History Main / SturgeonsLaw

The though is probably [[OlderThanTheyThink older than that]], though. UsefulNotes/BenjaminDisraeli wrote in 1870: "Books are fatal: they are the curse of the human race. Nine-tenths of existing books are nonsense, and the clever books are the refutation of that nonsense."

* In economics, there's the Pareto Principle, sometimes called the "80-20 rule", which states that 80% of the work is done by 20% of the group. And again, it makes sense if you think about it: in any given group, there will be, for whatever reason, variation in the capability of its constituent individuals, and by and large, variation tends to take the form of a bell-curve distribution. In other words, the vast majority of people are average or nearly so. That bell-curve represents the number of people at each level of performance; if you multiply that by the actual level of performance, the better performers will obviously produce more, and it shakes out quite close to 80% of all the work. This, of course, will vary by situation, but it's reliable enough that it's used in several places[[note]]such as Statistical Process Control, a mathematical approach to quality control, which states that generally, 80% of total defects are caused by 20% of known failure modes[[/note]].

This is Sturgeon's Revelation, but common usage has it that this phrase is what is meant when the Law is cited. (The actual quote for the Law is "Nothing is always absolutely so.")

This law comes from an observation on Sturgeon's part; when he saw that critics were calling [[SciFiGhetto 90% of Sci-Fi crap]], he flipped it on them instead and stated that [[SoWasX 90% of anything is crap]].

The first reference to Sturgeon's Revelation appears in the March 1958 issue of ''Venture Science Fiction,'' where science fiction author Creator/TheodoreSturgeon wrote:

-> "I repeat Sturgeon's Revelation, which was wrung out of me after twenty years of wearying defense of science fiction against attacks of people who [[StrawmanProduct used the worst examples of the field for ammunition]], and whose conclusion was that ninety percent of SF is crud."

There is also a (possibly apocryphal) story that tells of Sturgeon making the above comment during a panel discussion at a science fiction convention. When the audience protested, Sturgeon reportedly blinked and replied, "90% of ''everything'' is crap."

Sturgeon's Revelation is sometimes expanded as follows:
* Corollary 1: ''The existence of immense quantities of trash in science fiction is admitted and it is regrettable; but it is no more unnatural than the existence of trash anywhere.''
* Corollary 2: ''The best science fiction is as good as the best fiction in any field.'' (Note: It is clear this doesn't ''necessarily'' follow from the Revelation -- sci-fi has minor advantages and disadvantages compared to other genres, and differing amounts of literature compared to other genres. If a thousand write sci-fi, but a hundred thousand write real world, do the maths.)
* Crawford's Corollary: ''Should you ever find that less than 90% seems to be [crap], your standard is set too low and should be adjusted.''
* Critic's Corollary: ''90% of people lack the taste necessary to distinguish between crap and non-crap.''
** Critic's Second Corollary: ''90% of people will criticize 90% of what they see regardless of their ability to distinguish crap from non-crap.''
* Ghetto Corollary: ''A "respectable" genre of fictional media will always be judged by the 10% of good works, but a stigmatized genre will always be judged by the 90% of bad works.'' (See the GhettoIndex for examples of such stigmatized genres.)
* Wiki/TVTropes Corollary: ''The difficulty of getting a group of people to agree on '''which''' 10% is '''not''' crap [[UnpleasableFanbase exponentially approaches infinity]] [[BrokenBase as the size of the group increases]].'' (Or, "Crap is in the eye of the beholder... so to speak.")
** Wiki/TVTropes Second Corollary: ''The other 90% of crap is further divided into "Subjective Crap", [[SoBadItsGood "Crap You]] [[GuiltyPleasure Like Anyway"]], and [[EpicFail "Total]] [[DarthWiki/SoBadItsHorrible Crap"]]. The exact proportions of this division have never been researched, and most likely vary by the individual for reasons mentioned above.''
* TheTheoremOfNarrowInterests: ''The more constrained the thing you're looking for, the fewer good examples exist.''
* Video Game Corollary: ''If a video game has user-created content, then 90% of it will be based on [[VideoGamePerversityPotential male or female genitalia]] or "[[VideoGame/LittleBigPlanet LittleBig]][[GodwinsLaw Holocaust.]]"'''[[note]]Or fart jokes, when applicable.[[/note]]
* [[Anime/MartianSuccessorNadesico Ruri]]'s Law: ''"The vast majority of people are idiots".'' or, in other words, [[ThisLoserIsYou ''You're probably crap.'']]
* Evonix's Corollary: Crap is fractal, 90% of crap is crappier and the non crap is 90% tainted.

