You have been terribly hard done by my friend, the actions of the people in that thread absolutely disgusted me.

Whatever you did, that was not the way to fix it. It is clear there was a break down in communications and the rash and STUPID actions of some STUPID people have resulted in this horrible shit happening.

I had something similar occur to me once. I used to hang out with 2 gay girls, they were very close friends of mine but i never harboured anything further. I am far too much of a gentlemen to ever approach or attempt a move on a person in a relationship.

One night, we all got drunk and one stormed off into a side street to be alone and i had to follow her to make sure she was safe. I was the only sober person present. Whilst talking her back to her home, she told me she wanted to leave the girl and hated her but couldn't get away. So i told her "When you're sober, tell me the same thing again and i will help you, but i think this is the drink talking."

When we got in, i said to her in the hallway "Remember - if you say the same thing tomorrow, we'll do it." - i had to be cryptic as her girlfriend was in the front room and i didn't want everything to come out and cause an argument.

I was asked later what this cryptic comment meant and i said oh forget it, it's irrelevant. It looked odd but i said "You know you can trust me," and she could. Shortly after, i was deleted off facebook from both of them, ignored, friends of friends ignored me and shunned me.

It turns out that the girl had been asked what that cryptic comment meant. She didn't want to tell the ugly truth and had accused me of trying to kiss her and been pushed away, and told "Ask me tomorrow."

This story went round a lot of the people that i knew and hung out with and as a result i was completely ostracised due to this girl's lie. I actually could have completely exposed her for the liar she was early on, but i decided not to because i didn't want to ruin their relationship. I'm a martyr to my morals, and how ironic it is that my morals facilitate someone attempting to make me look immoral

Perhaps only similar in a small way, but i felt like sharing. I think you're alright, that disgusting behaviour hasn't affected my opinion of you at all. It's certainly made me think twice about my opinion of THEM, however.

Man, there's some heated back and forth here... that's for sure.

Mac vs PC for Me?

PC:

Pros
* WAY cheaper hardware, seriously. My house was robbed recently, and my laptop stolen. This was a 3 years old Dell Inspiron that was about 2Grand (AUS) at the time of purchase. To replace that with a Dell Inspiron that's way better specced now...? $AU745 To replace with an Apple with a similar size screen (I don't want anything less than 14" it gets used as a DVD player for the kids in the car when we go on holidays)? $2,700! Seriously insane! The cheapest laptop they offer AT ALL? $1600, with a 13" screen... Holy crud. You can argue all you like about build quality and included features etc. etc. But if you don't offer some damn sort of entry level computers, then you've lost me I'm afraid.

* Games. I like to play PC Games, playing through Bioshock was blissful. I hardly ever get to these day (4 kids under 6 will do that to you), but I like to buy a game every six months or so and get some playing in now and again... and I'm afraid the PC has the Mac beat in every possible way here.

* I actually really like Windows Media Player. I didn't for ages. Up until, erm, I think it was version 10, I was a staunch Winamp user. But now, WMP is great. And I have no idea what you're talking about with ads in it, because I never see any, it opens in my library. But then I guess I never use online music stores as I'm old fashioned and actually like to get a physical CD for my music.

* It's what I'm used to... I've been using PCs since DOS, so I'm kinda comfortable with them, and I have no real issue with them or Windows. Is it a crap reason to stick with an operating system? Maybe... but it's a reason.

* Even moreso... It's what the Wife is used to: She really doesn't want to learn some other operating system. And she uses all the pcs in this house, so that's a serious consideration.

Cons
* Lack of a unix based terminal... yup, agree there. When you're doing web based development, and the things you're doing are deployed on Linux boxes, it would be really nice to be able to have a local setup that mirrors that. Can't really on a Windows box (and no, Cygwin doesn't count).

