I've been listening to more music lately on various audio systems in the
house - in particular, music for the baby's benefit, because it's now old
enough, at almost 18 weeks, to hear sounds/music outside the womb. We're
also making a point of not watching any movies or listening to any music
with loud crashing sounds, which can be disturbing to a fetus at this stage
of life.

I've also been perusing recent issues of Stereophile for a change (I'd lost
interest for awhile, and even allowed my subscription to Stereophile Guide
to Home Theater elapse) and have been thinking back about what brought me to
RAO in the first place in the spring of 1996. About that time I'd lost all
interest in the "it all sounds the same" audio reviews in Stereo Review and
Audio magazine (now both defunct) and realized I finally "got it" about the
reviews in Stereophile, which I'd been reading since August, 1991.

It was a huge disappointment to me to find that RAO had already, by the
spring of 1996 been infected with one of the ABX propagandists which was
destroying the audio pages of AOL at the time. Despite numerous good
people, genuinely interested in audio quality and a diversity of audio
equipment, the ABX cancer spread on RAO for years, turning RAO into more of
a ng for flamefests than anything else.

Not much has changed, as jj (Jim Johnston) - one who formerly posted here
regularly - recently reminded me in several e-mails this week - the only
difference this past year is that politics has been injected into the
flamewars. As he originally asked, "doesn't anyone discuss audio on RAO any
more?" The few who do post about audio are pretty much ignored, as the
flaming goes on and on, whether about politics or personalities.

So I suppose I'm going to take jj's approach and stand by until and only if
I see a major transformation in behavior on this ng and hope for the day
that RAO will be a useful forum for discussing people's subjective opinions
about audio equipment and music played back on it. Hopefully, the political
posts I've put up during the past year have not only been educational, but
have helped a few people begin thinking critically for a change, and that
this will help them think critically about audio subjects as well.

I'll probably pop in from time to time with my new "Seabiscuit" handle - to
see what's going on - because the technician who removed the virus on my
computer set me up with this new handle with a fictitious e-mail address to
prevent spammers from harvesting my real e-mail address here (and on other
ng's) - and indeed, since I've been using it, the spam cluttering my e-mail
in-box has indeed diminished significantly.

Of course, the new handle doesn't prevent the cowardly dweeb using SpamCop
from complaining to my ISP - because the ISP number hasn't changed. Indeed,
I've received 5 new complaints from this cowardly idiot in the first week
since returning to RAO. It appears I'm being singled out and stalked by
this twerp.

There's only one poster here who appears to have the lack of character and
the warped personality and the juvenile personal animosity towards me to be
motivated generate these SpamCop complaints - Scott Wittevrongel. I don't
believe for a minute that he received any such complaints himself. There are
numerous pieces of evidence supporting this conclusion. His original post
on the subject of ISP complaints was nothing more than a troll to attract
people like me to comment so he could generate even more complaints. In
addition, the fact that the first SpamCop complaint Lionel's ISP received
indicated his denouncer was Scott W, lends even more credence to this
conclusion.

My ISP isn't terminating my account, but I don't feel like having them
bothered by the Terrierdork's cowardly SpamCop compaints either, and I'm
tired of hearing about it.

So with that I bid thee all adieu until we meet again. I've got my hands
full with numerous real-life matters right now, and I've pretty much said
all I've felt I needed to say on RAO.

Those of you who still count me as a friend are always welcome to e-mail me.

Jim S.


"Lionel" wrote in message
...
Sandman - - dimanche 18
Avril 2004 02:06 wrote:

I have been banished from my ISP in February.
The first delation messages on SpamCop attempted to make me believe that
ScottW was my denunciator, the last ones were without real specific
characteristics.