Tuesday, March 22, 2011

Typecast: Hostage situation

12 comments:

  1. Theological questions, Yay! How soon before the Typerati grows a secret police arm to right these horrible wrongs? We demand clandestine night-time extractions of endangered specimens from the clutches of the backslidden, faithless wretch by ninja agents of the secret government! Yes, ninjas are clearly the proper solution to apply to this travesty.

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  2. ...or maybe we should take up a collection and offer her fifty cents a pound for her machines, and get someone to drive a truck up there. That's likely a better price than she'd get by scrapping them.

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  3. She didn't just lose her initial motivation, she took offense at the tone that a discussion of keychopping took on the forum, and apparently decided that she would bail out of the hobby and thumb her nose at us all with the remark about scrapping the machines. I have to point out that if she sees this typecast (which is hardly impossible) she may go still more ballistic.

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  4. She sounds like a total snob, and unfortunately I live in the east coast and thus, I'm probably not going to get a lovely new typer. However I agree with Ted and think we should do that! I want pristine machine please!

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  5. Poo, my request to join the Yahoo group was summarily denied. I must not have given the proper secret handshake. ):

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  6. I've considered driving there myself...it may be a 5 hour drive, so I'm not sure I want to do that, but I have sent her an e-mail to get an address. So far, I haven't heard anything back...

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  7. Based on what Richard is saying - and a private email I received - there seems to be so much more to this story, and I find it incredibly sad that someone would do this - or threaten to - merely out of spite, which is what it looks like.

    If this typecast is read and taken the wrong way by any concerned parties, oh well. I am a stranger on the internet that most of you will never meet (to be quite honest, although I will let you all know if I'm visiting) and the fact that my - or any of our - stated observations and expressed opinions might incite someone else to such drastic (and expensive in so many ways) action is really quite inconceivable to me.

    I'll sit back and see how all this shakes out - it might all turn out to be a ruse.

    @Ted - Denied? Did you at least include a link to your blog? It must have been a mistake - you should send a message to Will Davis via his blog and state your case. Brouhaha or no, you are very well-qualified to be a member of PTF!

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  8. As if I need one more online group to join! Until they let me in, I am curious about where this disgruntled typerati is located. If she's five hours from @deek, she might be closer to me.

    Plans for a militant typerati branch aside, we can not force anyone to stay in the typosphere. If someone wants out, we should be understanding and help to find worthy homes for her machines.

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  9. I am now accepted into the aforementioned Yahoo Portable Typewriter group. I merely had to mention how handsome and erudite I am, and that I am a man of the cloth. My professional and personal qualifications clearly grease the rails for my admittance into any social tier. :D

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  10. I'm not usually a voice of contention...but I have to admit, although the threat (insincere as it is likely to be) is rather petty and obviously primarily meant to goad, I'm a little taken aback by how violently people have pounced on her to get their hands on the typewriters, without any attempt to reason or dissuade. I understand that it's at least partially motivated by a desire to save machines from destruction, but even so... But maybe that's just me. I only skimmed over the original argument, so maybe I'm missing some of the story.

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  11. @MTCoalhopper - I have been cautioned not to drag this out (and besides the topic seems to be dying a natural death now that most suspect it was merely a ruse), but I will say that the person is located in the, er, Windy City. For the rest of the story, you'll have to join PTF (it's worth your while) and look up the relevant threads. It's the most drama I've seen on the forum since I joined almost a year ago, and I really am stunned.

    @Ted: Great news! Now that you are a card-carrying PTF member, I'm sure you have not hesitated in getting up to speed. Hmm, so you really are a Reverend...

    @LFP: In the defense of the bargain-hunting collectors (who have come out to defend themselves as well, I now see), the scenario is not entirely implausible - in January a collector from the other typewriter forum offered up her collection (this time with price list and viewing times), citing lack of interest, financial hardship, etc. So it happens. The big red flag here was the imminent destruction, of course, which is hard to believe and should have alerted respondents that there was more to the story. On the other hand, not everyone faithfully reads every message posted to the forum, so the argument that preceded might have been missed by many. Glad all of it's died down now, though.

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  12. I have to admit, I jumped at the opportunity, privately via e-mail, as soon as I saw the post/threat.

    I really didn't care about the reason, I just saw an opportunity to look through a huge collection and maybe find some gems.

    Now, that can be taken as selfish that all I wanted was more, more, more. Or, it could be taken as not wanting to get personal and let their own reasons be let to themselves. Since I never received a reply to my note, I wrote the whole thing off, but had I, I'd like to think I may have inquired more if I noticed some trouble...

    With there being a couple of the typosphere near Chicago, I was also kind of excited to meet up over a weekend trip. Maybe another time!

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