Sturgeon's Law is particularly obvious when [[CreativityLeash the barriers to entry — the whims of publishers]] -- are removed. Self-publishing, especially in the virtually cost-free environment of the Internet, makes the crappy 90% visible to the public; it no longer languishes in an aspiring writer's desk drawer. This often leads to the false impression that FanFic attracts poor writers; the fact is that the poor writers have ''always'' been out there, but until recently, their poor writing had few outlets to the public. As one writer put it, "flipping through Website/FanFictionDotNet is like flipping through hell with an occasional slice of the heavenly cheesecake thrown in."

If we assume that the 90% figure applies only to works that managed to get published anyway, then about [[MillionToOneChance one in a million of all things out there]] is not crap. Most people, though, have seen more than one non-crappy thing in their lifetime.

Often the phrase is followed by the even more cynical addendum, "... including the other 10%." Rarely, a more optimistic (but even more stratifying) second clause is added: ''"...but the remaining 10% [[SugarWiki/SoCoolItsAwesome is worth dying for]]."''

A more ominous reading has it that ''Sturgeon's Law is a baseline''. In other words, though ''at least'' 90% of a given thing is crap, it does not necessarily follow that the remaining tenth is all good. For a given subtype of medium, genre, etc., the percentage of crap may range from the minimum 90%, to 95%, to 99.99[vapor trail of 9s]%.

A related adage is employed by critic [[WebAnimation/ZeroPunctuation Yahtzee Croshaw]], known as the ''[[TakeThat Guantánamo Bay approach]]'', who declares in one review: "''Everything is shit until proven otherwise.''" In another review, he elaborates: "''Even if declaring a game to be shit after its first few hours of gameplay is [[CausticCritic perfectly professional]], one should never assume that [[DisappointingLastLevel a game that starts out good will stay that way]].''"

The NostalgiaFilter and ImportFilter can be considered both side effects of this and a major balancing factor.

In person, Theodore Sturgeon [[{{Bowdlerize}} didn't use the word 'crap']] when this subject came up, in 1979. According to the Wiki/PortlandPatternRepository, however, the true story is the opposite: Theodore Sturgeon said "crud", but the law is quoted using the word "crap".

There is a related principle actually observed in economics, the Pareto Principle or "80-20 rule": 80% of the work is done by 20% of the group. This makes sense if you think about it: in a given group, there will be, for whatever reason, variation in the capability of its constituent individuals, and by and large, variation tends to take the form of a bell-curve distribution: the vast majority are average or near-average, with occurrence correlating to rarity. So, if you take that curve (representing the number of individuals at each level of performance) and multiply by said level of performance, you get a plot showing how the total amount of work done is distributed among the various levels of performance, which will obviously be skewing towards the higher-performance end. The rule is an approximation and the exact ratio will vary with the situation, but the general principle is very widespread in situations involving normal and power law distributions. The principle is also used in Statistical Process Control, a mathematical approach to quality control, stating that generally, 80% of total defects are caused by 20% of known failure modes.

