Asimov's Foundation

[toobfreak]

What I see is capitalism at work. If they include more diversity, they gain a more diverse audience.

That is a pretty naive and puerile attitude, WB. If we follow that logic to reducio ad absurdum, then if we make a movie about Mars, that should gain us a Martian audience!

Or maybe not.

In reality, the majority of the viewing audience is WHITE. That is where your primary audience is generally. If you market to blacks, then you are mainly marketing to a much smaller audience. If you make a movie a jumbled hodgepodge of nationalities for obvious PC inclusivity with no real support for it in the storyline, that does not mean you will necessary attract more Asians or Latinos, say, and if it is very diverse, you might actually LOSE some of the black audience or white audience who don't go in for too much psych-ops social "justice." You just don't know.

The reason? Super-diversity for diversity's sake does not reflect any actual real life situation in the real world. Oh, you will find a few blacks with whites and whites with blacks, the odd asian or latino thrown in, but for the most part, most places you go you will find that people tend to naturally congregate with their own kind.

Think of any good movie and you generally find the story set in a time and place where most of the people are this or that, rich, poor, oppressed, tyrants, black or white, with some number of variants thrown in as needed for the story.

A producer of a movie should have a vision of each character then select the best actor for each role, not because of diversity pressure or any need to conform to government-pressured social goals.

Maybe I'm not expressing myself well. But I have studied television and television writing and producing pretty thoroughly, as well as having done a lot of writing myself, both informal as well as published non-fiction, I've even dabbled a little at writing some science fiction once or twice.

 

[RetiredGySgt]

Just because the writer was white does not mean the characters can not be a different race.

 

[Flopper]

And yet I don't think these people did so out of any particular overt animosity for these people as much as maybe out of a bit of shock and unfamiliarity; much like the shock of Indians seeing the white man for the first time, it took a long time for people to get used to and accept that people so different from them (in those days, black people were REALLY black) as being really no different than them--- --- especially because of the educational divide--- Black people simply were not afforded the education yet more common to white people so it became comfortable and easy for whites then to really attribute that to their just being dumb.


Whatever dates I do not know but that is a good point---- not everyone was interested in rockets and other worlds back then much less hypothetically possible life and societies and scenarios on them, that was a bit outside the mundane sphere.

I think Asimov was ahead of his time. He was very good writer with good ideas. I'm sorry he is not around writing today.

 

[Flopper]

That is a pretty naive and puerile attitude, WB. If we follow that logic to reducio ad absurdum, then if we make a movie about Mars, that should gain us a Martian audience!

Or maybe not.

In reality, the majority of the viewing audience is WHITE. That is where your primary audience is generally. If you market to blacks, then you are mainly marketing to a much smaller audience. If you make a movie a jumbled hodgepodge of nationalities for obvious PC inclusivity with no real support for it in the storyline, that does not mean you will necessary attract more Asians or Latinos, say, and if it is very diverse, you might actually LOSE some of the black audience or white audience who don't go in for too much psych-ops social "justice." You just don't know.

The reason? Super-diversity for diversity's sake does not reflect any actual real life situation in the real world. Oh, you will find a few blacks with whites and whites with blacks, the odd asian or latino thrown in, but for the most part, most places you go you will find that people tend to naturally congregate with their own kind.

Think of any good movie and you generally find the story set in a time and place where most of the people are this or that, rich, poor, oppressed, tyrants, black or white, with some number of variants thrown in as needed for the story.

A producer of a movie should have a vision of each character then select the best actor for each role, not because of diversity pressure or any need to conform to government-pressured social goals.

Maybe I'm not expressing myself well. But I have studied television and television writing and producing pretty thoroughly, as well as having done a lot of writing myself, both informal as well as published non-fiction, I've even dabbled a little at writing some science fiction once or twice.

I agree, diversity for sake of diversity is not good. However, today there is plenty of talent to choose from from all races and cultures. The trick is to match the person to the part without regard to race. Of course parts often require a certainty race or ethnicity.

 

[Flopper]

That is a pretty naive and puerile attitude, WB. If we follow that logic to reducio ad absurdum, then if we make a movie about Mars, that should gain us a Martian audience!

Or maybe not.