* Windows Movie Maker/ Windows DVD Maker: When I first got Vista I got really excited about Windows DVD Maker because the look and feel of the menus it can create and the way it all seems to fit together looks superb. After having it now for a year and a half or so, I think I have successfully burnt ONE DVD using it. ONE. And it's not like it tells you beforehand that it can't handle whatever video format you've given it or whatever, it quite happily previews and goes ahead and spends an hour preparing the video etc. only to die at 99% with a cryptic message. UTTER SHIT. And Movie Maker? Urgh, doesn't really output into any format I really want. I have used it, I have made some nice movies with it, but it's not fun to use at all. For my DVD creation needs I now use DVD Flick (Open source), and I have yet to hit any video format it can't handle... see MS, it's not that hard.


APPLE:
Pros
* Built on BSD: Having a real terminal, and real linux/unix operating system under the hood is great for anyone doing dev work... very nice.

* iLife: As much as I don't like iTunes (see below), from what I've played with in iMovie and iDVD, I really like them, very nice to use. Would love to be able to play with them, and it most of the reason I would like to give owning a Mac a go.


Cons
* Cost: Insane... mentioned above... unavoidable.

* The strip thing: Sorry, don't like that thing along the bottom... heaps of icons with only a tiny little triangle to let you know which ones are currently running, and which aren't. Not intuitive to me at all... but that might just be me.

* Lack of games... again, mentioned above.

* The incredibly annoying advertising: Seriously, this is enough to make me not want one. The arrogant, bullshit of 'Windows always crash' and 'Macs never fail' is SUCH SHIT. I can't remember the last time I had a windows box crash, and I use them ALL day most days. Whereas the last time I was using a Mac at work (OSX, but a fews years back) I had it crash with the delightful bomb thing...

* During that same time I was using the Mac I wanted to eject the DVD I had in it... I looked and looked for an eject button, and could not find it. Could find no logical way to do so... ended up dragging it onto the rubbish bin to eject it, which to me seemed like an insanely loopy way to get a disc out of a drive. I'm sure there are simpler ways, but I found it baffling that here I was, using the 'so simple' OS and could not for the life of me work out how to GET A DISC OUT OF THE MACHINE.

* I despise iTunes and Quicktime. The interface to iTunes, to my eye, is ugly as sin, and quicktime on the PC (can't speak for OSX obviously, but if you want to win people over, don't release shit software on other systems) is a horrendous piece of software that irks the absolute hell out of me... plus until recently had the gall to try and charge you money just to be able to watch movies full screen. I wouldn't have it installed on my pc at all if it wasn't for apple.com/trailers.

* Hardware upgrades: Sort of linked to the price thing, but different in that you can't throw any old video card or whatever else you want in the machine, because you're limited to what Apple offer you in their infinite wisdom.

Neither here nor there
* Physical design: People rant and rave about how beautiful Apples are... and to some degree they are very nice to look at, but you're kinda stuck with that and nothing else. PCs have some pretty sexy desktops and laptops now, in a form for pretty much everyone.


It is obviously personal, and for people like budzos to attack dag for dag finding Macs to be more productive for him is insane. If HE finds it more efficient, then that's friggen great! I really would love to give a Mac a chance, but that entry price is just insanely high, so I'm afraid, unless work switches to Mac (very much a Dell shop), it's not going to happen.

I think you're seeing specters, mashiki. It looks exactly like it did when I posted the link. I'll certainly give you that it's a bit cryptic and with the "concern" I thought that they didn't acknowledge the validity of the voting process - and for what it's worth, I don't think they really do yet. It's vague enough that they could claim, that this was just a preliminary assessment without any further investigation, and back away from it.

I wanted more.. I have to admit, I don't remember all the details from the whole series. And lots of the time I watched, I was very tired and a bit drunk, so I might have forgotten a lot.

Though wyhen I heard that there was going to be a Galactica remake, and Starbuck would be famela, I was not happy. I had a majot crush on Starbuck when I watched the original series, and a female Starbuck, wtf??

But I nreally grew fond of Kara! I love Aeryn Sun in Farscape, and Kara was like her.. kick-ass hero, who was soft inside. I really would have wanted to know more about her.

