Emma Thompson Is Right: The Word ‘Content’ Is Rude | Hacker News Reader

Emma Thompson Is Right: The Word ‘Content’ Is Rude

nytimes.com

19 pointsadrian_mrd8 comments

'Content' may be rude, but using it in the modern sense does demonstrate contempt for nuance, in the same way that corporations demonstrate contempt for nuance by using "product" to mean anything from toothpaste to cars to electricity to loans.

rms had an old piece about this that i can't find right now. All my searches are coming up with things to do with his cancellation.

By the way I think "consume" is way more cringe than "content" especially when regular people use it to describe what they do.

https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/words-to-avoid.html#Content

The two go very much hand in hand. The studios want to produce nebulous "content" to feed the maw of "consumers" who don't seem to care all that much about the quality of it.

I'm on Thompson's side on that. I'm also a Shakespearean actor, and she was one of the strongest influences on me.

And yet... she and I are entertainers. In the end, our craft is sterile if nobody sees it. Nobody owes us a medium to connect us to our audiences. I can tsk-tsk at audiences who would rather watch yet another 30-second dance video, but I can't dictate taste to them.

She's a star, and people come to see her for reasons that are only loosely related to her immense talent. I'm not, and few come to see me. I wouldn't dare compare my talent to hers, but there is some genuine merit to my shows, and the audiences could usually fit on a school bus.

I don't think it's over yet. I think we're still figuring out what artists and audiences mean to each other. So while I don't love the way studios produce "content" for audiences to "consume", but I'm going to pursue my craft and hope somebody wants to see it.

I apologize for having been using this word as a label to group my bookmarks of books, articles, music, videos and movies for years.

paywalled

"content" is an accurate and intentional term for what "content creators" actually produce. It's substance, it's material, and that's all. There are not guarantees about what it is, nor about the quality. As dog shit is to matter, the stuff "content creators" produce is to content

Agreed, a lot of what social-media only paid personalities is creating is low-value churn so they don't lose their search placement while waiting for the next decent video idea or sponsor to come through.

Which is not what Emma Thompson was talking about.

And that’s exactly her point. A Wes Anderson movie is not the same thing as a video of birds at a bird feeder for cats to watch on YouTube.

And accuracy isn’t sufficient to say a term is being appropriately used in a certain context. A completely digital movie is also nothing more than bits. It would be accurate to talk about the movie as bits. Or as stuff. Or as an actualization of an idea. Or a trademarkable good. Or the output of a collaborative effort.

All of those are accurate terms to describe that movie. But it does not make them appropriate terms to describe the movie in most contexts.

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