Helmet Wankers

[Tom Keats]

In article <[email protected]>,
Peter Keller <[email protected]> writes:

> and is also under the Gnu licence, not some wierd university one.

...must .... resist .... temptation .... to .. get .. .. into ... GPL .. vs .. BDSL ....
argument ...

cheers, Tom

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[Tom Keats]

In article <[email protected]>,
[email protected] (Tom Keats) writes:
> In article <[email protected]>, Peter Keller <[email protected]> writes:
>
>> and is also under the Gnu licence, not some wierd university one.
>
> ...must .... resist .... temptation .... to .. get .. .. into ... GPL .. vs .. BDSL ....
> argument ...
^^^^ oops. BSDL. Haven't had enough coffee yet.

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[Just Zis Guy]

On Fri, 6 Feb 2004 17:56:40 +0000 (UTC), "W K" <[email protected]>
wrote:

>They give me the confidence to do 60 + Which is fun. So they are good!

up there ^^^ is a bloke who could do with you telling the NZ highway transportation agency that,
they don't believe in risk compensation.

Guy
===
May contain traces of irony. Contents liable to settle after posting.
http://chapmancentral.demon.co.uk

 

[Just Zis Guy]

On Thu, 05 Feb 2004 21:51:51 -0500, "frkrygow"
<"frkrygow"@omitcc.ysu.edu> wrote:

>Your logic leads to the kind of society imagined by T.H. White in _The Sword in the Stone_:
>"Everything not compulsory is forbidden."

Hey! He copied that idea from Switzerland!

Guy
===
May contain traces of irony. Contents liable to settle after posting.
http://chapmancentral.demon.co.uk

 

[David Reuteler]

Tom Keats <[email protected]> wrote:
: ...must .... resist .... temptation .... to .. get .. .. into ... GPL .. vs .. BDSL ....
: argument ...

heh - heh. funny you mention that. i had gone so far as to write out a post before ... wisely ...
canceling.
--
david reuteler [email protected]

 

[S. Anderson]

"Chris Zacho "The Wheelman"" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> What does this have to do with bicycling? Do cowboys all ride MTB's now?
>
> Or was this just posted to start another helmet war?

Hey..has Mr. Kunich managed to usurp the title of "Longest Most Useless Helmet Thread" yet?? We must
be getting close. Has anyone ever managed to successfully convert a person from one side to the
other?!?! What's the point of this?!?! ;-)

Cheers,

Scott..

 

[Just Zis Guy]

On Fri, 6 Feb 2004 17:14:58 -0500, "S. Anderson"
<[email protected]> wrote in message
<[email protected]>:

> Has anyone ever managed to successfully convert a person from one side to the other?!?!

Yes. I used to be a True Believer but now I accept that polystyrene foam deflector beanies prevent
only the most trivial injuries and thereafter cause at least as many serious injuries as they
prevent, through a variety of mechanisms.

I am now campaiging against a law which is due to come before the UK parliament making it a criminal
offence to allow a child to ride a tricycle or pedal kart in a public park without a helmet. BMX
stunts on waste ground will be permitted. It is an unusually badly worded bill.

What gets me is, fifteen years ago the first, best thing you could do for your safety on a bike was
to get trained. Second was to make sure your bike was in god working order, and third was to wear
bright clothing. Now, first, second and third is wear a plastic hat. All the others have dropped
completely off the radar. Nobody has even hinted at evaluating which of the four things yields the
best result in terms of injury reductions.

Guy
===
May contain traces of irony. Contents liable to settle after posting.
http://chapmancentral.demon.co.uk

 

[Just Zis Guy]

On Fri, 06 Feb 2004 19:39:03 +1300, Peter Keller <[email protected]>
wrote in message <[email protected]>:

>I'm having a running battle with our Land Transport Safety Authority (sic) over the need for
>compulsory helmet legislation.

I wish I could help. We're fighting to ward off the Liddites over here right now, as you know. I
rather liked Perry's submission re trailers - but presumably the Liddites now mandate plastic hats
for trailer occupants as well?

Guy
===
May contain traces of irony. Contents liable to settle after posting.
http://chapmancentral.demon.co.uk

 

[Dane Jackson]

Tom Keats <[email protected]> wrote:
> In article <[email protected]>, [email protected] (Tom Keats) writes:
>> In article <[email protected]>, Peter Keller <[email protected]> writes:
>>
>>> and is also under the Gnu licence, not some wierd university one.
>>
>> ...must .... resist .... temptation .... to .. get .. .. into ... GPL .. vs .. BDSL .... argument
>> ...
> ^^^^ oops. BSDL. Haven't had enough coffee yet.

