Rant - Camera, Template, Chat Laughing

The fun stuff in this post is at the end, but I felt the need to get a few things said first.

I found a cheap digital camera. It was a broken Finepix A203 (the female USB Mini-B port for offloading pictures has a broken pin) which usually retails for about $200, and I took for $79. The salesman said he'd throw in a free card reader so I could get the pictures off the camera. I'm kewl with that as it's faster and burns less batteries then the Mini-B port. It's also a much higher quality camera than I could have gotten for my 'less than $100' price requirement. And hey, free card reader. With that said, the reader won't arrive until next week. So, I promised patio pictures, which I've been taking, but I can't post them until the card reader arrives. By then I expect the patio will be about complete, so that posting should have lots of progress pics.

As return visitors may have noticed I updated my template. I honestly liked the old one better, but I dislike the constrained width. My laptop's resolution is 1920 x 1200 (fabulous for writing code), so a 400 pixel main post column is far too small for my tastes. What about this new look? Kinda dreamy. Maybe I should rename my blog to 'Heaven by the Sea.' :) Maybe not. Totally not me.

Ok, now some rules on laughing in chat (IRC, instant messagers, chat rooms, news groups, etc.). Keep in mind that if you are currently breaking these rules, its likely because you were not around when the terms were being invented on BBSes, usegroups and IRC back in the late 80's. It tooks years for the pioneers to fine tune these rules, so pay attention.

:) = A smiley is basically the same as a smile in real life. Hard to screw that up. I'm trying to show that I'm not being serious or maybe that I wish to diffuse a situation some. Don't make wise cracks at someone that you don't know well without at least including one of these to indicate you aren't serious. Most internet mediums don't allow people to see your face in real time, so placing these properly is critical.

heh = This is most often used in response to someone else's comment, and means I am humoring you. I could ignore you, which I may want to do, but am being polite. It's almost the same as a smiley in tone but can often mean 'please leave me alone, I'm busy.'

hehe = Person makes joke. Joke isn't laughed at, or person rereads and realizes the joke may not be quite as funny as originally thought. This is often said by a person in such situation because 'hehe' implies a certain submission, a sort of self depreciation, used to dig a person out of a hole. When a person uses this, help them out. Or, knowing they are already situationally weakened you can use the opportunity to tear them a new butthole.

haha = Something you or I said was humorous, at least enough to make me smile. That's it. Note the double 'ha'. No more than two.

hahahaha = Something you or I said had enough humorous potential to make me smile and show my teeth, maybe even slip a small chuckle.

lol = This means 'laughing out loud.' Don't type it unless you really laugh out loud. Its hard to get people to laugh out loud in real life, so it should be equally as hard online, and rewarding to the joker when seen. If you type it every few lines, people stop trying to make you laugh. You are no longer rewarding. You have become 'easy.'

rotfl = Acronym for 'rolling on the floor laughing' and is acceptable when used properly. By properly, I mean you are an identifiable level above 'lol' and are at least going to need tissues to clear the tears off your face and chin. If you type this and your ribs aren't hurting, or you haven't spewed Blackhorse all over your keyboard, my friend you have blundered. Personally, I don't think you should be agile enough to type 'rotfl' when you are in this state, so I don't use it myself and usually don't believe it when I see it.

rotflmao (my ass off) rotflmaoomfg (my ass off, oh my f'n gawd) and any other rotfl* = Do you think any of the rotfl* deviations are making your current state of laughter more clear? More pronounced? More accurately descriptive? My poor misinformed friend, trust me when I tell you this: they are truly not. Please stop typing acronyms just because you have learned them. I'm betting the only people online who speak to you are people who also use rotfl* regularly. You are all wondering why smart people ignore you, aren't you? It's because you are an internet abuser, about 1% of the way up the 1337 ladder, and deemed by most unfit to be spoken to, let alone shown the error of your ways. Put down the keyboard.

lolololol .. = This means you are a complete moron, full stop. I can only parse such a blasphemy as 'laughing out loud out loud out loud out loud.' How do you see that as being possible? To whom does a sentence like that make sense? Only morons. Point made. Stop typing it. Your useless bytes are slowing down the internet.

So why follow these rules at all? Because any chat attempting to use any of these emotes has moved beyond technical exposition to something more emotional, to an exchange of not just ideas but of feelings and reactions. So with that, know that most people have come to learn what particular level of emotion is attached to each of these types. If you use them incorrectly you are in the least giving the wrong impression, and in the worst ostracizing yourself.

Those among you who already know the above are probably saying 'amen brother! down with chat spam and IM idiocy!' Those among you getting these wrong: please allot some extra time in the evenings to learning these commandments, a few hours for the sake of bettering yourself. If you are currently thinking 'sheesh, it's only stupid chat.' Right you are ... but realize that from our point of view it's only stupid when you are there.

:)

TPC