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#1
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A small suggestion
To those of you who use aterisks in your posts for *emphasis*:
Please reconsider. Not only does this practice weaken the impact of what you are saying, it's annoying as hell to have all those things buzzzing around on the page like flies. Swat! Let your words speak for themselves. |
#2
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Billy,
Thanks for offering your literary suggestion. I don't use asterisks in my RAH posts as a tool to express emphasis, but to express a degree of irony or even sarcasm. In my opinion, if anyone believes that their writing is enhanced by any particular writing technique or style, then they should go ahead and use it. As long as what you are saying is clear, that is all that matters. Meanwhile, a reader owes it to himself (not to the writer) to focus on what is being expressed, and to resist their own prejudices regarding how it is expressed. Afterall, clarity is the nine hundred pound gorrila that the writer must wrestle to the ground, while sophism or intellectual narrowness is the reader's. Otherwise the attempt to communicate, or to receive a communication, becomes a personally wasted exercise. Nonetheless, I apologise for any feelings which may be provoked by my previous posts or those I will post in the future. Good luck. Peter Medeco Billy Shears wrote: To those of you who use aterisks in your posts for *emphasis*: Please reconsider. Not only does this practice weaken the impact of what you are saying, it's annoying as hell to have all those things buzzzing around on the page like flies. Swat! Let your words speak for themselves. |
#3
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#4
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On 2 Jun 2005 00:09:29 GMT, Billy Shears wrote:
In article , wrote: Billy, Thanks for offering your literary suggestion. I don't use asterisks in my RAH posts as a tool to express emphasis, but to express a degree of irony or even sarcasm. But using asterisks for that is like having to explain a joke. The moment is gone. Not at all, the alternative is bold or italics, a common literery device, but that's often not supported on screen fonts. Using aterisks for emphasis is absolutely *not* like having to explain a joke. When you read the text, does not an asterisked word *sound* louder in your head? In my opinion, if anyone believes that their writing is enhanced by any particular writing technique or style, then they should go ahead and use it. Really? So you don't mind ALL CAPS? R U shure your bein consistant hear? All caps is regerded as 'shouting', and hence rude, but if it conveys the writer's mood, then I guess it serves its purpose. As long as what you are saying is clear, that is all that matters. Indeed, and while I am not 'text fluent', U R likely 2 no what I mean, and texting has the great advantage for *any* written language of being terse - a noted feature of English, BTW. Could 160 characters of text be the modern Haiku? :-) But having a *bunch* of *asterisks* buzzing around can *mask* the *clarity* of the *thought* by putting obstacles in the reader's way. It certainly can when you place emphasis in the wrong place, but the sentence above would sound just as stupid if you *spoke* it with that ridiculous emphasis, so what's your point? Meanwhile, a reader owes it to himself (not to the writer) to focus on what is being expressed, and to resist their own prejudices regarding how it is expressed. There is no such obligation. A reader reads for his own purposes, and may well be moved to deliver a comment on what he sees as a dismal tendency in Usenet prose. He may of course show himself to be an illiterate fool by so doing, but as you say, it's his choice................. Hey, try this on for clarity: FOURSCORE AND SEVEN YEARS AGO OUR FATHERS BROUGHT FORTH ON *THIS* CONTINENT A *NEW* NATION, CONCEIVED IN *LIBERTY* AND DEDICATED TO THE PROPOSITION THAT ALL MEN ARE CREATED *EQUAL* . Hmm, you'll strain your voice shouting *THAT* loud all day! :-) NOW WE ARE ENGAGED IN A GREAT CIVIL WAR , TESTING WHETHER THAT NATION OR ANY NATION SO CONCEIVED AND SO DEDICATED CAN LONG ENDURE. WE ARE MET ON A **GREAT** BATTLEFIELD OF THAT WAR. WE HAVE COME TO DEDICATE A PORTION OF IT AS A FINAL RESTING PLACE FOR THOSE WHO *DIED* HERE, THAT THE NATION MIGHT *LIVE* . THIS WE MAY, IN ALL PROPRIETY *DO*. BUT IN A LARGER SENSE, WE *CANNOT* DEDICATE, WE *CANNOT* CONSECRATE, WE *CANNOT* HALLOW THIS GROUND. . . . ALL IMHO OF COURSE. 47 Main Street, Gettysburg, one of the *great* addresses! :-) BTW, an emoticon is always read with an implicit pause, so shouldn't have been used after *DIED*, as it breaks the flow. -- Stewart Pinkerton | Music is Art - Audio is Engineering |
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