SCP Idea: A person that cannot be described inaccurately.

Summary:

or the person presenting the inaccurate information will become ill

SCP Idea: A person that cannot be described inaccurately.

PaperMarioFan 04 Jan 2020 07:41

Information about this person (no matter what medium is used to present it) cannot be inaccurate, or the person presenting the inaccurate information will become ill.

I trimmed your thread summary above, since it was taking up a lot of space on the forum listing. Try to keep thread descriptions and titles under 7 lines so you don't visually crowd out other people's threads. ~Zyn

Here's my idea:

The subject is a fifteen-year-old woman named Martha. She is perfectly ordinary in almost every way. However, there is one particularly strange thing about her: all recorded information about her is affected by an infohazard. If someone writes down/types/records themself saying any intentionally inaccurate information about her, they will immediately succumb to a mysterious illness. The intensity of this illness depends on how inaccurate the information is. For example, if Person 1 posted an article online wherein they talk about her as if she was an object rather than a person, they would experience moderate flu-like symptoms and probably vomit all over their keyboard, whereas if Person 2 broadcasted a news segment in which they intentionally describe her as a forty-year-old mechanic that has slept with over 600 men and has ties to the Italian mafia, they would immediately experience an extreme burning pain throughout their whole body and the contents of their entire gastrointestinal tract would be expelled through their mouth.

The affected individuals will remain ill until the inaccuracies are corrected. Individuals affected by the illness cannot die due to the symptoms, however they can still be killed by other unrelated things. Also, the inaccurate information does not need to be personally corrected by the affected individual. If the affected individual gets another person to correct the information for them, then the affected individual will recover.

Martha's ability does not affect mistakes or personal opinions. If someone accidentally called her Mary instead of Martha, they would be fine. Likewise, if someone said she had terrible music taste, they would be fine, though Martha would most likely be quite offended.

Alright, how was that? I'm sorry if there were any grammatical errors, I wrote this post at 11:37 PM.

Last edited on 04 Jan 2020 08:59 by Zyn Show more

Re: SCP Idea: A person that cannot be described inaccurately.

Doctor Fullham 05 Jan 2020 03:48

This woman is 17 and named Margaret.

Okay, there's a bit to unpack here.

The subject is a fifteen-year-old woman named Martha. She is perfectly ordinary in almost every way. However, there is one particularly strange thing about her: all recorded information about her is affected by an infohazard.

This is a good start.

If someone writes down/types/records themself saying any intentionally inaccurate information about her, they will immediately succumb to a mysterious illness.

And this is not a great continuation.

The intensity of this illness depends on how inaccurate the information is. For example, if Person 1 posted an article online wherein they talk about her as if she was an object rather than a person, they would experience moderate flu-like symptoms and probably vomit all over their keyboard, whereas if Person 2 broadcasted a news segment in which they intentionally describe her as a forty-year-old mechanic that has slept with over 600 men and has ties to the Italian mafia, they would immediately experience an extreme burning pain throughout their whole body and the contents of their entire gastrointestinal tract would be expelled through their mouth.

So, the degree to which the information is inaccurate affects this illness as well as the size of the audience the information reaches? Is there a reason there's such a focus on….vomit?

The affected individuals will remain ill until the inaccuracies are corrected. Individuals affected by the illness cannot die due to the symptoms, however they can still be killed by other unrelated things. Also, the inaccurate information does not need to be personally corrected by the affected individual. If the affected individual gets another person to correct the information for them, then the affected individual will recover.

How do they correct the inaccuraccies if it's in something like a live broadcast? What constitutes the information being "recorded"? Can it simply be erased rather than corrected?

How does The Foundation connect random sicknesses to information about this person? She's not famous or anything, what happened on a scale that it attracted The Foundation's attention?

On top of that, what you have currently is the "Superpowered humanoid" or "X-Man" concept. An SCP article is much more than simply an anomalous item, being, place, or event. The true meat of the SCP is the story around the anomalous thing. The thing itself is a vehicle that the narrative is attached to. To give my best example from Series 1, look at SCP 093: The anomalous item itself is a rock that turns mirrors into interdimensional portals. The thing that makes this SCP shine is the story; the history of the dimension that it leads to.

I recommend reading several items on the Guide Hub:

How to Write an SCP

Things What Do a Thing: An Essay On Anomalies That Are Things That Do A Thing

Essay Regarding SCPs, Narratives, and How They Can Share a Page

There are other guides there that can be very helpful, but these are some of the most often recommended for first-time contributors.

As you are pitching a humanoid SCP idea, I also recommend reading So You Want To Write A Humanoid SCP Object to assist in avoiding the "X-Men problem."

General Notes

We need to know more than just "it's a being that makes people sick when they write incorrect information about her." What story are you going to tell - How The Foundation found her, how she got her powers and/or why, did someone use her to some end? (These are not all questions that must be answered, these are some possible narrative hooks.)

I also recommend reading a significant amount of the top-rated SCPs from the last several months, and focus on reading more recent SCPs rather than older series. Many early series SCPs would not last a day under current SCP standards, and a few are only still around because of their history with the wiki itself. (This does not apply to all early series SCPs, but many of these were written before the wiki's style had really been cemented.)

The anomalous entity, while important, is not actually the main focus of the SCP. A good story, a compelling narrative, something that makes the reader feel something - that is the goal of an SCP article. What feeling do you want to evoke from the reader? Horror? Empathy? Sadness? You need to create a narrative around this object and its effects.

I am not saying this to discourage you, I just want you to understand the amount of effort that goes into creating a successful SCP.

If you can revise this idea with a story that you want to tell, we will be able to give you much more meaningful and constructive critique.

The anomalous being is the vehicle, the narrative is the person driving, the readers are the passengers. You can have the shiniest, most polished, most interesting vehicle in the world, but without the driver, the passengers aren't going anywhere. Where is the narrative taking the readers, and how is it getting them there?

Last edited on 05 Jan 2020 06:05 by Doctor Fullham Show more