Off-Topic Posts

David Cambon said:

Re: Off-Topic Posts

...

Quoted message said:

Stick to the facts. Try to be nice.

I've been in western Wyoming, US of A, since 1993. Good winters we have snow above the barbed wire
fences but highways are cleaned down to asphalt and sanded if hard packed snow won't clear off. Salt
is verboten!

I've pedaled my ASSets off so long as highway is clear and puddles avoidable during spring thaw.

Due to extreme muscle loss from ski bag impacts on legs at former airport job I converted to BikeE
winter of 2002 with limited success. Some muscle is rebuilding with intake of Shaklee Instant
Protein but balance still suffers.

Mother's Trike looking more and more like way for me to go. Article came out in 1983 edition of
magazine and claimed construction cost of 65$ [1983, mind you] using EMT [the tubing which carries
house wiring in USA] but I'm choosing smallest diameter auto exhaust pipe to carry my 6'4", 230
pound frame.

Construction article on Mother Earth News 2F1R home-brew trike with specs, parts list and drawings
is available online at the Mother Earth News web site.

Here's the link:

motherearthnews.comgoto.aspOpen ↗

There you go, this topic is clearly OT and someone starts goes off topic by writing about bikes.
Jeeeesh!!!!

Has anyone ever studied the obvious attraction of mentally ill adults to bicycles in general and
recumbent bikes in particular? (It should be worth at least a thesis or two in abnormal physiology.)
Maybe I could learn something about why I ride one....jd

"David Cambon" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
"]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Re: Off-Topic Posts

Sometimes gay banter on Usenet discussion groups can have entertainment value. Certainly the
unrestrained personal assesments made on this discussion group have been mildly amusing for those
of us in countries where customary politeness infringes on the forthright expression of ones real
feelings!

Sometimes off-topic discussion can be genuinely informative and appropriate on any Usenet group.
It can be particularly enlightening to discuss worldly topics with people who one shares a common
interest with. For example, discussion of US foreign policy on this Usenet group has given me new
insights into some topics from people that I am familiar with because of their on-topic posts on
this group. I am not opposed to off-topic posts of genuine importance that are correctly labelled
as such in the "subject" line.

I am opposed to off-topic posts that are not correctly labelled. I do not have time to sift
through topics that no one has updated the label on. I also have trouble when people who consider
themselves to be the great intellectuals of the 21st century insist on using outdated political
terminology such as "left" and "right".

Discussions focussed on a determination of who is an illiterate right-wing fascist pig and who is
an illiterate left-wing baby killer will never end. Such discussions should be moved to the
alt.stuck-in-nuetral Usenet group along with the people trying to hand-write pi to ten billion
decimal places.

Re: Personal Insults

The original purpose of the internet was to transmit information, not to transmit psychological
assesments of who is an idiot.

Sometimes people just get carried away because they are not accustomed to the e-mail discussion
format. We do not want to discourage discussion just because someone occasionally does some wild
writing. We also do not want to shun people just because their ideas are different from our own.
Sometimes we need a good challenge to keep us intellectually honest.

Some people, however, are going to have to consider the possibility that they could be sued for
libel. One cannot really be anonymous in a Usenet group (despite all hopes to the contrary). A
Usenet group is "publication" for the purpose of civil litigation. Insulterers and insultresses
may wish to think twice when they think about posting something that is not actually true.

Stick to the facts. Try to be nice.

[email hidden] (David Cambon) wrote in message
news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

Re: Off-Topic Posts

Sometimes gay banter on Usenet discussion groups can have entertainment value. Certainly the
unrestrained personal assesments made on this discussion group have been mildly amusing for those
of us in countries where customary politeness infringes on the forthright expression of ones real
feelings!

At this point it would have been nice of you to maybe mention the country that you are from since
you imply that you are not from the US.