I really did not care much about Baltar.. He was way to weird and cryptic and crazy the whole series long. This Adama was way more human.,, and in the end, I wish he could have lived happily ever after with Roslin..

Oh, and what is the life span of a cylon like Tigh? Obviosly he eventually dies without resurrection. And what about Heras?

And what do Cylon Centurions do for fun anyway? Cruise the galaxy and.. ?

Like I said, I probably have forgotten more than I remember right now. I just wanted to know aboiot Starbuck!

I hope 'Lost' gets some better closure and explanation.

sweeeeeet! i knew the original one got scrapped and that it had been picked up again but cryptic is alot farther along then i thought they would be.

now, more than ever, the possibility that monkeys can not be fully civilized must be questioned. i honestly had hoped that monkeys had the possibility to achieve a state of legitimate human rights. i'm really starting to doubt whether that is true.

clearly, it is possible as some have managed to achieve it, but what is standing in the way for the rest? are there really physiological differences in the brain which prevent this from occurring? i don't want to believe that. is there a mental barrier? the ego? indoctrination? societal pressure?

i'm confused and i don't know what else to conclude. is my message honestly that cryptic and hard to understand? have you tried to check my assertions for yourself, deriving the principles on paper with your own pencil? is it really not working? do you not understand what i am saying because it is hard to understand, or because you aren't really giving it a fair chance? are you simply failing to absorb the information? are we just miscommunicating? is it a poor presentation on my part?

can someone here who agrees with me at least to an extent (banshee maybe?) try to shed some light on the issue? if it is only a mental barrier, than we can overcome it.

i don't know what thought is like for anyone else. i only know how words, phrases, and concepts form and are connected and associated in my brain. i really want to believe that we all have the potential to think the same way. if there are honest, physiological barriers then that is a truly frightening premise.

(Sorry in advance, i'll certainly be off-topic, and my english will be awful. And this is only my opinion, which i don't mean to impose, even if I'll employ directive sentences and stuff that looks like factual speech)

First of all, human beings may have rights (freedom, etc ...) but they have one duty : preserve our species. Human rights should be a corrolary of this duty, or, a result of the way we've managed to acheive this duty. Education should be the first step to learn our children how to achieve this duty. If it can lead to the acquisition to some rights like 'freedoms', it's a bonus. Some will say that's a necessity (maybe the two - rights and duty - are interdependant). Some fights for their own preservation, just like corporations, acting for their own good. Well, it's a way to preserve the human race after all. But is it better than keeping the whole humanity on track ? I don't know. This question deserves deeper analysis.

For my part, I think that the more important is to anwser some fundamental questions and build a good understanding of mankind issues, before looking at the current political system (whatever country i'm in and from) and searching how to deal with it.

(Wow, that was cryptic ... sorry. I should have done better in french )

>> ^roguewrx:
>> ^Krupo:
That was SLY! Precursor to the woohoo goodness we now enjoy, I say.

I've been on the Interwebs too long. I thought this was new l33t spelling of "silly."


Yeah, I was using the cryptic videosift invocation to associate the video with the Matt Groening & Friends Appreciation channel.

1. Watching Kronosposeidon exchange sexual favors for votes
2. Deciphering Choggies cryptic comments and connecting the results to wild conspiracy theories about how Elvis is behind 9/11 and how that relates to the NAU.
3. Taking people too seriously
4. Discovering siftbot is a sockpuppet account
5. No YouTards.

That may be, but most don't do anything worthwhile for society with their riches. (Buffet and Gates are notable exceptions).
Ubuntu is a remarkable achievement, bringing consumer - level usability to a usually cryptic operating system.

(wikipedia reads): A Snipe is any of nearly 20 very not similar wading bird species. They are characterized by a very long slender bill and cryptic plumage. The Gallinago snipes have a nearly worldwide distribution, the Lymnocryptes Jack Snipe is restricted to Asia and Europe and the Coenocorypha snipes are restricted to New Zealand. The three species of painted snipe are not closely related to these, (end quote)

I'd like to lecture more one of the rarest and most uncommon of Snipes. The Videosift Snipe. It too has a long slender bill, also called a nose. And cryptic markings all over that we shall call feces.

