Re: [NTLK] Fighting Complacency within the Newton Community

Since most of what should have been said has already been said, allow me
to
try to get my very personal reaction across...

Most people here have a rough
idea of who I am. For those who don't: I'm inclined to think that Jon is
wrong
when he says that he might be the member who is on this list longest. It
might well
be that this member is myself. I subscribed to this list when a Mac II
was state of
the art and a Mac IIx hadn't even been thought of. eBay had not yet been
invented.
My first hard disk was a 20 MegaByte one and I had no idea whatsoever
what to do
with THAT much hard disk space, having used my PC with good success
booting the OS
from a 5.25'' floppy disk before.

I even remember Jason Kulas...

For a start, I was fairly surprised at the kind of language in Matt's
post. It
was quite unlike anything I've ever seen posted from Matt. But everybody
gets
pissed some time or other for whatever reason there might be. If this
happens to
me, I try to refrain from communicating altogether for some time. If I
didn't,
posts like this might well be the result.

My father in law used to say that it is not a good idea to stick out
one's tongue
at somebody who has just stuck out his tongue at you. If you do, you put
yourself
on the same level as your "opponent", and personally I try to avoid
sharing a level
with people who stick their tongues out at me.

So calling Matt names, or even bringing nazis etc. up, has been quite
uncalled for,
I think. A discussion on this list, just as ANY discussion between
people who expect
to be taken seriously, should abide by certain rules. Two of which are
to stick to
the facts and not to insult people regardless of what you think about
their contribution
to the discussion.

Apart from that, comparison with nazis and mentioning Hitler is a no no
as far as
I am concerned. My father was born at about the time when the second
world war ended, hence
there's no need for me to feel guilty. But I am a German and I DO feel
guilty.
At least insofar as this kind of comparison is about the worst insult I
can think of. I would
ask all of you politely to consider this before you think of using this
type of "argument"
again. Many, especially many Germans, feel the same way.

Apart from that, I would like to suggest politely that people who are
about to phrase
and post an angry reply search the archives beforehand in order to find
out who they
are dealing with. In Matt's case they would have found that he is one of
the most
active and contributing list members we have. I don't want to say that
this excuses
profanity in a post, I just want to point out that maybe people who
spend that much
time on helping the Newton community along just MIGHT be understood when
they express
their wish to make others contribute more, even if they happen to
express said wish in a way
that is... well... subject to improvement.

As for Matt's suggestion itself, I do personally consider it sheer
nonsense. Sorry,
Matt, but mailing lists, especially this one, have a history of managing
themselves
successfully. There are still two or three things that I would like to
mention, however.

Back when Sean Luke was list dad and Jason Kulas was about the most
active list member
we ever had, I was a measly owner of an OMP. It was the time I describe
in my story
"How it all began" that you find in the stories section of the site in
the signature.
The Newton 2000 was already visible at
the horizon, and the 130 was what most earnest Newton users were using
back then.
I knew almost nothing whatsoever about Newtons. After finding this list
I immediately
started bombing it with all types of newbie questions. Questions that
many
people were no longer able to even understand because nobody seemed to
use an OMP actively
anymore. Still, everybody went out of his way to help me.

Today, I think I have reached the stage that Jon called "Senior". I know
my way
around most Newton hardware, and a fair amount of you out there can keep
enjoying
their Newtons because I was lucky enough to be able to fix them.
I have even managed to write a couple of Newton applications that some
of you
seem to find useful.

Nothing of this, virtually nothing, would I have been able to achieve if
the members
of this list hadn't answered all my Newton questions promptly and
patiently. I would
have never spent that much time and energy on the Newton part of my life
in the first
place if it hadn't been for this list. For its helpfulness and my desire
to give
something back in return.

The fact, by the way, that people do not seem to contribute to this list
does not
neccessarily mean that they do not help the Newton community. The fact
that the English
part of my site www.pda-soft.de is not only readable, but also
understandable to most
English-speaking people out there is not because my own English so good,
but because there are
members of this list who spend a considerable amount of their time
improving it and
the stuff I publish. The same applies to the manuals of the Newton
software that I
write.

The fact that there's a spanish version of my site under way is only
possible because a list
member who you probably haven't even heard of is willing to spend an
amazing amount of
his time on translating it. And because another list member of which you
might have heard
occasionally will take the time to check the translation for mistakes.
Myself, I do not speak a single word of Spanish, but those people will
do all this tremendous
work in exchange for some measly pieces of Newton hardware that I can
offer them
in return.

At least three dozen people have beta-tested my Newton software in the
last couple
of years, making it better and easier to use.

Many list members have helped me find particular info, even the most
blatantly off-topic
info, in the web because I hadn't time to search for it myself, with
Newtons to be
repaired queueing at my workbench.

Many of those people have never spoken up on this list publicly. Still,
they have been
helping the Newton community. Often tremendously, as I may say.

This is why I would like to suggest that we leave things as they are.
Many of the
list members have helped others at one time or other without the list's
noticing this.
People spending the knowledge silently accumulated here on helping a
colleague with a Newton
problem won't necessarily report their success in this forum. Many of
the lurkers and Newbies are
busily collecting knowledge that will one day help them to help others.

And those that remain, even if they do form the majority, should be
welcome to listen to their
heart's content. Or download and enjoy one of the many, many books that
Matt and DJVollkasko
have made available for us in the past.

Sorry for the long-winded post

Frank

-- Newton software and hardware at http://www.pda-soft.de

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