# Would derivative success bother you? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [July 8, 2010, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-derivative-success-bother-you/545978 "2010-07-08T16:42:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![The\_Hamster\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8edcca/32.png) [@The\_Hamster\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Hamster_King)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2010, 12:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-derivative-success-bother-you/545978/21 "2010-07-09T00:39:45Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > But the person who buys the book at the publishing house is not going to care what he thinks about the quality. The important thing is that it gets you past three levels of screening, so your work doesn’t get rejected by some intern. Exactly. For example, I’m one of the guys at Sony who evaluates ideas for new PlayStation games. In order to get to me, you have to go through several layers of producers who filter out the obvious rejects. Occasionally, management will tell the group I’m in to take a pitch just because its coming from someone with connections – a rap star, a guy on a popular TV show, a well-know comic book artist. In general, these tend to be crap, but we listen to the pitch anyway because the higher-ups want us to. The fact that a famous person is pushing a project won’t get us to waste a 5 million dollars making it, but it will get us to waste an afternoon looking at it. ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2010, 1:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-derivative-success-bother-you/545978/22 "2010-07-09T01:03:11Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > But the person who buys the book at the publishing house is not going to care what he thinks about the quality. The important thing is that it gets you past three levels of screening, so your work doesn’t get rejected by some intern. It is a lot easier to get a job with a direct link to a hiring manager. You’ve automatically survived the winnowing process. You may not get it, but you have much better odds. Yep. Unless someone like Stephen King were to fall in love with me, which is pretty damn unlikely (because my heart belongs to **Jennifer Government** ’s Max Barry), the already known author would lack the money and power to pull off a Will Smith for me. He’d only be able to open doors for me, not force unwilling hands. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2010, 7:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-derivative-success-bother-you/545978/23 "2010-07-09T07:12:27Z")
“Arranging” as in “someone comes to visit, notices one of my pieces on the wall, says he likes it and the SO says ‘yeah, it’s Nava’s’ ‘oh, I didn’t know she painted’ ‘yup, would you like to see her other pieces?’” is fine with me. That’s just networking and people do it all the time. “Arranging” as in “leaning on people to buy Nava’s things because otherwise nobody will”? Hell no. That’s an insult, both to my nonexistent art and to my intelligence. ---
**Author:** ![Kamino\_Neko](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kamino_neko/32/34_2.png) [@Kamino\_Neko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kamino_Neko)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2010, 8:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-derivative-success-bother-you/545978/24 "2010-07-09T08:10:16Z")
> [@Oakminster](#): > > I am older and far more cynical. Long as I’m getting paid, I don’t give a damn whether I get critical acclaim or not. If people want to pay me ridiculous sums of money to create crap, so be it. I’ll be the King of Crap, for the right fee. What he said. I’d be doing something I enjoy doing, and getting paid for it. I might be a bit worried that I would lose it if I broke up with the celeb, but, meh…I could suddenly lose all the fandom I’d developed if I got it entirely on my own merits, too, so, you know, whatevs. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-derivative-success-bother-you/545978.md?page=1)