From: Aredridel <aredridel@...>
Date: 2003-07-04T04:37:45+09:00
Subject: Evangelism & List Culture [was Re: OT: It's that time of year	again ...]

> Actually it's mildly fascinating to me to find out
> people's ages, since I can't tell from their posts
> how old people are (unless perchance they give it
> away somehow). And I think it's great that we can
> meet as equals here without the prejudice of looking
> at someone and saying "dumb kid" or "outmoded dinosaur."

I agree!  That's one thing that was very useful for me as a teenager: I
actually got treated as an adult when I was doing things on the 'net.

I think I may have grown up faster because of it... once, I was the
twelve-year-old in the flame war, and the other fellow who was so hot on
attacking my educational ideals ended up looking like the immature one.
It was an odd turn, that's for sure.

It seems to me that it's a simple extension of that not knowing that can
make a respectful forum, like this list, because you can't really know
someone's nationality, native language (except ruby!), age or much
else.  I rather like that.  Too bad some list-cultures out there have
such a anglocentric view and such technical elitism thrown around.  I'd
like ruby-talk's culture to stay similar to how it is as Ruby grows -- I
think that's something people should keep in mind in their evangelism:
how can we help keep or create a culture of friendly helping? How do we
deal with the inevitable always-asked questions without becoming angry
like so many PHP forums do?

Something to think about.

Ari

> 
> I've noticed that some people here are college students
> and some are even high school students, I think. All I
> can say is: Take it and run with it. I didn't have Usenet
> access when I was in high school. Use what you've got.
> Sometimes I think this is the 21st century or something
> (but then I think: Where are all the flying cars?).
> 
> On the Internet, nobody can tell you if you're a
> child prodigy or an octogenarian or a three-headed
> alien or a hyperintelligent eggplant.
> 
> Yet another reason to give people slack. I don't 
> want to find myself in a heated flamewar with a 
> twelve-year-old.
> 
> --
> Hal Fulton
> hal9000@hypermetrics.com
> 
> 
>