Game of Thrones. CEO Directive: Please catch up or agree not to care.
2Stephen King got into trouble last night for commenting on an element of the episode that had just aired. Here's a non-spoiler follow up tweet from him:
He continued to get negative responses. Had a funny response here:
I feel bad that the world cannot get opinions from other amazingly creative people because they might accidentally spoil the story for someone who wasn't watching. There are good arguments for why someone wouldn't give HBO their money, but I think you just have to accept that you are going to have much of the plot spoiled if you don't figure out how to watch it live.
Can we agree that you will get caught up or not care? what say you?
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After getting my wife (@ar) interested in Game of Thrones I went the "screw it, here iTunes store, take my money" approach and we're desperately trying to get caught up. But we're lame and still on season 1... so no spoilers until then!
It's interesting with GoT how assumed it is that basically no one read the books. It seemed like people didn't care about LotR spoilers all that much, partly because most people who really cared had read the books.
Also, the hobbit has a long journey before he throws the ring into the volcano. Even if you didn't read the book who didn't see that coming?
I think it could be because a lot of people hadn't heard of the books before the TV series, unlike LotR.
I'm in a kind of a weird spot because I read the books years ago but haven't caught up with the show yet. So it's not like anything can ever really be spoiled for me...I already know everything that happens.
The fun for me is more in seeing how it's presented in the show, but I'm not going to be upset finding out when something I already know is going to happen happens.
But I'm torn because I understand how spoilers can totally ruin something great. I just watched Breaking Bad for the first time a few months ago and I had accidentally come across a spoiler that said [spoiler]Jesse died.[/spoiler] Even though it ended up being a fake, it completely changed the way I watched the show. I was waiting for it to happen the entire last half of the final season.
On the other hand getting upset about GoT spoilers is akin to being upset about Lord of the Rings spoilers, everything that happens is out there and available to you in the form of some kickass books.
Also the way you named this thread makes it sound like you're the CEO of Game of Thrones which is a pretty awesome thought.
ha - ok added a period there for some better delineation.
Come on, everybody knows Game of Thrones is a VP-level position
Oh, btw, I also haven't finished the Bible yet, so no Noah spoilers.
I've been a George R.R. Martin fan since the late 80's Wild Card series (though I read them in the early 90's), but I haven't read much after having kids. I picked up and read the first couple books of GoT but then the series launched and it was too easy to just let it catch up and pass by my reading speed.
I did find Stephen King's use of that excuse to be pretty enjoyable. From his perspective it's just everything.
If you're way behind on GoT and want to get with the times, here's a decent summary of what's happened so far.
Great button - "Let the words flow like summerwine"
I know this was specific to GoT, but I'd like to extend this out for other shows. We cut the cord a while back, so we pay Amazon for certain shows, SoA, Walking Dead, etc. - at a higher rate per show than any subscriber. Which is fine, we don't have commercials, etc. That said, I think it's ridiculous that we have to wait for the same content.
If I'm paying more for that content, I should have access to it at the same time as cable subscribers.
So, "find a way to watch live" is counter-intuitive to me. We are moving to a streaming delivery of content, so why cater to the old, antiquated cable model? If the producers of these shows want people to pay for their work, then give them the product they pay for, the same time it's available to everyone else.
And for goodness sakes, make HBOGO a stand alone subscription service!
/rant
This reminds me of the "don't tell me the score" phenomenon with DVR's and sporting events. If you choose to DVR a sporting event and don't want to learn the outcome you must "unplug your life" for a period of time and hope it works. This also applies to TV episodes via DVR or OnDemand . It's far more practical (yet still challenging) to do this for isolated episodes/events than for seasons of a series. Who cares though, either watch live or don't worry about it. I've heard plenty about Game of Thrones without watching the series or reading the book and totally look forward to diving in deep one day. Heck, condensing a series later in it's life is fun and quite a reward for a procrastinator.
I definitely agree on how annoying it is that content is delayed and access to HBO requires a major cable carrier. I do happen to solve this annoyance by paying a major cable carrier to have HBO. HBO funds these series and I have to respect their choices to consume them. Stephen King apparently does the same. I would like him to make public statements about this content that I can enjoy. As per his joke about Hamlet, it's all about where the line is drawn.
Zero chance of this succeeding, but I'd propose people start trying to define this line. For instance "The Joffery Rule: By Episode 4.2 of any series you must accept that you had time to be caught up if you wanted to and not bitch about spoilers following live broadcasts"
Sports scores is a great analogy where the person with delayed watching intent knows the extreme challenge and entirely up to him to stay off the grid. After episode 4.2 I say all series should be treated as live sporting events.
I'm not interested in reading the books, so I try to avoid spoilers. That's on me to do, but it's just polite not to tweet major story points directly. At the end of last season I tweeted "GOT: stunned silence" -- everyone who saw knew what I meant, but no spoilers.
King could have shared his opinion through another medium, with spoiler warnings. I'm sure he could have said something more insightful than 140 characters allow anyway. His twitter-length opinion wasn't worth spoiling it.
ok, good - I like having the solid opposite opinion. So how do you feel about his hamlet spoiler?
Hamlet is pretty much common knowledge. GoT is not. I wouldn't spoil less-common classics for anyone either.
