "that's as easy as reading a 200 page book."
In regards to the organization of the site, I'm not sure if there's a page that clearly explains what BYOND is, what the software does, and how you can use it to make games. I suspect that authenticated users would be routed around such a page so I'm not even sure if the site has such a page in the new layout. I think this is partially Tom's problem because it does involve design aspects of the site, but it more is the community's problem - there's nothing stopping any of us from writing up good introductions for the BYOND software. These kinds of issues are probably low on the staff's list of priorities because they're busy with other things. Identifying problems is a good start but we need to start coming up with solutions. | |
This problem that everyone has with reading the guide is ridiculous. It's a 200 page book. Get over it. That's a day, maybe two, of reading. Even re-reading it and working with the knowledge as you go, that should only take a week at best. If you were really adamant about making games, then you would have no problem with this.
The biggest problem I had was that I was a stupid teenager raised without the appreciation of books. The fact that everyone else is the same way kind of puts a sour taste in my mouth. The other problem was that I read better when the book is in my hand. I'm probably going to buy one from Tom, if he still has any. We'll see how long it takes for mine to get a coffee stain. | |
Forum_account wrote:
I absolutely agree about the frequent suggestion to "read the guide". I'm not sure how that came to be a newbie friendly suggestion but it's a joke. BYOND is supposed to make game development easy, but I don't know many people who would ever use the expression "that's as easy as reading a 200 page book." The guide is the most valuable resource for prospective BYOND developers, especially those without prior programming experience. They don't have to read the whole thing-- a large part of it is a reference-- but they need to at least read the introductory chapters to understand the syntax of DM. If they aren't familiar with basic programming constructs, it can help with that too. The guide is written in a fairly practical manner and introduces working programs (including the map construction) very early on. If developers can't make it to that section, then I don't give them much hope, honestly. In regards to the organization of the site, I'm not sure if there's a page that clearly explains what BYOND is, what the software does, and how you can use it to make games. The Start page, which is linked from the main pages, gives a brief overview and includes a link for developers, which leads to a very useful page of links (this is also linked as the very first item on the main developer page. We've tried to make this as simple and visible as possible, but it is a work in progress. IMO, if people aren't seeing that the site is full of help, they aren't really looking. Now it may be the case that the quality of the help is not so great; that is mostly on the community to improve but we are working on some things to help make the feedback process better. As far as the general question: I agree with most of the responses that it is a bit ridiculous to expect one-on-one tutoring. I don't think that the initial forum thread was that bad; however, I have seen much ruder responses and I would like to cut that crap out of our site. The forums have gotten very hostile in recent years, which leads to an unwelcoming atmosphere for newbies and keeps some knowledgeable users from participating as much as they could. We could all benefit from a more welcoming environment. That is partially on me and the mods to enforce things better and partially on the community to make a better effort. | |
I have never encountered an unfamiliar programming language, library, software suite, or API and had someone tell me "you want to know the best way to learn about that? Read this 200 page book." If the basics of any other topic (and I mean any topic) can be summarized in less than 200 pages, BYOND should have a shorter introductory resource too.
It's very likely that over the course of using DM a person will read more than 200 pages of text scattered over various resources. It's not the amount of text or time required to read it that's daunting. The problem is proclaiming that a 200 page book is the best way to learn about an easy to use game development suite makes the software look not so easy to use. | |
SuperAntx wrote:
I guess it's just easier to demand things of others while you're in no position to meet those demands yourself. Another way of saying that would be, "its easier to ask for help when you're not capable of doing something yourself." Your tone sounds rude and discouraging, but I'm not sure why you'd discourage people who are asking for help. Asking for help is exactly what they should do. I think this is the exact attitude Tom is trying to get rid of. | |
I challenge you to find me a 200 page book that gives a person with no prior programming experience a grasp on it's respective language and programming in general.
