FAQ: GLOSSARY

GrumblesMcGee
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Joined: Wed Apr 17, 2019 7:53 pm

Re: FAQ: GLOSSARY

Post by GrumblesMcGee »

It's cute how quickly a position crumbles. Let's follow the bouncing ball here.

First, PsyGuy stubbornly (surprise!) insists that he isn't trying to create barriers while straw-manning the critique against him:

> If I was so disposed to creating barriers, why would I create a glossary and explain
> terms when asked. Introducing them on first use is not very helpful...

Then, PsyGuy doubles down, arguing that not only does he not intend to create barriers through his writing, but that his writing doesn't create barriers, period:

> So the difference between being disposed to creating barriers or that my
> writing creates barriers differentiates the barriers how? Your position is
> my writing creates barriers, mine is that it doesnt.

Oh, how quickly that shifts. Even in the same post cited above, he starts to walk out this "beyond the text" argument. It'd be a great argument if we weren't on a de facto help forum. But the "my writing [doesn't] create barriers" argument crumbles instantly. Heliotrope kicks it off:

> If a lot of people have to look up the acronyms used, in a glossary they
> might not know exists, it does create a barrier.
> It's pretty standard to introduce acronyms upon first use [...] and it's standard for an obvious reason:
> it lowers the barrier.

PsyGuy instantly concedes that readers have extra work to do to understand him:

> Well readers will have to explore the text to determine if there is a glossary.

After Heliotrope (accurately) points out that many readers will be confused by the acronym and not even know a glossary exists (let's call that a "barrier not overcome"), he hits the nail on the head:

> Plus it adds a step, where introducing the acronym upon first use in the
> thread isn't much extra work, plus it should be second nature to you if you
> ever attended university.

At this point, most people would just concede. Maybe a little righteous indignation ("I help people, I'm entitled to some shorthand") could be understood. But the battle is lost. The point is proven. That PsyGuy's writings creates barriers is beyond contestation by any rational........wait...

PsyGuy argues that they'll [all?] know of and consult the glossary, adding:

> So what, lots of systems processes can add a step, its a step, type
> 'glossary', click search. Its not climbing Everest.

In a few short posts we went from.

PsyGuy: I don't intend to add any obstacles to understanding. I'm helpful. I've added a glossary. My writing doesn't add any obstacles.

...to...

PsyGuy: "So what, lots of processes can add a step."

Honestly, PsyGuy, you should've stuck with your selfish "the time and typing savings are significant" argument. It's still laughable, but for a different reason. You spend a LOT of time [trying to?] [help?] people here. It's worthy of admiration. Even as I critique you, I've gone out of my way to acknowledge the areas where you are knowledgeable and your assistance valuable. You deserve credit for that. And if you could make a coherent argument along the lines of "I'm able to help the same amount and save 10% of my typing time with acronyms," it'd be hard to deny you your "time and typing savings."

But it's all bull. What do you really save from these acronyms? 1% of your forum time? Probably less. As an old saying goes, the cheap pay twice. Whatever you save, you wind up having to explain at length after reading follow-up inquiries. That's assuming everyone who doesn't get it follows up (they don't), and that's also ignoring THEIR lost time trying (often unsuccessfully) to look "beyond the text" for meaning.

You ultimately fail in your defense because of the very nature of this forum. You're [ostensibly] trying to help people. No one's forcing you to, you aren't paid, you aren't even receiving "credit" beyond your pseudonymous persona. If those you try to help don't fully grasp your meaning, or need twice as long to decipher your meaning, or have to follow up with you, you've helped them LESS. But instead of taking the constructive criticism, you hunker down into a ball of idiotic stubbornness, making your stand with an indefensible "I create no barriers" position.

You do. You've admitted that you're now aware, waving it off as an extra "step" (an understatement), but let me just put it this way, as someone NOT on your official adversaries list: if you're really so deluded that you think your time savings from (often made-up) acronyms outweighs the lost time (and lost comprehension) of readers, you have no reason to help people in the first place.

Oh, and an aside. Asking someone to spell out not-universally-understood acronyms "on first use" applies at least at the thread level (one *could* argue that it applies to posts; I'm not making that argument). The whole "its [sic] a minority of readers that will go back to read previous posts on common topics" routine is a red herring; as long as the acronym is spelled out the first time it's used in a thread, that's sufficient.
PsyGuy
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Post by PsyGuy »

@GrumblesMcGee

No straw man argument about it, as common I provide a glossary and I am happy too and have explained the use of terms.
Your position is my writing creates barriers, mine is that it doesnt. Thers no shift thats how it is.

Were not on a defacto help forum, this is a discussion forum. No where in any of our forums headlines is the term help used, this isnt the IE customer support forum.

