NEWS: Wil Wheaton's Geek in Review: So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish

When technology and information became highly-prized commodities in the 90s as we were all getting out of college, those of us who had spent much of the 80s alone in our darkened bedrooms, bathed in the green or amber glow of a personal computer's CRT while we "jacked in" at 300 baud to FidoNet and the few of us who were lucky enough to have access to the real Matrix (ARPANet) when 56k was but a dream for mortals had a head start on an entirely new world. While the popular kids continued what Lester Bangs called "the long journey to the middle," we were using our passion for computers and knowledge to found companies and change the way people communicated with each other. It wasn't long before we became our own demographic, and not just any demographic_a demographic that was inherently smart, and had a lot of disposable income. Suddenly, mainstream companies were marketing to us, and in the dot com boom, we finally threw the massive parties we were never invited to when we were younger. The geeks may not have inherited the Earth, but we certainly had arrived, and now we got a say in what was cool.

January, 1984:

Papers scattered across my bed appeared to be homework to the casual observer, but to me they were people. A thief, a couple of wizards, some fighters; a party of adventurers who desperately wanted to storm The Keep on the Borderlands. But without anyone to guide them, they sat alone, trapped in the purgatory of my bedroom, straining behind college-ruled blue lines to come to life.I tried to recruit my younger brother to play with me, but he was 7, and more interested in Monchichi. The kids in my neighborhood were more interested in football and riding bikes, so I was left to read through module B2 by myself, wandering the Caves of Chaos and dodging Lizardmen alone.

I know that I'm opening myself up to ridicule from my peers, but I'm going to take it like a man, and admit to really liking a few movies from the 1970s that some may call cult classics, but I call guilty pleasures.



After the atomic horror B-movie onslaught of the 1950s, the 1960s were a relatively dry decade for Sci-Fi, with notable exceptions like 2001 and Planet of the Apes. As the 1970s got underway, though, there was an explosion of Sci-Fi flicks, giving audiences a cautionary look at an ultramodern, dystopian future that was as much influenced by the Vietnam war and Watergate as it was by classic Sci-Fi themes.



Though the '70s were a prolific decade for big studio Sci-Fi films -- particularly the "pre-Star Wars" half of the decade -- quantity clearly outpaced quality, and this is where I'll focus my attention this week. These movies don't age particularly well, which is a big part of their charm, and I share them today in the hopes that they may just become guilty pleasures of yours, too, if you can accept a future world where the sideburns are huge, the furniture is made of molded white plastic, and almost everyone wears a tunic.

The Transporter Chief says, "Welcome to the 24th century. You are aboard the starship Enterprise."



She could have said to me, "Welcome to 1987, Wil. You are on Stage 9."

"What is that, your spacesuit?" He said, and made a sound that was somewhere between a laugh and a cough.



"Oh? This? Yeah. It's not as cool as yours, but it's what they tell me to wear." I put my hand down. I really wanted to leave. I felt a little light headed. Why wouldn't Captain Kirk shake my hand? And why didn't he like my spacesuit? Could he see the fake muscles? Maybe he didn't like the color. I became hyper-aware of the spandex, clinging to my body, and longed for the comfort of my fleece jacket.



"Well?" He asked.Oh no. He'd asked me a question, and I'd missed it."Excuse me?" I replied."I said, what do you do over there?" he asked. There was a challenge in his voice.



"Oh, uh, well, I'm an acting ensign, and I sometimes pilot the ship." Maybe he'd be impressed that I'd already logged several hours at the helm of the Enterprise D, all before the age of 16.



"Well, I'd never let a kid come onto my bridge." He said, and walked away.

Over the years, I've learned something from being on both sides of this table: it's never about the signature. It's about that brief moment, that brief encounter with a Star Trek cast member, that is so important to the fans. That 30 seconds or so of hopefully undivided attention is what they're really paying for, and I always do my best to make sure they get their money's worth. Contrary to popular belief, sitting at a table signing hundreds of autographs for several hours without a break is hard. It's not just mindlessly scrawling my name; It's stopping and listening to the always excited, sometimes shaking, always sweating, sometimes scary dude who wants to know exactly why I did "X" on episode "Y" and would I please sign his picture in silver . . . because Marina signed it in gold and now I want the men in silver and the women in gold, and I hated your character and here are 25 reasons why and I expect an answer for each one of them and I'm not leaving until I'm satisfied.

"So I thought we'd head over toward stage 9," the producer said to me, "and we'll shoot our host wraps in there."



"Wait." I said. "You mean we get to walk into stage 9?"



"Don't get too excited," He said, " there's nothing left from Trek in there."



Though I knew that there was no way they'd preserve our sets for twenty years, and though I knew that someone else would eventually move into our stages, just as we'd moved into the original series' stages, I still felt a little sad.



"Nothing at all?" I said. It was a stupid question. Of course there wouldn't be anything there. But like a kid who just learned that Darth Vader was just a guy in a suit, or that KITT didn't really talk, I had to ask again, just to be sure I hadn't somehow misunderstood the cold hard reality.



