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Old 22nd October 2001, 22:57   #1  |  Link
DDogg
Retired, but still around
 
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Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: Lone Star
Posts: 3,058
open message about free pies :)

I thought I would take a few minutes to put a few things into perspective, especially for the newer participants to this forum (and have a little fun doing it).

Let's go back to the early part of 2001. At that time only a few, very proficient people could backup a dvd to svcd. It was a mind-boggling concoction of different programs, many of which worked poorly. To be able to hand make a svcd backup was close to an art. It was extremely new, difficult, and more importantly, terribly time consuming. It was not unusual for a backup to take a week of evenings to finish.

Along comes DVD2SVCD the author. He did a fairly quick down and dirty hack to be able to automate some of the stuff we were doing manually so in the wee hours of the morning a process could be completed and another begun automatically. That was a terrific thing for those of us who could do all the steps and we were VERY appreciative of what he did.

Now comes the blessing or the curse depending on your perspective
Many more features were added and DVD2SVCD became a feature packed robust program a long way from its humble origin. Doing a backup became much easier and so began to attract less experienced users. These users not only had less computer experience, they also had much less "board" experience in an online community and some did not understand forum manners.

Why is that a curse to some? Well let me answer that question, with a question. If somebody stops by your house and brings a nice pie, do you say to that person, "You FOOL!!!, WHY did you bring me a cherry pie, I WANTED an APPLE PIE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! [edited for language - 2001 was a different time than now regarding language on this board]

Btw, to the newer folks, note how irritating the caps and exclamation marks are (besides the content). (See this post about that) So, from the perspective of many of the older members of this group, DVD2SVCD was nice enough to bring us a great pie (without being asked). That was a neighborly thing to do, yes? Even if I didn't like cherry pie, I would not offend my neighbor by suggesting I just was not satisfied with what he brought me. If I did, I could count on getting no more free pie Everybody with me? LOL

Now here is the problem, the pie is good, free and in demand. The chef is getting stressed out trying to keep all his old and new friends in great tasting pie. In short, it is becoming a pain in the ass for the pie maker. Adding to that, most will not even do him the courtesy of buying a little flour and eggs by way of making a small donation. They just want the free pie AND THEY WANT TO BITCH ABOUT IT. Amazing!

The moral of this story is: if you like free pie, but not this weeks flavor, keep your pie hole shut about it, or you may not get the chance to try next weeks flavor. Or you can go bake your own, of course. If you do, I strongly suggest you don't start baking for all your neighbors. It is way too stressful.

DD

Last edited by DDogg; 16th October 2003 at 16:16.
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