Warning: spoilers [spoiler]
[/spoiler]
Personally, I think this problem highlights a major deficiency in most major social networking applications: the ability to filter out posts. Many Twitter clients have had this for years, but it's never been implemented on Twitter or, to my knowledge, in any official Twitter product. And Twitter's been slowly edging out third-party clients for some time now, so it's tough to add good solutions on top of the network.
It'd be worthwhile for them to implement. Filtering features don't only help avoid spoilers; for instance, they also help PTSD victims avoid triggering content.
I don't know why but I've never thought about this as an option, very good idea. I wonder if there are chrome/FF extensions that do this?
Apparently the answer is yes: http://www.wired.com/2014/04/silencer-chrome-extension/
It's still strange to me that Facebook has filtering options and Twitter doesn't. That said, Facebook's aren't great and reset constantly.
He raised $1200 for charity in exchange for never spoiling another TV show again on Twitter.
@katylava exactly the point Mr. King was highlighting on Hamlet - it's a line drawn somewhere. I'd like the line to be drawn at less than 400 year old content.
The Joffery Rule: after episode 4.2 you may treat live performances of a series as common knowledge.
The other angle is how do you feel about sports outcomes on twitter? Isn't the line drawn there where common knowledge is the expectation that you watched it "live" ?
Hmm, setting the book argument aside, I'd like the line to be drawn at somewhere more than "aired last night".
A 24 hour line doesn't seem unreasonable. King's tweet hit before the west coast had even hit 'live' airing.
Probably more than 24 hours. Downton Abbey airs in it's native land a couple months before here in the US, right?
I'd say the earliest you can spoil for one season is when the next season begins.
I'm in favor of being very conservative with spoilers, because what do you really lose by not spoiling it for people? No obvious headlines, tweets, or FB posts... and try to keep it out of the first sentence. How much does that really hinder discussion, or your enjoyment of the show? Why not just be nice and, when in doubt, hide your spoilers?
We could still have a whole discussion about GoT 4.2 here if we made a topic called "[Spoilers] GoT 4.2".
What you lose is culture building. Status quo is we're reserving cultural events for when people come together to talk about Miley Cirus or the Superbowl. We are decreasing the cultural value of other items (of higher quality) by demanding people suppress their public opinions.
I did not seek out opinions on GoT but I got one from Stephen King and I very much enjoyed it. Other people demanded that he was wrong and maybe he'll stop.
special threads with [spoilers] = friction. it doesn't take much - culture is formed by immersion.
I disagree. Our culture seems very affected by these shows as-is, without spoilers everywhere.
Trial Question: Would the Chinese people benefit from public discussions of Tiananmen Square or is it ok that it is suppressed?
What happened at Tiananmen Square? Wait, don't tell me, there's probably a movie about it I haven't seen yet.
There's a pretty big difference in effect between discussing government oppression and discussing televison shows.
hey, at least I avoided Godwin's Law :D
I haven't seen either episode of the new GoT season. They're patiently waiting on my DVR. However, I'm aware that this is solely my fault, so I've stayed off of Twitter and Facebook to prevent as many spoilers as possible (even though I've read the books), and accept that some parts of the show will be spoiled for me.
If you're avoiding spoilers and still on Twitter, you're doing it wrong.
I just don't follow people who are known to spoil things.
someone RT'd Stephen King to me so you'll have to be wary still.
Exactly. And some of the people I follow are wildcards. You never know when they'll spoil something randomly. I just don't trust it.
Exactly. Ron Perlman spoiled the culmination of his plotline in SoA, with one tweet.
I think there must be a perceived critical mass to require live expectations. In the past, network TV achieved this quite easily. "Who shot J.R." was certainly a spoiler, right?
Did the Sopranos suffer from spoiler outcry or were they free of it?
is Netflix to blame?
@snapster I think it's just growing pains. Many are still adjusting to the new media standard of accessibility (DVR, online downloads, Netflix, etc.), and some don't know how to handle it.
Eventually, I think the outcries of "spoiler alert OMGZ!" will be replaced by those saying, "It's your own damn fault."
http://torrentfreak.com/game-of-thrones-sets-new-torrent-swarm-record-140415/ I definitely think we're not there yet through legal means.
In my opinion, HBO's resistance to having an affordable or easily accessible online streaming service causes this. Not general accessibility
Where I'm torn on this is the way Netflix releases series all at once. I mean, when is it ok to talk about the end of House of Cards Season 2?
24 hours after the series is released? Or do you set some sort of pace like one episode a week that you should reasonably be able to assume people are watching?
And then there are the people who jump straight to the last episode to post midnight spoilers on Twitter.
My wife was surprised to see the spoilers on her Google News feed. She read the books, and knew about it, but still the day after was pretty bad for everyone else.
I noticed this - a few major pubs are on board with the Joffery Rule :)
http://www.nme.com/filmandtv/news/game-of-thrones-director-teases-huge-series-final/336967
'Game Of Thrones' director teases huge series finale 'It's really the episode to end all episodes,' says Alex Graves
Idea: get caught up and enjoy it without facing spoilers :)
He's a heartless bastard too.
That guy also keeps killing people I like.
I hate to be "that guy", and I know that it says "Game of Thrones" (or GoT), but...
It's actually A Game of Thrones, or AGoT. I read the books and played the RPG eons ago.
Yep, I am that guy. #AGoThipster
Super hipster level: A Song of Ice and Fire.