E-mail after graduation

[Idealist]

You condecsending, ungrateful pleb. The association do alot for the university, and many students, who are also studying for a degree put alot of their time into it only to get snide remarks like yours thrown back.

That bitter attitude of yours will come back to haunt u one day.

Quoting Aelius Theon from 12:28, 13th May 2005

Quoting Eliot Wilson from 11:48, 13th May 2005
Did the Association actually discuss this with IT Services beforehand, or did they (as I suspect might be the case) turn up with their referendum result and get all stroppy with IT because of their "mandate"?

Surprisingly, for The Sinner, some sense has been spoken in this thread by those arguing with the proposers of this absurd whinge.

'Referenda' run and/or invented by the tossers in the Student Association (as they clearly have nothing better to do, like getting a degree for instance) carry about as much weight with the University and its appointed staff as a manifesto pledge does with New Labour.

While I can happily say I know little (and would prefer to know less) about the Student Association (I wish we could disaffiliate from it as easily as we can from the NUS), I do have some understanding of IT and specifically LIS within the University.

Nob-jockeys who think they are somehow entitled to free email for life and who bandy about 'costs' for bandwidth and email server hosting have about as much clue about the real world as the bejewelled yahs currently hanging about smoking outside the Library do about their upcoming exams.

It never fails to amaze me, having been an undergrad at the end of Thatcher's 80s, a senior manager in business in the 90s, and then a postgrad here, how greedy, ingrate, thoughtless, selfish, ignorant, feeble, naive, intolerant, unworthy, unintellectual, grasping, and arrogant students are today.

[hr]

"...I'm in love with someone I haven't even met yet..."

[Starla]

Um, you can actually get alummni (sp?) email addresses I think...
I know someone with one anyway...

[Steveo]

Quoting Starla from 13:59, 13th May 2005
Um, you can actually get alummni (sp?) email addresses I think...
I know someone with one anyway...

I seem to recall the e-mail saying that you had to have a good reason, e.g. be contributing to the university, to keep the account.

Perhaps if you just ask ITS nicely, they would extend the time they keep an account active, worth a try anyway.

[Al]

Quoting Aelius Theon from 13:09, 13th May 2005
Sorry, can't see anything wrong with either. Perhaps it is the 'Students' Association' but frankly I care not. 'Association hackery I suspect' is perfectly correct. You yourself should learn when to use speech marks (for speech only) and when inverted commas are the accepted academic convention (for direct quotation). Come to one of my English classes sometime.

"Association hackery, I suspect." would be perfectly correct.

Actually, the use of either double or single inverted commas/quotation marks (there is no such thing as "speech marks") is - unless stipulated by editorial policy - simply a matter of personal preference.

[Aelius Theon]

Criticising the English of others really is the lowest form of argument, and I find generally is the intellectual cripple's substitute for any real retort. Kindly desist.

While it is generally considered poor form to criticise the English of those more intellectually challenged than oneself, this is, in case you had failed to notice (blinded by the hordes of 'revisers' sunbathing outside the Library), an academic institution.

I would not be able to find you one academic in my school, or in any other school or academic department in this university and in the other for whom I lecture, who would agree with your assertion. Academics, as you know, are notorious pedants.

Learning to express oneself competently, clearly, and above all correctly, is (or should be, despite this dumbed-down New Labour culture of celebrating mediocrity) part of one's education. After all, it is I believe a small but important part of why you come here to learn and why we teach you.

[Aelius Theon]

Quoting Al from 14:55, 13th May 2005

"Association hackery, I suspect." would be perfectly correct.

Actually, the use of either double or single inverted commas/quotation marks (there is no such thing as "speech marks") is - unless stipulated by editorial policy - simply a matter of personal preference.

Both are perfectly correct. Mine has additional (intended) ambiguity of reading.

You might have meant 'there ARE no such things as speech marks', but even then, you would be quite wrong. You would also be at odds with accepted academic convention in Schools and Departments of English in this university and a large number of others (my own experience could give you Oxford, Cambridge, Warwick, UEA, Bangor, Sheffield Hallam), not to mention CCUE (the Council for College and University English), one of the most important and respected academic bodies in this country.

[exnihilo]

I don't see why ITS should keep your email address for you after you graduate, I really don't. If people keep them for life we'd pretty soon be on such ridiculous addresses as js1065@st-and.ac.uk, the numbers are odious as is without them becoming ridiculously large. Even when the highest number I knew of following my initials was 4 I got plenty of email intended for others (granted I had no number, so I probably got more than 1, 2 and 3). I wasn't always as scrupulous as I should have been about forwarding them to the correct person and when we have hundreds to choose from, neither will anyone else be, so plenty of messages will go astray.

