[sclug] HTML vs plain old text

[Neil Haughton]

Tom,

PMFBI, but here's an alternative opinion:

My old man, who at 84 has taken to email like a duck to water (he can 
keep in touch with his kids across the world, nightly almost), /loves/ 
(that's in italic) HTML email, and I hate to rub this in, but he also 
loves Outlook Express even though he thinks Windows is crap. For him the 
ability to use italic, bold, underline, colour etc is so liberating in 
enabling him to communicate the written word in a way he never felt able 
to with handwritten letters. And it's fun! Now what is wrong with that?

The fault seems to me to be with crappy email clients that allow dodgy 
stuff through. I myself have little problem with spam thanks to 
Thunderbird's junk mail abilities, and my old man who insists on using 
OE has no problem at all with spam - for all the HTML email he has 
received over the years, nobody has seen fit to grab his email address. 
I think his ISP does spam filtering anyway, so that probably helps. On 
the other hand, at work where we have a plain-text policy, we are all 
spammed to death. (Oh, if every p_n_s enhancment I had been invited to 
use had worked... well we won't go into that :-) )

As an observer it strikes me that there is a discernible element of 
inverted snobbery over this whole plain-text/HTML thing, which does the 
Linux fraternity little credit.

 

>Worst of all, it's unecessary. .... it's ... pointless.
>
>
>  
>
Surely it's not pointless - see above. If font embellishments were 
pointless they would never be used in printed books. They allow greater 
expression, and add clarity of meaning.

....it's one of those things that 
can really get up your nose when you're not having a good day :o)


In the nicest possible way, if an html email upsets your day, you really 
need something worthwhile to worry about! ;-)

Regards,

Neil.


PS Is there a sclug meeting next Wednesday?


-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.tmdg.co.uk/pipermail/sclug/attachments/20041203/ba43fdb0/attachment.htm