Readers have extra work to do thats no different from any other text provider. You dont understand a term, look to see if theres a glossary, is it an extra step, yes, is it an accepted and common extra step, still yes.
Again my writing doesnt create barriers no more than what is acceptable and typical in other texts.

Your argument is that a common additional step is a barrier and its not.

Even if I accept your argument that its only 1% efficiency, Im the sole and exclusive authority on what degree of efficiency I consider significant. 1% is significantly important to me and Im the one doing the writing.

Is there some authoritative manual of style or convention I have violated that dictates I must define the use of acronyms or terms in each post or thread, because Im pretty sure there isnt, and Im really sure that @GrumblesMcGee claims that such rule "applies" or that such standard is "sufficient", is a claim I have to give absolutely zero deference too.
Nothing has changed from my previous conclusion in that you dont like jargon, acronyms and technical language and your against their use, despite being a common practice in edu and my previous post and example support that. Your opinion on whether its pretentious or not isnt relevant to me, Im not going to change or adapt alternative usage as your argument is ultimately without merit and unpersuasive, your assumption is that this is a help forum, and its not, you might think it is, and I dont share your position, and Im not adapting your position because you deem it so.
Heliotrope
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Re: Reply

Post by Heliotrope »

This is not a help forum?
Thanks for clearing that up, I was confused by all the threads in which people are asking for help.
The 'discussion' is merely about what the right answer to their request for help is (and yes, in some cases we do get off-topic by discussing lots of unrelated or slightly related things). I know it says 'Discussion Boards' at the top in the menu bar, but if you look at the posts being posted, they're all people asking for help.

But of course you can call it a discussion forum if you want. You're still making it more difficult for people to read your answers to the questions (sorry: discussion starters) by not introducing the acronyms used where it really isn't much trouble to do so, and only a few of those will think of the possibility that the forum might contain a glossary. I didn't for example.
Plus the glossary doesn't even contain all the acronyms used. Assessment Only (AO), used by you in a recent topic, is missing for example, and 'AO' also doesn't yield results when searched for with the search function either. By the way, it took me less than three seconds to type 'Assessment Only'.
PsyGuy
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Post by PsyGuy »

@Heliotrope

Good to see things cleared up for you and you agree that this is a discussion forum. Its not the IE customer support forum.
Im not doing anything that isnt common practice for any text provider.
Im happy to define AO, which I did in that post, and to make an entry for it in the glossary.
I can type AO in one second which is a 67% efficiency savings over typing Assessment Only.
Heliotrope
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Re: Reply

Post by Heliotrope »

I don't agree.
It's primary purpose is to help people asking questions about IE.
And throwing acronyms at them that aren't introduced properly in the thread but are explained in a glossary they don't know exists isn't helping.
If you can't spare 2 extra seconds to do so, you might not be very eager to make your answers accessible to the readers, and it makes me wonder why you reply at length about many many things unrelated to the topics posted, such as telling @Thames Pirate that you know more about how much she's saving than she does herself. If you'd used all the seconds you've spend typing about that you could have explained a whole lot of acronyms upon first use in threads.
I admit I digress frequently as well, but then again I don't claim my time is so precious that I can't type two words to explain acronyms upon first use in the thread.
PsyGuy
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Comment

Post by PsyGuy »

@Heliotrope

We disagree
Heliotrope
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Re: Comment

Post by Heliotrope »

Yep.
GrumblesMcGee
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Re: Reply

Post by GrumblesMcGee »

Heliotrope wrote:
> I don't agree.
> It's primary purpose is to help people asking questions about IE.
> And throwing acronyms at them that aren't introduced properly in the thread
> but are explained in a glossary they don't know exists isn't helping.
> If you can't spare 2 extra seconds to do so, you might not be very eager to
> make your answers accessible to the readers, and it makes me wonder why you
> reply at length about many many things unrelated to the topics posted, such
> as telling @Thames Pirate that you know more about how much she's saving
> than she does herself. If you'd used all the seconds you've spend typing
> about that you could have explained a whole lot of acronyms upon first use
> in threads.
> I admit I digress frequently as well, but then again I don't claim my time
> is so precious that I can't type two words to explain acronyms upon first
> use in the thread.

Glad someone got to the "you waste so much time here yet can't afford the 2 seconds?" part of our scripted melodrama. I knew it was inevitable but didn't want to preemptively answer PsyGuy's predictable retorts.

I think a lot of us get diverted into silly arguments [and probably enjoy them too much], so I'm loathe to propose any sort of "quit bickering and spend that time making your posts clearer" deal. Get your kicks wherever/whenever you want. But anyone who knowingly obfuscates their attempts to help others in the name of "time savings," but is willing to spend hours on the meta level chirping in defense of their obfuscation, has serious issues.