Moreover, the email address provided by the University is for university matters, not your own private email for signing up to porn sites and newsgroups and what have you. You should have your own address, privately, if you want to use it for non-academic matters. If you leave a company, you don't get to take your work email with you, why should this be different?

Finally, at the risk of the usual "it's a messageboard, I can spell properly when I want to" response, why is it low to criticise English standards? This is, as Aelius Theon has pointed out, a university, surely some sort of attempt to get things right can be expected? Besides which, the usual argument that you know the correct standards but just choose not to employ them is not borne out by the standard of written work I have to mark. So instead of bleating about it and about personal expression, learn to spell, punctuate and construct grammatical sentences. You'll find you get taken more seriously.

[Eliot Wilson]

I quite agree, on almost all points. Expecting to keep your university e-mail after graduation is even more preposterous than wanting to. I haven't used my university e-mail for years; it automatically forwards everything to my Hotmail account, because Webmail is a great steaming pile of shit. That said, it's a step forward from Telnet.

Also, if you bleat about people criticising your standard of English, here's an idea: write better English. It isn't hard, as it is(for most of you) your first language. If you know how to write proper and grammatical English, then do. If you don't, learn to do so. And I have to agree with exnihilo here: my experience of undergraduate work suggests that most fall into the latter rather than the former category. And please don't plead that "it doesn't matter, you knew what I meant", because then I'll be forced to hunt you down and kill you. You won't like it, and I won't like it (well, I will, a little bit).

[hr]

Bill and Ted beat the Grim Reaper at Twister

Bill: "You played very well, Death, especially with your totally heavy Death robes."

Death: "Don't patronise me."

[Ga]

This may be an "academic institution", but it does not excusse you from acting like an arsehole.

Going after somebodys' spelling and grammar instead of answering their agument is acting like an arsehole.

Indeed, it is usualy the last resort of an arsehole who has already lost the agument.


[hr]

If everything in life had a point, life would be pointless

[Aelius Theon]

Quoting Ga from 16:06, 13th May 2005
This may be an "academic institution", but it does not excusse you from acting like an arsehole.

Going after somebodys' spelling and grammar instead of answering their agument is acting like an arsehole.

Indeed, it is usualy the last resort of an arsehole who has already lost the agument.

No idea what an 'agument' is but I think you'll find in my postings at least that I engaged with the argument AND discussed grammar. You, sadly, appear to be illiterate AND unable to argue coherently. Merely calling people 'arseholes' instead of discussing properly really proves the point, wouldn't you say?

Thank god for fellow tutors Mr Wilson and exnihilo. Also, like me, graduates of this university, and therefore more than qualified to comment effectively and sensibly on this 'agument'.

[Ga]

Quoting Aelius Theon from 16:14, 13th May 2005
No idea what an 'agument' is but I think you'll find in my postings at least that I engaged with the argument AND discussed grammar. You, sadly, appear to be illiterate AND unable to argue coherently. Merely calling people 'arseholes' instead of discussing properly really proves the point, wouldn't you say?

Thank god for fellow tutors Mr Wilson and exnihilo. Also, like me, graduates of this university, and therefore more than qualified to comment effectively and sensibly on this 'agument'.

Game. Set. And the match.

*takes a bow*

[hr]

If everything in life had a point, life would be pointless

[Eliot Wilson]

Now, the really arsey thing to do would be to correct your grammar and spelling, wouldn't it, Ga? I'll leave that to someone else. What you're failing to notice, though, is that there are two concurrent strands here. I'll try to explain them; the slow of thinking can read carefully a couple of times to make sure they've got it.

1) ITS has no obligation to maintain university e-mail accounts for graduates, nor should graduates expect their accounts to be maintained; to repeat the analogy, your work e-mail account would lapse if you moved jobs, so why shouldn't your university account lapse when you leave?

2)Standards of spelling, grammar and syntax are often poor, for which there is (in the main) no excuse. As I said before, if you don't like being corrected, get it right first time.

So no-one was "going after somebodys' [sic] spelling and grammar instead of answering their argument". Actually, I think Aelius Theon was doing both. He's tricky like that, you see.

[hr]

Bill and Ted beat the Grim Reaper at Twister

Bill: "You played very well, Death, especially with your totally heavy Death robes."

Death: "Don't patronise me."

[Eliot Wilson]

Quoting Ga from 16:17, 13th May 2005
Game. Set. And the match.

*takes a bow*

If you think so, dear.

Apologies to readers; Aelius Theon posted before me and said much the same thing. Still, if something's true, it bears repetition, I suppose.

[hr]

Bill and Ted beat the Grim Reaper at Twister

Bill: "You played very well, Death, especially with your totally heavy Death robes."

Death: "Don't patronise me."

