Many serious players of brass instruments, for example, are critical because they think the artificial sound is deceptively good through the headset, providing a false sense of quality.
For serious players of stringed instruments the products of three great violin-makers of Cremona, Nicolo Amati, Giuseppe Guarneri and Antonio Stradivari, have ruled the roost since the 17th century.
It is a phenomenon familiar to serious players of online role-playing games, where managing relationships with other people is at least as important as the science-fiction or fantasy action of the game itself.
Something of its allure can be seen in the revelation – distressing to those of us who like our intellectuals to be Olympian figures, detached from the mundane human traffic beneath them – that most of the "serious" players of 20th-century culture were incorrigible gossips.
All of these point towards CoComment now being a serious player on the web.
Publishers will bid high not just for economic reasons, but often to make a statement, to announce that they are serious players for a particular kind of book, as, for instance, when a paperback house moves into hardcover publishing as well.
Australian Rules Football, their major rivals in a fiercely competitive sporting landscape, do not have that option, and although rugby union is not a serious player in terms of television ratings, it can offer an international dimension to lure away the odd superstar such as Sam Burgess.
The deal underscores Google's ambitions to become a serious player in the business of selling software to companies and organizations, in competition with Microsoft and others.
It's quicker, more stylish and, crucially, allows for a greater degree of showboating and skilful play – an essential development as publisher Activision continues to position the game as a serious player in the world of professional eSports.