And the whole intertextuality argument is a complete joke. This isn't a graduate class. It's not scholarly research. It's not even Wikipedia (and any effort to hotlink your acronyms to glossaries, etc., would make you an even bigger hypocrite, as that would take more time than simply spelling them out). The notion that someone asking a straightforward question should look for baseline understanding of your response text beyond the text--to your OTHER texts--goes beyond naval-gazing and fart-sniffing to full-blown idiocy. I write this as someone who has no problem with the EXISTENCE of your glossaries or even your penchant for copying and pasting some of your (occasionally dubious) rants as part of an answer. If someone asks a complicated question and you give them the baseline answer, sure, pull a "see also" move and point people to additional resources. But if your answer qua answer cannot be sufficiently understood because of selfish "time savings" choices (really a stalking horse for your egotistical desire to spew/invent jargon), you're crossing a threshold.

You perform a service here, beyond entertainment--at least on certain topics. Embrace it, take the constructive criticism, improve your efforts to assist, and put down that shovel. Or is this just going to be the long-unawaited sequel to The Cost of Apartments in The Hague?
GrumblesMcGee
Posts: 72
Joined: Wed Apr 17, 2019 7:53 pm

Re: FAQ: GLOSSARY

Post by GrumblesMcGee »

Does anyone else want to take over the portfolio on the whole "a step is a barrier" thing? Or is he just too trollish to deserve the keystrokes on that one? I'm tired.
PsyGuy
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Post by PsyGuy »

@GrumblesMcGee

Isnt all jargon invented?
Im the sole and exclusive authority on what is and isnt a waste of my time.
Nothing has changed from my previous conclusion in that you dont like jargon, acronyms and technical language and your against their use, despite being a common practice in edu and my previous post and example support that. Ive considered your constructive criticism (and I do consider it constructive), weighed and measured it and found it wanting, and thus absent of merit and unpersuasive.

Still €1900
Heliotrope
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Joined: Sun May 13, 2018 1:48 am

Re: Reply

Post by Heliotrope »

> Im the sole and exclusive authority on what is and isnt a waste of my time.

Nobody is disputing that, but it says something that you don't mind investing time to engage in endless discussions that have nothing to do with the the OP's questions, but don't want to take two seconds to introduce an acronym (which you then quite often have to explain later anyway, thus rendering your time-saving argument irrelevant).

And yes, I also frequently engage in endless discussions. Like TO (this one).
secondplace
Posts: 191
Joined: Thu Apr 14, 2016 12:40 pm

Re: FAQ: GLOSSARY

Post by secondplace »

IHJAAALOP.

Sorry,

I hate jargon and abhor a lack of punctuation.

Just sayin'
PsyGuy
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Comment

Post by PsyGuy »

@Heliotrope

I take your question.
GrumblesMcGee
Posts: 72
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Re: Reply

Post by GrumblesMcGee »

Heliotrope wrote:
> > Im the sole and exclusive authority on what is and isnt a waste of my time.
>
> Nobody is disputing that, but it says something that you don't mind investing time to
> engage in endless discussions that have nothing to do with the the OP's questions,
> but don't want to take two seconds to introduce an acronym (which you then quite
> often have to explain later anyway, thus rendering your time-saving argument
> irrelevant).
>
> And yes, I also frequently engage in endless discussions. Like TO (this one).

I have to do this.

Actually, I'm disputing that PsyGuy is the "sole and exclusive authority" on what is/n't a waste of his time. He can be the primary authority, but when he crosses the threshold into ridiculousness or trollish behavior, he opens the door to critique.

Not only are his ubiquitous acronyms and use of jargon a detriment to understanding, undermining the ostensible purpose of his contributions, they're a net waste of time given the "cleanup" work he does after the fact.

He's entitled to waste his time. He's entitled to claim he's the arbiter of when he chooses waste/conserve time. But
that doesn't change the objective, external reality: he's wasting time, not saving it. And my reasonable outside perspective is that he uses jargon not to save time, but to gain satisfaction. And he knows it, doesn't care, and gains additional satisfaction from lobbing flimsy arguments in defense of his choices.

That's fine. It's weird as hell considering he provides value to many people with some of his posts. But weird is just gonna do weird.
PsyGuy
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Location: Northern Europe

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Post by PsyGuy »

@GrumblesMcGee

There is nothing about my behavior thats either ridiculousness or trollish, your self appointed role as a critic is nothing more than your opinion and your position. Being a critic gives you an opinion it doesnt make you an authority.
While you disagree with technical language its just your claim that its detrimental, undermines understanding, and ubiquitous, and your claims are not self authenticating. They arent a waste of time because @GrumblesMcGee deems them to be, Im the sole arbiter on what is and is not a waste of my time, and I find your argument to the contrary absent of merit, and unpersuasive and thus dismiss it.
Im not wasting time and Im the sole and exclusive authority of hat is an is not a waste or worthy of my time.
The objective ana1ysis and external defacto reality is that Im saving time.
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