Tech Thread Flame War Cease Fire Declared (vanity)

(self) ^ | 2010-07-24 | Dayglored

[dayglored]

Jim Robinson has laid down the law with regard to tech thread flame wars.

I am motivated to make sure we tech-thread-heads are aware of this. This vanity is a heads-up with regard to Jim's comments last night, and I've added a few thoughts of my own as an observer.

Here's what Jim said:

To All: [That goes for everyone.] I don’t see any reason whatsoever to be having flamewars on FR over computer products. Those who have a problem with Apple should just not buy the product and that takes care of that. Don’t come to FR to flame those who like the product. That’s just dumb. Who cares what computer products people use.

Everyone on these threads need to lighten up! On all sides!!

I think Jim's declaration of a cease-fire is clear as a bell -- the disruption, flame wars, abusive comments, etc. that have characterized many tech threads, especially Apple threads, are to stop.

I'm sure we can all abide by this reminder of FR site policy, with no loss of meaningful content, and our enjoyment of the conversations in these threads will increase considerably. Arguments can be had civilly, and without rancor. We're adults, not 13-year-olds.

Personally, I think this applies by simple extension to the Windows threads, Linux threads, indeed any of the computer / high-tech threads. So I encourage ALL partisans, pro-Apple and anti-Apple, pro-Microsoft and anti-Microsoft, pro-Linux and anti-Linux, etc. to heed this reminder.

I am going to ping a handful of my FRiends of all tech persuasions, so that we can spread the word as widely as necessary, to ensure that nobody can claim they didn't know about it.

Here's to a saner, more enjoyable tech environment on FreeRepublic!

Thanks,
Dayglored

[FLcitizen]

Years ago, I found a pocket dictionary of computer terms. Under Infinite Loop, it just said See Loop, Infinite. When you found Loop, Infinite, it just said See Infinite Loop. Best definition of Infinite Loop I’ve ever seen.

[Minn]

Maybe each side could make a Religion Caucus thread, some treat it as such.

The problem there is that, when people posted drivel from phony technical TV clerics, no debate would be allowed.

[piytar]

LOL, granted. But 7+7 isn’t 16, it’s 10.

[Secret Agent Man]

Well if you can give us all a sure-fire, 100% way to disagree with others that will never offend anyone, ever, I am all for that.

Part of believing you are right about something is being able to explain why someone else in your view is wrong about their view. Or in discussing non-absolute issues, why your view is better than theirs.

To date there is no way not to irritate other people when you’re explaining why your view is right/better than theirs. The only way is to ban discussion of everything. And that would mean no more exchange of ideas.

Exchange of ideas cannot occur without people becoming defensive. Nobody wants to think they are wrong. It is part of the human condition to want to be right. It’s hard to be wrong. It’s harder when you think or feel the other person’s trivializing it or making fun of you.

The real problem is people who don’t realize this fact (you can’t have free exchange of ideas without friction), and think ALL exchanges are just out there to taunt and goad another person. And believe me there are people that just exist to stir things up and argue for the sake of arguing. That isn’t constructive. When you run into people like this you know it. Most of the stuff here isn’t that. I don’t read every post but from what I do read I don’t get that impression.

[piytar]

Geez, I meant E, not 10. Sigh.

[JRandomFreeper]

Good try, grasshopper. Work through the fatigue and learn to add BCO or BCD or hex at a glance in context.

When you can add a column of octal numbers in your head and express the result in manchester encoded data using a 28 bit data stream, you will have achieved the next level.

Don't forget to pad the header.

/johnny

[Ronin]

The computer flame wars do not really bother me. I look at the Mac vs. PC rivalry much like I look at sports rivalries.

But it does seem to be a bit different to me when the religious types snark at each other. I can’t help but feel disappointed (Which is strange because I am not religous. Not yet anyhow.) when I see Christian types of whatever denomination bashing their fellow Christians over what to an outsider appear to be very minor doctrinal points rather than celebrating and cherishing the points they have in common.

Rather than wondering how many angels can fit on the head of a pin, I sometimes wonder if Guardian Angels ever get the urge to knock heads together like angry nuns on a playground.

[Richard Kimball]

Well if you can give us all a sure-fire, 100% way to disagree with others that will never offend anyone, ever, I am all for that.

Just agree with everything I say and you'll do fine.

[CougarGA7]

010001100110111101110010011101000111010101101110
011000010111010001100101011011000111100100101100
001000000100100100100000011001000110111101101110
001001110111010000100000011010110110111001101111
011101110010000001100101011011100110111101110101
011001110110100000100000011000010110001001101111
011101010111010000100000011000110110111101101101
011100000111010101110100011001010111001001110011
001000000111010001101111001000000110011101100101
011101000010000001101001011011100111010001101111
001000000110000100100000011001100110110001100001
011011010110010100100000011101110110000101110010
001000000110111101110110011001010111001000100000
0111010001101000011001010110110100101110

[piytar]

BCO+BCD = 189D, at a glance. But it’s been a while, so I probably messed up. LOL.

And I really have no clue what a manchester encoded data stream is. Guess I’m stuck at padawan...

[piytar]

Can’t believe you said that. This is a family place! /joke

[CougarGA7]

What? I edited out the bad words!

[DigitalVideoDude]

16K Disk Extended Color Basic baby!

And a little 6809E assembler on the side.

[piytar]

178D sigh

[ReignOfError]

Well, sure, if you're gonna get all fancy-pants.

I still have my ZX-80. It's a wall hanging above my desk. I'm half-tempted to pull out a universal power adapter and see if it'll boot.

[ReignOfError]

I hear a couple of kids have a BASIC for the Altair. They’re calling themselves Micro-something or other.

[TXnMA]

"Can we still make fun of Microsoft OS?

I think that may be OK -- but only if you own and run it... and preface your remarks with, "I Love MS -- but..." '-)

[ReignOfError]

Commodore was way ahead of its time. Long before anyone thought of computer porn, Vic-20 programming was all full of PEEKs and POKEs.

(Ducking)

[TXnMA]

LOL!! When we unpacked after our move from MA to TX, I found one of those clear Lucite weights we used to put atop the card stacks to keep them feeding right... ‘-)

[WhirlwindAttack]

LOAD “*” ,8 ,1