[exnihilo]

It does. I, too, would be interested to know where anyone has concentrated in grammar and spelling and ignored people's arguments. If anyone ignored arguments, Ga, it was your good self who instead of participating in the discussion about email decided to attack those who were for the way in which they had and, moreover, to resort to personal insults. I hope in tutorials you don't do that. That said, I wouldn't be surprised.

[Ga]

*sigh*

Shall I explain?

I have made no comment of my own on the Webmail addresses issue.

My first post was a comment on the method by which are making an argument. IE An attack on spelling as if to reduce the impact of another persons argument, case and point, Aelius Theon's response to Steveo and the high and mighty vitriol that went with it.

Why? Because I have lost count of the number of times I have faced such mind numbing pettyness.

Now, the idea is simple, I propose that in the real world situation, such attacks are nothing short of arseholedom. Indeed I have seem similar methods of argument that have be made in a face to face level that result in fists being thrown.

Now to prove this point, insert the standard 30 second webboard reply from a guy who has spelling problems (with 2 edits to make it readable). Attacking this method of argument, and quite rightly, saying that only an arsehole would use them.

The bait is set.

In comes the classic response, straight for the spelling.

Hook, line, and sinker for the oldest trick in the book.

I may not be able to spell, but there are word processors.
Attitudes such as those demonstrated by the 3 of you are much harder to solve.


[hr]

If everything in life had a point, life would be pointless

[Eliot Wilson]

Don't you think that it would have been odd for someone who believes that spelling and grammar are important not to mention yours? You'll note, anyway, that I tried to clarify the strands of the argument you were avoiding. You, on the other hand, decided just to call someone an arsehole. Which do we think is the more constructive approach?

[hr]

Bill and Ted beat the Grim Reaper at Twister

Bill: "You played very well, Death, especially with your totally heavy Death robes."

Death: "Don't patronise me."

[oddly familiar]

Quoting Eliot Wilson from 17:39, 13th May 2005
Don't you think that it would have been odd for someone who believes that spelling and grammar are important not to mention yours? You'll note, anyway, that I tried to clarify the strands of the argument you were avoiding. You, on the other hand, decided just to call someone an arsehole. Which do we think is the more constructive approach?

[hr]

Bill and Ted beat the Grim Reaper at Twister

Bill: "You played very well, Death, especially with your totally heavy Death robes."

Death: "Don't patronise me."

On the other hand, Aelius Theon weighed into the discussion by calling current students “greedy, ingrate, thoughtless, selfish, ignorant, feeble, naive, intolerant, unworthy, unintellectual, grasping, and arrogant”. Oh, and “nob-jockeys”. This was done with almost no provocation, even if he later tried to make it all better by saying he was only referring to “some” students.

I imagine that had he not started off posting in such an angry manner, people may not have taken exception to his following statements. You also neglect the fact that despite your assertion to “the slow of thinking” that the two strands of this thread are separate, Aelius Theon made the first attack on grammar in reply to a statement about how he had got his facts wrong. Thus his assertion that in his postings he “engaged with the argument AND discussed grammar” is incorrect. He did NOT engage with the argument, at least not with that post.

Anyway, this thread seems to be descending rapidly into name calling, and I’m perfectly happy with my email arrangements, so I shall now bow out and not return.


[hr]

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[Newty]

The point is that it distracts from the point of the thread. It creates an argument just for the sake of creating an argument when the grammatical/syntactical faux pas should be obvious to the intelligent reader of the thread. Yes it's irritating but please content yourselves with the fact that whoever did it shot themselves in the foot already, there's no need to kick them when they're down. By all means deduct marks from undergraduate coursework for it but there's no need to point it out on a messageboard - get on with the thrust of your argument and leave the poor man's typing skills alone.

Aelius Theon I accept did not ignore Steveo's comments entirely but to first criticise his English and only then continue the argument smacks of pedantry and only serves to create a hostile tone. Imagine standing up in opposition on a debate and saying "Well first I'd like to criticise Mr Watson for that dropped H..."

[hr]

Will Watson. Medical student. Cake lover.

Edited. Would you Adam and Eve it, a typing mistake.

[Pender Native]

Quoting Eliot Wilson from 17:39, 13th May 2005
Don't you think that it would have been odd for someone who believes that spelling and grammar are important not to mention yours?

Only if they criticised the spelling and grammar of every message they replied to. That would be annoying, but understandable. However, the complaint was made because Aelius Theon only criticised the spelling of this one post, presumably as an alternative to actually addressing the issue.

[hr]

"I have seen flowers come in stony places
And kind things done by men with ugly faces,
And the gold cup won by the worst horse at the races,
So I trust, too."

[Paranoid]

I think I missed the point where this thread switched from uni emails to NUS affiliation...!?!

[hr]

..I've got this pain down all the diodes on my left side...