[nearestneighbor]

> if you instead define "nerds" to be "people with a lot of interest in some academic subject, and/or people who are quantifiably 'smart'"

So, the Comic Book Guy is not a nerd? Even Wikipedia calls him that.

[aharrison]

This is drifting offtopic, but CBG was a member of MENSA[1] and therefore falls under the "quantifiably 'smart'" category.

[1] http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Is_Comic_Book_Guy_a_member_of_MENS...

[nearestneighbor]

You win this round, The Simpsons Cartoon Guy.

[trominos]

The terminology is secondary; the important point is that it seems like smart people are unpopular, but it's not clear whether that's true and if it is true it's not clear why.