Ray said:
This is a great group for getting help to solve a problem. Most responses
are courteous and helpful - but - it's discouraging when a question is asked
for assistance and the response is from a smart ass who answers with the
attitude that the person asking is an idiot who should know better. I doubt
that the smart ass never had to ask for help before he became such an
expert. I recently posted a question and the answer I got was a person who
made me feel stupid for asking. I'm 91 years old and although I have had at
least seven computers beginning before the internet went public, I have
always used them for business and have never delved into the technicalities.
I don't think that makes me inferior or stupid. Like most others in this
group, I only want to learn.
Your sum total of experience is for naught considering your inexperience
in posting in Usenet. For example, you kept responding with your reply
content AFTER the signature delimiter line ("-- ") and some newsreaders
or web interfaces strip signatures since they are considered fluff (they
are unimportant and the body before the signature is where you add your
content). So despite your experience with using computers for maybe 20
years and with your age being irrelevant, your replies may have gotten
stripped along with the signature. In my newsreader, I can strip
signatures or just dim them. Lots of users don't understand that
EVERYTHING past the sigdash line is the *signature* so I've had to just
dim signatures since many posters put their reply content in the wrong
place. It takes awhile to get used to the netiquette standards in
Usenet and that requires repeated visits and postings. By the way,
"----" is NOT a valid signature delimiter line.
Also, WLM is a lousy Usenet client as it does not properly quote and
indent the quoted content in your replies which makes it unclear which
content is from which poster. Microsoft abandoned Usenet and then in
WLM v15+ removed proper quoting (adding the ">" prefix to each quoted
line) and indentation when replying. Posters now have to do that
manually to show who said what, or switch to a good NNTP client.
You also started your thread with no reference to WHICH program you were
using to read .pdf files and even guessed at it in one of your replies
despite the program clearly identifies itself. Too often newbies in
Usenet forget that respondents aren't looking over their shoulder to see
at what they are pointing. In your case, there are SEVERAL programs
capable of viewing PDF files so no one would know until you told them
which one you were asking about. It wastes time by respondents having
to prod out more details from the OP (original poster) by issuing more
posts to get the details. You can lose potential respondents if you
omit the details since many will see there is insufficient information
to troubleshoot and there are plenty of other posters asking for help so
they move on. I didn't contribute to your PDF thread because I could
see at a glance the PDF program was not identified so I moved on as I
visit somewhere around 30 newsgroups. I didn't have enough to prod out
more details unless I didn't spend much time elsewhere and decided to
come back to yours.
Because you added your reply content after the sigdash line and because
you don't realize that Usenet is an *un*moderated venue for
communications, your age and your length of experience with using
computers are irrelevant regarding Usenet where you are inexperienced.
Driving a car for many decades does not qualify its driver as a master
mechanic. There is no moderation here. There are some moderated
newsgroups but that incurs a delay to have your submission await
qualification by a moderator. Moderated newsgroups are usually denoted
by .moderated in their name. With unmoderated newsgroups, anyone can
post and that includes children (mental age, not physical age),
spammers, scammers, malcontents, and trolls. Usenet is an anarchy. It
is not a warm, comfy, fuzzy nice place to visit nor somewhere for easily
bruised egos.
Ranting about a bad experience with a poster has absolutely no effect on
detering whomever you were complaining from continue to inhabit the
newsgroup. It's like they have a thicker skinned ego than newcomers,
like yourself. In fact, it may only instill further flaming which is
something for which newbies are unprepared.
I'm not sure who you think made a severe agregious attack against you in
your PDF thread. Seems the worst was duplicate requests from
respondents asking you to identify WHICH program you were asking about.
From looking at that thread and the replies there, if you think that was
such a horrendous experience in Usenet (where you did NOT say that you
have experience) then you're incapable of handling Usenet and should
find some well-moderated web-based forums to visit. If your experience
in the PDF thread is what spurred you to waste time in a separate new
thread to rant about it, your ego is far too easily bruised for you to
be here. Sorry, but if it was some other thread of yours, I'm not
sufficiently motivated by reading your rant to go hunting around for
where someone somewhere else so offended you.
