Television Mag

On Mon, 11 Apr 2011 22:08:01 +0100, "Stephen"
wrote:

It's one thing putting warnings on things that otherwise look perfectly
innocent, but there is something fundamentally wrong with a society that
insists on this- http://tinyurl.com/5ssrxqx

Thats nothing, I work for a supermarket and I've seen the following:

Own label Frozen Nut Roast: Warnimg Contains Nuts

Totally nutty!

Own label Mild Cheddar: Warning, Contains milk

Not everyone knows that cheese comes from milk.
"Warning, Contains milk" will be there to satisfy the lawyers.

Own label sliced bread: Warning: Contains Gluten

A person with gluten intolerance would buy only bread labelled "Gluten
Free". "Warning: Contains Gluten" - again the lawyers.

On the bottom of a frozen gateau: Warning: Do Not turn upside down.

Too late!

--
Peter Duncanson
(in uk.tech.digital-tv)

On 11/04/2011 19:23, Kennedy McEwen wrote:

Just up the road from where I occasionally work are 24hr KFCs & Mickey
D's - next to a busy dual carriageway. Within a couple of years of them
being opened the local council put 8ft fencing down the central
reservation to dissuade the synaptically challenged from dodging 70mph
traffic with their Colonel McNugget Buckets. That wasn't enough so, a
couple of years later they fixed large signs to the fencing which read
"Warning Fatal Accident Site - DO NOT CROSS".

A road to Southend?

--
Adrian C

In article , Adrian C
writes
On 11/04/2011 19:23, Kennedy McEwen wrote:

Just up the road from where I occasionally work are 24hr KFCs & Mickey
D's - next to a busy dual carriageway. Within a couple of years of them
being opened the local council put 8ft fencing down the central
reservation to dissuade the synaptically challenged from dodging 70mph
traffic with their Colonel McNugget Buckets. That wasn't enough so, a
couple of years later they fixed large signs to the fencing which read
"Warning Fatal Accident Site - DO NOT CROSS".

A road to Southend?

That's the one!

I suggested "4 morons have already been killed crossing here for a 99p
burger. Are you stupid enough to be next?" and a civic award for every
driver that hit one. That suggestion was rejected - not sure if it was
because of the expense of rewriting the numbers or the risk that the
challenge would cause local population decline. ;-)
--
Kennedy
Yes, Socrates himself is particularly missed;
A lovely little thinker, but a bugger when he's ****ed.
Python Philosophers (replace 'nospam' with 'kennedym' when replying)

In message on Mon, 11 Apr 2011 13:39:45 +
0100
Ian Field wrote:

There has, and always will be the tin-foil fuse wrapper brigade.


Just the sort of person you want intruding into a, primarily, trade forum
asking stupid questions ...

People who post here are doing so (I would assume) in their own time and are
usually prepared to devote some of that time to answering queries from all and
sundry - including the tin-foil fuse wrapper morons.

Why, though, is it felt to be wrong to have a (virtually) closed forum for
professionals - mainly sole traders - to exchange information between
themselves?

Every minute spent answering questions from time wasting idiots, who are
unlikely to understand the answer anyway, costs them money.

Somebody referred to http://www.vintage-radio.net/forum/index.php earlier in
this thread.

Take a look at it. Choose the field you know best and read a few threads. You
won't know whether to laugh or cry sometimes ...

Like the clown who wanted to know the value of the leaky capacitor in his
transistor radio ...

When he finally got round to posting a picture of it, it was very obviously the
thermistor controlling the output stage bias ...

Turned out that he was trying to 'educate' himself by taking components out at
random to try and work out what they did ...

If you were to cost the time taken for all the helpful responses he had at a
commercially viable rate, the figure would be colossal ...

--

Terry

In article ,
Terry
Casey wrote:


Why, though, is it felt to be wrong to have a (virtually) closed forum
for professionals - mainly sole traders - to exchange information
between themselves?

It isn't 'wrong' so far as I am concerned. But that isn't the only relevant
issue here so far as I can see. Note that 'Trevor' has already said that
the idea is to block "consumers" from having access. cf below.


Every minute spent answering questions from time wasting idiots, who are
unlikely to understand the answer anyway, costs them money.

Somebody referred to http://www.vintage-radio.net/forum/index.php
earlier in this thread.

Take a look at it. Choose the field you know best and read a few
threads. You won't know whether to laugh or cry sometimes ...

Like the clown who wanted to know the value of the leaky capacitor in
his transistor radio ...

When he finally got round to posting a picture of it, it was very
obviously the thermistor controlling the output stage bias ...

Does it not occur to you that every person has to learn - starting from
*not* being born with a complete understanding of all engineering already
in their mind?

Or even that - I assume - no-one was compelling them to answer his
questions. Or even read his postings once they had decided it wasn't worth
the effort.

Or even simple removing people when they prove to be a pest. Not deciding
in advance.

And not all "consumers" (i.e. almost all of us some of the time) are also
idiots or time-wasters or trolls (though some are. :-) ).

The implication of *pre*-excluding "consumers" may be a wish to keep away
from them the realisation that they could perhaps DIY various things
without a problem given some simple info.

So is the idea to exclude "idiots and time-wasters" or the exclude "those
not in a self-chosen cartel"? If the latter, perhaps not a sign that
those in the magic circle think their skills are very special... ;-

Turned out that he was trying to 'educate' himself by taking components
out at random to try and work out what they did ...

If you were to cost the time taken for all the helpful responses he had
at a commercially viable rate, the figure would be colossal ...

Yes, you can of course cherry-pick examples to make almost any point in any
direction. Hard cases make bad law, though.

I'm more concerned by the general principle that you should start off
regarding people as adults, and only then judge if they are an idiot or
pest or child by their behaviour. Nor should you treat people as
'consumers' rather than adults if their interest is in learning or doing
things for themself, or having the info they can use to make a
well-informed choice.