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Hiro the Dragon King wrote:
I challenge you to find me a 200 page book that gives a person with no prior programming experience a grasp on it's respective language and programming in general. I'm not sure I was clear. The guide is useful, just not as an introductory resource. Its content is worth reading but shouldn't be presented as "you must read this before you start." Beginners should be given examples, not warnings. If you want examples of good introductory resources, any Wikipedia page for a major programming language provides better introductory information in less than 200 pages (even if you include some related articles). | |
Forum_account wrote:
I have never encountered an unfamiliar programming language, library, software suite, or API and had someone tell me "you want to know the best way to learn about that? Read this 200 page book." If the basics of any other topic (and I mean any topic) can be summarized in less than 200 pages, BYOND should have a shorter introductory resource too. I don't think the problem is the length of the guide; I think that people telling newbies to read it are not giving them the information that just reading the introductory portions of the guide is enough to get them started. Then again, anyone who fails to open the guide after being given clear directions to it, or subsequently fails to grasp that they don't need to read it cover-to-cover to get started, probably isn't going to learn from any resource of any length. Some people want to be spoon-fed, and we can't help them. But if I go to an unfamiliar forum and get a list of helpful get-started links from someone, I'm inclined to at least give them a glance and decide whether those links are helpful to me. For my part I'd like to see people giving longer and friendlier answers than the standard "RTFG", and tell them about all the great resources there are to learn from and that the guide is just a tool to help them get started. That's part of what Tom mentioned, the need to improve on civility and make the forums a more welcoming place. In addition I often see that same response given to people who are asking fairly specific questions that, while the answers may be in the guide, may not be immediately obvious to a newbie looking to find them. Little frustrates me more than having a specific question and getting a very general answer that doesn't really help me, and I think some newbies are getting brushed off in that way, to our collective detriment. Lummox JR | |
Forum_account wrote:
Another way of saying that would be, "its easier to ask for help when you're not capable of doing something yourself." Your tone sounds rude and discouraging, but I'm not sure why you'd discourage people who are asking for help. Asking for help is exactly what they should do. I think this is the exact attitude Tom is trying to get rid of. That's one way of saying it, but it's not how Moussiffer chose his words. If I sounded rude or discouraging in my previous post then mission accomplished because that's exactly what I intended. Ranting about how other people should do things you're too lazy to do yourself isn't going to solve anything. Had he asked an actual question or posted code problem I might have helped him. Unfortunately he didn't, and while everyone here has been arguing about nothing actual developers have been asking actual questions on the proper forums. This isn't the first time I've seen someone raise a fuss about newbie tutorials. There is some merit to the argument, but this has been a completely ass-backwards way of getting to the point. What seems to be the problem is most of our newbie-friendly resources are aimed at a type of newbie which doesn't really exist anymore. Tutoring or making well-documented demos wont help much either. The barrier to entry is too high for this generation of 140-character or less denizens of the internet. Most people, at least in this community, seem to be hands-on learners. Rather than reading a bunch of guides they would rather download a completed game and poke at it to see how each little tweak changes things. While it's not the "best" way to learn, it does shed some light on how a game works; a pretty weird concept to grasp for a non-programmer. The problem is most of those sources have horrible design flaws, aren't documented at all, and at this point have been completely banished from the hub. If BYOND was distributed with a few basic game engines with corresponding art packs I think the problem would solve itself after a few years. When I say art packs, I mean huge tile sets people can actually make a beefy game with in just under a day. RPG Maker and Game Maker are direct competitors of BYOND, if you look at either of them you'll see they have all sorts of "starter projects" like that freely available. If BYOND is to remain in the business of making games it'll need these sorts of options available to aspiring game developers. | |
I feel like, maybe, we now need in-depth good quality embedded Youtube videos with link to the source code and graphics used in the video on the side, and a description of what goes on below it for people to be more interested in learning.
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Lummox JR wrote:
For my part I'd like to see people giving longer and friendlier answers than the standard "RTFG", and tell them about all the great resources there are to learn from and that the guide is just a tool to help them get started. This is where the website and developer community come into play. I think the people who say "read the guide!" are often trying to be helpful. They want to do a good deed so they look in the code problems or how-to forum and make the suggestion to RTFG. It feels to them like they're doing a good deed but we know it's not really helpful. By giving these helpers better ways to spend their limited volunteer time (ex: read existing tutorials and suggest improvements) they're being more productive. The trend to suggest reading the guide will be self-perpetuating until there's a better trend for people to follow. | |
You don't understand how people work. In the real world, people don't spend years learning something and then just give away their time and knowledge for no reason. If they do give it away, then they choose to do so for a cause that has meaning to them. THAT is how the world works. Therefore, that is how BYOND works.
Let's put the ball in your court. Write me a $200 check and I'll spend 5 hours of my valuable time tutoring this guy. I have the knowledge, you have the money, and he has the need.
Why on earth would you ever do that for him? That's a good question to ask yourself.