On Jul 23, 2006, at 10:09 AM, P. J. Alling wrote: > My point is that you claim insider knowledge on just about everything,
"Everything" is rather a broad statement. We haven't even begun to discuss "everything" on this mailing list, by your own statements one of the few you participate in. I only claim insider knowledge on things that I feel I have insider knowledge on. That's a moderately broad set of things as i have been quite active in a lot of areas. > ...I would expect someone with your > breath of interests, that seem to often overlap my own, that I would > have heard of you. I would expect that especially in the area I have > the most experience. And what area is that? > As I said you claim to be in a ratified atmosphere, I do not. I have had the good fortune in my life to work closely with a lot of very interesting and influential efforts and people. I don't consider this as any special thing that I have planned or sought; it's just happened like that. My clients and customers, for about half the years of my high tech career, were the CEOs, CTOs, Technical Leads and strategic innovators in software companies, education, science and business that I was supporting for my employers. > In fact many of the places I worked were so small > that we didn't have e-mail, or Internet connections before the 1990's. > Several large companies I've worked for didn't even give out Internet > e-mail addresses, only internal e-mail addresses. I haven't published > any papers, nor have I had any part in building large public > systems or > publicly distributed software, as you claim. I know a lot of > programmers like that. Most of us do our jobs write code maybe run a > small team and collect our pay. Few of us claim to have been at the > Nexis points of earth shaking, or even industry changing events. You > imply both. At one point in time, some large percentage (30-50%) of the software available for Apple computers had some contribution that I was responsible for. That's more a fact that I was in a position of influence than that I was the DRI for all of those things. > On top of that, I only contribute to one e-mail list > regularly, I have always liked my anonymity. Google only records > public > Internet discourse. No wonder I have never heard of you in any circle other than this one. I have never sought celebrity, but I've always enjoyed participating with groups of people of like interests. Networks and computing have been a communications tool for me: a way of connecting with other people with similar interests. I was a network participant on ARPAnet, through venues like SUMEX-AIM, BITNET, etc, before the internet as we know it today existed, a side effect of my working for NASA. I worked in the computer and high-tech industries for 20+ years. I honestly had no particular intent or plan to be there, I simply took advantage of opportunities that posed a) an interest and b) an income for me. My personal interests range from art and photography to environmental action to racing, classic cars and motorcycles, etc, and pose the majority of what will be found of my activities on line. I have never been a "hacker" or "computer enthusiast" so there's a limited amount that you'll find in the circles of computing hobbyists; computers are just tools to facilitate my interests and a career business I worked in. So it's natural you wouldn't know who I was if that's where you expected to hear of me. I do, of course, like to understand my tools thoroughly and expend adequate energy in that direction to be considered an expert. Godfrey -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net
