On 10/27/2011 3:36 PM, Benjamin Klein wrote:
Is anybody working on *those*, these days?
;-)
If you look back, you'll see that that's what this whole discussion started about. I told people about the development I was doing on an ePub editor/creator, BowerBird asked for examples, I commented that I couldn't get good HTML from Internet Archive, Alex pointed to a script that would generate complete but complex HTML output, BowerBird started whining, in a polite, respectful and non-name-calling way, about how Internet Archive (the organization you know, not the people) is stupid, in kindergarten, and floating mindlessly in it's own little bubble. Things kind of went downhill from there, and the original discourse kind of got lost in the noise. This is not BowerBird's fault. He consistently asserts he is "a real nice guy," and always responds politely. I've been around long enough to come to the conclusion that he really /believes/ that. No rational argument can convince him to improve his "abrasive," "abusive" or "anti-social" behavior, because he cannot see that his posts /are/ abrasive, abusive or anti-social. He's just wired that way, so all the posts intended to change that behavior, whether couched as derisive or helpful, are doomed to fail. BowerBird is just the curmudgeonly old uncle in our family tree (you know what I'm talking about, you've all got one ...), and we should just tolerate him for what he is. Yes, he's hopelessly technologically out of date, but we knew that and he's doing the best he can. Don't keep rubbing his nose in it. Hopefully, the rest of us are wired differently (although sometimes I have my doubts). When he goes off on his little rants, just roll your eyes, mumble some apology for "Uncle Bruce" and go on about your business. That alone would greatly increase the signal to noise ratio. But enough about that, it seems like I, too, am becoming part of the problem. So Alex, I've been looking closer at the output from those scripts and I'm beginning to find more and more value in them. We'll have to talk...