[Catlady]

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

If someone told me at a party that they were an author, an artist or a musician, all I know is that they write books, create art or make music. It doesn't imply that they write good books, create good art or create music, or that their creations would be to my liking.

Authors must write books? As opposed to poems, essays, short stories, letters, blog posts, grocery lists? Why only books?

Quality is a different issue entirely.

We have no basic for limiting the definition of author, artist or musician to someone who is able to make a living at it, because that sort of reasoning leads to absurdities.

I didn't say "make a living at it." I said make money from it.

I don't think my criterion is as absurd as your complete lack of any criteria--we're all authors, artists, singers, etc., etc.

If writing good books is a prerequisite to being an author, it follows that there is no such thing as a bad author. It implies that the starving artist meme is invalid - there could not exist such a thing as a starving artist, instead, we would have a non-artist. A person playing guitar for tips in the subway station is in fact a musician.

I did not say anything about quality. Again, neither did I say that the artist needs to make a living through art, only earn some money from the artistic endeavor.

Yes, the person playing guitar in the subway is a musician because he's making money from it. He fits my criterion.