What is a fanboy?

[James Cassidy]

I think that fanboy is inherently negative, when other people are using the term to refer to you. They say it because they want a reason to discount whatever argument you've made in favor of the game/band/movie/book in question, and so it will always be negative in this context.

Alright so...it is not the word itself, but user who uses it that is bad. I see. Good point that there is a difference between being a fan and being obsessive about it.

I also agree with Kiutu in that we all are fanboys in some way to something and we all do things that maybe a normal fan would not do, but as I said this is not a bad thing.

It's good to have a hobby that is safe and clean, but too much and you get to a point of false idolization.

 

[Trivun]

A fanboy is someone who refuses to listen to logic that undermines his own opinion on a game/console. Unless of course the person in question provides logic to debate the undermining retort.

This does kind of fit, I think. I am a self confessed fanboy of both Halo and Valve, and I am perfectly willing to accept that some people won't like those things. However, I expect them to have some knowledge or reasoning behind this. For example, somebody who has never played Halo and thinks that it's rubbish just because someone else doesn't like it, I have no time for. Same with someone who refuses to play TF2 or L4D just because 'Valve made it'. If they can say something reasonable about why they don't like it, for example "I saw my friend play it and I didn't think much of the graphics" or "the controls were too clunky, IMO", then that's fine.

What I don't like are the bad fanboys/girls who refuse to hear ANY argument against their chosen obsession. To take an extremely topical example, at the risk of starting a flame war, I watched the Twilight film. I read all the books, and own all the books. Although I'll admit they're badly written and the only characters I really liked are Alice and Jasper, I still like the series, in the same way I like Dan Brown or Abba. Other people think it's the scum of the earth, and they have no experience themselves of either book nor movie. These people are idiots and hypocrites, I feel. But on the other hand, there are the screaming fangirls who give us actual fans a bad name. I've met several people, all girls, my own age (18/19) who saw the film and read the books, and even a guy my age who I live with who enjoyed them. These people are perfectly able to sit down and have a conversation about Twilight without screaming "OMG MARRY ME EDWARD LOLZORZ!!!!1111" and so on. They are proper fans, or whatever the term is for non-fans (unfan?), of Twilight. The 14 year old girls who do scream this give actual fans an extremely bad name, and further perpetuate the haters.

My point therefore is as follows: Haters are bad, extreme fanboys/girls are bad. An actual fanboy/girl is simply someone who has a greater liking of something than the average fan (an average Halo fan will simply buy all the games, foir example, a fanboy like myself buys the novels and comics as well). The haters perpetuate the extremers, by making the extremers more vocal in their devotion. The extremers perpetuate the haters by giving them more reason to hate. It's a never ending cycle.

The best thing would hence be for us to have only fans and fanboys/girls, and non-fans. Haters and extremers should not exist. But then, this is the internet. That'll never happen, right? Right?

Prove me wrong, people. Please, prove me wrong.

 

[James Cassidy]

twilight and halo are perfect examples of how fanboyism can ruin something.

There is only one thing I can say about that is...it is fans that ruin it. While the game or book in question is good and decent, it's the fanbase that ruins it.

However, people have this habit to blame the game or book itself when really you can't blame it. This is what pisses me off so much. "I hate Halo because everyone loves it." Yeah that is a reasonable statement that has no backing.

I also hate the fact when someone uses sales against my arguments, but when I use it against them they deny it. Such as "My game sold 1.5 million copies and it much better than yours" coupe of years later they make a sequel and my sales sales better "My game sold 2.5 million copies more than your game" and then they reply "Well sales mean nothing."

I guess there is one more feature to the "negative-fanboy" is hypocrisy.

 

[IrirshTerrorist]

I'm a fanboy of life. Life FTW! Woot! Life > CoD6:MW2!

... Yeah, so thats my impersonation of what a fanboy of life would be like. Personally i believe 'fanboy' is a fad term which was first used to describe a certain group of people but has now become over used and will shortly go almost entirely out of usage.

 

[James Cassidy]

This does kind of fit, I think. I am a self confessed fanboy of both Halo and Valve, and I am perfectly willing to accept that some people won't like those things. However, I expect them to have some knowledge or reasoning behind this. For example, somebody who has never played Halo and thinks that it's rubbish just because someone else doesn't like it, I have no time for. Same with someone who refuses to play TF2 or L4D just because 'Valve made it'. If they can say something reasonable about why they don't like it, for example "I saw my friend play it and I didn't think much of the graphics" or "the controls were too clunky, IMO", then that's fine.

