{"id":4090,"date":"2019-01-07T16:50:25","date_gmt":"2019-01-07T23:50:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nathalielawhead.com\/candybox\/?p=4090"},"modified":"2021-10-18T15:10:23","modified_gmt":"2021-10-18T22:10:23","slug":"gdc-talk-transcript-alternative-paths-in-indie-dev","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.nathalielawhead.com\/candybox\/gdc-talk-transcript-alternative-paths-in-indie-dev","title":{"rendered":"GDC Talk Transcript: Alternative Paths in Indie Dev"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Lats year at GDC I participated in a micro-talk set about alternative paths to indie development and success.<\/p>\n<p>A friend of mine has a hard time watching videos because English wasn&#8217;t her first language, and has been bugging me to publish the transcript since I gave it.<br \/>\nSo I&#8217;m publishing it here in case others are interested in reading it instead of watching.<\/p>\n<p>My talk was basically about how money isn&#8217;t everything, and that the people you influence with your work are also a valuable way of measuring success. For example, how many lives it has changed, what type of difference it has made to the people that engaged with it&#8230; Not everything makes money, and money doesn&#8217;t always quantify value&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s not exactly the kind of thing you want to say at a conference like GDC (the speaker review and youtube comments demonstrated that), but given the abusive labor practices, and other problems we&#8217;re facing, they&#8217;re probably important points to bring up.<\/p>\n<p>As a VERY IMPORTANT FYI, I have bad speech dyslexia, and it&#8217;s especially pronounced when I&#8217;m nervous, so I prefer to read for structured messages like this one. I say this because a few people complained about my following a script (speaker comments were that I &#8220;seemed angry and detached&#8221;).<br \/>\nI&#8217;m not capable of presenting meaningful and structured messages without reading.<br \/>\nDepending on how serious the dyslexia bouts are, speaking can be painfully impossible for me.<br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/channel\/UC1ufp9xk5NzexS3boBRndAA\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">Fantastic Arcade<\/a> is probably the only event where I feel comfortable enough for this not to be debilitating. The audience is so wonderful and supportive there.<\/p>\n<p>Quite a few people thanked me for saying this, and told me that they really valued this, so I&#8217;m fairly proud of it and my &#8220;performance&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Here&#8217;s the video on YouTube if you want to watch it.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/OKG2-wndDIM\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen=\"\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><strong>Here&#8217;s the talk transcript:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><center> ~~~~~ <\/center><\/p>\n<p>Alternative Paths in Indie Dev<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/nathalielawhead.com\/noodles\/ALTERNATIVE_PATHS_SLIDES\/1.jpg\" alt=\"\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Hi, I&#8217;m alienmelon, or Nathalie Lawhead, outside of the internet.<br \/>\nI make art that people call games.<\/p>\n<p>I started doing this in the late 90&#8217;s, early 2000&#8217;s. At that time it was considered net-art, but my interest in art on computers has always been more complex than that.<\/p>\n<p>My most recent project is &#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/alienmelon.itch.io\/everything-is-going-to-be-ok\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">Everything is going to be OK<\/a>&#8220;.<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/nathalielawhead.com\/noodles\/ALTERNATIVE_PATHS_SLIDES\/2.jpg\" alt=\"\" \/><\/p>\n<p>As you can imagine this sort of work isn&#8217;t exactly financially sustainable. It doesn&#8217;t pay for itself. People do support it, and sometimes pay with the Pay What You Want Option, but I largely pay for making this out of my own pocket.<\/p>\n<p>The pattern my career has taken over the years is to do contracting work, mostly web development, to pay for making this.<br \/>\nI live as meagerly as possible so that all my resources can go into this.<br \/>\nThis is my passion. It&#8217;s something I have to do.<br \/>\nI view myself as an artist, and making this is my drive.<\/p>\n<p>The conversations of business, and financial success, surrounding my art have been a strong point of contention through-ought the time that I have been doing this.<br \/>\nTo me it&#8217;s not about the money.<br \/>\nTo everyone else it should be, otherwise I am a failure as a functional member of society.<\/p>\n<p>Good work is often measured against how much money it has made in order to be considered good.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/nathalielawhead.com\/noodles\/ALTERNATIVE_PATHS_SLIDES\/3.jpg\" alt=\"\" \/><\/p>\n<p>That said, as you can imagine, I&#8217;m not a business success,<br \/>\nbut I am going to discuss my own personal measurement for success, and the success of my art.<\/p>\n<p>I very much believe that some of the important things in life can&#8217;t be quantified by monetary value, and art is one of those.<\/p>\n<p>To me art is about dissent, raising questions, pointing at the beauty of life, or making the darkness in life tolerable.<br \/>\nIt&#8217;s uniquely expressing views and giving a voice to topics that need to be expressed. Sometimes these topics aren&#8217;t popular.