User talk:SteveBaker/archive26

Question

May I ask you a question, if you don't mind? Miss Bono ^{[hello, hello!]} 15:05, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

Sure - what's up? (If it's something you don't want read publically - you can email me privately using the "Tools/Email this user" link over on the left menu) SteveBaker (talk) 15:09, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

Oh, no, it is not a private thing, but about the writing thing. If it's ok if I ask you about that here. I cannot check my email often, once per week actually. Miss Bono ^{[hello, hello!]} 15:31, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

OK - whatever suits you. SteveBaker (talk) 15:37, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

When I start writing a story - I had to give a 180 degrees twist to the one I was working on - it is really hard to get inspiration, for example, the scenes at the airport, or the girl arriving in New York City, arriving at the hotel... so many descriptions of places I've never been (honestly I don't know how Jules Verne managed to wrote all those books) leads me to a writer's block, I get really bored and drop the pen or leave the laptop and go to do whatever. So, do you have any tip that helps you and you can share with me. Thanks

P.S. this is the first question that will lead me to the next. Miss Bono ^{[hello, hello!]} 15:50, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

I don't have much to offer in the way of help. I know that some famous writers force themselves to sit in front of the keyboard every day and don't allow themselves to do anything else until they've written some number of words (say, 1,000 words) - even if they are bad and need to be rewritten the following day. Jules Verne had the advantage over you - he wrote about places that nobody had ever been to - so nobody could criticise his descriptions. But if you write about someone going through an airport terminal and get it entirely wrong - then everyone who has done that (which is probably the majority of your readers) will immediately think that this is very strange! So in that regard, you're at a horrible disadvantage.

Most writers tell you that you should always write about things you know. So rather than writing about the rich and famous jet-setting around the world, write about the place you live...which (and you can trust me on this one) is a weird and somewhat wonderful place to those of us who haven't been there.

I've tried my hand at writing, several times in fact. I've written technical books (one of which was a collaboration that was actually published) and some short stories for kids that I had up online while my son way the right age to appreciate them - but I'd really like to write a novel. My girlfriend (now my wife!) and I were trying to write a book together, it's an "alternate history" book about what might have happened between Charles Babbage and Ada Lovelace if one teeny-tiny event (a famous duel) had turned out slightly differently (a stray bullet nicks a horse being ridden a few hundred yards away). We have the plot for the book laid out chapter by chapter. The plot is pretty detailed and seems compelling. We researched the characters and locations and all of the historical stuff to a crazy degree. Then we set to writing. I wrote a draft of the first chapter - but it's too short - about a quarter the length of a typical first chapter of a 30 chapter novel. In fact, every time I try to write something like that, I just can't put enough padding into it to make it seem like the right length. I describe the locations and the characters - but somehow, I can't feel the need to write more than I do.

It's not exactly writer's block - more like I'm just not built to be a novelist!

Probably, what both you and I need are some proper classes on creative writing.

16:14, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

I have everything in my mind, I have everything figured out. I know where I want to lead my characters, and Cuba doesn't fit, I thought about setting my story here but, I cannot find a way for my some of my characters to fit. I've been at the Airport here and I have stayed in a couple of hotels, the thing is that I don't know how things work out there (the world).

Going to have lunch, I'll be back with more in about 30 min. Miss Bono ^{[hello, hello!]} 16:50, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

I guess that's a problem with FanFic stuff - you don't have the freedom to change all the things you'd like. I suppose another way to avoid the problem is to come up with a completely fictionalized setting - an entirely imaginary place that you can tailor to fit your needs exactly - an imaginary country, an entire imaginary word - or perhaps sometime in the future. If things worked differently there, it would add to the creativity in the story rather than making it seem less real...it worked for Jules Verne! SteveBaker (talk) 17:01, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

Oh, it is not a fanfic anymore, I mean, it is about a famous rock band but I have changed a lot of things, to avoid the fanfiction stuff. I gave the singer another lifestyle. Now the plot is about the daughter of one of the members of the band and.... I leave that to your imagination. Is it legal to create a fictional city in a real country? Miss Bono ^{[hello, hello!]} 17:15, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

You mean like Duckburg or Gotham City or Metropolis or Eureka (not to be confused with Eureka or Eureka, or 30 more)? Yes ;-). --Stephan Schulz (talk) 17:23, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

