This also is interestingly informative of RPGs because, like any specialized craft, there's a lot of self assessment. This is pretty much unavoidable, because with a specialized field, it is usually only the people within that field who can comment intelligently. The bookbinder has to live with the frustration that the bulk of people picking up his book have no understanding of what went into making that book, and how it is different than the book next to it.
Where this becomes problematic is that the bookbinder has both inclination and incentive to elevate his own work to art. Part of this is defense against those who would dismiss his work out of ignorance, partly its the simple reality that art gets more respect than craft. There's also a component of having a genuinely deep appreciation of his own work - he knows it so intimately that it's rich and full of meaning for him in a way that can make it look legitimately like art to his eyes.
Unfortunately, that can end up elevating anything that is simply well done to being art, and that's hard to address. If only some work in a field is art (as is the case, I would say, in bookbinding) then everyone else who binds books has incentive to declare at least some portion of their own work to be art, if only to keep up with the neighbors. Often this means that the bar for art gets lowered to include anything that's merely well done. Of course, since this assessment tends to only take place between small, isolated communities, it arguably doesn't really impact beyond those bounds.
How this applies to RPG design is, I think, an exercise best left to the reader. :)
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This also is interestingly informative of RPGs because, like any specialized craft, there's a lot of self assessment. This is pretty much unavoidable, because with a specialized field, it is usually only the people within that field who can comment intelligently. The bookbinder has to live with the frustration that the bulk of people picking up his book have no understanding of what went into making that book, and how it is different than the book next to it.
Where this becomes problematic is that the bookbinder has both inclination and incentive to elevate his own work to art. Part of this is defense against those who would dismiss his work out of ignorance, partly its the simple reality that art gets more respect than craft. There's also a component of having a genuinely deep appreciation of his own work - he knows it so intimately that it's rich and full of meaning for him in a way that can make it look legitimately like art to his eyes.
Unfortunately, that can end up elevating anything that is simply well done to being art, and that's hard to address. If only some work in a field is art (as is the case, I would say, in bookbinding) then everyone else who binds books has incentive to declare at least some portion of their own work to be art, if only to keep up with the neighbors. Often this means that the bar for art gets lowered to include anything that's merely well done. Of course, since this assessment tends to only take place between small, isolated communities, it arguably doesn't really impact beyond those bounds.
How this applies to RPG design is, I think, an exercise best left to the reader. :)
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I'll respond when I've got the chance. Possibly in a fresh LiveJournal post.
yrs--
--Ben