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I was always a windows user until vista came out. I have used both mac and linux, but my main computer was always windows.
However, Vista turned me off to windows. It is supposed to be the next great thing...but it caused me nothing but problems. I am a very experienced computer user...I have used windows since version 3.1, back when you also had to know how to use dos...and I have never had this many problems. Windows update is glitchy for me, streaming video rarely works right...and it freezes up at odd times. I still have my windows XP laptop...but I don't use my Vista desktop much anymore...I would rather just use my mac or my linux partition on my PC than bother with Vista...or go through the hassle of reinstalling XP on my desktop.
Posts: 1901 | Registered: May 2004
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Your problem is that Vista is a very intelligent OS, and dislikes users who believe that ellipses are an acceptable substitute for all other punctuation.
Posts: 10645 | Registered: Jul 2004
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Whatever do you mean........... like....... do you remember.... that person... .who started posting.... a few years ago...... and used..... mega.ellipses...... when he wrote.....................
Posts: 9912 | Registered: Nov 2005
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I've always been a fan of the message board ellipses. I've never been tempted to use them outside of message boards though. Perhaps because I'd get those green squiggly lines from word (or open office, depending on my OS at the time).
Posts: 1901 | Registered: May 2004
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It's just a time-saver, since it denotes that you aren't completely finishing a thought, or making a good transition to another thought. "I would have written a shorter letter but I didn't have the time" and all that.
Posts: 2409 | Registered: Sep 2003
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Lottery tickets are sold in low income areas far more than other places. It's really terrible that the very people who can afford it least are fleeced in this way for state money. In a lot of ways, Alabama is backwards and ignorant, but I'm quite proud that each time a state lottery is on the ballot, we in Alabama vote it down. I think there should be required warnings on lottery ticket sales saying things like "you have far higher chance of winning the Nobel Prize for physics than of winning this lottery". Or else do a study of level of education vs. lottery tickets bought and publish that on the tickets. It really bothers me because it's so exploitative.
Posts: 6246 | Registered: Aug 2004
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quote:I think there should be required warnings on lottery ticket sales saying things like "you have far higher chance of winning the Nobel Prize for physics than of winning this lottery".
That's almost certainly not true for the vast majority of lottery-ticket purchasers. For example, I have zero chance of winning the nobel prize for physics. ANY lottery offers better odds of winning to me.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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quote:Originally posted by Jhai: It's just a time-saver, since it denotes that you aren't completely finishing a thought, or making a good transition to another thought. "I would have written a shorter letter but I didn't have the time" and all that.
Perhaps rather than denoting that you aren't completely finished with a thought, you should completely finish your thoughts before sharing them. Ellipses should not be so broadly used; they have specific purposes, and sharing the incompleteness of your own thinking is not one of them.
Posts: 9912 | Registered: Nov 2005
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quote:I think there should be required warnings on lottery ticket sales saying things like "you have far higher chance of winning the Nobel Prize for physics than of winning this lottery".
That's almost certainly not true for the vast majority of lottery-ticket purchasers. For example, I have zero chance of winning the nobel prize for physics. ANY lottery offers better odds of winning to me.
You are more likely to win the lottery than you are to be struck by lightning, for example. However, the sentiment is appropriate. Perhaps a colorful statistic should be found to express the unlikeliness of a *big* lottery win, but off-hand I don't know of one that fits.
Posts: 9912 | Registered: Nov 2005
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I assume you mean win something, even $5, in the lottery, when you say win the lottery. Being struck by lightning is much, much more likely than winning the jackpot in the lottery.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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quote:Originally posted by Jhai: It's just a time-saver, since it denotes that you aren't completely finishing a thought, or making a good transition to another thought. "I would have written a shorter letter but I didn't have the time" and all that.
Perhaps rather than denoting that you aren't completely finished with a thought, you should completely finish your thoughts before sharing them. Ellipses should not be so broadly used; they have specific purposes, and sharing the incompleteness of your own thinking is not one of them.
Clearly, you have not studied the idea of opportunity costs or marginal gains very much.
