Tuesday, July 15, 2003

Last night Jacob Levy told me that I saved his life by writing publicly about my experience with heart disease. That's the proudest moment for a writer, you want to know that you made a difference, and saving a father's life is about as good as it gets. With the system that's in place now, you won't get that. No way I'll take the chance. Send a message to Mark Pilgrim if this makes you angry. [Scripting News] My first reaction was to encourage you to keep talking freely and ignore the hecklers; free speech always attracts some, but they'll soon get tired of their sterile pursuits. But then I thought of a Usenet news group of yesteryear that used to be a great community — funny, edgy, informative, argumentative — and was ruined by a few relentless, pathological flamers. The standard recommendation to improve one's killfile did not help when every conversation was corrupted by flames and their echoes. There's a big difference between occasional arguments, however strongly worded, and relentless pursuit. 12:08:09 AM