Writing as someone who has spent decades teaching others I can sympathise
with having the feeling of banging your head against a wall when trying to
educate or help some. But I also think the whole point of education is to
openly help people to make their own informed choices.

So what about the questions I put to 'Trevor'? I haven't seen him give his
own answers.

FWIW I have no interest in joining the specific closed group. My interest
is in their thinking.

Slainte,

Jim

--
Please use the address on the audiomisc page if you wish to email me.
Electronics http://www.st-and.ac.uk/~www_pa/Scot...o/electron.htm
Armstrong Audio http://www.audiomisc.co.uk/Armstrong/armstrong.html
Audio Misc http://www.audiomisc.co.uk/index.html

On Mon, 11 Apr 2011 03:03:47 +0100, Bill Wright
wrote:

The fact is, people these days are happy to buy in skills as and when
needed. The reason is that skills of the brown goods type are now cheap.
Nasty news guys, but Joe Bloggs thinks "OK, this guy will charge me £60
to fix the telly. Hypothetically I could look on the net and find out
how to do it myself, buy in the bits and bobs, the soldering iron, the
test gear, and it would take me a total of three hours plus £5 on bits.
But I earn £25 per hour. So I'll let the guy do it. I'm more short of
time than I am of money.

You forgot the Elastoplasts

On 12/04/2011 10:50, Terry Casey wrote:
In on Mon, 11 Apr 2011 13:39:45 +
0100
Ian wrote:

There has, and always will be the tin-foil fuse wrapper brigade.


Just the sort of person you want intruding into a, primarily, trade forum
asking stupid questions ...

People who post here are doing so (I would assume) in their own time and are
usually prepared to devote some of that time to answering queries from all and
sundry - including the tin-foil fuse wrapper morons.

Why, though, is it felt to be wrong to have a (virtually) closed forum for
professionals - mainly sole traders - to exchange information between
themselves?

The problem is, that 'being in the trade' is no assurance or guarantee
of any technical knowledge, skill or integrity. I've met so called
engineers who don't even know basic electronic principles, conversely
there are some excellent 'hobbyists' (for want of a better word).

I'm afraid that the forum in question, should they wish to take on
'useful' new members, really have to draw up far better criteria to
select suitable contributors. If they took the time to lurk in this, and
other related groups for a few days, they soon be able to sort the wheat
from the chaff.

Personally I don't like the concept of closed forums, I prefer this
environment, where complete strangers can (and do) wander in, and ask
perfectly intelligent questions, which they find answers for, and often
some very valuable and enlightening spin off sub-threads are generated too.

--
Mark
Please replace invalid and invalid with gmx and net to reply.

www.paras.org.uk

In article , Mark Carver
wrote:


Personally I don't like the concept of closed forums, I prefer this
environment, where complete strangers can (and do) wander in, and ask
perfectly intelligent questions, which they find answers for, and often
some very valuable and enlightening spin off sub-threads are generated
too.

Ditto. My experience of closed groups is fairly variable. Some seem to
exist simply so that a given set in a 'magic circle' can discuss things
without any fear that their ideas may be disgareed with or questioned. Thus
they themselves aren't always open to learning. Others are closed simply
for the purpose of 'keeping to topic' in a friendly manner.

From the external POV the only systematic and obvious difference I've
noticed tends to be how the group is 'closed'. Seems to me there is a big
difference between

A) *pre*-judging in a very narrow picky way

B) letting people in who apply, but then later excluding any who behave
badly. i.e. judge by behaviour and contribution.

Given the current example under discussion I'd also have my doubts about
simply keeping out 'consumers', and wonder about reasoning behind that.
I've not seen any dictionaries where 'consumer' is a synonym for 'idiot'.
If a group of service engineers *do* think this is so, then I'm not sure
I'd want to employ any of them! :-)

As a general idea it is fair enough for any 'club' to set its own rules.
But in some cases the rules may tell you a lot about the members. :-)

Again, I can understand this from another context. Many AES members are
very reluctant to discuss audio on public forums because they can easily
find they are in arguments with some people who become obnoxious when their
views are doubted or undermined by evidence. As professional engineers they
don't want to have to put up with the flak.

I can understand this, but it tends to then abandon public forums to odd
views not being challenged by those who may have evidence or a solid
grounding in the relevant engineering. And also can mean the 'in club'
forum discussions may exclude genuine and valid criticism which they are
unwilling - and deny themselves a chance - to hear. The result impedes
learning and improvement on both sides.

Slainte,

Jim

--
Please use the address on the audiomisc page if you wish to email me.
Electronics http://www.st-and.ac.uk/~www_pa/Scot...o/electron.htm
Armstrong Audio http://www.audiomisc.co.uk/Armstrong/armstrong.html
Audio Misc http://www.audiomisc.co.uk/index.html

On Tuesday, April 12th, 2011 at 14:35:49h +0100, Mark Carver wrote:

The problem is, that 'being in the trade' is no assurance or guarantee
of any technical knowledge, skill or integrity.

And that is exactly the problem with "the trade" in the UKofGB&NI.

In Germany for example, for most trade professions, it is only possible
to trade once one has completed an apprenticeship or appropriate training
and demonstrated competency in the necessary tests or exams.

This even applies to bakers.

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the
drugs began to take hold. I remember Trevor
saying something like:

So to summarise, you think we should give out trade information like
how to enter the service mode in your
Samsung lcd do you??

Why not? As a recent purchaser of a Samsung LCD, I was able to find
exactly that information on the web within a day of casually searching
for it.
Your desire to keep a closed shop of knowledge in the days of the
internet is nothing more than an attempt to **** against the wind.