If you think that “functional programming” and “stamp collecting” and “writing poetry” are more valid “side passions” than writing scifi or fanfiction, can you give a good explanation for why, or is it just a matter of “what most people would think”?
But this is a specifically empirical question. Go look around the Internet—what’s the predominant view of fanfictioners among non-fanfictioners (who are aware of them)? It is very very negative, I mean, close to furry levels of opprobrium. To give an example, here’s the first response when I asked for free association for ‘fanfiction’ in #wikipedia:
11:00:53 < Lubaf> gwern: “Reeeeaaalllly creepy ideas about sexuality.”
What do you think the predominant view of functional programming is? ‘creepy sex’ or ‘hopeless loser’ or
Yeah. When I tell CS people my hobby is Haskell, do they back away and in the future avert their gaze from me? Or do they look interested and re-evaluate their opinion of competence? (The stereotype seems to be that if you use Haskell, you must be very smart indeed.)
I cannot speak for ‘Enterprise Architects’, but I would be surprised if the impression of Haskell among them was overall negative, and that they would hold negative opinions of any Haskell user.
It was a hypothetical, a thought experiment of the form “if it happened that an Enterprise Architect believed..., ”, would you let that influence your behavior or would you say the disapproval is their problem (even if it does cost you something to ignore their disapproval)?
It wasn’t a very good example though. I guess my point is that the stereotype-based disapproval of ignorant people who think that knowing somebody wrote a fanfiction gives them deep insight into their personality and their worth as human beings is not something to lose sleep over, it’s something to be ignored or even ridiculed.
But this is a specifically empirical question. Go look around the Internet—what’s the predominant view of fanfictioners among non-fanfictioners (who are aware of them)? It is very very negative, I mean, close to furry levels of opprobrium. To give an example, here’s the first response when I asked for free association for ‘fanfiction’ in #wikipedia:
What do you think the predominant view of functional programming is? ‘creepy sex’ or ‘hopeless loser’ or
Yeah. When I tell CS people my hobby is Haskell, do they back away and in the future avert their gaze from me? Or do they look interested and re-evaluate their opinion of competence? (The stereotype seems to be that if you use Haskell, you must be very smart indeed.)
I cannot speak for ‘Enterprise Architects’, but I would be surprised if the impression of Haskell among them was overall negative, and that they would hold negative opinions of any Haskell user.
It was a hypothetical, a thought experiment of the form “if it happened that an Enterprise Architect believed..., ”, would you let that influence your behavior or would you say the disapproval is their problem (even if it does cost you something to ignore their disapproval)?
It wasn’t a very good example though. I guess my point is that the stereotype-based disapproval of ignorant people who think that knowing somebody wrote a fanfiction gives them deep insight into their personality and their worth as human beings is not something to lose sleep over, it’s something to be ignored or even ridiculed.