In reality, the majority of the viewing audience is WHITE. That is where your primary audience is generally. If you market to blacks, then you are mainly marketing to a much smaller audience. If you make a movie a jumbled hodgepodge of nationalities for obvious PC inclusivity with no real support for it in the storyline, that does not mean you will necessary attract more Asians or Latinos, say, and if it is very diverse, you might actually LOSE some of the black audience or white audience who don't go in for too much psych-ops social "justice." You just don't know.

The reason? Super-diversity for diversity's sake does not reflect any actual real life situation in the real world. Oh, you will find a few blacks with whites and whites with blacks, the odd asian or latino thrown in, but for the most part, most places you go you will find that people tend to naturally congregate with their own kind.

Think of any good movie and you generally find the story set in a time and place where most of the people are this or that, rich, poor, oppressed, tyrants, black or white, with some number of variants thrown in as needed for the story.

A producer of a movie should have a vision of each character then select the best actor for each role, not because of diversity pressure or any need to conform to government-pressured social goals.

Maybe I'm not expressing myself well. But I have studied television and television writing and producing pretty thoroughly, as well as having done a lot of writing myself, both informal as well as published non-fiction, I've even dabbled a little at writing some science fiction once or twice.

In early science fiction, issues of diversity, intolerance, integration, and bias were often addressed in writing about being from other worlds. We saw this in Asimov's The End of Eternity, H.G. Wells Time Machine, and many others.

 

[toobfreak]

In early science fiction, issues of diversity, intolerance, integration, and bias were often addressed in writing about being from other worlds. We saw this in Asimov's The End of Eternity, H.G. Wells Time Machine, and many others.

Gene Roddenberry took the same approach with Star Trek. Long ago he said that by painting Star Trek as a wagon train to the stars, he could address issues here on Earth the networks would never allow (then) by making them happen on other worlds.

In one of the late ST episodes with Riddler Frank Gorshin, they addressed differences in races, racial bias, and the need for people to live together in harmony.

But they didn't listen. Seems still, no one is listening.

 

[Dogmaphobe]

It's been a little more than half a century since I have read those books.

Good stuff.

If you like that, I'd recommend the Across Realtime series by Vernor Vinge.

 

[monkrules]

In the distant future we will all be a pinkish, yellowish, brownish color.

That's just a sad thought. I hate the thought of looking out on a boring, ugly, beige population.

I love the variety seen in asians, indians, whites, hispanics, etc. There are a lot of gorgeous people out there.

Beige people would be a literal nightmare, imo.

 

[monkrules]

I read the Foundation Trilogy as a teenager, decades ago. Loved it.

Asimov was a prolific writer. I read, long ago, that he had written fifty or sixty books. He wrote on a variety of subjects.

I believe his wife was also a writer, if I remember correctly.

 

[EvilCat Breath]

Absolute bullshit. Do you think, given all the changes we have seen in the last 100 years, that the future will somehow revert to old ways?

The idea that the future holds nothing but white men as leaders and all the important people is simply laughable.

Quite possibly it would. Once we understand that multiculturalism is unworkable and the savage cannot live with civilization it might well revert to an older norm.

 

[EvilCat Breath]

What I see is capitalism at work. If they include more diversity, they gain a more diverse audience. That means more people watching. More money.

It doesn't work that way with entertainment. It's not like advertising Tide Pods with a dancing black fatties.

Blacks are shoehorned into science fiction and fantasy. They are there if paid to be there. They don't watch it, they don't like it unless it's a Black superhero. Until very recently there were no black science fiction writers.

The network forcing diversity into every aspect of programming is the CW. It went from having several good shows to having none. It is for sale. If you are correct, the more diversity, the more people watching the CW would not be in the awful position it is in.

 

[occupied]

That's just a sad thought. I hate the thought of looking out on a boring, ugly, beige population.

I love the variety seen in asians, indians, whites, hispanics, etc. There are a lot of gorgeous people out there.

Beige people would be a literal nightmare, imo.

Don't worry. We will be long extinct by that time.

 

[Flopper]

I read the Foundation Trilogy as a teenager, decades ago. Loved it.

Asimov was a prolific writer. I read, long ago, that he had written fifty or sixty books. He wrote on a variety of subjects.

I believe his wife was also a writer, if I remember correctly.