Oh, then I can build my own city, cool! But what about if the story isn't set in only one city... do I have to create more cities. Oh Lord! Miss Bono ^{[hello, hello!]} 17:55, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

You don't have to stick to fictional places, of course. It's common to have some things happen in big, well-known places (whether London, the Grand Canyon or the Indian Ocean), but to have other parts happen in e.g. Smallville, which often are somewhere vague but nowhere specific ("a small town in the American Midwest" or "a village by the sea"). This gives you the freedom to create settings you want or need, while still anchoring the book in the here and now. From your many question (and you're very welcome to ask them ;-) I have the impression that you try very hard to get all the details right. I don't think you have too - just avoid big whoopers, and you will be fine. Very few readers will know or check details. As an example, I've flown a lot, I know that certain airlines use certain terminals in the abstract, but for most airports I don't know anything about which ones use which, and even for the ones I use frequently, I would not even stumble over a sentence like "Bono schlepped his guitar case up the stairs into Terminal 2 just before Lufthansa closed the counter", although I think I know that Lufthansa universally flies out of Terminal 1 in Frankfurt. Also check our article on artistic license ;-). --Stephan Schulz (talk) 18:13, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for your explanation Stephan, I will have your advice and Steve's in mind next time I sit in front of the laptop to start writing. And I will take your word when you said that my questions are very welcome ;). When I was at school I was the one who asked all the questions in classes, I recall one of my professors telling my mom that, I still don't know if he was pissed because soemtimes I asked questions he couldn't answers or he was glad that I was interested in his class.

Anyways, that's the kind of things I am trying to avoid. I got in a state after reading the critics they made to The Da Vinci Code, for some geographical mistakes. Miss Bono ^{[hello, hello!]} 18:40, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

Well, for one, The Da Vinci Code was not a very good book. I got cliff-hanger-sick after the first few chapters, and the writing is best described as "bad" ;-). It also was a runaway bestseller. It will attract criticism just because people like to criticize something very successful. It makes us feel superior. I'm quite sure that Gone with the Wind and War and Peace contain plenty of inaccuracies, and I know that the Horatio Hornblower books are full of historical license. I'm a bit frustrated by the fact that the medical plot twist in Strong Poison is scientifically wrong (though believed at the time), but it still is my favorite crime novel of all times. If you insist on perfection, you will set yourself up for failure - or, worse, paralysis. Wikipedia's motto "be bold" also applies to writers, I think. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 18:56, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

Oh, I will try to be bold. Actually, after I manage to write the entire prologue, everything became clearer. I really enjoy writing, but when I start to think about critisism, I get completely blocked and leave what I am doing. You would be surprise if I tell you that I have 5 started projects in my personal stuffs folder. I stopped writing when the real world started blocking me. Airports and hotels ar the hardest things to write about. Miss Bono ^{[hello, hello!]} 19:18, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

I think that using real places and weaving your story around real events can add depth and richness because you can pull things from the real world - but if you do that, then you're chaining yourself to things that require lots of research to get right. On the other hand, if you go to a fictional setting, you have to invent absolutely everything. In a fictional setting (like aliens on a giant space station) something as simple as someone writing a letter to a friend requires you to think about whether they have paper - or write on the dried skins of specially-bred lizard-like creatures or whether they use the woven webs of giant spiders...what pens do they use? What writing style? Before you know it, you have to invent an entire culture, history and so forth. If you set the same scene in a New York apartment, then you can just say they used a nice fountain pen, a gift from grandma because they hate to write with a ballpoint...and you've said something useful about your character. However, if you set the story in world-war II, you suddenly have to think about whether ballpoint pens were around in the 1940's. If you forget to check, then you may well be criticised for screwing up.

Choosing something like Gotham or SmallVille gives you something in the middle. We know that smallville is small-town USA, so we can guess that the barns are red and white, that there are water towers and so forth - but if the author needs a newspaper office to be there, then they don't have to sweat about whether there really *is* a newspaper office in Smallville.

For my book (eternally in-progress), I decided on early Victorian England because that's something I like to research, and I'm broadly familiar with the place from having grown up in the UK.

