<Nomex suit : check>
<Extinguishers : check>
<Ice materia : check>

<Engage rant mode>

Nightman wrote:

Doug Murphy wrote:

each individual that we're not aware of that give them good cause to 
post as an attachment.

Oh balony. Isn't there a 'no attachments' rule in the FFML FAQ? (I 

That's bologna.  What was that you were saying about spellcheckers?

don't know, I lost my copy.) People are either 1. Lazy or 2. not 
sufficiently technically skilled with their computer. Often these are 
also the people who don't know what a spell-checker is. (Hey, I admit, 
I forget to use it sometimes but there are people who NEVER use the 
checker!

Excuse me?  I've posted 'fics as attachments on a couple of occasions,
and I don't think you can find one person who knows me who would
classify me as either lazy or technically unskilled.

Problem : I use Netscape Messenger as my e-mail client.  There are very
good reasons why I use it, starting with the fact that I like the
interface.  I've tried several other programs, and gotten generally fed
up with them after about a day or two.
     But you see, Netscape Messenger imposes a rather drastic limit (I
think it's about 30k) on the maximum size of the body of a message. 
While it is certainly possible to break those 'fics up, I've run into
considerable trouble with that.  Usually it amounts to the server eating
one of the segments, and me getting flooded with umpteen million
requests for the section that didn't get through.

My alternative?  I post it as a plain-text attachment, which most people
can read.  I then include a note in the BODY of the message, stating
that anyone who CAN'T read the attachment can mail me for a broken-down
copy of the story.  I usually do get several requests for this, but it's
MUCH less trouble than the other way, and quite effective.  And it
avoids the gobbledy-gook problems, because the attachment is plain
text.  Either you can read it, or you don't see it at all.

Don't lay down the swift hand of justice unless you know exactly 
what you are talking about, which, in this case, you dont.

Bah. We're not laying down a judgment on high. We're just saying that
we're not going to play the 'read scrambled text' game.

Actually, you said a good deal more than that.  Among other things, you
made the general statement that people who post attachments are the same
people that don't know how to use spellcheckers.

If you want me to read your fic, it has to be cleanly formatted. 

that's fine.  Mine are, except when the server glitches (as it has done
on a couple of occasions.  Once it split my story into fifteen pieces in
no discernable order and sent them all as separate mails with no subject
line to reference them... fortunately that went to prereaders, not to
the ML.)

Reading someone  else's fic & commenting on it is a favor other 
authors are doing for  their peers. To hand out a fic composed of ten 
lines that are 500 characters wide is obnoxious beyond reasonableness. 

Obnoxious beyond resonableness?  Not really.  Annoying I'll grant you.

So I think we DO know what we're talking about.

Perhaps so.  But to say that people are lazy or technically incompetent
is pretty insulting, and I don't react well to insult.

Nightman
*Happy to be up on the soap box in good company*

Stormwalker
*Dancing in the flames... and also in good company.*