When I was very young a read and enjoyed the robot series. I still remember the 3 laws of robotics

1. A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
2. A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.

However, I think foundation series was written better and written more for adults.

 

[Flopper]

It doesn't work that way with entertainment. It's not like advertising Tide Pods with a dancing black fatties.

Blacks are shoehorned into science fiction and fantasy. They are there if paid to be there. They don't watch it, they don't like it unless it's a Black superhero. Until very recently there were no black science fiction writers.

The network forcing diversity into every aspect of programming is the CW. It went from having several good shows to having none. It is for sale. If you are correct, the more diversity, the more people watching the CW would not be in the awful position it is in.

All black people do not reject science fiction nor do they all love to watch Black superheroes just as all White people do not all love to watch White superheroes.

Provided it's a good quality production, diverse casts attract bigger audience than homogenous casts. By diversity, I don't just mean race but diversity in sex, age. physical characteristics of the characters, cultures, locations, etc. This is particularly true today with so much diversity among audiences. When the average budget for films today being 70 to 90 million dollars, studios need large audience to make money so they have to appeal to an audience that is often multiracial and multicultural. According to the Motion Picture Association of America almost 70 per cent of the studios’ annual revenue from box office now comes from international markets.

Smaller budget films, 10 to 15 million can afford to appeal to certain groups and thus reduce diversity. We see a lot of this on the streaming channels like Netflix.

 

[EvilCat Breath]

All black people do not reject science fiction nor do they all love to watch Black superheroes just as all White people do not all love to watch White superheroes.

Provided it's a good quality production, diverse casts attract bigger audience than homogenous casts. By diversity, I don't just mean race but diversity in sex, age. physical characteristics of the characters, cultures, locations, etc. This is particularly true today with so much diversity among audiences. When the average budget for films today being 70 to 90 million dollars, studios need large audience to make money so they have to appeal to an audience that is often multiracial and multicultural. According to the Motion Picture Association of America almost 70 per cent of the studios’ annual revenue from box office now comes from international markets.

Smaller budget films, 10 to 15 million can afford to appeal to certain groups and thus reduce diversity. We see a lot of this on the streaming channels like Netflix.

One would think that the more diverse the wider the audience. It just doesn't with that way. It's the reason why the incredibly diverse network CW has lost incredible amounts of money and is now for sale.

It's the basis for the truism get woke, go broke.

 

[EvilCat Breath]

The remake of West Side Story cost 100 million. It is diverse. It failed.

 

[Flopper]

One would think that the more diverse the wider the audience. It just doesn't with that way. It's the reason why the incredibly diverse network CW has lost incredible amounts of money and is now for sale.

It's the basis for the truism get woke, go broke.

Know nothing about CW networks but the major sources of the big productions need to appeal to diverse audience and you just can't do that anymore with an all white, male dominated cast which ignores the ethnicity of audiences.

 

[BackAgain]

Just started reading this book after seeing it recommended everywhere. I think it's a trilogy.

But I noticed something weird. 15 chapters in and there's no women, not even a waitress at a restaurant or the mention of some guy's wife.

WTF?

Then I looked up the publish date, 1951.

Things were different back then.

Lots of stuff stolen from "Foundation" wound up in other books, movies, etc. The "hive city" is one of them.

Very good, even if it's 70+ years old.

I read it many years ago. It was brilliant then and still is. The televised version (season one just finished) is pretty good too.

 

[monkrules]

One would think that the more diverse the wider the audience. It just doesn't with that way. It's the reason why the incredibly diverse network CW has lost incredible amounts of money and is now for sale.

It's the basis for the truism get woke, go broke.

Overall, CW is filled with shit programs. But that's true of broadcast TV in general, these days.

In fact, it's hard to find anything at all that's worth watching. I call it Ghetto TV. 'Cause it's pure shit.

 

[WinterBorn]

Overall, CW is filled with shit programs. But that's true of broadcast TV in general, these days.

In fact, it's hard to find anything at all that's worth watching. I call it Ghetto TV. 'Cause it's pure shit.

Broadcast is shit. Cable isn't worth the price.

We have Netflix, Prime, Hulu and HBO Go. We've watched some great shows and movies. And usually have something on the list as we binge whatever we are watching.