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Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxj!ihnp4!inuxc!pur-ee!uiucdcs!renner
From: renner@uiucdcs.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.flame
Subject: Re: Minor Catharsis
Message-ID: <36200151@uiucdcs.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 26-Sep-84 16:10:00 EDT
Article-I.D.: uiucdcs.36200151
Posted: Wed Sep 26 16:10:00 1984
Date-Received: Fri, 28-Sep-84 04:33:50 EDT
References: <319@ihu1e.UUCP>
Lines: 22
Nf-ID: #R:ihu1e:-31900:uiucdcs:36200151:000:1152
Nf-From: uiucdcs!renner    Sep 26 15:10:00 1984

>   This flame is for all you nitpicking arrogant assholes that can't read
>   an article without first checking it for the correct use of "its/it's",
>   "your/you're", "there/their/they're" and other homonyms.  It's also for
>   all the obviously bored argumentative pricks that read a serious
>   article on a serious topic and then flame the author because a word was
>   misspelled or a comma was in the wrong place.

The goal of an author is to communicate some idea or ideas to the 
reader.  A neatly formatted, correctly spelled, and properly punctuated article
aids in achieving this goal because it is easier to read and understand.
A sloppy article implies either that the author does not care if his article
is understood, or that he does not think his ideas are worth the extra
trouble that neatness would require.

The desire for neatness can be taken too far.  It is clearly out of place
to flame an author for the occasional misspelled word.  But it is also
unreasonable to expect others to read an article "for content" when the
author insists in hiding his content in mounds of horrible writing.

Scott Renner
...ihnp4!uiucdcs!renner