The snipe can be found in the New Jersey area of North America, being attracted to loud, obnoxious, unintelligible dialects of the English language that are spoken frequently in the area.

It also spends a lot of time on Videosift often pecking at other members and puffing itself up to make it look more imposing.

Spotting the Videosift Snipe is not as difficult as one may be lead to believe from experiences at summer camp. Rather it is quite simple. The Snipe has a fatal attraction to Hanna Montana concerts and can usually be found waiting in line for tickets. Beating up a mother of 4 for tickets. Or front and center at the concert singing very song loudly.

-Excerpt from "The Complete Guide to Snipe Hunting" Vol.4 pg.145

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaHA!
gotcha

In reply to this comment by dag:
It was just a small attempt at humor- please don't take offense. Allow me to explain and thereby neutralise it:

Choggie has a reputation for cryptic, some would say incoherent comments. Your silver star indicates that you are an experienced sifter and have been around for awhile. So the humor lies in the conundrum that you are an experienced Sifter but are unaware that most of Choggie's comments are difficult to understand.

Man, you know when I explain it like that- it's hilarious.

In reply to this comment by residue:
There's no angst in my comment, Choggie's comment just seemed really strange to me and I thought that I might have missed something.

As far as the silver star, I noticed that I had it with only 24 sifts. Does the star have something to do with choggie or an applauded comment? If so, is there any way to figure out which one?

In reply to this comment by dag:
^ Confusing comment from Choggie you say?



Where did you get that silver star from young one?

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag. (show it anyway)

It was just a small attempt at humor- please don't take offense. Allow me to explain and thereby neutralise it:

Choggie has a reputation for cryptic, some would say incoherent comments. Your silver star indicates that you are an experienced sifter and have been around for awhile. So the humor lies in the conundrum that you are an experienced Sifter but are unaware that most of Choggie's comments are difficult to understand.

Man, you know when I explain it like that- it's hilarious.

In reply to this comment by residue:
There's no angst in my comment, Choggie's comment just seemed really strange to me and I thought that I might have missed something.

As far as the silver star, I noticed that I had it with only 24 sifts. Does the star have something to do with choggie or an applauded comment? If so, is there any way to figure out which one?

In reply to this comment by dag:
^ Confusing comment from Choggie you say?



Where did you get that silver star from young one?

^Oooh! How cryptic is THAT response?!

I hope that means we get an all-you-can-eat salad bar.

I can agree to no more PM's (profile messages?)

If you think my tone is smug you should hear yourself. You come off as a condescending know it all who can't stick to discussing an issue but has to revert to cryptic nonsense mixed with juvenile name calling. Seriously, you sound like a person who has read the Ayn Rand anthology and it screwed up your head.

so I summed you based on a few comments ? a few ? a few ?

I sum you up based on your personal and impersonal comments to me and the rest of the community. From what I've read from your fingertips here on the sift, you are consistently rude, abrasive and incoherent.

keep it up gramps.

In reply to this comment by choggie:
let's simply agree to stop any pm's and leave it in the public arena....call it a change of heart-when I feel it necessary to piss and shit on your masturbation, I'll do so. Your tone is smug, and could give a fuck about your politics, they are head in ass like most folks are-images are a powerful force in our culture-perhaps its my inability to rise above judging you, guess you're simply unworthy-enjoy my, neo-con, right-wing, country bumpkin', (insert your comfortable label here) rants, as they will no doubt digress from this point, into screaming on a street corner style, like some schizoid homeless person. So, fuck off qrule, since you have summed me the fuck up based on a few comments, back at ya cocksucker. Oh....and it'
s not about condemning others for having different views.....it's about condemning the satisfaction others have in their views, which are incorrect, having not all the information to have a correct opinion. That and corrupted sensibilities.......