Based on actual usage and consumption, comic books and movies are for porn.
Video games aren't so much.
Maybe that's the definition of "art" - how well can it be used for porn. (Music seems to be an exception to this definition but we all know why Eric Clapton learned the guitar.)
I would posit that any medium which can be used successfully for porn can also be used for art. If a medium can convey the subtle and unconscious cues effectively to our senses so as to manage to turn us on, then it can also be used for the myriad subtle cues used for high art.
There are also mediums which lack the fidelity to effectively convey porn, but which can still convey art. (Scratching in a 1x1 foot patch of sandy dirt with a stick, for example. It's easy to convey nudity or profanity on such a crude drawing surface, but none of that would turn me on.)
We're discussing Ebert's claim that video games, the medium, can't be used to produce art, the message. I apologize for leaving out "medium" in the sentence that would have made that clear.
> There are also mediums which lack the fidelity to effectively convey porn, but which can still convey art. (Scratching in a 1x1 foot patch of sandy dirt with a stick, for example. It's easy to convey nudity or profanity on such a crude drawing surface, but none of that would turn me on.)
That might be because you're used to getting your porn in higher-fidelity. However, the first porn that most kids draw is basically scratches. Also, we're pretty sure that some "scratch fidelity" cave drawings are porn. (An alternative is that kids are/ancient folk were more abstraction-tolerant. This shouldn't be too surprising - a lot of porn works between the ears.)
Maybe that's the definition of "art" - how well can it be used for porn
This was the basis of my observation of medium/message confusion. The "it" which is being used is the medium and "porn" is the message. So it would seem that you are trying to define a medium as "art", which is wrong. A message transmitted via a given medium is art, not the medium in isolation. Maybe you are looking for a term like "art-capable medium."
An alternative is that kids are/ancient folk were more abstraction-tolerant.
I've been spoiled by years of pornographic magazines, then by high resolution images from the Internet.
Video games aren't so much.
Maybe that's the definition of "art" - how well can it be used for porn. (Music seems to be an exception to this definition but we all know why Eric Clapton learned the guitar.)