<\/p>\n<p>There&#8217;s a comfort zone of acceptable, or successful content that people are willing to consume, and I feel like art is about challenging that comfort zone and pushing for more.<br \/>\nArt like this doesn&#8217;t sell like entertainment does.<br \/>\nMost art relies on grants, or external support to exist.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/nathalielawhead.com\/noodles\/ALTERNATIVE_PATHS_SLIDES\/4.jpg\" alt=\"\" \/><\/p>\n<p>For example, my grandfather was a popular sculptor in Slovenia.<br \/>\nHis work was strongly anti-capitalist.<br \/>\nMost of his best was socialist inspired commentary about, for example, rich people putting poor people into meat grinders in order to make meals for the rich upper class.<br \/>\nPoor people carrying crosses up a hill with rich people depicted as devils in top-hats mocking them&#8230; and so on.<br \/>\nAs you can imagine his work would sometimes get him in trouble.<\/p>\n<p>This was true for many artists coming from his background.<br \/>\nArt raised dissent.<br \/>\nOn the other hand, this dissent wasn&#8217;t a suitable financial model.<br \/>\nBut this is why our society needs art.<br \/>\nArt is a conduit for social change.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/nathalielawhead.com\/noodles\/ALTERNATIVE_PATHS_SLIDES\/5.jpg\" alt=\"\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Despite the obvious financial, or social, setbacks artists will make art anyway.<br \/>\nThis is not sustainable for me, but making art matters to me because art is vital for the health of a society.<\/p>\n<p>So here is an interesting challenge worth consideration&#8230;<br \/>\nArt like this will often not be recognized in the historic timeframe that it is made in, and for.<br \/>\nIt will often be laughed at, but these struggles can lead to social change and inspire others to work outside of established comfort zones.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/nathalielawhead.com\/noodles\/ALTERNATIVE_PATHS_SLIDES\/6.jpg\" alt=\"\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Some messages are too political, too edgy, too controversial, but need to be said anyway.<br \/>\nIt&#8217;s difficult to weigh money as a metric for success against art like this.<\/p>\n<p>The going stereotype is that many artists die in poverty.<br \/>\nWhat we laugh at today ends up being the misunderstood genius of tomorrow, who&#8217;s work, after death, makes money.<br \/>\nWhere they a failure while alive?<br \/>\nCan we recognize this work, while it&#8217;s socially relevant?<br \/>\nDid sales define their art&#8217;s value?<\/p>\n<p>You cannot place a price on things like dissent. Yet artistic dissent is a critical component to the health of a society and things like this improve life.<\/p>\n<p>Here I don&#8217;t think money can define value.<br \/>\nFor example, you cannot financially measure sentimental value.<br \/>\nOne item might be priceless to one individual, and to everyone else it is trash.<\/p>\n<p>Applying a price on some things may even diminish their value because it does not take into account things like human impact, social impact, sentimental value, or personal worth&#8230;<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/nathalielawhead.com\/noodles\/ALTERNATIVE_PATHS_SLIDES\/7.jpg\" alt=\"\" \/><\/p>\n<p>My first project was released in 1999. It was political commentary about poverty, war, homelessness, and refugees.<br \/>\nMost of it was presented as interactive literature.<br \/>\nA combination of an animated feature that you interact with, and &#8220;experience&#8221; the writing in.<br \/>\nYou unravel messages as you interact.<br \/>\nOver the years I have received what feels like thousands of messages from people saying that it has helped them, touched them, changed their life, made them want to pursue a creative career, and often helped them through some serious dark times.<br \/>\nI used to get about a message everyday, because the project had a stylized email form that fit one of the environments.<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;ve also received a handful of messages from people that said that it saved their life.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/nathalielawhead.com\/noodles\/ALTERNATIVE_PATHS_SLIDES\/8.jpg\" alt=\"\" \/><\/p>\n<p>If you make work that speaks to a deeper human condition, and admits a type of brokenness in our society, I feel like it&#8217;s a message of solidarity for others that are undergoing the same.<br \/>\nMany of these emails where very personal. There is something about art that gets people to open up and examine their lives.<br \/>\nArt like this makes people feel less alone. The topics might be dark, but the fact that it admits this darkness speaks to a type of hope.<br \/>\nEven when admitting hopelessness, that admission gives people hope. Like I said, It speaks tremendously to solidarity.<\/p>\n<p>It was a lot to take in at the time, but at the same time it showed me how important it is to make this stuff.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/nathalielawhead.com\/noodles\/ALTERNATIVE_PATHS_SLIDES\/9.jpg\" alt=\"\" \/><\/p>\n<p>One conversation that I still think about sometimes was a kid in Japan that emailed me thanking me for this project.<br \/>\nThey said that they where inspired to make a virtual simulation to help their friends stop self-harming.<br \/>\nTheir idea was that if they could do it in a virtual environment, they wouldn&#8217;t do it in real life.<\/p>\n<p>On the surface this is very grim, but this was a real problem that they wanted to fix.