What I don't like are the bad fanboys/girls who refuse to hear ANY argument against their chosen obsession. To take an extremely topical example, at the risk of starting a flame war, I watched the Twilight film. I read all the books, and own all the books. Although I'll admit they're badly written and the only characters I really liked are Alice and Jasper, I still like the series, in the same way I like Dan Brown or Abba. Other people think it's the scum of the earth, and they have no experience themselves of either book nor movie. These people are idiots and hypocrites, I feel. But on the other hand, there are the screaming fangirls who give us actual fans a bad name. I've met several people, all girls, my own age (18/19) who saw the film and read the books, and even a guy my age who I live with who enjoyed them. These people are perfectly able to sit down and have a conversation about Twilight without screaming "OMG MARRY ME EDWARD LOLZORZ!!!!1111" and so on. They are proper fans, or whatever the term is for non-fans (unfan?), of Twilight. The 14 year old girls who do scream this give actual fans an extremely bad name, and further perpetuate the haters.

My point therefore is as follows: Haters are bad, extreme fanboys/girls are bad. An actual fanboy/girl is simply someone who has a greater liking of something than the average fan (an average Halo fan will simply buy all the games, foir example, a fanboy like myself buys the novels and comics as well). The haters perpetuate the extremers, by making the extremers more vocal in their devotion. The extremers perpetuate the haters by giving them more reason to hate. It's a never ending cycle.

The best thing would hence be for us to have only fans and fanboys/girls, and non-fans. Haters and extremers should not exist. But then, this is the internet. That'll never happen, right? Right?

Prove me wrong, people. Please, prove me wrong.

You have probably said the most truthful thing about how fanboyism works and how people are categorized in fields.

Very well done, my friend. Kudos to you.

I also like Valve games and Bungie games and I have read the Twilight books and enjoyed them despite the whole sparkling vampire thing. I looked past that and read the story regardless and enjoy it.

It's the same point I always bring up about Star Wars....they always tell me "Sparkling vampires?" and I always retort "Midiclorians?" They look at me and say "Good point." (Or at least most respecting fans will say.)

 

[General Recluse]

a fanboy is someone who will completely deny any imperfection with the object of choice. they will continue denying they are wrong and wont settle with "its an okay game" they will continue until the prosecuter admits the game is good.

name is also self explanitory

Fan-fanatic

Boy-will go to childish lengths to defend their game

take me for example. I thought i might be a Valve fanboy. then I realised that valve is just good at making games and i like basically all of their games but i can admit some of the flaws in their games so Im not a complete fanboy

 

[TPiddy]

Oh yes.... absolutely... hypocrisy runs rampant among bad fanboys... There is a particular PS3 fanboy on here who was very guilty of this, as he quoted a source for game reviews to further his argument that PS3 had more and better exclusives than 360, but when I quoted the same source to say that 360 had better games overall, he was like... "reviews are biased".

 

[General Recluse]

Oh yes.... absolutely... hypocrisy runs rampant among bad fanboys... There is a particular PS3 fanboy on here who was very guilty of this, as he quoted a source for game reviews to further his argument that PS3 had more and better exclusives than 360, but when I quoted the same source to say that 360 had better games overall, he was like... "reviews are biased".

LOL!

 

[TPiddy]

Oh yes.... absolutely... hypocrisy runs rampant among bad fanboys... There is a particular PS3 fanboy on here who was very guilty of this, as he quoted a source for game reviews to further his argument that PS3 had more and better exclusives than 360, but when I quoted the same source to say that 360 had better games overall, he was like... "reviews are biased".

LOL!

Oh it gets much worse, but I won't go into detail here. Suffice it to say, I've had to deal with many a PS3 fanboy and none of them seem to make compelling arguments against my points. Which is odd considering the PS3 has so much going for it.

 

[General Recluse]

i dont hate the PS3 but when the fanboys get WAY to involved with something i start to get pissed off. especially when they bring the damn blue ray into the argument

 

[Onyx Oblivion]

A person who ignores logical arguments against games/systems that they love.

 

[Serithil Menelith]

The word fanboy may have come from the derogatory term for a solder of the Experimental Elite Backpack Helicopter Corps (EEBHeCs). It was found it took a very special combination of many skills to be a good EEBHeCs. The flying skill to operate the copter, a total lack of a fear of heights, deeply nerdy mechanical aptitude to even get the thing to run and the cunning and bravery of a good warrior. It was virtually impossible to find this combination in any one solder without resorting to such intense training, the solder?s complete lack of free time caused his social skills to completely atrophy.

 

[DrDeath3191]

Oh yes.... absolutely... hypocrisy runs rampant among bad fanboys... There is a particular PS3 fanboy on here who was very guilty of this, as he quoted a source for game reviews to further his argument that PS3 had more and better exclusives than 360, but when I quoted the same source to say that 360 had better games overall, he was like... "reviews are biased".

You'd better hope that guy (Whose username begins with an M, correct?) doesn't find you here. I'd hate to see that flamewar again.

 

[Logic 0]

Many of you claim many others to be fanboys: Xbox fanboy, PS3 fanboy, Halo fanboy, Valve fanboy and so on and so forth.

I come to wonder what truly constitutes to a "fanboy?" What is the definition to "fanboy?" So educate me because I seem to get this definition wrong by the gaming world.

