Is the modern nerd different from the nerds of old?

[Menegrothx]

my attention spam is too short

And I am apparently dyslexic too

[J T]

Is attention spam like pointless stuff that distracts you? I like that phrase.

[Gamerforlife]

Something I read on gawker today that I thought was interesting:

"It's no longer self-deprecating to call yourself a "nerd"—"I'm reading 'Game of Thrones.' SO NERDY!"—so stop pretending that it is. Nerds started Apple and Facebook and everything else people obsess over nowadays, and comic book movies are consistent blockbusters at theaters. Nerds are the most powerful people in the world now. Nerds are the new jocks."

[Flake]

Re-post of something I wrote in another thread that fits better here:

One thing that frustrates me about modern nerd culture: The seeming need to earn your place.

I know I am not the only person who remembers being a nerd in the 80's and 90's. It was the ultimate in all-inclusive groups. Anyone who wanted to roll dice, play games, role play, or watch Trek was welcome.

Who knew that the most egalitarian of demographics would turn into what it has? Even Football jocks don't give the ladies so much shit when they want to paint themselves up and root for home team to score the foot ball touch downs.

[Valkyrie-Favor]

Using computers, playing video games, watching cartoons meant for Japanese high school girls...

These things are fairly popular now. They do not have the widespread appeal of American football, but they're not really nerdy anymore. Sure, I like to do them, but I'm hardly a nerd for it in the same way a proficient computer user would have been back in your day. There's also much less stigma, except maybe for the last one.

People who write novels, paints china dolls, go train-watching...Those are nerds. I write novels, so yay me, but if a nerd is someone who's passionate about an obscure hobby then being a gamer hardly makes you one.

[Flake]

People who write novels, paints china dolls, go train-watching...Those are nerds. I write novels, so yay me, but if a nerd is someone who's passionate about an obscure hobby then being a gamer hardly makes you one.

No sir, I won't accept such a cavalier attempt to alter basic definitions. Either being a nerd is something that has had a static enough meaning as to have not changed so radically in its brief life time or we don't have a clue what we are talking about and this topic is moot.

[elmagicochrisg]

Nerds used to look like this:




Now they look like normal people most of the time...

[dtrack]

very interesting topic as well as the posts.
similar things are on my mind for a long time. at the end i think nerds and geeks are simply gone and for one reason. fast and easy global communication - the internet.
a nerd was a nerd because he was mostly or partly alone so he was a bit on the edge of society. now they aren't. there are the chat, the forums, sites, portals, blogs and all the shit where they found each other, formed groups and so on. and then related things started to join each other like a cultural melting-pot. this is just the dynamic of the extended multipoint-multipoint communications so that's how they grow bigger and faster. everything is hip and popular and everything is in fashion. like there's no fashion anymore.
guys in the IT world aren't passionate on their job anymore. they know only IT related things and they talk about their job but this is due to the fact they are IT guys because they have no interests. and are into the popular culture such as blockbuster movies, top100 music and video games, which are - let's face it - not nerdy or geeky anymore. programmers (or as nowadays they're called developers /this change is also very expressive/) are the new slaves of the modern society and they've chosen that profession cos it still pays reasonably well and a developer doesn't have to have communicational skills, they don't have to be cultivated or anything like that. all they have to know is java (for example, it colud be C++). i know this from experience. i've been into computers and stuff since the end of the 80s then in between my university years started to move towards faculty of arts and arts in general and was surrounded by similar openminded people. now i work at a big IT company and i can't talk with these people and i'm thinking of quitting everyday because of this. this is quite scary because of i see myself becoming as they are - a definitely not nerdy guy who works in the industry because it pays reasonably well - the only difference that i have interests.

[Xeogred]

I hate to post a meme (some irony here) in such a discussion, but it's relevant (although pretty sure everyone here has seen this one by now haha)

So what's next? My money is on some kind of hermit movement. People will get tired of all this technology and try to go back to basic minimalism. I don't think it's plausible to live that way with how the world itself is evolving, but it'd be interesting and funny if such a movement happened.

[MrPopo]

People who write novels, paints china dolls, go train-watching...Those are nerds. I write novels, so yay me, but if a nerd is someone who's passionate about an obscure hobby then being a gamer hardly makes you one.

No sir, I won't accept such a cavalier attempt to alter basic definitions. Either being a nerd is something that has had a static enough meaning as to have not changed so radically in its brief life time or we don't have a clue what we are talking about and this topic is moot.

But it hasn't changed. It's always been what Valkyire said, it's just that people keep using that word; I don't think it means what they think it does.