4 ms·

In general, I think there's far too much policing of language and I wish everyone was more relaxed about it. Having said that, "money shot" really is a clear r

In general, I think there's far too much policing of language and I wish everyone was more relaxed about it. Having said that, "money shot" really is a clear reference to porn, and I was surprised to see it used in the way that it was. It's not inappropriate for every venue, but it seems pretty clear cut to say it's inappropriate for the title of a presentation at a tech conference.

protomyth 14y ago
Are you really sure about "money shot"? I know the porn reference, but I've heard it in multiple contexts over the years to refer to the photo (or in a more modern context video) that will sell it (whatever it is).
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
  - anigbrowl 14y ago
    It's a film term that has acquired a secondary meaning in porn. In regular movies it's a shot where you blow something or stage some similarly expensive setpiece that will provide a visual highlight for the film, and it's still current in that context - on a crew it's normal to discuss scheduling in relation to the day's 'money' shot, and the term is often stretched to include whichever shot is the most aesthetically important one for the current scene. Obviously, in this case the person explicitly referenced the porn context. I thought that the porn context was quite inappropriate myself and broadly supported Richards at the time, although I also think she should have taken her concerns directly to the organizers first. I'm not really offended by porn, but I'd rather not watch it myself, and it's very predictable that it will be offensive to quite a few other people, who'll feel excluded from that presentation even if they're interested in the technical topic (making effective screencasts). In the organizers' position I'd have asked the presenter to consider something more general, such as 'what you can learn from movie directors'.
- gaylemcd 14y ago
  Yes, it's really, really a reference to porn. The abstract even mentioned thinking like a porn director to get the money shot.
- AdrianRossouw 14y ago
  According to wikipedia [1], it was originally the scene in a film that took the most money to reproduce. And is used in journalism and many other fields. The relation to porn is of course obvious due to the presentation's subtitle, referring to something as a 'money shot' should probably not be considered pornographic in intent, in my opinion. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Money_shot http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Money_shot
  - subsystem 14y ago
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0V6vNEDMzgw http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0V6vNEDMzgw "I'm co-opting the term money shot, because I think it's very valuable... we all know what it is, if you don't know you can google it because I'm not going to talk about it, but if you co-opt the concept what you come away with is the content people actually care about and that is what people pay for in porn..." If you can't talk about the title it's probably not a very good one.
deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
rayiner 14y ago
Policing of words is bike shedding. Why don't women go into tech? Because they'll be in a distinct minority, and if you're ambitious and have some sense you'll avoid putting yourself in that situation. Better to go into a field like medicine where you're not the odd one out if you're a woman, where it's not unusual or atypical to find women in positions of power, etc. That's the nuts and bolts of it. Everything else is bike shedding. It's nothing more than "what do people talk like in this new version of the industry where women still have no power?" So why is it the focus? Because the male-dominated industry is willing to entertain forcing everyone to by hypersensitive about what they say. "Sensitivity" and "inclusiveness" is cheap. It is not willing to take affirmative steps to hire more women, put women in positions of power, etc. That's not cheap and upsets the entrenched power dynamic.
- MetaCosm 14y ago
  Also, it is chicken and egg. You need a pool of qualified people to pick from to promote the best. If only 20% of your workforce is women, the chance of the "best" person coming from that class is obviously reduced, you could decide to promote an unqualified or underachieving employee as an act of social justice, but you risk losing the qualified or better achieving employees as a result. Nursing is a bit of an inverse of tech, 93% women. Nursing has great and growing salaries, similar educational requirements and massive upward mobility... yet men still make up less than 7% of the industry.

protomyth 14y ago

Are you really sure about "money shot"? I know the porn reference, but I've heard it in multiple contexts over the years to refer to the photo (or in a more modern context video) that will sell it (whatever it is).

deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
- anigbrowl 14y ago
  It's a film term that has acquired a secondary meaning in porn. In regular movies it's a shot where you blow something or stage some similarly expensive setpiece that will provide a visual highlight for the film, and it's still current in that context - on a crew it's normal to discuss scheduling in relation to the day's 'money' shot, and the term is often stretched to include whichever shot is the most aesthetically important one for the current scene. Obviously, in this case the person explicitly referenced the porn context. I thought that the porn context was quite inappropriate myself and broadly supported Richards at the time, although I also think she should have taken her concerns directly to the organizers first. I'm not really offended by porn, but I'd rather not watch it myself, and it's very predictable that it will be offensive to quite a few other people, who'll feel excluded from that presentation even if they're interested in the technical topic (making effective screencasts). In the organizers' position I'd have asked the presenter to consider something more general, such as 'what you can learn from movie directors'.
gaylemcd 14y ago
Yes, it's really, really a reference to porn. The abstract even mentioned thinking like a porn director to get the money shot.
AdrianRossouw 14y ago
According to wikipedia [1], it was originally the scene in a film that took the most money to reproduce. And is used in journalism and many other fields. The relation to porn is of course obvious due to the presentation's subtitle, referring to something as a 'money shot' should probably not be considered pornographic in intent, in my opinion. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Money_shot http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Money_shot
- subsystem 14y ago
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0V6vNEDMzgw http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0V6vNEDMzgw "I'm co-opting the term money shot, because I think it's very valuable... we all know what it is, if you don't know you can google it because I'm not going to talk about it, but if you co-opt the concept what you come away with is the content people actually care about and that is what people pay for in porn..." If you can't talk about the title it's probably not a very good one.

deleted 14y ago

[deleted]

rayiner 14y ago

Policing of words is bike shedding. Why don't women go into tech? Because they'll be in a distinct minority, and if you're ambitious and have some sense you'll avoid putting yourself in that situation. Better to go into a field like medicine where you're not the odd one out if you're a woman, where it's not unusual or atypical to find women in positions of power, etc. That's the nuts and bolts of it. Everything else is bike shedding. It's nothing more than "what do people talk like in this new version of the industry where women still have no power?" So why is it the focus? Because the male-dominated industry is willing to entertain forcing everyone to by hypersensitive about what they say. "Sensitivity" and "inclusiveness" is cheap. It is not willing to take affirmative steps to hire more women, put women in positions of power, etc. That's not cheap and upsets the entrenched power dynamic.

MetaCosm 14y ago
Also, it is chicken and egg. You need a pool of qualified people to pick from to promote the best. If only 20% of your workforce is women, the chance of the "best" person coming from that class is obviously reduced, you could decide to promote an unqualified or underachieving employee as an act of social justice, but you risk losing the qualified or better achieving employees as a result. Nursing is a bit of an inverse of tech, 93% women. Nursing has great and growing salaries, similar educational requirements and massive upward mobility... yet men still make up less than 7% of the industry.