I find that if an email chain goes more than 3 back and forths that it is a lot more productive to pick up the damn phone and talk to someone. Not sure what that has to do with gossiping.

I'm thinking "around here" means the unemployment line.

No, but that is an excellent point.

Here's the translation: "People are more apt to be influenced by their peers than by science". This is not new; it has been known for decades. The best way to influence someone is to use those around them. This is why you see change.org petitions. The petitions themselves are crap, but if five of your friends send you a petition, you are more likely to think about the subject the same way as your friends.

My lead developer wanted to adopt Silverlight a couple years back for a key application we were developing. I am sure he had strong technical reasons, but getting tied to a highly proprietary Microsoft technology just smelled bad. .NET is one thing, Silverlight scared the hell out of me. I pulled out one of my rarely used veto cards and I'm glad I did.

Nobody claims the pirates are in the right.

No, but they do make endless excuses as to why it's wrong, but it's OK for them to pirate anyhow. So, the end result is the same as if they were claiming the pirates are in the right, because they won't admit the pirates are wrong. This has resulted in endless posts like the original and your reply where those whose legal rights are being trampled on are made out to be at fault.

*yawn*, just the kind of thoughtless and ignorant reply I expected. The law doesn't allow "the people" to obtain the fruit of other's labors for free and obstinately requires "the people" to respect other's rights - so the law must be wrong.

This kind of intelligent conversation makes me want to wipe out all of my Windows servers, and hire you to install and manage my new Linux boxes.

I sometimes struggle, yes. Folks who are religous, studying the Bible but don't really do anything with it are the most difficult. Those Chrisitans who are active in serving... working with homeless, shut-in visitations, service missions... those I relate to well. When I read the Bible I find that it points out my flaws, not leaing me to tell everyone else how to live

Those that I cannot relate to are those who study the Bible, can quote verse after verse yet don't seem to apply it to themselves...

In fairness, I was an atheist for most of my life and often find their ranting to be just as difficult to listen to :)

Ubuntu 8.04 was a spoonerism for Hairy Hardon. Once someone pointed it out, it became practically impossible to remember the original.