[FFML] Question about how to keep the text as is after submitted

[Adrian Tymes]

--- On Mon, 9/15/08, aleh at aol.com <aleh at aol.com> wrote:
> "Bla bla...bla.", as you're suggesting, is apparently a rather new 
> thing -- the guides that I use mostly use "Bla bla... bla."

Well, it's the way I've always been told to do it: either space on both
sides (and preferably between the dots too), or not at all.

> I suspect it has to do with the fact that half of them predate the Cold 
> War.

I myself do not predate it, so yeah.  >_>

Then again, that might explain the newness: extra spaces are more of an
issue with fixed width fonts as used in electronic communications.
Books more often use variable width fonts, so it's not always
immediately obvious that there is a space between the dots.  (And at a
certain company I used to work for which crafted SMS messages for
commercial use - before anyone flames, I emphasize "used to" - the
internal style guide noted that, since SMS messages on most US carriers
are limited to 160 characters, using double spaces instead of single
spaces to separate sentences was a no-no.)

--- On Mon, 9/15/08, Gary Kleppe <gary at garykleppe.org> wrote:
>I'd add that "Bla bla... bla." works better when word-wrapping in
>plain text.  "Bla bla . . . bla." might wrap a line after the first or
>second dot, while "Bla bla...bla." won't wrap a line after the ellipses.

That's part of the point of adding wrapping yourself: so that mail
clients and other reading programs won't wrap it for you,
causing odd
breaks
in your lines and throwing readers off.  (Example intentional.)  A few
fics I've read even use this intentionally, to illustrate a point or
better convey a character's point of view, though it's not the most
common of techniques.

--- On Mon, 9/15/08, Richard D LAWSON <nouma at msn.com> wrote:
> Screw the grammar question, where can I read more of this "Bla" fic?!?

It's an unfinished dark lemon involving the adults from the Peanuts
world, explaining their inability to speak in ways we can understand
(but of course the kids can understand it, having grown up with it;
without going into too much detail, the kids can still speak well
because they're too young to have been involved in the lemon part).  It
will hopefully remain unfinished and unposted forever.  :P