[Nottingham] Email Format - question

Fri Jul 13 21:02:07 UTC 2012

I'd thought I'd add my own thoughts. In the middle of th 80's most people that used USENET
were Americans - and as I recall the used in the main UNIX and were aged between 50 and 60
years of age.

In those far of days BIlly Boy Gates worked in close cooperation with IBM. "Windows for
Workgroups And later in collaboration with IBM Windows 95 were to come about. But Billy
realised that his collaboration with IBM would mean the Death of the much beloved Microsoft
Inc. He walked out of the offices of IBM with the disks which later became "Windows." IBM
still had Windows under copyright Ha! Ha! Then the war of the worlds broke out and the giant
of IBM was slain.

I mention all this in passing. For Microsoft Inc brought us all "Bloatware." It quickly
became noticed that if a "Windows" user said "Hello World" he was sending 260Kb whereas a
UNIX user would only send 6kb. Most modems in those far distant days only had a max speed of
300 baud - the problem was Microsoft Inc had no way of sending e-mail messages - so a us er
used Microsoft "Word" which still today holds the  unchallenged position for "Bloatware."
So all these UNIX users were rightly pissed off with a growing number of dick heads that
used Microsoft Inc products - they insisted on only text in e-mails - and of course no caps
lock - because the early dick heads that used Microsoft Inc's products were all computer
illiterate .  and did not know how to turn on and off cap lock. And they started writing at
the top of e-mails filled with "bloatware" and so the UNIX users decided collectively to
have some rules.

The world wide web - and the Internet protocol are two differing ways to send data. But most
users of Microsoft Incs products are in ignorance of this - for them there is only one way
to send an e-mail via "bloatware."

I view all my e-mails as plain text and send all my e-mails as plain text. There is good
reason for quoting all an e-mail - others may appear late in the game and miss out on what
people have said in the past. You can write under quoted text or at the end.

But what has happened in the passing years? Most people really don't give a fuck about
conventions - or care about Microsoft's criminal activities or give a fuck that you can't
ever get a refund or give the software back to Microsoft - or its aim to stifle competition
through the use of end user licenses and the development of hardware that prevents a user
from installing another O/S. Since Billy Boy Gates walked out of the offices of IBM it has
set itself on a path of criminal business practices. Netscape SUN IBM the EU and many many
others over a 20 year period of criminal activity.

I can here all you Microsoft users getting really wound up! You were babies when all this
happened but who cares for convention? Or in deed ethics? Or even good business practice?

Mailing lists are as old as USENET. Mailman has not changed all that much. The convention is
that net-etiquette still applies. Every mail list and every usenet group had a net etiquette
page - but over the past 20 years or so such conventions have waned and over the same period
we have seen the rise of "bloatware."

When I look back - those early "internet users" bent over the UNIX machines they were in an
age of "values" "conventions" "code of conduct" "good manners." They were all by and large
50 an 60 year old middle-class university educated Americans who had their "values" set in
the 40's and 50's. They are all pioneers looking at the super highway where international
boundaries were mere "road humps." From little provisional England we have become
international - sharing our common interests and concerns across international boundaries.

How often are we mis-quoted? We write something and then some one reads it puts their own
interpretation on  it and then they are set to rant and rave? I write this in the cool of
the evening with a clear mind - not ranting and raving - I well remember the rants and raves
at "bloatware" users entering usenet groups and being ticked off.

Now we have an age filled by mobile devices. Tablets - NetBooks - Laptops - Mobile phones -
have I missed some technology? All using differing formats - and with end users with their
own (if any sense of) conventions.

We have a generation largely inarticulate with just "txt-speech" - who have not a thought
for "convention" "good practice" let alone "ethics." So what is the solution? Why not send
every one a text message about net etiquette when they join this mailing list? And every
month as a reminder?

1985-2012 27 years I am 64 now - so I was 30 something. I realise that many of those good
folks are long gone. But what they set down still continues today. Linux users still have
the conventions from UNIX - and "bloatware" users are forced to send e-mail in text mode! I
have to laugh! So funny! World domination!! Reduced to 30 year old conventions!

David

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