May 2005 Archives

This diagram isn't really very accurate, but after conversations with Chris and Heide (who's making a documentary about AS and things like that in her family) and my friend Donna (whose son has ADD and loves games) and now working on this latest book idea I've been thinking about the connections between computer nerds and gamers and those mental issues/differences that make them socially awkward. And I love Venn diagrams so here is one attempting to illustrate some of the overlap between savants, virtuosos, those with Aspergers and computer nerds. (After briefly noodling around I decided I'm not going to get into all the websites and debates over autism and stuff -- that's actually partly what Heide's film will be about and I'll leave it to her).

Anyway, I know this isn't very accurate -- for instance, shouldn't perfect pitch (I'm thinking of those people who can hear a song and sit down and play it right the first time -- I've seen them on 60 minutes more than once now) be where music and austism overlap? And band geek -- shouldn't that be where computer nerd and music overlap? And is that really where asshole belongs? How many circles can you have in a Venn diagram? Well, I encourage you all to make your own undoubtedly more accurate versions.

And now back to the book propsal.

**Update**
slashdot today had something to say about and linked to a couple articles on Asperger's/nerds - a little old, but still interesting. This one in Wired seemed to sum a lot up. I particularly like the theory that in olden days of yore, nerds wouldn't have been breeding but, "in the last 10 years, geekitude has become sexy and associated with financial success."

On a completely unrelated topic: Chris's Meta-Venn is brilliant!

Nic sent me this inspirational tale of what might happen if I start wearing the right shoes.

Remember my idea for a dogpark video game?

Chris sent me these links today to Nintendo dog game and a review.

Oh my god! So cute! So much easier to deal with than Pica!

What seems most interesting is that it will have an online multiplayer aspect. Woof!!

So, I'm playing World of Warcraft these days. I'm a level 11 Night Elf named Settee, and we're trying to work up to creating a guild called "The Living Room" based on furniture -- the furniture naming convention was Chris's idea, the Living Room guild was mine. I need to chose a trade. I can chose between being an engineer (and make robotic chickens and stuff), or a leatherworker, or a tailor, or a blacksmith, or an alchamist or an enchanter.

What I really want to be is a therapist. I think it would be awesome if you could chose that. You'd have to train first to get your credentials. And the other players would have to use you because they'd have an added bar called (Pete's idea): "Angst" and when it got too low they'd have to get therapy.

Pete also pointed out it would be best if you could only counsel people that were the same level as you. And I thought maybe if a therapist of a higher level counseled someone of a lower level maybe they'd both end up WORSE off.

You could combine it with alchamy and make drugs for people,too. (I thought crack dealer would also be a good profession.)

You could do couples therepy for parties or guilds that aren't getting along.

And I was thinking you could even do real "e-therapy", since you have the chat windows. You could talk to people about their problems with their parents or wives, or even do couples therapy. Online thereapy seems to be fairly robust on the web, so massively multiplayer online game therapy just seems like the next logical step.

Shane and Arne were also thinking you could have a self-help series: "Taking Your Career From Level 1 to Level 60 in 2 weeks" etc. (with lovelife, weight loss, etc.), which would maybe be a book series using WoW as an analogy catered towards the WoW crowd, or maybe you'd do it within the game.

This is one of those things where I'm pretty sure it probably exists in this world of avatars and such -- there are references to avatar therapy, but I think there's more than one meaning of the word avatar.

I think I may go be a leatherworker. Either that or an engineer. Pete's being an engineer, but maybe we can have two. We've got a game date tonight -- Armoire, Settee, Ottoman, Chaise and Catafalque (what, you don't have a catafalque in your living room?).