I've read the arguments related to mission objectives and priorities for this community. I'd like to clarify the argument. You guys are arguing about definitions of entertainment and about overarching philosophy (or purpose). In defining who we are and what we do, first comes philosophy. In defining the philosophy of this site, there are four main criteria at stake:
* the definition of entertainment and its application toward art
* what constraints are acceptable
* the criteria of acceptance of content (evaluating performance under certain constraints)
* how to categorize successful submissions according to the above
Definitions of Entertainment and of Art:
When you're arguing about entertainment, you're confusing the perspective of entertainment. Entertainment is a matter of perspective. What is entertaining to the designer may not be entertaining to the uninitiated, casual viewer. It may not even be entertaining to the initiated viewer, because there is no slowmotion replay mode with explanatory subtitles at this point in our community's evolution. And a successful submission may not be entertaining at all to a non-TAS naysayer. The particularly ignorant or elitist amongst them may not even consider it to be a valid form of art at all. Watching a blindingly fast video like Zelda II or Monopoly may not be cinematically entertaining, but still may inspire wonder and curiosity. Not all videos can be as spectacular as Mario64 or SMB3. Nevertheless, the entertainment and art value exists, however theoretical. Philosophically, all videos are ultimately created for artistic purposes with an emphasis on entertainment.
Even prestige, honor, design, and software engineering behind it all are a form of intangible emotional and psychological reward. That may be entertainment or a more basic artistic expression. One definition of "fun" is the response your brain makes to the successful matching of a pattern. It sure isn't for the morality of it! People don't labor over routes and frames and bots for their health or to save human life! These aren't photojournals of the aftermath of the atomic age. Mario's not curing cancer!
Even where the primary
constraint is speed, the
motivation or
philosophy is still that of art with an emphasis on entertainment. The philosophically useful way to convey value is by considering all content to be art. Because it is.
See wikipedia's definitive discussion of art itself:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art
"the product or process of the effective application of a body of knowledge, most often using a set of skills ... from concept to creation, adhere to the "creative impulse"—that is, art is distinguished from other works by being in large part unprompted by necessity, by biological drive, or by any undisciplined pursuit of recreation"
Acceptable Constraints:
The list of acceptable constraints should be broadened where speed is only one of all possible primary constraints.
The reason why the moniker "Tool Assisted Superplay" is most appropriate is because there are such a wide variety of constraints and criteria available to the art form. Constraints include collection of all items, fastest time to completion, taking no damage, pacifist... you know them. Maybe someday someone will make a video whose objective is to be the least entertaining, most obfuscated, or most unviewable possible, in the spirit of the C and perl obfuscation contests or of the BF programming language. That would still be an application of nontrivial skill as applied to a given medium. Profound unentertainment is a form of entertainment known as irony. Maybe someone will make one whose purpose is to exploit the most programming bugs (Hello, Ikari Warriors; we are your worst nightmare!) regardless of speed. The constraints should be an open variable akin to impressionism vs. photorealism vs. surrealism.
The definitions of acceptable constraints as stated on the site are great, but should eliminate restrictions of edited game images (rom hacks) and of multiple submissions based on the same subject with different constraints. We can continue to accept entries based on hacked games if those games are essential works of art in their own right as with Super Demo World and if a definitive IPS is provided so that the work can be universally reproduced. That is, they should not blatantly degrade the original work by introducing bugs or by ending abruptly as with a crash.
Criteria of Acceptance
The bottom line is that, as with any other art form, the community must observe and evaluate the constraints as declared by the author and according to the estimated possibilities thereof. Yeah we obsolete a video when it's slightly faster when speed is the primary constraint, if it still achieves the goal of being good art. See above.
See this discussion on art appreciation:
http://silenteloquence.suryaonline.org/2005/02/22/why-do-we-appreciate-art/
Note the latter page's discussion of art appreciation as a community effort akin to an ongoing multi-leg race, and of art as being relative to the eyes of the artist and of the beholders. Art is a participatory process in which nobody should be denied unless it's just not good art. We already mostly acknowledge this philosophical element.
Categorization of Successful Submissions
This community has to evolve into a multi-categorical structure where speed is only one criteria. In other words, we must ask "is this good art?" A robust voting, and subsequent rating system goes a long way toward that. I think we can just take the above criteria and make one category for each. There won't really be a need for subcategories as long as that one primary category is set to define it as art. The other attributes exist for searchability, such as what platform it's made for.
In conclusion, the bottom line is that we already do all of these things overall; it's just that due to a scattered, limited, and contradictory view of our philosophy amongst various community members, we're collectively in denial of them. And as such, we're limited for no good reason other than to validate the popular-to-date pursuit by appeal to authority. Although it's not a primary goal, having a robust and uniform philosophy will help to further differentiate us from the native (non-TAS) players.