Re: Abbreviation for markup?

[Thomas Morley]

Hi David,

2012/1/30 David Kastrup <address@hidden>:
> Thomas Morley <address@hidden> writes:
>
>> Hi David,
>>
>> 2012/1/30 David Kastrup <address@hidden>:
>> [...]
>>> We have established that it does not make sense to divert work setting
>>> up generic channels when there is, at the current point of time, a
>>> single taker and not even enough to go around to support him.
>>
>> How to do it different? Should every person, interested in supporting
>> you, contact you offlist and ask for your bank account?
>
> Well yes, that would be the procedure for larger and/or regular
> payments.  Smaller amounts can go through PayPal for now.

So please expect a private mail from me.

>
>> [...]
>
> Let me reinsert a relevant part of the [...] here for the sake of our
> readers:
>
>>>> But I'm disappointed about your statements about experienced users.
>>>> You're right, I'm quite sure I could have solved Helge's problem.
>>>> But I decided to answer to Brent because he was first. The rest of the
>>>> day I visited a good friend being in her very last period of lifetime
>>>> at the hospital.
>>>>
>>>> So - very british - I'm not amuzed.
>
>>> And I don't think that any number of postings along the line "Dude, how
>>> come you expect something from me?  I, as opposed to you freaks, have a
>>> life." will really turn the balance to the better.
>
> Wouldn't you say that this is what your passage boils down to?

No, because of "as opposed to you freaks".
I never feeled like this and I never said, wrote or expressed it in any way.

> Mind
> you, there is nothing wrong with you having a life.  But there would be
> nothing wrong with me having a life, either.  And eating, heating and
> housing is useful for that.

Of course!

> And part of your life, apparently, is
> filled with music.  And keeping LilyPond in good shape is useful for
> that.

No doubt!

>
>> In an other mail of this thread you wrote:
>>
>> "Knowledge organizes in pyramids.  And one can't build those without the
>> intermediate layers."
>>
>> Will it turn the things better if you alienate all people not
>> satisfying your expectations?
>
> I am not enough of a diplomat to win a single person-to-person battle in
> the fight to get people to put their money rather than their foot where
> their mouth is.  And even if I were, I would not be getting the
> equivalent of the time and stomach aches and sleepless nights I spend on
> them.

Well, your lack of diplomacy is well known. :)
And in most cases I've no problem with it. But you tend to generalize
with your remarks about users or sub-groups of them. This is nearly
never helpful or even correct.

>
> I can be pretty sure that everyone I start arguing with is lost to my
> cause.  But I learn to lose in more embarrassing ways.  I don't have the
> resources to win a single battle in my fight for funding LilyPond
> development.  But that is less important than winning the war, and that
> is won in the hearts of the bystanders.  I need more of them than I can
> address individually.  How many battles did Gandhi win?
>
> I've been a gentleman about funding while being maintainer of AUCTeX
> (and, at some time, its prime developer).  That did not even by far get
> me back the travelling fees for conferences where I taught people how to
> make use of the stuff I gave them.  You don't beat a sense of economic
> decency into enough people by being discrete and humble.

I'm afraid you're right.

> There is
> nothing new with that: I again refer to Wilde
>
> <URL:http://www.eastoftheweb.com/short-stories/UBooks/DevFri.shtml>

BTW, german translation:
http://www.besuche-oscar-wilde.de/werke/deutsch/maerchen/opferwillige_freund.htm

>
> It is a bit of a painful spectacle for those that actually do the right
> thing without prodding.  I wish they were not outnumbered as severely,
> but then I have to work with what I got.
>
> --
> David Kastrup


Cheers,
  Harm