More flame war stupidity
Robert Seiner (publisher of TDAN) and Fabian Pascal are now claiming that Computerworld approached Bob and asked him to do something about the false charge that I personally engaged in censorship. To the best of my knowledge, they’re both lying. It was just me, and me alone, who approached Bob, which is exactly what one would think, if for some odd reason one cared about the matter at all. I don’t have the faintest idea why they fabricated this story, or what they think it demonstrates — but they did.
Seiner also picked a title for an article of mine he published, then published one by Fabian attacking me for the title. Classy.
Bob also made two promises in the matter which he didn’t keep. Nor did he have the courtesy to inform me that he’d changed his mind, nor did he really address it when I called him on it.
I wondered why Seiner kept on publishing Pascal’s stuff, even for free, when most of Fabian’s other publishers have dropped him. Now I have a better idea. They’re soulmates.
A pity. Partway through our discussions, Bob sounded eminently reasonable. That’s why I jumped at his suggestion I write an article for him. Oh well; live and learn.
And for the record — no, I won’t respond to Pascal’s critiques point by point. He typically attacks straw men, rather than restricting his barbs to my actual opinions. In those areas where we do actually disagree, I haven’t hesitated to publish follow-on arguments, repeatedly and at length, here and elsewhere. I’ve given that relative nonentity much more attention than he deserves.
Also for the record — even though I don’t respond to every nasty shot Pascal and his associates take at me, I’m of course not conceding that his other libels and opinions are actually correct. I just think that by and large he’s a waste of bandwidth, because even his coherent ideas are quickly sidetracked by highly illogical fulminations. Even in articles where he’s otherwise making enough sense to respond to, he usually goes off on some extremist semantics-related kick that doesn’t mesh well with his own imperfect command of the English language.
(I really want to respond to his film contracts example from a three-year-old anti-XML diatribe. But the article gets bogged down with various “definitions” that are not easily reconciled to normal usage of the words, and it’s too much trouble to sort through them all. Maybe I’ll respond to the idea without linking to the article itself, when I get around to it.)
Exception to the above slam at Pascal — he recently posted a good interchange he had with Hugh Darwen, which I’m referencing in another post in this blog. His side was wrong, but both sides were well-presented.
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2 Responses to “More flame war stupidity”
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Curt,
I have known Fabian for well over a decade. I am an intelligent man with a better than average grasp of the english language. I also have the character defect of a highly critical nit-picking attention to detail.
On several occasions, I have had the temerity to correct Fabian on his use of english. On every one of those occasions, I embarassed myself because Fabian was absolutely correct in his usage.
Your suggestion that his command of the english language is somehow less perfect than your own serves no purpose other than to expose your ignorance and bigotry. When you find a flaw in Fabian’s use of the language, I suggest you stop and consider why his use is absolutely correct. You will learn something.
I note that your articles and posts consist entirely of sophistry, and I suggest that your contributions are actually far more damaging than a mere waste of bandwidth.
Bob,
Thank you for sharing your opinions. I will be sure to give them all the consideration they deserve.
CAM