Why Create?

The whole point of creating is affecting other people.

In a short piece on John Scalzi's "Whatever" blog, author, actor, and publisher Felicia Day comments on her new book You’re Never Weird on the Internet (Almost). Scalzi runs these pieces often, inviting authors with newly published works to talk about the big ideas and geneses of their books. Usually those are SFF novels, but sometimes other authors appear. In this case, Ms. Day's book is part humor, part memoir, and part commentary on the technosocial milieu of the early 21st century, as seen from Day's point of view.

That POV starts as an awkward fangirl looking in from the outside and goes to... well, she still claims to be awkward, insider looking out at a large fan base and around her at other people who are what passes for stars these days. And in this blog entry she looks inward, and shares what motivates her. Which, generally, is other people.

That is, Ms Day explains, what it's all about. It's about creating something you can give to others, about creating a thing that has an impact on others, about making something that exists so that others can repurpose it.