"They're building sets for some reshoots on a Farrelly Brothers movie," he said, "So we'll just shoot outside." I was struck by how blasé he was, which also shouldn't have surprised me. How could I expect anyone else in the world to have the same emotional attachment to those stages as I did?

I struggled to put the nostalgia and associated sadness of the day into perspective. I didn't mourn the loss of my sets, as much as I mourned the time in my life those sets represented: a time when my biggest responsibility was knowing my lines and getting to the set on time, not coming up with college tuition for the next four years. A time when KROQ played music that was relevant to me, and I knew all the DJs. A time when my biggest problem in the world was getting out of costume and makeup early enough to make it to the Forum for a Kings game. A time when my life was simpler and easier, when I had the luxury of taking for granted that I would always have everything I wanted and my opportunities were as numerous as the little mirrored stars on the black velvet starfield that hung behind Ten Forward on stage 9 . . . stars that are, most likely, cut up into hundreds of little bits to be doled out at auction for the next decade.



But, complicated as it is, I really like my life. I have a beautiful wife and two children who, though they don't carry my DNA, are clearly mine in every way that matters. I'm not going to be buying a boat any time soon, but I have been able to touch lives as a writer in ways that I never could have when I wore a spacesuit, just reading the words that other people thought I should say.

I was born in 1972, and came of age in the 1980s, which means that I am of the video game generation. Though my family started with the Odyssey2 before moving to the Atari 2600 and Atari 400 (membrane keyboards FTW!) much of my gaming took place in various arcades, or local businesses _ pizza parlors, drug stores, bowling alleys, liquor stores and even a head shop _ and they played such an important role in my life, I still have all kinds of very clear and powerful memories associated with certain games and the places I played them. It's good that I do, because arcades in America are vanishing like rainforests.



Come with me, for a moment, back to the days when a quarter really meant something, and take a look at some of those games and places . . .

"Mom! Dad! That Intendo is so great!" Jeremy said, once we were in the car.



"It's Nintendo, Jeremy," I said, in my very best Serious and Mature voice, "and it's probably the most advanced computer that will ever be made."

Rule One: Conventions would not exist without fans.

Pay attention, promoters: you have no business without the fans who come to your shows. Don't ever forget that, and respect them. I've personally watched promoters figure out that they could do something awesome for fans and earn nothing but goodwill for it, or alienate, exploit, and piss off fans to earn a dollar. Time and again, these people choose to earn the single dollar.



Rule Two: Conventions cannot function without volunteers.

When you see a volunteer, thank them. They're paying to be there just like you are, but they're also volunteering their time to help make the convention run smoothly.



Rule Three: Respect your fellow fans.

Treat your fellow fans with kindness and respect, especially when you're in line. Take a fucking shower every day. If you get hot and sweaty in your costume (excuse me, uh, "uniform") and it's stinky, guess what? You don't get to wear it until you've had it cleaned. If we can see the stink lines coming off of you when you walk into the con, we shouldn't have to endure standing next to you for two hours while we wait in an autograph line.



Rule Four: A memo to celebrity guests who sign autographs.

If someone waits in line to meet you and get your autograph, give them a moment of your undivided attention, listen to what they have to say, and honor them. If you're not willing to seriously interact with the people who are paying outrageous sums of money to see you, do us all a favor and don't go.



Rule Five: Don't be a dick.

This one is for fans and promoters and celebrities alike. If you're a promoter and you're just doing whatever you can to separate the fans from their money, you're a dick. If you're a guest and and you're just there to take whatever money you can from the fans without giving them any of your time or energy, you're a dick. If you're a fan, and you're determined to be unhappy no matter what happens at the show, you're also a dick. There are always fans at conventions who will not be happy no matter what happens, and we've all seen them. I will never understand why someone will spend the time and money to go to a show just to be miserable and complain the entire time they are there, but they are certainly a square on convention bingo.

"Wait." I said to the cashier. "You're carding me for a video game?"



"Yeah," he said, "It's an M-rated game. I have to."



"I'm 35," I said. "This is hilarious."



"I'm sorry, but my manager is standing right there, so . . ." he said.



"Well, I don't want to be a dick, and I don't want to get you into any trouble." I said. I reached into my wallet and handed him my ID. "But isn't this sort of lame?"



The manager nodded. "It's the stupidest thing in the world, and it's all because of the Grand Theft Auto thing."

My limited time is the most valuable commodity I have. I can always earn more money; I can always eat more food; I can stay up late if I didn't finish that load of laundry in the afternoon. (Curse you, Guitar Hero III: Thief of Daylight!) But I can't get back time that's already spent - in some cases, wasted (the time, not me) - on hollow pursuits, so I think very carefully about how I invest my limited free time, and my even more limited "me" time. Here's a look at a typical afternoon spent in a twisty maze of options, all enticing . . .

Oh . . . this should be interesting.