Also relevant are two psychological principles known as the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning-Kruger_effect Dunning-Kruger Effect]] and the Worse-Than-Average Effect, which basically boil down to "Incompetent people know too little about the subject to accurately assess their own competence" and "Competent people are more likely to evaluate their work as worse than it is," respectively. The net effect of these two phenomena is that people who produce genuinely good work tend to constantly second-guess themselves, which reduces their output, while their less-talented peers crank out work that's "good enough" and put it out there without a second thought because they don't know enough to realize how bad their work actually is.

May be OlderThanTheyThink; UsefulNotes/BenjaminDisraeli wrote in 1870: "Books are fatal: they are the curse of the human race. Nine-tenths of existing books are nonsense, and the clever books are the refutation of that nonsense."

[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturgeon%27s_law Here]] is a link to Wiki/TheOtherWiki's article on this.

[[JustForFun/IThoughtItMeant Nothing to do with]] the [[UsefulNotes/{{Scotland}} Scottish]] politician Nicola Sturgeon. Although since she's been the [[UsefulNotes/BritishPoliticalSystem First Minister of Scotland]] since 2014, she does play a part in making a number of laws.

''This just defines the fan-speak term. No examples, please.''

[[JustForFun/IThoughtItMeant Nothing to do with]] the [[UsefulNotes/{{Scotland}} Scottish]] politician Nicola Sturgeon. Although since she's been the [[Useful Notes/BritishPoliticalSystem First Minister of Scotland]] since 2014, she does play a part in making a number of laws.

[[JustForFun/IThoughtItMeant Nothing to do with]] [[UsefulNotes/BritishPoliticalSystem Scottish First Minister]] Nicola Sturgeon. Although she does play a part in making a number of laws.

-> "I repeat Sturgeon's Revelation, which was wrung out of me after twenty years of wearying defense of science fiction against attacks of people who [[StrawmanProduct used the worst examples of the field for ammunition]], and whose conclusion was that ninety percent of SF is crap."

[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/6a00d83451688869e200e54f332b7b8834_800wi.png]][[caption-width-right:350:TakeThatAudience He's looking at you!]]]]

[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/6a00d83451688869e200e54f332b7b8834_800wi.png]]

-> "I repeat Sturgeon's Revelation, which was wrung out of me after twenty years of wearying defense of science fiction against attacks of people who [[SciFiGhetto used the worst examples of the field for ammunition]], and whose conclusion was that ninety percent of SF is crap."

''90% of everything is [[PrecisionFStrike complete shit.]]''

--> "I repeat Sturgeon's Revelation, which was wrung out of me after twenty years of wearying defense of science fiction against attacks of people who [[SciFiGhetto used the worst examples of the field for ammunition]], and whose conclusion was that ninety percent of SF is crap."

Sturgeon's Law is particularly obvious when [[CreativityLeash the barriers to entry -- the whims of publishers]] -- are removed. Self-publishing, especially in the virtually cost-free environment of the Internet, makes the crappy 90% visible to the public; it no longer languishes in an aspiring writer's desk drawer. This often leads to the false impression that FanFic attracts poor writers; the fact is that the poor writers have ''always'' been out there, but until recently, their poor writing had few outlets to the public. As one writer put it, "flipping through Website/FanFictionDotNet is like flipping through hell with an occasional slice of the heavenly cheesecake thrown in."

If we assume that the 90% figure applies only to published works, then about [[MillionToOneChance one in a million of all things out there]] is not crap. Most people, though, have seen more than one non-crappy thing in their lifetime.

Also relevant are two psychological principles known as the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect Dunning-Kruger Effect]] and the Worse-Than-Average Effect, which basically boil down to "Incompetent people know too little about the subject to accurately assess their own competence" and "Competent people are more likely to evaluate their work as worse than it is," respectively. The net effect of these two phenomena is that people who produce genuinely good work tend to constantly second-guess themselves, which reduces their output, while their less-talented peers crank out work that's "good enough" and put it out there without a second thought because they don't know enough to realize how bad their work actually is.