Heh, that's ok, I kind of prefer the first version. It lends itself to more interesting acronyms...

--
Dane Jackson - z u v e m b i @ u n i x b i g o t s . o r g "Are [Linux users] lemmings collectively
jumping off of the cliff of reliable, well-engineered commercial software?" (By Matt Welsh)

 

[Benjamin Lewis]

Rick Onanian wrote:

> On Fri, 6 Feb 2004 17:14:58 -0500, "S. Anderson" <[email protected]> wrote:
>> Hey..has Mr. Kunich managed to usurp the title of "Longest Most Useless Helmet Thread" yet?? We
>> must be getting close. Has anyone ever managed to
>
> Nowhere near close. Last year's "Should I wear a helmet?" thread had 933 posts, according to
> groups.google.com, and it's parallel "Cycling is dangerous" had 368; there were some offshoots of
> each, whose titles I don't remember. I think I remember another 500 post thread, but I don't
> recall it's title.
>
>> successfully convert a person from one side to the other?!?! What's the point of this?!?! ;-)
>
> They have never had any effect. There is no point.

I was converted from a mostly "helmets are a good idea" point of view to a "they probably do little
or no good and may do harm" point of view (although I was always against MHLs).

--
Benjamin Lewis

Don't tell me how hard you work. Tell me how much you get done. -- James J. Ling

 

[Rick Onanian]

On Fri, 6 Feb 2004 17:14:58 -0500, "S. Anderson"
<[email protected]> wrote:
>Hey..has Mr. Kunich managed to usurp the title of "Longest Most Useless Helmet Thread" yet?? We
>must be getting close. Has anyone ever managed to

Nowhere near close. Last year's "Should I wear a helmet?" thread had 933 posts, according to
groups.google.com, and it's parallel "Cycling is dangerous" had 368; there were some offshoots of
each, whose titles I don't remember. I think I remember another 500 post thread, but I don't recall
it's title.

>successfully convert a person from one side to the other?!?! What's the point of this?!?! ;-)

They have never had any effect. There is no point. I spent way too much time trying to figure that
out through participation last year. I argued for the sake of not leaving stuff unargued, mostly,
I think...

There are three types of trolls who start these threads:
1. People who think that they know what's best for everybody
2. People who troll for trolling's sake
3. Misguided souls actually trying to accomplish something good
--
Rick Onanian

 

[Frkrygow]

Zebee Johnstone wrote:

> Risk compensation comes in many forms. While bods wearing leathers ride their bikes in ways they
> probably wouldn't if wearing shorts and t-shirt, bods wearing shorts and t-shirt ride that way too
> if they've been doing the squid thing for a while. If you do "foolish" things and don't get hurt,
> then the risk level of that activity drops in your estimation.
>
> So to make car drivers more wary and careful, have to ensure they crash now and then....

Won't work for all of them, of course.

One guy I know has had fairly frequent car crashes. After (nervously) riding as his passenger, I can
vouch that they haven't made him wary or careful at all.

--
Frank Krygowski [To reply, omit what's between "at" and "cc"]

 

[Tom Keats]

In article <[email protected]>,
David Reuteler <[email protected]> writes:
> Tom Keats <[email protected]> wrote:

> it was probably mostly a sysadmin vs developer thing. admins couldn't use emacs 'cause in the day
> it was rarely on new installs or production machines and developers liked it 'cause it was made
> for them and almost an IDE and had syntax highlighting, cvs stuff, etc and so the userbase ended
> up being pretty clearly drawn on those lines. those two groups were destined to fight about
> something, anything (i say this having been on both sides).

Aw, I remember all that stuff. Also the OpenLook vs Motif battle, and how COSE was gonna sort it all
out, once and for all. And how the GNU cry-babies felt emacs & other GNU/RMS productions were
victims of arbitrary prejudice (and were correct, to a degree).

But it's all historical artifact now; it's like an ancient feud that nobody knows what started it.

Do they still make those "System Administration: It's a Dirty Job, but Somebody Told Me to do it"
tee-shirts?

cheers, Tom

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[Frkrygow]

S. Anderson wrote:

> Has anyone ever managed to successfully convert a person from one side to the other?!?!

Yes. There was a time, long ago, when I thought helmets were a good idea and deserved promotion
(although I wasn't in favor of mandating them).

As a result of discussions here and elsewhere, I began actually going to the library and reading the
research papers and position papers on this issue.

I decided I'd been wrong - that they are not nearly as protective as claimed. I now believe they are
not worthy of even promotion. And I'm very, very strongly against mandating them.

