Re: this is the time to pray

From: Beth (BethStone21_at_hotmail.NOSPICEDHAM.com)
Date: 01/13/05

  • Next message: Chewy509: "Re: Shhhh!" 
    Date: Thu, 13 Jan 2005 06:51:06 GMT

    Evenbit wrote:
    > Phil Carmody wrote:
    > > Evenbit writes:
    > > > Every sentence above is a non-sequitur that commits a logic
    > > > fallacy.
    > >
    > > Technically correct, but as you don't actually quote any sentences
    > > at all, you're talking about the empty set.
    >
    > It is obvious to all readers that my posting was a response to Ro's
    > posting, so no quoting was required.
    >
    > For those of us who can follow Usenet threads (if you can't, then get a
    > new newsreader), quoting is rarely required.

    Possibly; But it's "strongly advisable"...USENET postings don't necessarily
    arrive in the order they are sent, due to propogation (and this _has_
    caused a problem before - believing someone to be "inconsistent" when, in
    fact, you're just reading their posts out-of-order from how they sent them
    (such as a person changing their opinion - a rare sight, indeed, true...but
    it can happen - but when read "out of order", it's confusing that they
    argue one thing, then another, then seem to go back to the old opinion,
    then back to the new one, etc. ;)...apparently, some newreaders (or
    something along the "chain", anyway) don't deal with a change of subject
    line or even attaching posts to what they are responding to (Annie's posts
    used to do this a lot...perhaps a previous ISP or something was responsible
    for that, doesn't seem to happen anymore...but, anyway, as they often
    weren't appearing in the right places, her quotation was basically about
    the only thing available to know what she was responding to)...

    And so forth...plus, simply, the conversational "quote / reply" style is
    the most easiest post to read...it's all there in the post and doesn't
    require flipping back and forth between one post and another to work out
    what's being said...in the longer posts - or any posts with "bullet points"
    or a number of many different things to say - it would be a complete
    nightmare to work out what's being said...

    This _ISN'T_ a "newsreader technology" issue alone and don't make the
    mistake of thinking it is...

    1. Posts propogate and, thus, do not necessarily arrive in the order sent
    (hence, it's quite possible I see your reply appear before the post you're
    replying to and, without context, it appears to make no sense...you are
    talking to "phantoms" or something ;)...

    2. Posts sometimes get dropped, pure and simple (perhaps because an ISP
    misdiagnoses it as "spam", maybe? Stupid but has been known to happen...the
    CLAX "black hole" was probably due to this mixing with the need to
    "approve" posts at the same time...for a while, some ISPs were moronically
    stupid and started "blacklisting" other servers that sent too much
    "spam"...they seem to forget that not everything is "spam" and totally
    ruined their service for everything else by ignoring particular ISPs
    "wholesale"...this is simply idiocy and not quite comprehending how things
    actually work but, regardless, they are problems that posters encounter and
    suffer by)...if Ro's original post was dropped then your reply doesn't help
    in the slightest...indeed, you often discover that posts have been dropped
    _because_ you get quotation (and I _have_, once or twice, picked up
    someone's comment via a quotation because I somehow couldn't see the
    original)...

    3. Viewing posts in a thread "hierarchy" can cause subtle differences in
    interpretation...for example, I tend to start at the top of the threads and
    work my way down (UNLESS I'm very far behind what's going on in the threads
    that I have to "catch up"...in those cases, I start at the bottom and work
    up instead (yes, I order by date which puts the newest _bottom_, not top,
    as might be expected...no particular reason for that...got set that way,
    one day, and now I've gotten used to that order...it probably makes more
    logical sense to have newest top? I don't know...I suppose like
    "endianness", it doesn't actually matter, so long as it's "consistent"
    ;))...I open up a thread to look at the posts inside and then it's, of
    course, quite natural to start at the top "unread" post and then work down
    one-by-one in reading them...other people may have different approaches
    (indeed, my own approach varies...mostly downwards but sometimes upwards
    when I'm trying to "catch up" to jump to the newest postings
    first..."back-tracking", if necessary, to get more context...sometimes I
    immediately want to reply to something and make the reply then and there as
    I'm reading...other times I remember that it's usually wise to read the
    rest of the replies first - no sense posting what it turns out someone else
    already posted before you - and then "go back" to reply, if it still makes
    sense to do so)...

