Erik got a mention in Scientific American website!

[NathanAllan]

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?alias=theres-history-and-money&chanId=sa003&modsrc=reuters

Read the whole article, it's a good one!

[chuckcmagee]

Yep, I knew that article would make the magazine rounds.

[ahm]

Sure. They got it from Reuters.
(Mobilemaster got a mention too).

[EvanK]

Except I feel like a total idiot for saying "funner" ... elaborated on my quote at http://www.computerworld.com/blogs/node/5351.

[carlsson]

I'm not quite sure what the problem is; that it is a typo for "funnier", or that it was a bit simplistic choice of word?

[Terry Yager]

I don't get it. Old machines are funner. What's the problem?

As a professional journalist, Evan, perhaps you can lend some insight. Why is it that when an article quotes someone, often all that is printed is the one thing that makes them sound the dumbest? (Yes, I said 'dumbest'). I mean, I can spend 45 minutes talking to a reporter, and out of that entire interview, all I see 'quoted' in the paper is half of a sentence which, taken out of context, sounds really st00pit. Is this something they do on purpose, just so that person's friends and relatives can spend the rest of forever teasing them about it?

--T

[ahm]

I'm not quite sure what the problem is; that it is a typo for "funnier", or that it was a bit simplistic choice of word?

Hard to explain. It's a misuse of a superlative. For example, when describing the temperatures on a number of summer days, you would say one was "hot", another was "hotter" and yes another was "hottest". The word "fun" doesn't work that way. If you try to use "fun", "funner" and "funnest", it makes one sound uneducated. (Instead, one would say "fun", "more fun" and "much more fun").

HTH,
Andy

[lynchaj]

Congrats all around!

I think vintage computers are "funner" too so it made perfect sense to me.

:-)

Thanks!

Andrew Lynch

[Terry Yager]

Hard to explain. It's a misuse of a superlative. For example, when describing the temperatures on a number of summer days, you would say one was "hot", another was "hotter" and yes another was "hottest". The word "fun" doesn't work that way. If you try to use "fun", "funner" and "funnest", it makes one sound uneducated. (Instead, one would say "fun", "more fun" and "much more fun").

HTH,
Andy

Actually, it's a comparative adverb. The superlative would be 'funnest'. Not that I'm 'educateder' than others. Hell, I made it almost all the way through the ninth grade...

--T

[carlsson]

Aha, I really thought you could compare it fun - funn(i)er - funn(i)est. It is a bit like new - newer - newest?

[ahm]

Terry, if you want to get picky, "fun" is a noun.
In this case, it's being bent into a comparative adverb.
For simplicity's sake I didn't think we really needed to get into all of that.

P.S. You misspelled "neener neener".

[Vlad]

Ok, cool statement about Erik getting mentioned has been made. Far too much OT discussion here. This is a Vintage Computer Forum, not a grammer forum, c'mon folks....

-Vlad

[Terry Yager]

Grammer & style discussion continued in 'General Off-Topic'...

--T

[mbbrutman]

Whyz botherz continuing itz at zall?

[Erik]

Poor Evan. :D

I wouldn't worry about it. It's a good article and I think the quote in question was a good thing to keep. I liked the comparison and you did a better job with that question than I did. Plus your clarification on the BLOG helps a lot.

The article sure has made the rounds and I'm impressed by the reaction to it. I've seen more page hits and site visits since publication than in any month prior!

I got a note from my ISP on Thursday night warning me that I was almost out of bandwidth for the month. I checked yesterday morning and I was at 92% of my quota on the 13th!

I upgraded to the next level of service (tripling bandwidth and disk space) to keep us rolling. Just in time, too, since we crossed over my old threshold this morning! ;)

Meanwhile, emails and guestbook posts keep coming in from this mention which shows how many other folks are into this kind of thing but who just don't know about the hobby yet!

This is all great stuff and funner than you could imagine!