[lolinder]

Genius would be a much worse term for what the author is describing because it explicitly doesn't come with trade-offs. The term needs to convey both the unique talents and the odd differences.

"Nerd" has been the subject of a long and largely successful attempt at reclamation, to the point where people younger than a certain age don't generally consider it to be derogatory and comfortably identify with it. It's been so successful that the author feels the need to prepend the word "weird" to clarify that we're not talking about just anyone who likes video games.

[programjames]

Younger than what age? I think every age still generally considers "nerd" derogatory. Also, I think a genius would tell you the trade-offs only exist because most people are wrong. Calling them weird has the connotation that something is "wrong" with them, yet it seems quite the opposite is true. I could agree with the term "outlier" but not "weird".

[lolinder]

The trend towards embracing it was already starting when I was a kid in the late 00's and early 10's, but it really picked up with the class of ~2016. The rise of the computer programmer as the highest ROI degree in this generation made a huge difference in perception of the word "nerd".

By the time I was helping with a local youth group in 2017 (14 year olds) the very extroverted ringleader of the group was a proud "nerd", by which he meant that he and his friends loved to play video games like Fortnite and had an aversion to sports.

Take a look at the highest voted entries in Urban Dictionary [0]. Obviously this isn't a scientific measurement, but it shows a strong subculture of self-identified nerds who embrace the label to some degree.

Edit: here's another source [1] that you may find more credible, from 2012:

> And the appropriation of the word "nerd" was a "battle that got won", says [Neil] Gaiman. "It's like many terms that were originally intended to offend, the team that was offended took it as its own as a badge of honour.

> "It's part of a cycle, that terms of abuse are turned around - in this case it has been socially turned around."

[0] https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Nerd

[1] https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-20325517