And if anyone's wondering "What Would Tim Do?", I think Tim would want this thread to end so we can get back doing actual work with Perl on Mac OS X.
yes, please.
And since I started this sordid saga, indulge me by letting me have (hopefully) the last word.
1. My apologies to David Wheeler. His is the name that has now forever been immortalized in the subject line. I don't recall him ever being anything but kind and helpful to me and others on this list (and outside this list, when he helped me understand Bricolage's capabilities).
2. I did not mean any disrespect to Tim. Now I realize that some can be offended by it, however, I would feel justifiably reprimanded _only_ if the reprimand came from Tim. Many folks on this list had harsh words for me, directly or indirectly, even though I did nothing to besmirch their name or character. I never said any unkind words to any of you.
3. I have spent a considerable amount of my personal money buying O'Reilly books and subscriptions. All my purchases have been related to perl, and two relevant titles include the Camel and the Llama books. I believe in some way I did my bit (and continue to do so) to support the creators and promoters of Perl.
4. It wasn't even my joke. As I mentioned in my email to the list, the Register sells O'Really swag at its cash'n'carrion shop. See
http://www.cashncarrion.co.uk/?listPos=&op=catalogue-products- null&prodCategoryID=14
When I first saw it I wondered why the Register is selling O'Reilly stuff. When I noticed the spelling, I fell out of my chair laughing. I believe the ability to laugh at anything and everything is very unique to the US and the UK (I am neither American nor English, but besides my own national identity, I identify the most with the US. After all, this is the only country that invented both the Macintosh and Jazz). Without satire and humor we would be nowhere, even if at times it might offend.
5. I made the original posting on the list, not to any one person privately. All responses to that should be made to the list. Yes, I did repost an unsolicited private email to the list, but I did not do it out of any malice. I was honestly astounded that what I thought was innocuous at best, could be misinterpreted. I was trying to preempt others from misinterpreting by saying upfront that I did not mean any disrespect. It was not rude, it was not illegal. To call it that is just intimidation in this already overly litigious society. If you disagree with this position, please don't send me private emails.
6. I don't know any of you personally. I am not good at perl (yet) as much as most of you. But I don't think I am "stupid." And I am certainly older than a lot of you on this list. Hopefully I will meet some of you someday (I now know that there are a few from Madison itself here on this list), and learn more about perl and other things. Most of you have been kind, patient, and funny. Thanks for your help.
7. There are a few who spoke up for me. Thanks to you. You know who you are.
8. Only two people saw the actual point of the original post (thanks Sherm and Bill)... material justifying opensource that comes from sources other than FSF, Gnu, or O'Reilly folks. Sceptics would say that these three have obvious reasons to promote opensource (philosophical or monetary), even if their reasons may be very sound ones. The material I referred to was the first one I had seen from sources other than the above three (actually, I also found a paper from Mitre Corp., but these are few and far in between).
Let's get back to perl, please.
