Can someone please tell me why a lot of people here tend to replace letters of the alphabet with asterisks in such words as "h*lm*ts" (helmets), "H*lfo***" (Halfords) and so on.
Surely because 'h*lm*t' is a swear word, and we're nice polite people who don't [censored] swear?
Can someone please tell me why a lot of people here tend to replace letters of the alphabet with asterisks in such words as "h*lm*ts" (helmets), "H*lfo***" (Halfords) and so on.
Surely because 'h*lm*t' is a swear word, and we're nice polite people who don't [censored] swear?
Use the f-word on news.individual.net and you will get it bounced "437 scoring filter". That's why I always say b****y - but I'm far too polite for f*** ;-)
On Tue, 28 Sep 2004 19:17:34 +0100, "BrianW" <[email hidden]> wrote in message <[email hidden]>:
Quoted message said:
Use the f-word on news.individual.net and you will get it bounced "437 scoring filter"
No you [censored] won't!
Guy
I always thought the asterisks were to stop people doing Google searches for specific terms. Eg I thought you all said P**l Sm**th because it stopped him finding mentions of himself and joining in.
Surely because 'h*lm*t' is a swear word, and we're nice polite people who don't [censored] swear?
Use the f-word on news.individual.net and you will get it bounced "437 scoring filter". That's why I always say b****y - but I'm far too polite for f*** ;-)
Well, [censored]. I didn't [censored] know that, and I post through news.individual.[censored].net.
Daniele -- Apple Juice Ltd Chapter Arts Centre Market Road www.apple-juice.co.uk Cardiff CF5 1QE 029 2019 0140
I always thought the asterisks were to stop people doing Google searches for specific terms. Eg I thought you all said P**l Sm**th because it stopped him finding mentions of himself and joining in.
That's called Kiboing, because Kibo was always said to grep the entire news spool for occurrences of his own name.
Daniele -- Apple Juice Ltd Chapter Arts Centre Market Road www.apple-juice.co.uk Cardiff CF5 1QE 029 2019 0140
Surely because 'h*lm*t' is a swear word, and we're nice polite people who don't [censored] swear?
Use the f-word on news.individual.net and you will get it bounced "437 scoring filter". That's why I always say b****y - but I'm far too polite for f*** ;-)
Well, [censored]. I didn't [censored] know that, and I post through news.individual.[censored].net.
[censored] me. Is that [censored] right?
-- Matt K. "Everything is true -- everything is permissible!"
I always thought the asterisks were to stop people doing Google searches for specific terms. Eg I thought you all said P**l Sm**th because it stopped him finding mentions of himself and joining in.
That's called Kiboing, because Kibo was always said to grep the entire news spool for occurrences of his own name.
The verb was originally to Kiboze, as I recall. Thus 'Kibozing'.
-- [email hidden] (Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/ Ye hypocrites! are these your pranks? To murder men and give God thanks? Desist, for shame! Proceed no further: God won't accept your thanks for murther -- Roburt Burns, 'Thanksgiving For a National Victory'
I always thought the asterisks were to stop people doing Google searches for specific terms. Eg I thought you all said P**l Sm**th because it stopped him finding mentions of himself and joining in.
Sometimes. If you wish to refer to the Great One without troubling him to read your comments you must munge the name, e.g. "Sh3ld0n"; he uses search tools to make sure that requests for help are not missed.
At other times it is ironic and based on the false prudery of the tabloid press, as with P**l Sm*th (obviously if you were to speak that name in this NG you may be requested to wash your newsreader out with soap and water).
H*lm*ts falls into the second group. It is Bad Form to mention the H-word :-)
On uk.rec.sheds they use ROT13 to protect delicate sensibilities from the horrors of words such as "new" and "work" (shudder).
On Wed, 29 Sep 2004 12:03:02 +0100, Just zis Guy, you know? <[email hidden]> wrote:
[...]
Quoted message said:
At other times it is ironic and based on the false prudery of the tabloid press, as with P**l Sm*th (obviously if you were to speak that name in this NG you may be requested to wash your newsreader out with soap and water).
H*lm*ts falls into the second group. It is Bad Form to mention the H-word :-)
Can I mention it? I saw a cyclist in Newcastle a couple of days ago. He was wearing a climbing helmet. I did wonder if he thought it offered him something that a cycling helmet didn't or just that he only had one helmet and was too tight to buy another yet felt he should wear something.
On Tue, 28 Sep 2004 19:17:34 +0100, "BrianW" <[email hidden]> wrote in message <[email hidden]>:
Quoted message said:
Use the f-word on news.individual.net and you will get it bounced "437 scoring filter"
No you [censored] won't!
Guy
I always thought the asterisks were to stop people doing Google searches for specific terms. Eg I thought you all said P**l Sm**th because it stopped him finding mentions of himself and joining in.
There are some subjects that invite grepping loons. There was a time when mentioning Turkey (or turkey, the bird) would get a response from someone using the name Serdar Argic claiming that Armenia had committed genocide against Turkey (something most historians disagree with, just as they disagree with the idea that it was Nazis who were the victims of Jews). There's a pseudo-religion founded by an American science fiction writer that can get similar attention, and some newsgroups talk about gnu control for similar reasons.
Helmets aren't really the same sort of subject, in that anyone who cares really strongly is likely to be following the group already, but the asterisks are still used as a sort of magic amulet which might fend off a flame war.
There's also an element of showing membership of a group, for example alt.folklore.urban uses pendantry as a shibboleth. Putting in the "traditional" asterisks shows you've followed the group for long enough to know they are traditional.
Can I mention it? I saw a cyclist in Newcastle a couple of days ago. He was wearing a climbing helmet. I did wonder if he thought it offered him something that a cycling helmet didn't or just that he only had one helmet and was too tight to buy another yet felt he should wear something.
Perhaps he was going climbing, and was simply wearing it as the most practical means to carry said headgear.
On Wed, 29 Sep 2004 11:49:54 +0000 (UTC), Mike Quin <[email hidden]>
Quoted message said:
In article said:
Can I mention it? I saw a cyclist in Newcastle a couple of days ago. He was wearing a climbing helmet. I did wonder if he thought it offered him something that a cycling helmet didn't or just that he only had one helmet and was too tight to buy another yet felt he should wear something.
Perhaps he was going climbing, and was simply wearing it as the most practical means to carry said headgear.
Possibly but he looked more like a regular commuter. Newcastle Eldon Square is home to a climbing wall so he may have been on his way home from that.
On Wed, 29 Sep 2004 12:04:05 +0100, "Just zis Guy, you know?" <[email hidden]> wrote (more or less):
Quoted message said:
Whingin' Pom said:
[censored] me. Is that [censored] right?
To be fair, being British, we should probably spell it "phuq" anyway...
I can, to this day, remember the extreme disappointment I felt when, at the age of seven, I discovered that 'phart' wasn't the spelling in general use.
I can, to this day, remember the extreme disappointment I felt when, at the age of seven, I discovered that 'phart' wasn't the spelling in general use.
I remember Fyffe Robertson proposing the abbrevition "phart" to describe installations, "happenings", blank pieces of canvas, piles of bricks and all other forms of "phoney art" :-)
