Log in/on; frag. punctuation; quoting

[Daniel Strychalski <dski -at- CAMEONET -dot- CAMEO -dot- COM -dot- TW>]

This post has three subjects. I'll get the first two out of the way quickly,
then plunge into the third (and ramble a bit).

A friend with whom I've discussed "log on" and "log in" recently sent me the
following citation of "unprompted, unconscious use from a literate fellow," the
fellow being his brother, who has a Ph.D. in computer science: "...can't send
mail, log on..." (hmm, strange ordering; sorry, I don't know the context).

Someone else privately suggested to me that "log on" might be appropriate for
the simple activation of a network connection, while "log in" better describes
the process of initiating a session on a server.

A post about using the word "things" started a thread about how to punctuate a
sentence fragment introducing a vertical list. I would note that --

   1. The Chicago Manual of Style says you can use an em dash, as I do here.

   2. Webster's Standard American Style Manual, on page 25, has a colon after
      such a fragment and an em dash before each (one-word) item in the list.

   3. Such a fragment with no following punctuation at all looks strange to me.
      I prefer to use a non-break space and two hyphens in typescript, and a
      tiny non-break space followed by a real em dash in typeset material.

Pat O'Connell has again asked list members to refrain from quoting whole long
posts in messages to the list. I once made such a plea, too, and now I, too, am
making it again. Thank you, Pat, and thank you, everyone who has at least tried
to quote as little material as possible.

Like Pat, I get digests, and I try to keep them. A few months ago I thought I
could keep a month of postings on a 1.44MB floppy. Now, no way. Sure, the list
is growing rapidly -- just over a thousand subscribers when I came on early
this year, and now about 1,500 -- but that's not the main reason for the bloat.

My feeling is that extensive quoting is justified only if the original message
is several days old and didn't produce a thread. In any other case, if you must
quote, please, *please*, don't quote more than a few lines. I, for one, simply
delete most quoted material, and while I wouldn't say it's "extremely labor-
intensive" (Pat's words), it does take time and it is a nuisance.

I don't think such a plea is off topic. It concerns how we, professional com-
municators who deal mostly with high-tech subjects, communicate -- mostly about
our work ;-) -- through a high-tech medium. As professional communicators, we
should possess, or be eager to acquire and hone, the ability to paraphrase. I
prefer to paraphrase rather than to quote, if only for the practice. I find
that it takes very little extra time, and that it makes me read the original
message more carefully, which often results in better understanding.

As for quoted messages unnecessarily taking up "bandwidth" -- signal-carrying
capacity -- well, I think that's a concern, though a relatively minor one.

We should keep in mind the load on the list server. As the listowner has
mentioned, a large number of short messages will put a much greater load on
the server than a small number of long messages. Happily, we get few "Yes! I
agree! / Quoted message follows" posts.

The Internet itself can easily handle far more text than it now carries. It is
not text that is threatening to strain the 'net: the real bandwidth hogs are
the Web and the growing number of people who use the 'net mainly as a source of
entertainment. This trend is evident in the ASCII art newsgroups and mailing
list: a year ago you might see scores of original works posted on any day,
whereas now it's mostly "do this for me," "do that for me," "send me this,"
"give me that," gimme, gimme, gimme. I don't know about the U.S., but in Taiwan
people are so enamored of Web graphics that they are willing to wait ten or
twenty minutes for a page to come through, though they can get the text in
seconds using Lynx. With all the concern about energy and pollution, how many
people are willing to make a bicycle their main means of transport, even if it
would often be faster?  People will demand more and more of the 'net -- I'm
waiting for real-time voice and video to become the rage -- and ("modem tax"
warnings aside) I wonder if the governments that are footing a large part of
the bill might not eventually say, "TANSTAAFL, folks; it's time for a change."

Now, THAT statement is tangential to TC, and neither a prediction nor a
warning; all I said was, "I wonder."  What is indisputable is that extensive
quoting is an inconvenience and an annoyance to some of us. Maybe someone
should do a survey. Sorry, I can't handle it right now; I am SNOWED UNDER.

Back to shoveling....                                           Dan Strychalski
                                                     dski -at- cameonet -dot- cameo -dot- com -dot- tw