And, just incidentally, there have been several others who have told the same tale. But, FWIW, I've
never heard of someone changing in the other direction as a result of these discussions. I think the
discussions do expose some truths that others are trying to hide.

>What's the point of this?!?! ;-)

Admittedly, some people won't have the curiosity to learn much about the issue. For them, I suppose
there is no point to this. They should just go back to watching TV.

--
Frank Krygowski [To reply, omit what's between "at" and "cc"]

 

[Frkrygow]

Rick Onanian wrote:

> On Fri, 6 Feb 2004 17:14:58 -0500, "S. Anderson" <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>>successfully convert a person from one side to the other?!?! What's the point of this?!?! ;-)
>
>
> They have never had any effect. There is no point. I spent way too much time trying to figure that
> out through participation last year.

Then I'd say you didn't spend enough time reading and studying the factual data.

It's like anything else. If you think you already know everything, you won't learn. If you don't do
the homework and studying, you won't learn.

If that describes you, then truly, for you the discussion has no point. Go watch TV.

--
Frank Krygowski [To reply, omit what's between "at" and "cc"]

 

[Frkrygow]

W K wrote:

> I don't tend to do 60kph when not wearing a helmet ont bike. [*]
>
>
>>The bulk of available data says that your judgement is in error - that the funny hats don't do
>>significant good.
>
>
> They give me the confidence to do 60 + Which is fun.
>
> So they are good!
>
>
> [* thinking about it, I'm not even metric when riding the kind of trips I do without a helmet ]

Thanks, W K. Next time someone doubts the idea of risk compensation, I'll reprint your post. It's
one of the clearest examples I've seen!

--
Frank Krygowski [To reply, omit what's between "at" and "cc"]

 

[David Reuteler]

Tom Keats <[email protected]> wrote:
: Do they still make those "System Administration: It's a Dirty Job, but Somebody Told Me to do it"
: tee-shirts?

laugh it up smart guy. after all our development jobs are shipped off to india you & i will be back
in as sysadmins and happy to have the work.

.. or not. i'm camping out in business intelligence. NOW there's an oxy- moron! but it's an oxymoron
that's also a buzzword.
--
david reuteler [email protected]

 

[S. Anderson]

"frkrygow" <"frkrygow"@omitcc.ysu.edu> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Admittedly, some people won't have the curiosity to learn much about the issue. For them, I
> suppose there is no point to this. They should just go back to watching TV.

The TV part is interesting. I always think about the three wheel ATV in situations like this. They
were banned in some places because they were "inherently unstable and dangerous". I always liked to
point out that if you let go of a motorcycle, it would fall over all by itself..how much more
"unstable" can you get?? And yet it hasn't been banned. But, a few well-publicized accidents with
some gruesome video of people dying or being seriously injured, and the public outcry is predictable
from fearful people who see danger around every corner. It's the evil ATV, not incompetent riders.
And that's why I don't like these nanny laws. It's debases us as people capable of individual
thought, and takes away bits and pieces of our own responsibility. Can't we make our own minds up??
We let people drive 4000lb cars at 140kmh making split-second decisions. But that same person can't
be trusted to deal with the decision to wear a helmet or not?? It's insanity.

Scott..

 

[Dane Jackson]

Benjamin Lewis <[email protected]> wrote:
> Rick Onanian wrote:

>> On Fri, 6 Feb 2004 17:14:58 -0500, "S. Anderson" <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>>> successfully convert a person from one side to the other?!?! What's the point of this?!?! ;-)
>>
>> They have never had any effect. There is no point.

> I was converted from a mostly "helmets are a good idea" point of view to a "they probably do
> little or no good and may do harm" point of view (although I was always against MHLs).

I'll chime in with a "me-too" here. I don't think I was too far inclined towards liking them much,
but I basically bought the message.

Keep in mind, no-one who actually posts to these threads is likely to change their minds. If they've
worked up enough of an opinion to post, more than likely they've already drunk the kool-aid. The
people's minds you are influencing are the innocent^Wuninvolved lurking bystanders.

--
Dane Jackson - z u v e m b i @ u n i x b i g o t s . o r g "The loss of life will be irreplaceable."
-Dan Quayle

 

[Peter Keller]

On Fri, 06 Feb 2004 12:47:10 -0800, Tom Keats wrote:

> In article <[email protected]>, Peter Keller <[email protected]> writes:
>
>> and is also under the Gnu licence, not some wierd university one.
>
> ...must .... resist .... temptation .... to .. get .. .. into ... GPL .. vs .. BDSL ....
> argument ...
>
>
> cheers, Tom

I have no strong views on this so i am resisting the temptation! However, when I l;ooked for Pico I
was annoyed to find that it was part of a much bigger package.

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