Blocking in Pidgin

[David Gerard]

2009/7/7 Samuel Thurston, III <sam.thurston at gmail.com>:
> On Mon, Jul 6, 2009 at 11:44 AM, David Gerard<dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:

>> And asking this of the typical MSN user will get "LOL I DUNNO", "MATHS
>> IS HARD LETS GO SHOPPING" or "OUT OF FINGERS ERROR REDO FROM START".
>> In caps.

> While I can't disagree about "typical users," all of my MSN contacts
> are educated, insightful and interesting people who just happen to use
> a crappy messaging protocol.  My take on it is more along the lines
> that unless the math question were a simple integration or "rewrite
> ohm's law in terms of R" that they would probably find it insulting.
> Nevertheless I think your comments are unconstructive and contributory
> to the "linux user as elitist" meme which I don't think ultimately
> helps the community.  It's a shame they will be in the archive for
> perpetuity.


You are of course correct - I was taking the local cluster of
teenagers and their friends as being a representative sample. DId I
mention above they've both virused their Windows boxes through
clicking on things they got through MSN? My sincere apologies to the
four or five MSN users worldwide who aren't like this.


>  I hope they are not taken as representative of the "linux
> mindset" by any of the <sarcasm>irrelevant pleebs</sarcasm> that
> haven't adopted Ubuntu as their sole operating system of preference.


It's not Linux elitism, it's beleaguered middle-aged stepdad elitism ;-p


- d.