Also relevant are two psychological principles known as the Dunning-Kruger Effect and the Worse-Than-Average Effect, which basically boil down to "Incompetent people know too little about the subject to accurately assess their own competence" and "Competent people are more likely to evaluate their work as worse than it is," respectively. The net effect of these two phenomena is that people who produce genuinely good work tend to constantly second-guess themselves, which reduces their output, while their less-talented peers crank out work that's "good enough" and put it out there without a second thought because they don't know enough to realize how bad their work actually is.

''90% of everything is complete garbage.''

--> "I repeat Sturgeon's Revelation, which was wrung out of me after twenty years of wearying defense of science fiction against attacks of people who [[SciFiGhetto used the worst examples of the field for ammunition]], and whose conclusion was that ninety percent of SF is crud."

There is also a (possibly apocryphal) story that tells of Sturgeon making the above comment during a panel discussion at a science fiction convention. When the audience protested, Sturgeon reportedly blinked and replied, "90% of ''everything'' is crud."

* Crawford's Corollary: ''Should you ever find that less than 90% seem to be [crud], your standard is set too low and should be adjusted.''
* Critic's Corollary: ''90% of people lack the taste necessary to distinguish between crud and non-crud.''
** Critic's Second Corollary: ''90% of people will criticize 90% of what they see regardless of their ability to distinguish crud from non-crud.''

* Wiki/TVTropes Corollary: ''The difficulty of getting a group of people to agree on '''which''' 10% is '''not''' crud [[UnpleasableFanbase exponentially approaches infinity]] [[BrokenBase as the size of the group increases]].'' (Or, "Crud is in the eye of the beholder... so to speak.")
** Wiki/TVTropes Second Corollary: ''The other 90% of crud is further divided into "Subjective Crud", [[SoBadItsGood "Crud You]] [[GuiltyPleasure Like Anyway"]], and [[EpicFail "Total]] [[DarthWiki/SoBadItsHorrible Crud"]]. The exact proportions of this division have never been researched, and most likely vary by the individual for reasons mentioned above.''

* [[Anime/MartianSuccessorNadesico Ruri]]'s Law: ''"The vast majority of people are idiots".'' or, in other words, [[ThisLoserIsYou ''You're probably crud.'']]
* Evonix's Corollary: Crud is fractal, 90% of crud is cruddyer and the non crud is 90% tainted.

Sturgeon's Law is particularly obvious when [[CreativityLeash the barriers to entry -- the whims of publishers]] -- are removed. Self-publishing, especially in the virtually cost-free environment of the Internet, makes the cruddy 90% visible to the public; it no longer languishes in an aspiring writer's desk drawer. This often leads to the false impression that FanFic attracts poor writers; the fact is that the poor writers have ''always'' been out there, but until recently, their poor writing had few outlets to the public. As one writer put it, "flipping through Website/FanFictionDotNet is like flipping through hell with an occasional slice of the heavenly cheesecake thrown in."

If we assume that the 90% figure applies only to published works, then about [[MillionToOneChance one in a million of all things out there]] is not crud. Most people, though, have seen more than one non-cruddy thing in their lifetime.

A more ominous reading has it that ''Sturgeon's Law is a baseline''. In other words, though ''at least'' 90% of a given thing is crud, it does not necessarily follow that the remaining tenth is all good. For a given subtype of medium, genre, etc., the percentage of crud may range from the minimum 90%, to 95%, to 99.99[vapor trail of 9s]%.

In person, Theodore Sturgeon [[{{Bowdlerize}} didn't use the word 'crud']] when this subject came up, in 1979. According to the Wiki/PortlandPatternRepository, however, the true story is the opposite: Theodore Sturgeon said "crud", but the law is quoted using the word "crap".

''90% of everything is crud.''

This law comes from an observation on Sturgeon's part; when he saw that critics were calling 90% of Sci-Fi crap, he flipped it on them instead and stated that [[SoWasX 90% of anything is crap]].

