Nihilism Doesn't Mean What You Think it Means.

Nihilism. He keeps using that word. I do not think it means what he thinks it means. George is either singularly focused on cash or a quite subtle satirist. He’s willing to call himself a Mobile Maverick, so I assume that subtlety is out of the question.

Yes, yes, for the love of all things holy, how can someone turn down web advertising, especially with the high cost of page hosting on GitHub?

George seems to narrowly derive existential meaning from commercial success. If a game isn’t commercially successful or at least written with the intent of commercial success, it isn’t worthy of existence because it may detract from the commercial success of others. He actually goes further than that. It’s OK to rip off a general concept created by someone else if the ripoff is geared toward making mad stacks of cash most efficiently. Free market, baby.

Let’s review. Some things with no existential value:

• Recreational programming.
• Open source software.
• Playing games that are fun and freely offered.

Things with existential value:

• Monetization strategies.

This all comes from someone in the game development industry. A guy who writes games for people to play when they could instead spend a few extra hours tending their backyard furnace. Why should his users play games rather than monetize their lives? Does he believe that users inhabit some lower rung of the evolutionary ladder, where people derive meaning from purchasing apps, clicking ads, and making in game purchases?

We’re living in the future. We actually don’t need to tend backyard furnaces, or sow our own seeds, or grind our own grain. We enjoy extra time to pursue creative acts that bring us each joy and fulfillment. Not only that, but we’re all connected in a way that allows us to share and collaborate with the world rather than our immediate friends and neighbors. Clay Shirky makes the case for this cognitive surplus, and argues that any form of creativity is a sign of human progress.

I enjoy playing 2048, but I enjoy seeing the near endless stream of 2048 clones even more. We’re living in a future where people have the time and skill to write and release useful, fun, entertaining software for free just because they enjoy the act.

I hope that more people turn to creation rather than consumption to pass time and find meaning. I’d rather see 2048 people proudly posting clones of 2048 that they wrote than 2048 people posting screenshots of their high score in 2048 or Threes.

Find meaning in making.