Jargons of Info Tech industry

[Roedy Green]

On Sun, 09 Oct 2005 00:03:05 +0200, Lasse Vågsæther Karlsen
<lasse at vkarlsen.no> wrote or quoted :

>On one side you got control freaks who condemn everyone who dares send 
>an email with something other than what you've got your own email set up 
>to use. "You dare specify the font sized when I finally figured out that 
>10 is just right? Infidel!"

This is one of the marvels of CSS once you get the hang of it.  If you
don't like bright red letters on green backgrounds, you can CHANGE
that. You can change the fonts, sizes etc etc. You can if you want get
something very like plain ASCII text.

So from an aesthetic point of view, once people learn how it works,
CSS lets sender and receiver compromise on what the message looks
like. No other medium gives ANY control to the receiver about how a
message is formatted.

One of the most important changes in the ability to select special
fonts for the those without prefect vision and larger fonts.

There is also the philosophical question. When my nephew sends me a
message, do I have a right to warp his intent even if I don't like the
aesthetics?  That is part of his message.

Should my email reader fix the spelling mistakes in the emails sent me
by angry US soldiers?  Or is that part of the message?

There are three different issues getting muddled together:

1. avoiding spam

2. making mail from well meaning but inept friends more readable.

3. what constitutes a good general style for general correspondence.
How should you use rich text appropriately.
-- 
Canadian Mind Products, Roedy Green.
http://mindprod.com Again taking new Java programming contracts.