<br \/>\nThis is exactly what art is suited for. Addressing issues that you won&#8217;t be able to address in any other capacity, especially in consumer entertainment.<br \/>\nIt&#8217;s about challenging social stigma, and talking about things we don&#8217;t talk about.<\/p>\n<p>It was a very personal conversation, but this is exactly the value measurement that I quantify art against.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/nathalielawhead.com\/noodles\/ALTERNATIVE_PATHS_SLIDES\/10.jpg\" alt=\"\" \/><\/p>\n<p>The human value is the true value here.<\/p>\n<p>My peers would criticize me for throwing my talents away on social criticism in my art.<br \/>\nFor example, why does something this beautiful have to be so depressing, anti-capitalist, heavy handed, have this kind of message&#8230;<br \/>\nAt the time, in these commercial circles, it was really uncool to talk about social injustice, poverty, war, and so on&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>This was a very commercial crowd. They were, by popular standards, very successful in their business.<br \/>\nWhy risk appearing opinionated, and controversially so, if you can make money?<\/p>\n<p>Challenging things is risky, but it is exactly this risk that makes art so valuable.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/nathalielawhead.com\/noodles\/ALTERNATIVE_PATHS_SLIDES\/11.jpg\" alt=\"\" \/><\/p>\n<p>So it was an interesting contrast.<br \/>\nTo my peers I was a failure and waste of talent, to people that played this, I changed their lives.<br \/>\nSo how do you place value on this?<\/p>\n<p>If I quit pursuing this art, I would be a successful creative professional.<br \/>\nIf I pursue this art, then I am socially viewed as lacking ambition, or wasting my talent.<br \/>\nHow our culture dictates value has always fascinated me.<br \/>\nIf we didn&#8217;t measure value by money, then I feel like art would matter more.<\/p>\n<p>Money serves a purpose but it isn&#8217;t the end all defining factor of success.<\/p>\n<p>To me, lives touched, people influenced, making the world better is what matters.<br \/>\nAs artists we have a social responsibility to do that.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/nathalielawhead.com\/noodles\/ALTERNATIVE_PATHS_SLIDES\/12.jpg\" alt=\"\" \/><\/p>\n<p>I realize how cheesy that sounds, but this is why I do it.<br \/>\nI believe artists should exercise their talents in a way that will make the world better, bring social change, or challenge people to be better.<\/p>\n<p>We assert humanity through our work.<\/p>\n<p>There is something valuable to be learned from art, and artistic dissent, in regards to how we measure: business success, financial success, or even entertainment success.<\/p>\n<p>The bigger picture here being how we can help society, and benefit those around us through our work.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/nathalielawhead.com\/noodles\/ALTERNATIVE_PATHS_SLIDES\/13.jpg\" alt=\"\" \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Lats year at GDC I participated in a micro-talk set about alternative paths to indie development and success. A friend of mine has a hard time watching videos because English wasn&#8217;t her first language, and has been bugging me to publish the transcript since I gave it. So I&#8217;m publishing it here in case others are interested in reading it instead of watching. My talk was basically about how money isn&#8217;t everything, and that the people you influence with your work are also a valuable way of measuring success. For example, how many lives it has changed, what type of&#46;&#46;&#46;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4609,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"http:\/\/nathalielawhead.com\/noodles\/ALTERNATIVE_PATHS_SLIDES\/10.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"GDC Talk Transcript: Alternative Paths in Indie Dev","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[30,34],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4090","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-games","category-talks"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.nathalielawhead.com\/candybox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4090","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.nathalielawhead.com\/candybox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.nathalielawhead.com\/candybox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.nathalielawhead.com\/candybox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.nathalielawhead.com\/candybox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4090"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"http:\/\/www.nathalielawhead.com\/candybox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4090\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4608,"href":"http:\/\/www.nathalielawhead.com\/candybox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4090\/revisions\/4608"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.nathalielawhead.com\/candybox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4609"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.nathalielawhead.com\/candybox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4090"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.nathalielawhead.com\/candybox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4090"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.nathalielawhead.com\/candybox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4090"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}