Posts: 2409 | Registered: Sep 2003
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Perhaps rather than denoting that you aren't completely ignorant about economic ideas, you should complete your education before sharing insults. Economic ideas should not be so narrowly considered; some are broadly applicable to the vast majority of human experience, and sharing the incompleteness of your own understanding is not an argument against that.
Posts: 2409 | Registered: Sep 2003
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quote:Originally posted by Jhai: Perhaps rather than denoting that you aren't completely ignorant about economic ideas, you should complete your education before sharing insults. Economic ideas should not be so narrowly considered; some are broadly applicable to the vast majority of human experience, and sharing the incompleteness of your own understanding is not an argument against that.
That is true. And I am familiar with a number of economic theories. I never claimed ignorance of them. However, I do not consciously apply economics to my writing. I am influenced by authors who do, (either consciously or no) such as Hemingway, Krakauer, Fitzgerald, Baldwin, Harlan Ellison, Ralph Waldo Ellison, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Kundera, Chekov, Nabokov, Pablo Neruda, Garcia-Lorca, Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouak, and others.
I'll thank you to keep your writing theory advice to yourself. If you should find my actual technical abilities to be so lacking as to make my prose unreadable, then you can speak up. You may not, however, give me advice I have not asked for. So shut your face. Posts: 9912 | Registered: Nov 2005
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You're the one who offered advice first, Orincoro:
quote:Perhaps rather than denoting that you aren't completely finished with a thought, you should completely finish your thoughts before sharing them. Ellipses should not be so broadly used; they have specific purposes, and sharing the incompleteness of your own thinking is not one of them.
And, whether you like it or not, you do apply the ideas of opportunity cost & marginal gains to your writing, given that you don't continously write and never do anything else. It's not writing theory, it's fact.
Posts: 2409 | Registered: Sep 2003
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That wasn't advice. Perhaps it was framed by way of a suggestion, but it was a request for respect of the readers hear, who shouldn't have to look at someone's badly constructed and distracting scrawl.
Actually I do continuously write and never do anything else. I am a robot. Thanks for robotist remarks.
Posts: 9912 | Registered: Nov 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Tatiana: Lottery tickets are sold in low income areas far more than other places. It's really terrible that the very people who can afford it least are fleeced in this way for state money.
Eh. If you're poor, you buy lottery tickets ... if you're middle class you play at the casino or bet on penny stocks ... if you're rich you buy derivatives and hedge funds (preferably of the non-Madoff variety). These things work themselves out and things could be worse than having the state regulate gambling and take a cut for the public services. Better than trying to stamp it out anyways. Not that I particularly mind pushing people to Macau
I don't even think that the education thing is all that critical. Lottery tickets can actually be pretty good in terms of hours of enjoyment per dollar spent. Its not all about the expected value.
Posts: 7593 | Registered: Sep 2006
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quote:If you're poor, you buy lottery tickets ... if you're middle class you play at the casino or bet on penny stocks ... if you're rich you buy derivatives and hedge funds (preferably of the non-Madoff variety).
And only one of those groups is rescued by the government when their bets fail to pay off.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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quote:If you're poor, you buy lottery tickets ... if you're middle class you play at the casino or bet on penny stocks ... if you're rich you buy derivatives and hedge funds (preferably of the non-Madoff variety).
And only one of those groups is rescued by the government when their bets fail to pay off.
But there's a spectrum to this. A "bet" on a smart business decision carefully placed makes our economy work. There is no such thing as a smart set of lotto numbers or a smart bet at blackjack, unless you're counting cards, in which case it isn't gambling in the same sense. I agree that in the case of the current situation, the banks were no better than lotto ticket purchasers, but ideally there is a way to incur risk that gives the best possibility for reward. With organized gambling, the possibility of winning is never better than that of losing- even if you play perfectly. IF the economy worked that way all the time, we wouldn't have an economy- more people have to win than lose. And so if you play perfectly at investment, your risk is lower than your reward.
The only smart angle in organized gambling is owning a casino, and even then there is a risk of loss.
Posts: 9912 | Registered: Nov 2005
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