Here is my definition of a Fanboy

Fanboy N. (phan-boi) also look at "Fan-girl"
1. Someone who goes above and beyond a normal fan of a series because of their enjoyment.

(Of course, this is not necessarily a bad thing in my opinion as there are many people who are fans of something not just in video games. They like music, movies, celebrities, and so on.)

However, this next definition might constitute why fanboyism is bad

2. A person who is so infatuated with something they deny any and all imperfection said thing may possess and will fight to prove that their said item is above anything else.

Thing that gets me is if I say I am fan of something...I am automatically a "fanboy." Now, the way this term is thrown around is disturbing because if one person even enjoys something they are considered a fanboy.

Can I just enjoy something without the "name-calling?" If I say "Well I enjoyed playing this game" does that make me a fanboy? Also, why is used as a negative term, why not a positive terms?

So educate me fellow posters...what do I get wrong?[/quote/]

Because the bad kind of fanboys are more vocal and delude reality to make there item of fandom perfect, finally to avoid being labeled as a fanboy you must also list the flaws in something you like.

 

[zombflux]

Someone with a different viewpoint they are passionate about.

 

[TPiddy]

Oh yes.... absolutely... hypocrisy runs rampant among bad fanboys... There is a particular PS3 fanboy on here who was very guilty of this, as he quoted a source for game reviews to further his argument that PS3 had more and better exclusives than 360, but when I quoted the same source to say that 360 had better games overall, he was like... "reviews are biased".

You'd better hope that guy (Whose username begins with an M, correct?) doesn't find you here. I'd hate to see that flamewar again.

Hahaha, yeah that would be him.... I don't really care... I've chosen to ignore anything he says that doesn't have any valid point.

 

[orangebandguy]

They're more over-zealous and will argue more than other people who like the same thing.

 

[TikiShades]

A fanboy is a huge fan of something, and everyone here is a fanboy or girl of something.
Its the crazed ones that are bad. But the difference is the same as loving someone and obsessing.

This. A fanboy doesn't have to be crazy. Somewhere along the line someone generalized all fans as crazy, so it eventually became easier to just say "fanboy" instead of "crazed fanboy". A fanboy is actually just a fan that is male. As simple as that. If someone wanted to refer to the fans of something, but only of a specific gender, they'd say "fanboy" or "fangirl" instead of "the fans that are guys" or "the fans that are girls". Maybe the majority of the fans for something were crazy, so they just called them fanboys instead of using the crazed, since there wasn't a huge need to define a specific group, because they were "all" crazy.

 

[Vrex360]

A fanboy is someone who refuses to listen to logic that undermines his own opinion on a game/console. Unless of course the person in question provides logic to debate the undermining retort.

This does kind of fit, I think. I am a self confessed fanboy of both Halo and Valve, and I am perfectly willing to accept that some people won't like those things. However, I expect them to have some knowledge or reasoning behind this. For example, somebody who has never played Halo and thinks that it's rubbish just because someone else doesn't like it, I have no time for. Same with someone who refuses to play TF2 or L4D just because 'Valve made it'. If they can say something reasonable about why they don't like it, for example "I saw my friend play it and I didn't think much of the graphics" or "the controls were too clunky, IMO", then that's fine.

What I don't like are the bad fanboys/girls who refuse to hear ANY argument against their chosen obsession. To take an extremely topical example, at the risk of starting a flame war, I watched the Twilight film. I read all the books, and own all the books. Although I'll admit they're badly written and the only characters I really liked are Alice and Jasper, I still like the series, in the same way I like Dan Brown or Abba. Other people think it's the scum of the earth, and they have no experience themselves of either book nor movie. These people are idiots and hypocrites, I feel. But on the other hand, there are the screaming fangirls who give us actual fans a bad name. I've met several people, all girls, my own age (18/19) who saw the film and read the books, and even a guy my age who I live with who enjoyed them. These people are perfectly able to sit down and have a conversation about Twilight without screaming "OMG MARRY ME EDWARD LOLZORZ!!!!1111" and so on. They are proper fans, or whatever the term is for non-fans (unfan?), of Twilight. The 14 year old girls who do scream this give actual fans an extremely bad name, and further perpetuate the haters.

My point therefore is as follows: Haters are bad, extreme fanboys/girls are bad. An actual fanboy/girl is simply someone who has a greater liking of something than the average fan (an average Halo fan will simply buy all the games, foir example, a fanboy like myself buys the novels and comics as well). The haters perpetuate the extremers, by making the extremers more vocal in their devotion. The extremers perpetuate the haters by giving them more reason to hate. It's a never ending cycle.

The best thing would hence be for us to have only fans and fanboys/girls, and non-fans. Haters and extremers should not exist. But then, this is the internet. That'll never happen, right? Right?

Prove me wrong, people. Please, prove me wrong.

Yeah I agree pretty much one hundred percent. The aggressive haters are far worse in some respect because their needlessly cruel negative reactions to a game/movie/book series generate an aggressive response.