Sturgeon's Law is particularly obvious when [[CreativityLeash the barriers to entry -- the whims of publishers]] -- are removed. Self-publishing, especially in the virtually cost-free environment of the Internet, makes the cruddy 90% visible to the public; it no longer languishes in an aspiring writer's desk drawer. This often leads to the false impression that FanFic attracts poor writers; the fact is that the poor writers have ''always'' been out there, but until recently, their poor writing had few outlets to the public. As one writer put it, "flipping through [[FanFictionDotNet Fanfiction.net]] is like flipping through hell with an occasional slice of the heavenly cheesecake thrown in."

* Wiki/TVTropes Corollary: ''The difficulty of getting a group of people to agree on '''which''' 10% is '''not''' crud [[UnpleasableFanbase exponentially approaches infinity]] [[BrokenBase as the size of the group increases]].'' (Or, "Crud is in the [[LoveItOrHateIt eye of the beholder]]... so to speak.")
** Wiki/TVTropes Second Corollary: ''The other 90% of crud is further divided into [[LoveItOrHateIt "Subjective Crud"]], [[SoBadItsGood "Crud You]] [[GuiltyPleasure Like Anyway"]], and [[EpicFail "Total]] [[DarthWiki/SoBadItsHorrible Crud"]]. The exact proportions of this division have never been researched, and most likely vary by the individual for reasons mentioned above.''

-->--Music/BruceSpringsteen, "57 Channels (And Nothin' On)"

* Wiki/TVTropes Corollary: ''The difficulty of getting a group of people to agree on '''which''' 10% is '''not''' crud [[UnpleasaableFanbase exponentially approaches infinity]] [[BrokenBase as the size of the group increases]].'' (Or, "Crud is in the [[LoveItOrHateIt eye of the beholder]]... so to speak.")

* Wiki/TVTropes Corollary: ''The difficulty of getting a group of people to agree on '''which''' 10% is '''not''' crud exponentially approaches infinity as the size of the group increases. '' (Or, "Crud is in the [[LoveItOrHateIt eye of the beholder]]... so to speak.")

There is a related principle actually observed in economics, the Pareto Principle or "80-20 rule": 80% of the work is done by 20% of the group. This makes sense if you think about it: in a given group there will be, for whatever reason, variation in the capability of its constituent individuals, and by and large, variation tends to take the form of a bell-curve distribution: the vast majority are average or near-average, with occurrence correlating to rarity. So, if you take that curve (representing the number of individuals at each level of performance) and multiply by said level of performance, you get a plot showing how the total amount of work done is distributed among the various levels of performance, which will obviously be skewing towards the higher-performance end. The rule is an approximation and the exact ratio will vary with the situation, but the general principle is very widespread in situations involving normal and power law distributions. The principle is also used in Statistical Process Control, a mathematical approach to quality control, stating that generally, 80% of total defects are caused by 20% of known failure modes.

In person, Theodore Sturgeon [[{{Bowdlerize}} didn't use the word 'crud']] when this subject came up, in 1979. According to the PortlandPatternRepository, however, the true story is the opposite: Theodore Sturgeon said "crud", but the law is quoted using the word "crap".

[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturgeon%27s_law Here]] is a link to the OtherWiki's article on this.

[[quoteright:185:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/irishdrinker_8826.jpg]]

* TvTropes Corollary: ''The difficulty of getting a group of people to agree on '''which''' 10% is '''not''' crud exponentially approaches infinity as the size of the group increases. '' (Or, "Crud is in the [[LoveItOrHateIt eye of the beholder]]... so to speak.")
** TvTropes Second Corollary: ''The other 90% of crud is further divided into [[LoveItOrHateIt "Subjective Crud"]], [[SoBadItsGood "Crud You]] [[GuiltyPleasure Like Anyway"]], and [[EpicFail "Total]] [[DarthWiki/SoBadItsHorrible Crud"]]. The exact proportions of this division have never been researched, and most likely vary by the individual for reasons mentioned above.''