Dr E D F Williams wrote: > > My Dear Keith, > > You answered for William. > > For the last twenty years or so, after leaving the academic world, I have > been writing for a living. As far as I know those who read my stuff don't > get the wrong idea. The people who employ me to write, (Nokia is one) have > continued to do so, year after year. Those who read my fiction, and have > bothered to comment, also seem to understand what I have to say. I have no > smiley faces in my books, or short stories, or technical articles.
Horses and chickens... Writing for readers, that is, having your writing reduced (yes, reduced) to print is not at all like a give-and-take conversation between live human beings. Not at all. You write. They read. 90% of the time, maybe more, if they take umbrage at that which you write, they tacitly agree to disagree, or they write you and complain or try to open discussion... That's one-way communication, and doesn't require enhancement for understanding. You're preaching or teaching or expounding, not conversing. Heck of a difference! > Photographs do accompany some articles. I think that if such devices - as > smiley faces - become necessary, then the writing is at fault, or perhaps > the reader, or both. Of course, but talking to your "audience" by means of a book, magazine or newspaper, is worlds apart from conversing, face to face. You are the writer, they are the readers, and there IS no communication involved, if you define communication as conversation. It ain't! ;^) > I made a simple statement of fact: > > There is nothing 'cheap' about Photoshop. And I meant exactly what I wrote. > > Unless, of course, $600 (or thereabouts) is generally considered cheap for > such a product. > On the other hand maybe its the *use* of the product that's cheap: as in > 'cheap and nasty'. Which is probably what was meant. Again, it would be > difficult to imagine some using a computer program cheaply. The act of > purchase precludes this. > > Aaaaargh! This is the sound of agony and needs a face I suppose :-( > > :-) ;-) :--( comma > > XXX > > Don > > PS: I don't know why I've bothered to write this. I do. You had all those pent-up emoticons filling your head and you just had to do something to release them! Were I talking to you directly, you'd see me smiling now, because a smile would enhance and clarify the meaning of what I just said. But I wasn't, and you just have to imagine how I felt when I said what I did...by putting all of what preceded that in context, and so on. Much easier to simply append a textual <smile!> isn't it? > Dr E D F Williams Keith Whaley