    What's the trouble here? Well, the order one reads things following the
    "hierarchy" isn't necessarily the order that the posts were written...this
    can cause the odd confusion or misunderstanding if one post says "it's like
    I just said in my last post"...which is the previous posting? It's not
    necessarily the one just before it in the "tree", you see...if a reply is
    depending too much upon the posts being listed in the order they see on
    their screen (which, as noted before, isn't universal because posts
    "propogate" and can reach news servers and machines at different times),
    then it's very easy for all hell to break loose in the thread...there
    _WAS_ - which is why I'm noting this for you - a problem before with "but
    you said!" / "No, I said then I said" / "No, you didn't!" / "Oh, yes, I
    did" / *look at time stamps* "Oh, ummm, yes, you did, didn't you? Sorry!"
    (and, note, not even "time stamps" are necessarily reliable when posts are
    sent very close together because they typically are the "arrival" time at a
    news server, not necessarily the "send" time from the machine)...

    This becomes even more complicated if some people have "send posts
    immediately" set and others have "send all posts together at end of
    session"...then, if replying to lots of posts, then the whole lot of them
    can be sent simultaneously, making "time stamps" useless to work out what
    "order" someone read / replied something...

    4. If one relies solely on the last posting and not quotation, then a long
    posting with many points would become a total nightmare to read..."what you
    say in point 1 is true but"...point 1? What on Earth was point 1? Time to
    search through previous postings...ah, okay, that's point 1...back to the
    reply..."but point 2 is even more interesting"...point 2?!? Oh crap! Back
    to that post again...ah, right, that's what point 2 was...back to the
    reply..."because point 2 in the context of point 3 means"...oh, bloody
    hell, are you taking the piss here!? Back to that other post...okay, right,
    that's point 3...understood...back to the reply..."means that Randy's point
    5 and Rene's point 37 and Annie's point 3 are inconsistent with Herbert's
    point 7"...right, you're clearly taking the piss! I'm NOT reading any
    further...it'll take forever to bounce around from post to post to pick up
    all the context for understanding that sentence completely! ;)

    5. Last but not least, there _are_ technical reasons with newsreaders as
    well...this is NOT the only reason why quotations make sense (just given 4
    possible reasons that have NOTHING to do with any "technology" previously)
    but it is another reason to provide "context"...and if we are doing so for
    the reasons of the other points, then, even if you are going to be an arse
    with some Microsoft "Upgrade! Upgrade! Upgrade!" chanting, you should still
    do this for the other reasons and it naturally "coincidentally" aids people
    with "lesser technology"...

    6. The "conversation" style of reply is the most logical and easiest to
    read...insert your reply in the correct places in the quotation...as simple
    as that...it reads like a "conversation"...the "context" is all there (and,
    thus, even "out of order" you still know what they are replying to because
    it's _included_ in the message itself)...as newsreader software
    automatically quotes (with the default settings typically) then it's no
    extra effort - indeed, it's _useful_ because you can see exactly what
    you're replying to in the quotation - to just tap ENTER to make a space and
    then slot in your reply in the relevent places...the style most people use
    because, simply, it's the easiest, most logical and reads well...

    [ 7. Another possibility is wanting to demonstrate some "inconsistency" in
    the previous post...the easiest way? Grab two quotes, put them side-by-side
    and then query how the two can both make sense...trying to do that without
    quotation? It just wouldn't work at all... ]

    Right, if you want proof of these points being correct, then just try
    replying to them point-by-point without quoting any "context" beyond "your
    point 3 says" or whatever...your post would be quite unreadable doing so
    without constantly referring back to previous postings...if you're forcing
    people to "flip" back and forth between posts to comprehend "context" then
    guess what'll happen to your post? It'll be ignored because it's just far
    too much hard work to read...heck, I have my posts ignored simply for being
    too long...if you're actually asking people to "dance" around a hierarchy
    of posts reading one line here, one line there and so forth, no-one's going
    to be bothered to read it...

    Indeed, so, so often we see people get so wrapped up in "technology" issues
    that they forget that these aren't the only things at play here...point 8
    would be "courtesy and politeness"...point 9 would be "make your post
    user-friendly for reading"...point 10 would be...and so forth...if you only
    aim for some "technical" correctness, then you might end up sitting there
    confused...why, you're being so "technically correct", so why is everyone
    snubbing making a response? Ah, simple, really: In all "non-technical"
    ways, you're being a bit of an arse...indeed, I'd happily put money on
    people being much more happy with a _useful_ but possibly "technical
    inaccurate" post from me than a million "pedantically technically accurate"
    posts where the poster is simply being a complete arse while doing
    so...now, if you were conversing with robots or something, that might be
    different...but you're not...so it isn't ;)...

    "Use the quote, Luke!"

    Beth :)

  • Next message: Chewy509: "Re: Shhhh!"