Why, Peter?
Rich Tietjens
OK, I admit I'm a little bit interested. I mean, after all, Peter
Sinclair-Day admits he has no recent experience with Atari computers, and
to judge from what he knows of them, he has never owned one. Why, then,
are the vast preponderence of his Usenet postings in the Atari newsgroups?
He doesn't own an Amiga, either, as far as one can tell from his postings,
but the Amigans are the next-largest "beneficiaries" of Peter's peculiar
brand of wisdom. Here's a quick summary: Of a total of 1859 articles
posted by sinclap between March 29, 1995 and this past Saturday (August 17,
1996), he has posted 1181 (that's almost 64 percent) in Atari newsgroups,
and 364 (almost another 20 percent) in the Amiga groups. Only 140 messages
- less than 8 percent - were posted in Mac-specific newsgroups. This adds
up to over 80 percent of his Usenet time being devoted to attacking the
users of other computers, rather than being spent joyfully in using the
system he has chosen for himself? What drives a man to do such
self-defeating things? Is he so unpopular that the other Mac users won't
talk to him either?
I really dont' understand the mentality that says "I chose X brand, and you
didn't, so you must be an idiot." If Nike paid me what they pay the
pro athletes to wear their shoes, I might be inclined to go recruit
other people to wear Nikes - but otherwise, brand loyalty simply for the
sake of brand loyalty seems rather stupid to me. Certainly trying to
convert people by insulting them (either directly, or insulting their
intelligence with transparent lies) wouldn't be the path I would choose in
that case, however.
I chose an Atari computer because I like the hardware/price/performance; I
certainly don't much like what Jack Tramiel and family did either to the
company or to the customers. If money were no object, and it were easy to
change operating systems, I'd love to have a brand-new Mac; I'd like to
have a nice shiny Amiga for the places where it excels, also (need I say
"toaster" more than once?). I did have an Amiga for about 6 months,
but at the time, I couldn't afford the upkeep on two systems, and I was
running my BBS and writing software on the Atari, so the Amiga had to go.
Those of us who are using Motorola-based computers have far more in common
with each other than we do with Bill Gates and his legion of drones
(although the chips themselves are perectly fine; installing MS-Windozzzze
on any system is like hitching a thoroughbred to a hard-scrabble plow). So
why would anyone waste all of his time (OK, only 80-plus perrcent of it)
trying to irritate other users, instead of learning everything he could
about /his/ system, so he could use it better? It's a puzzle.
Anyhow... Here's the Deja News user profile on our resident gadfly.
AUTHOR PROFILE: sincl...@cobra.uni.edu (PETER SINCLAIR-DAY)
1859 articles posted between 1995/03/29 and 1996/08/17.
88 % followups.
Number of articles posted to individual newsgroups (slightly skewed by
cross-postings):
606 comp.sys.atari.advocacy
413 rec.games.video.atari
250 comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
115 comp.sys.atari.st
101 comp.sys.amiga.misc
46 misc.invest.stocks
46 rec.games.video.advocacy
38 alt.atari-jaguar.discussion
27 comp.sys.mac.advocacy
27 comp.sys.mac.hardware.misc
22 comp.sys.newton.misc
16 comp.sys.powerpc
14 comp.sys.mac.portables
12 misc.forsale.computers.mac-specific.systems
12 rec.games.video.3do
10 misc.forsale.computers.mac-specific.portables
8 comp.sys.mac.hardware
7 comp.sys.amiga.marketplace
6 comp.graphics.packages.lightwave
6 comp.sys.mac.wanted
6 rec.games.video.sony
5 comp.sys.be
4 comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy
4 ia.talk.politics
3 alt.games.video.sony-playstation
3 alt.politics.elections
3 comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action
3 comp.sys.mac.games
2 alt.politics.clinton
2 alt.president.clinton
2 alt.sex.stories.gay
2 alt.steinberg.cubase
2 comp.sys.amiga.games
2 comp.sys.mac.comm
2 comp.sys.mac.hardware.video
2 ia.talk.misc
2 misc.forsale.computers.mac-specific.software
2 rec.games.video.nintendo
2 rec.games.video.sega
2 rec.sport.hockey
1 alt.activism
1 alt.sex.stories
1 bit.listserv.i-amiga
1 comp.multimedia
1 comp.soft-sys.middleware.opendoc
1 comp.sys.amiga.emulations
1 comp.sys.amiga.graphics
1 comp.sys.amiga.hardware
1 comp.sys.atari.st.tech
1 comp.sys.mac.hardware.storage
1 comp.sys.mac.misc
1 comp.sys.mac.programmer.help
1 comp.sys.mac.programmer.misc
1 comp.sys.mac.system
1 comp.sys.powerpc.advocacy
1 misc.consumers
1 misc.forsale.computers.modems
1 misc.forsale.computers.monitors
1 pdx.test
1 rec.arts.startrek.current
1 rec.autos.makers.honda
1 talk.politics.misc
*!* Opinions expressed herein are those of the writer only *!*
Unsolicited Email of a commercial nature delivered to this address is
subject to a $500 charge. Emailing such items, whether manually or
automatically, constitutes acceptance of these terms and conditions.