Quoted message said:

Sometimes off-topic discussion can be genuinely informative and appropriate on any Usenet group.
It can be particularly enlightening to discuss worldly topics with people who one shares a common
interest with. For example, discussion of US foreign policy on this Usenet group has given me new
insights into some topics from people that I am familiar with because of their on-topic posts on
this group. I am not opposed to off-topic posts of genuine importance that are correctly labeled
as such in the "subject" line.

At last, someone is saying something intelligent! But off-topic posts don't have to be about
anything important. They can be about anything at all, no matter how trivial.

Quoted message said:

I am opposed to off-topic posts that are not correctly labelled. I do not have time to sift
through topics that no one has updated the label on. I also have trouble when people who consider
themselves to be the great intellectuals of the 21st century insist on using outdated political
terminology such as "left" and "right".

The West is becoming more and more polarized between left and right, liberals and conservatives.
What terms would you like to describe what is going on?

Quoted message said:

Discussions focussed on a determination of who is an illiterate right-wing fascist pig and who is
an illiterate left-wing baby killer will never end. Such discussions should be moved to the
alt.stuck-in-nuetral Usenet group along with the people trying to hand-write pi to ten billion
decimal places.

I certainly do agree with you about those technical types who think we all remember our high school
physics classes!

Quoted message said:

Re: Personal Insults

The original purpose of the internet was to transmit information, not to transmit psychological
assesments of who is an idiot.

Sometimes people just get carried away because they are not accustomed to the e-mail discussion
format. We do not want to discourage discussion just because someone occasionally does some wild
writing. We also do not want to shun people just because their ideas are different from our own.
Sometimes we need a good challenge to keep us intellectually honest.

There is no difference between Usenet, emails and letter writing by snail mail. It is all one thing.
You say what you want to say, and I will say what I want to say. And we should both say it how we
want to say it.

Quoted message said:

Some people, however, are going to have to consider the possibility that they could be sued for
libel. One cannot really be anonymous in a Usenet group (despite all hopes to the contrary). A
Usenet group is "publication" for the purpose of civil litigation. Insulterers and insultresses
may wish to think twice when they think about posting something that is not actually true.

You and I are both using our real names. They have Internet addresses attached to them. Calling
someone an idiot is not libelous for heaven's sake. If it were the entire population of America
would be in court. Don't be so ridiculous!

Quoted message said:

Stick to the facts. Try to be nice.

I have posted many times previously what I think of "liberal" facts. If we could agree on the facts
we would not have much to write about. However, there is no fact that ever existed that did not have
to be interpreted.

Niceness is blandness and bores most people to death who still have a spark of life left in them. Do
not worry about niceness so much and concern yourself more with being interesting and exciting. Look
at all the responses I get to everything I write. That right there ought to tell you something!

However, I do detect that you and I are not going to get into a flame war because you are not saying
anything at all outrageous, unlike all the liberal nuts and screwballs who infest this newsgroup.

Ed Dolan - Minnesota

"Jack Davis" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

Has anyone ever studied the obvious attraction of mentally ill adults to bicycles in general and
recumbent bikes in particular? (It should be worth at least a thesis or two in abnormal
physiology.) Maybe I could learn something about why I ride one....jd

You raise an interesting point Jack. For close to 20 years I was completely absorbed with bicycles.
Now that I think back on it I realize I may have been slightly crazy. Then I found this newsgroup
about a year ago and I now know that my fellow cyclists are just as crazy as I am.

And you are right about recumbent cyclists being slightly more crazy than the other types. That is
because recumbents themselves are designed to drive us over the edge with all their quirks and
eccentricities. It is a never ending battle to decide which recumbent that we are best suited for.
There are so many and they are all so different. That is why we recumbent cyclists are all so crazy!

Ed Dolan - Minnesota

"DH" <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

There you go, this topic is clearly OT and someone starts goes off topic by writing about bikes.
Jeeeesh!!!!

It probably should have been [OT] Off-Topic Posts, but since the subject heading is itself the same
it would be redundant.

Ed Dolan - Minnesota