Arlo -
What are the points awarded/detracted for using other people's arguments?
fASCIIsm - Everything2.com <http://everything2.com/title/fASCIIsm>
versus
www.textfiles.com/100/whytext.oct
<http://www.textfiles.com/100/whytext.oct>
-Arlo James Barnes
How about points for stirring Doug *and* Glen up at the same time? Score!
I recently noticed a fASCIIsm yet more extreme. It is not new, but in
the light of our whining about whether ASCII should be enough (not
unlike whining about the time/clock change?).
I call it half-ASCII. When people find it too hard or unnecessary to
use Case... and sometimes even punctuation (or correct spelling or
grammar!). They only use (much less than) *half* of the ASCII character
set. Most recently, it was a woman correspondent who is not merely a
regular (and articulate) blogger but is also a published book author.
She began her ALL CAPS-SOUNDS-LIKE-SHOUTING message by cautioning me
that she was NOT SHOUTING, she just preferred ALL CAPS because it was
easier for her to SEE (apparently). None of her books nor blog posts
were written in ALL CAPS, so I have to assume that she has "people for
that"... copy editors, etc. who can add all the appropriate clues to
make it easy to gather.
I tried, I swear I did, to not hear her message as shouting... but
finally gave over to shoving it all into *lower case* wherein I found
her to no longer seem to be belligerent but now rather semi-literate and
timid... hmmm.... same *content*, different *form* and it was rather
difficult (impossible) to read her message as she must have conceived
it... the BELLIGERENT and the _timid_ version just didn't sound like her
writing. I finally settled for some mangled average between the two. I
was SHOCKED that someone as (otherwise) sophisticated didn't realize the
effect of writing in ALL CAPS ALL THE TIME! I even suspected it was a
test.
In the early days of developing WSIWYG text/graphics tools, I remember
the shock I felt that letting people write *rough drafts* with full
formatting yielded all kinds of unintended consequences. This was before
we fired all our copyeditors and even typesetters... so there were still
professionals helping make sure the *final product* was of high
quality. Suddenly I found myself reading (for content, not format) my
peers' work *formatted* as if it were a finished product (with plenty of
formatting errors along with spelling, grammar, punctuation, emphasis,
nuance, etc.). It was really eerie! Cognitive Dissonance. I *longed*
for a tool that had just enough smarts in it to not allow the rough
draft to have any more formatting than straight ASCII, and then
gradually introduce more sophisticated formatting as the status of the
revisions evolved. I still do... but it ain't happening. I've worked
with teams writing together who by convention eschew formatting until
after the content is 90% hammered out. I *much* prefer to work with
formatted text myself, but don't like the confusion I feel when someone
throws me text that is still "stream-of-consciousness" with
"stream-of-consciousness" formatting as well as content.
Unsurprisingly, I prefer CamelCode style in my code as well. I'll cope
with those who like to live in FLAT^H^H^HASCII-Land... and even those in
Half-ASCII-Land... it's really only a minor inconvenience. And while I'm
quite capable of clicking through a weakly identified link/URL, I also
appreciate it when the author/submitter offers a hint of why I would
want to, where I might go, etc...
- Steve
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