But it's definitely a trade-off between researching real places versus having to think up more details to make a fictional place seem real. SteveBaker (talk) 19:29, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

Take a look at this, it is a part of the prologue i wrote (Culle328 reviewed the old one, so this one might have some mistakes because he still hasn't review it yet) I omitted a part. Feedback is appreciated. click Miss Bono ^{[hello, hello!]} 19:57, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

Did you read it? Miss Bono ^{[hello, hello!]} 20:15, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

The page only has a speedy-delete template on it?!? SteveBaker (talk) 20:41, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

Search in the history of the page. Quickly before they delete it. Miss Bono ^{[hello, hello!]} 20:46, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

You can check out the first draft of my first chapter: User:SteveBaker/ch1. SteveBaker (talk) 20:48, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

I am reading it right now :) Miss Bono ^{[hello, hello!]} 20:50, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

It's hard to tell how you're doing on the basis of such a short sample - I suppose it's a bit odd that she's talking about this guy who is clearly so close to her - yet she formally uses his full name. Surely just "David" - not "David Conner"...but I don't know. I don't claim to be any good at this stuff. SteveBaker (talk) 20:51, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

But what was the first impression. I mean, what did you think at first. It was the Prologue. I will post more on Monday because it is hard for me to transalte all of it. Miss Bono ^{[hello, hello!]} 20:56, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure, it's not the kind of book I'd normally read - so I'm not a good judge. It seems like you have what it takes to write something good. SteveBaker (talk) 23:39, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

Oh, I see, I know men doesn't like romantic novels, hahaha I can show you my first novel, it is kind of a thriller. I decided to try an write something romantic, although I don't read romantic stuffs :P-- Ohh and are you saying this: It seems like you have what it takes to write something good. to cheer me up? :? Miss Bono ^{[hello, hello!]} 13:41, 11 November 2013 (UTC)

True, I don't much like them - probably because of my Asperger's syndrome, I don't really identify with the characters...they are always going around knowing how other people feel and stuff like that...which I can't easily do. Anyway - no, I'm not just trying to cheer you up - it's clear from the attention to detail that you're paying - and the span of time you've been working on it - than you have the determination to do this. But I'm definitely not an expert on what does or doesn't make a good novel...especially not a romance kind of thing. SteveBaker (talk) 01:23, 12 November 2013 (UTC)

Oh, I remember watching some House M.D. episodes when I was 14 or 13 and started thinking I had Asperger, because of my personality back then. That thought disappear as time went by. I am trying for my novel not to be just romance. That is boring. Miss Bono ^{[hello, hello!]} 13:18, 12 November 2013 (UTC)

There are a LOT more people who think they have Aspergers than actually do - I didn't get diagnosed until about 15 years ago - and it came as a considerable shock to me! People who know me well say that they weren't surprised at all.

Anyway, I agree 100% that romance novels are boring to me. But, they do sell in considerable quantities! Romance novel says "In North America, romance novels are the most popular genre in modern literature, comprising almost 55% of all paperback books sold in 2004."...and later, it says..."women buy 90% of all romance novels". Let's think about that - if 55% of paperbacks sold in the US are romance novels and 90% of them were bought by women, then 49.5% of all books sold in the US are romance novels that were bought by women. So unless American women are reading a heck of a lot more books than men, that means that they read almost nothing else!

Short answer: Know your audience! SteveBaker (talk) 14:57, 12 November 2013 (UTC)

I've finished reading it. I like it very much. Do you have more? Miss Bono ^{[hello, hello!]} 21:13, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

Kind of you to say so! Well, I have bits of several other chapters - but nothing ready to read yet. Some of the ways we tell the story are tricky to get right - there are some clever ideas on how to represent victorian society that my wife came up with which I think will make for a compelling read - but it's is tough to write - so we're not going to have much to show for a long time yet! SteveBaker (talk) 23:39, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

Oh, if you finish it and publish it, I will tell my aunt to buy it and send it to me. :) Miss Bono ^{[hello, hello!]} 13:42, 11 November 2013 (UTC)

Ah! So I have at least one definite sale! I'm sure that (one the basis of that) the publishing houses will be rushing to get a hold of it!  :-)

SteveBaker (talk) 01:23, 12 November 2013 (UTC)

Yes, you will have one sale, BUT, you have to give an autograph and no with ~~~~ because it doesn't count. Miss Bono ^{[hello, hello!]} 13:18, 12 November 2013 (UTC)

At the rate the book is getting written, by the time we get done paper books will be obsolete and printer ink will cost $10,000 per cartridge - so you may have to put up with ~~~~! :-) SteveBaker (talk) 14:57, 12 November 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for opening the RfC at List of topics characterized as pseudoscience

