Polishing Turds: A Rant

[Pifflestick]

I've been looking over the internet and have noticed a disturbing trend, the term "polishing" is used quite a lot. I take this clip from City of Heroes Issue 15: Anniversary; "Architect toolbox allows players to better and more easily polish their content before sharing it with the public." Now, an old saying comes to mind when I read this, you can't polish a turd, which leads me to my next part.

Now, Myth Busters have proven that you can indeed polish a turd and give it a little gleam and make it look more appealing, but heres the thing. At the end of the day, no matter how polished it is, no matter how appealing you make it look, at the end of the day its still just a piece of shit and no amount of polishing will make it anything else.

When writing a story you can use perfect grammer and big words. When you draw you can make the lines neat and the coloring even. When you create a game you can add great sound and particle effects. But no matter what you do, if it the basic premise is shit no matter what you do the end product will be shit. No matter how much polish you apply, no matter how much it shines.

So, in conclusion; Once shit, always shit.

Update: I'm updating this post to clarify. A few people (*cough* Sparky *cough*) were confused by what I was saying so I'll explain it a bit better.

Polishing good work to make it better is fine, and polishing skills is necessary to make your work better, but when you have an absolute failure don't bother trying to fix it up because no amount of polish or shine can make it any better. Throw away your failed works and move on, don't bother trying to edit it or fix it because no matter how much you polish a turd its still shit.

I'm not trying to discourage people from writing, and I'm not making any hidden comments about any of the art or fiction on this site, all I'm saying is that if you write a bad story or make a bad edit, don't go back and try to make it the original work better. Move on with your work and use your failure as a learning experiance. And if you really feel you absolutely have to go back to that work, then do a complete rework because unless you start from the ground up your alway gonna end up in the same place with a piece of shit.

You wouldn't put a new chandelier in a haunted house, don't try to fix your old work. Just leave the turd behind you and work towards the future.

[TBsparky]

Uhhh. ok? =3
-claps hands- ^^

[Pifflestick]

Originally Posted by TBsparky

Uhhh. ok? =3
-claps hands- ^^

Well I wasn't really expecting much in terms of a response but this one is worthy of the title. Your response dosn't at all address what I have stated here, it is simply filler. Thank you for wasting space. Sorry if this may seem rude, but really you should be more in-depth when responding instead of just giving a short nothing. Might as well have just sayed "bump."

[TBsparky]

Dump. Is that better? =3
btw you did come off a bit rude but with your starting of this rant it seemed a little odd.

Well as for your rant i shall say this. Ahem, ok not everyone has perfect grammer and most people do not use big words, myself for instance. I have actually produced a story long ago was was basically shit lol it was so bad that i had it removed =3 and well what I'm trying to say is yes, the end product may be shit but polishing up your work may help but most importantly polishing up your skills and potential as a writer, artist, game designer etc will help.

[Pifflestick]

Originally Posted by TBsparky

Dump. Is that better? =3
btw you did come off a bit rude but with your starting of this rant it seemed a little odd.

Well as for your rant i shall say this. Ahem, ok not everyone has perfect grammer and most people do not use big words, myself for instance. I have actually produced a story long ago was was basically shit lol it was so bad that i had it removed =3 and well what I'm trying to say is yes, the end product may be shit but polishing up your work may help but most importantly polishing up your skills and potential as a writer, artist, game designer etc will help.

I think you missed my point. A good story is a good story even if the spelling isn't perfect and the words are small, and polish helps to bring that out, but a shitty story is a shitty story no matter how god the grammer is or how big the words are. Also, I don't deny that polishing skills is important, I just deny that polishing the product of under-polished skills won't make the product any better.

BTW: I haven't slept yet and thats why my responses may be rude. Sophisticated Jackass Piffle is in the office right now, check back around 12:00pm Sunday for Shmoozer Piffle.

[Kid Chimour]

Originally Posted by TBsparky

Dump. Is that better? =3
btw you did come off a bit rude but with your starting of this rant it seemed a little odd.

Well as for your rant i shall say this. Ahem, ok not everyone has perfect grammer and most people do not use big words, myself for instance. I have actually produced a story long ago was was basically shit lol it was so bad that i had it removed =3 and well what I'm trying to say is yes, the end product may be shit but polishing up your work may help but most importantly polishing up your skills and potential as a writer, artist, game designer etc will help.

Yeah I remember when my stories were shit, luckily I got a local writer (Mistress) to point out the flaws in my story and tear it apart, which may have hurt at some times but it helped greatly, and so now I owe her greatly.
Yeah I was so bad that even my formating was shit so been there done that.
And I think this rant has some point because to truely fix one of my mediocre stories from back then I had to rewrite the entire story >.<

[Pifflestick]

Originally Posted by Khameloen

Yeah I remember when my stories were shit, luckily I got a local writer (Mistress) to point out the flaws in my story and tear it apart, which may have hurt at some times but it helped greatly, and so now I owe her greatly.
Yeah I was so bad that even my formating was shit so been there done that.
And I think this rant has some point because to truely fix one of my mediocre stories from back then I had to rewrite the entire story >.<

Like I said in my reply to Sparky, yes polishing skills is important, but polishing the result of under-polished skills is pointless.

[TBsparky]

Yeah I remember when my stories were shit, luckily I got a local writer (Mistress) to point out the flaws in my story and tear it apart, which may have hurt at some times but it helped greatly, and so now I owe her greatly.
Yeah I was so bad that even my formating was shit so been there done that.
And I think this rant has some point because to truely fix one of my mediocre stories from back then I had to rewrite the entire story >.<

I didn't know mistress back then but I wish I did lol XD my story was sooooo bad but i got over that about a year ago and now I hope my stories are good =3 but yeah everyone needs a good push and i think DR.J has given alot of writers help =3

[Pifflestick]

I think you guys are missing my replies so I'll just repost them.

My response to Sparky:
I think you missed my point. A good story is a good story even if the spelling isn't perfect and the words are small, and polish helps to bring that out, but a shitty story is a shitty story no matter how god the grammer is or how big the words are. Also, I don't deny that polishing skills is important, I just deny that polishing the product of under-polished skills won't make the product any better.

My response to Kham:
Like I said in my reply to Sparky, yes polishing skills is important, but polishing the result of under-polished skills is pointless.

[TBsparky]

Yeahh but if you noticed alot of people do try to polish their stories most do fail but with guidance they prevail. By the way, is this a hint to you saying that most stories here suck?