pouët.net

Some hipster cult of amateur programmers, sums it up quite nicely

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Amateur? .. yes, okay.

Agreed, sadly, but it's a complex issue. I personally mostly disagree with the PC police of nowadays' scene who lose their shit if boobs flash on the screen for two seconds (cw: hyperbole, but you get the point). That said, going out of one's way to offend/shock people without any other purpose just childish, not to mention done to death in this and other media. That, and people actually do need those lines in their CV.

Where exactly to draw the line is hard to say. Still, I do agree that something is lost if the culture devolves into a platform for nothing but sterile all-pleasing releases even grandma and the vice president of Coca-Cola marketing would approve.

Well I really like the anarchic everything-goes attitude the scene has and always will have. How this materialities in the end is another question, be it childish boobs, noise demos, weird wilds or spontaneous 'illegal' raves

..or..or..

Counterculture has become mainstream though.

well, what's wrong with mentioning your passion in your CV?
If I would be a passionate singer, scuba-diver or amateur theater actor I would mention that as well.
Or did I miss something and the scene now is a secret cult nobody is allowed to speak about?

The first rule of the demoscene is "don't talk about the demoscene".

Prods that need capture for youtube

Outlet for creative whims.

I think at this point the demoscene is about its community more than anything else. Its scope and means have become so wide that the only thing truly separating a scener from a non-scener is that the former visits or contributes to specific parties/sites/chats; in other words, participates in the scene somehow. It's not a bad thing per se, but it has led to somewhat of an identity crisis which tends to emerge in situations where a design-heavy prod competes for the first place with a tech-heavy prod or something else like that, and members feel compelled to take sides. :)

I want to make pretties but all I can do is codes

For me, it's mostly the cultural aspects and the community. Chances are high that I can have pretty deep and interesting talks with "random scener" at a party, people tend to be open minded and knowledgeable in their particular "thing". This I enjoy a lot when at parties. I also enjoy the freedom and safety I experience at parties. I can just assume that people are decent and nice to each other.
Example: At one Revision, I had my Mac Mini set up in the pi-tunnel for showcasing my game. When I collected it after the party, it dangled on its power cord and was turned off, because apparently it has fallen down. No harm done, also my xbox controller was still there.
Some days later I got an email by a scener who explained to be that he might have created a mess with it, drunkenly trying to get the game to work, asking whether it was still working and saying "sorry about that". Very nice move if you ask me, and I'd behave the same way.
This explains the trust level I feel in the scene, and it's something to be cherished imho.
In addition to "people being decent", I'd like to add "people are tolerant". As has been mentioned before, the scene (at least at parties) allows for quite a lot of self expression as long as you don't harm anybody. I've done my portion of stupid stuff at parties, but it never backfired.

Then, there are the obvious things you can read at wikipedia, the shared history, the common interest in niche topics (like obsolete computers), and so on.

When you've been part of this community, it might play a role that it's always (mostly) the same people, providing a lot of consistency and "growing up together", which adds to the "feels like family" aspect.

I have a feeling we'll still be doing this when we're old, even though we already are, which has been an established fact since TUM 2009

I like your thinking.

We are the zombies of recreational computing, that´s what scene is about since it is dead for decades now.

JCO is spot on :)

Well, regarding the question of age which JCO brought up:

Quoting from http://www.hugi.scene.org/online/hugi16/repolls.htm


n = 116. The year this was published in: 1999.

So, in 1999, 58% of the people who participated in this poll were aged between 17 and 21.

Assuming that it is essentially still the same people who make up the scene, this means that now, the majority of us is between 37 and 41 years old.

I mention this also because there have been debates whether the demoscene should be considered a "youth scene" (see: http://wp1026128.server-he.de/wpsz/?portfolio=demo). While a person aged between 17 and 21 may be considered youth, we are obviously not a "youth scene" any more. So, perhaps the term "subculture", "computer art community" or simply "community of people sharing the same interest" may be more appropriate.

It is also to be noted that most of us actually started being active in the scene in our youth when we were still attending school, but there are also other people who are into computer graphics who usually started out at a more mature age, e.g. during their university studies.

I made a mistake: I wrote n = 116. That is wrong, in reality n = 224. So, the survey is probably even more representative than I previously thought. I apologize for my mistake.

How can you call a 20 year old survey representative?

Lots of people who are active now weren't active in 1999, and I doubt that survey was representative of the scene even back then.

JCO: Licht aus, Spot an.
ADOK: Kopp zu.

I'm sure the survey didn't include anyone born after the year 2000.

I'm sure the survey was only posted for Adok's obsessive attentionwhoring.