		The Original Barnstar
		Thanks for opening the RfC at List of topics characterized as pseudoscience. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 14:46, 28 November 2013 (UTC)

Knuth shuffle

Hi Steve,

you might be interested in some results I posted at Wikipedia:Reference_desk/Computing#Shuffle a deck of cards in Java. --Trovatore (talk) 18:49, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

Pseudoscience list & demarcation

Interesting discussion at List of topics characterized as pseudoscience. That list, by its very nature, is always going to be problematic. There is no objective, reproducible way of determining whether something is "really" pseudoscientific; the closest thing to that -- for WP purposes -- is a topic that is widely-agreed to be PS within the scientific community. Intelligent design is probably the ultimate example today, in terms of broad agreement. Climate change denial is a close second (and by far the most important to life as we know it). Then there's a spectrum of topics, ranging from astrology (widely agreed-upon) to, I don't know, perhaps psychoanalysis, or acupuncture as a treatment for pain, or something: things that are taken seriously by many in the mainstream, but with enough criticism to still be included on the list and not violate WP:PARITY.

What I think the list could do better is indicate how widely-held opinion is for each topic. We tried that once in a binary way, with a separate section for the stuff with clear sci consensus (i.e. sources meetingWP:RS/AC), and another for sources less rigorous like CSICOP, but that was unpopular -- it made some of the skeptics feel unworthy or something (sheesh). As with much else on WP, the stable solutions are often those that are the "least worst", i.e. least likely to generate continued discord, not those that are the most accurate or nuanced. And there are a lot of people here who don't do nuance well. At all. C'est la wiki... --Middle 8 (talk) 01:46, 4 December 2013 (UTC)

VRShoes?

I assume this is your project? (I know "Baker" is a relatively common name, but there can't be that many Linux-using British-Texan Steve Bakers interested in VR!)

Just wanted to say that I wish I'd seen it earlier. I'd have been a backer for sure. I'm always on the lookout for a VR foot input system better than a Wii-Fit board, but also not a cockamamie construction that'll dominate my living room. APL (talk) 02:29, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

Yeah - it's my project alright. Sadly, it failed - but I think that a combination of a bad time of year to do the launch with not-the-best video and people who's pockets had been drained by a couple of previous VR controller projects were the cause rather than an inherently bad project idea.

This was a project I took on when I was 'between jobs' - but now I'm back in gainful employment. I plan to rethink things a bit - and possibly re-launch it sometime in the new year. There is talk of the Oculus Rift *finally* getting their consumer version out there - and that should really boost the interest in new kinds of controllers.

I agree with your feelings about the Wii Balance board and the Omni treadmill - that's precisely what's driven me toward this solution.

If you'd like to chat more about the subject, let's use email because I don't like using my Wikipedia account for this kind of conversation. I'm <steve@sjbaker.org>

SteveBaker (talk) 17:15, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

File:WP Reference Desk protocol.svg listed for deletion

A file that you uploaded or altered, File:WP Reference Desk protocol.svg, has been listed at Wikipedia:Files for deletion. Please see the discussion to see why it has been listed (you may have to search for the title of the image to find its entry). Feel free to add your opinion on the matter below the nomination. Thank you. μηδείς (talk) 22:00, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

The Wikipedia Library Survey

As a subscriber to one of The Wikipedia Library's programs, we'd like to hear your thoughts about future donations and project activities in this brief survey. Thanks and cheers, Ocaasi ^{t | c} 14:48, 9 December 2013 (UTC)

ANI re IP

Hi. I have filed an ANI against User:54.242.221.254 here, you are mentioned. μηδείς (talk) 03:32, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

WP:RDS scaling question "muscle growth vs. strength"

Hey Steve, I wondered if you were going to respond to this question about the scaling you used in the muscle strength vs. mass question on the Science Ref Desk. Cheers! -- ToE 17:53, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

You're invited: Art & Feminism Edit-a-thon

Art & Feminism Edit-a-Thon - You are invited!

File:Csaky madonna.jpg

Hi SteveBaker! The first ever Art and Feminism Edit-a-thon will be held on Saturday, February 1, 2014 across the United States and Canada - including Austin! Wikipedians of all experience levels are welcome to join! Any editors interested in the intersection of feminism and art are welcome. Experienced editors will be on hand to help new editors. Bring a friend and a laptop! Come one, come all! Learn more here! SarahStierch (talk) 08:39, 21 December 2013 (UTC)