Posted by NRen2k5 on 11/16/08 11:36

Giles wrote:
> On 2006-01-04 15:24:40 +0000, NRen2k5 <napsterneorenegade@hotmail.com>
> said:
>
>> Justin wrote:
>>
>>> Why do you want to add HTML to a post? There's no reason for it.
>>
>>
>> Two reasons that I can recall right now:
>> - To add emphasis to what I'm writing.
>
>
> Can't you do that in your writing?

Yup, but fuckwits like you would never catch it.

>> - To maintain formatting in quotes from web pages.
>
>
> If the formatting is that important, why not just give the url?

I do, but not everybody wants to follow URL's because it's dangerous out
there. Or for all you know I could be passing you through a redirect to
goatsecx just for fun.

>> Without HTML, I have to type like a borg and screw around to make it
>> look right.
>
>
> But it doesn't look right, at least to anyone using a dedicated
> newsreader, rather than some hybrid email with news on the side reader.
> In fact it looks awful as we get endless html code, unless the
> newsreader is savvy enough to strip it out.

So get a newsreader "savvy enough" to strip it out and quit your bitching.

> This is why you can't just decide that you are going to use html and
> damn the existing standard. Usenet is plain text based and that is what
> dedicated newsreaders are set up to see. I would be surprised if your
> desire to scatter your prose with bold and italic will change that.

I doubt it too, myself. It's thanks to anal retentive bitches like you
that the rest of the world has abandoned usenet.

> Anyhow, use of emphases in any writing should be kept to an absolute
> minimum, I'd think, unless the chosen font is comic sans, in which case
> emphasise away to your heart's content as you are already condemned to
> one of the lower circles of hell.

Haha, finally something we really see eye to eye on.

> Top posting has been explained by others, but for what it is worth, top
> posting does make posts very hard to follow and even harder to respond
> to. A reply following the relevant part of the quoted post (edited to
> remove irrelevant parts) makes reading and responding easier and
> maintains the sense of the conversation. Because it is a conversation
> (even if a rude and frustrating one at times) one should have respect
> for what aids the conversation, rather than what one or other of the
> participants wants to do because he or she prefers it for themself.

Sensible enough. But the whole lot of you have to quit treating me as if
i throw kittens into a meat grinder just because I top-posted.

> This may be why you got a strong response. It looked like you were
> deliberately imposing your fancies on the way the conversation took
> place, despite knowing otherwise. If you genuinely weren't aware of the
> plain text standard and conventions on top posting, fair enough. We'll
> blame the producers of 'newsreaders' that place the insertion point
> automatically at the top of the reply <cough>Microsoft</cough>
> <cough>Thunderbird</cough>.

Actually, afaik Thunderbird defaults to bottom.

Over the course of this whole argument I've fiddled with my settings so
that things are the "proper usenet way" by default.

- NRen2k5

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