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#31
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Microsoft Rewards?
On 6/26/2018 7:35 PM, VanguardLH wrote:
cameo wrote: I keep getting this email from , but the email does not address me by my regular name just by my first name initial. Sounds like some phishing scam, so I don't click on its hot area. Has any of you got it, too? If you no longer want to get those e-mails, you can unsubscribe from them. Login and see if the following URL works: https://account.microsoft.com/profile/communications Else, somewhere in your account should be communication preference settings where you can opt out of all of their superfluous messages. Not a problem after seeing that it is not really a scam. But thanks for the tip nevertheless. |
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#32
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OT: Microsoft Rewards? (now OT: grammar!)
In message , Mayayana
writes: "J. P. Gilliver (John)" wrote | I don't _think_ your inversion is correct - try it with "includes": | X includes Y and Z, but X is included of Y and Z? I think not. (Wouldn't | work with "contains", either.) My Websters dictionary lists both usages: 1) include. contain. 2) to consist of (a nation comprising 13 states) I like; no "of". 3) to make up; form; constitute (a nation comprised of 13 states) At the end of # 3 it then says this: "In this sense regarded by some as a loose usage." I'm one of those some. (Is that grammatical?) I kid you not. Though one wonders what they mean by loose here, doesn't one? It sounds like a passive-aggressive moral judgement, accusing someone of conjugating with shady characters. Lovely! Then again, what isn't loose by British standards? (Don't talk to me about British Standards. The British Standards Institution charges for them. [IMO standards, like patents and several other similar things, should be free.]) | I think comprise (and include, for that | matter) are verbs that can't _be_ passivated. I do hope they shoot people in England for such lawless verbification. I am _really_ enjoying your use of language (-:. Interestingly, passivate actually is a word. It means to put a protective coating on metal. I actually knew that (hence my "(?!)"). I don't think it ever meant make passive though - not of a verb anyway! One of the MS pages about their rewards suggests that people can visit the rewards options page when they feel "spendy". But I rather like "spendy"! MS are comprised of techies, who have never (You did that "comprised of" deliberately, didn't you!) been famour for literacy. MS have a long history of artlessly contorting the language in the interest of marketing. Even Bill Gates, who comprises the most geniussy guy in his own mind, seems to limit himself to only one, adolescent, superlative: super. As in, "That chick is super well comprised." My parents would have loved your love of language. There was a BBC comedy series (called "The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin" - I'd recommend it), in which there were a couple of young men characters; when a boss said something, one of them would almost always say "great", to which the other would inevitably respond "super". After a reversal of fortune of the company, they got jobs similar to what they'd had before, but changed to "marvellous" and "terrific". -- J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf so that the vendors can "serve you better". As if you were a tennis ball, I guess. - Wolf K, in alt.windows7.general, 2014-7-21 |
#33
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OT: Microsoft Rewards? (now OT: grammar!)
"J. P. Gilliver (John)" wrote
| One of the MS pages about their rewards | suggests that people can visit the rewards | options page when they feel "spendy". But | | I rather like "spendy"! | Really? I cringed at it. But I've noticed that Brits like a touch of cuteness. Windy, for instance. Or the nicknames among the upper class, which seem to be silly in direct proportion to a person's social importance. | MS are comprised of techies, who have never | | (You did that "comprised of" deliberately, didn't you!) | I'll never tell. | There was a BBC comedy series (called "The Fall and Rise of Reginald | Perrin" - I'd recommend it), in which there were a couple of young men | characters; when a boss said something, one of them would almost always | say "great", to which the other would inevitably respond "super". After | a reversal of fortune of the company, they got jobs similar to what | they'd had before, but changed to "marvellous" and "terrific". I've often appreciated British culture for the use of English. It's their language and it shows. They often use it respectfully and lovingly. I liked the Jeeves And Wooster series for that. It was also a great example of silly upper class names. In the US there's little appreciation for the art of language. Like everything else, it's an athletic competition, with points being awarded for swagger and fashion, yo. |
#34
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OT: Microsoft Rewards? (now OT: grammar!)
"Mayayana" wrote in message
news In the US there's little appreciation for the art of language. Like everything else, it's an athletic competition, with points being awarded for swagger and fashion, yo. America is great for coming up with new usages and phrases which we in the UK condemn as "too American", and then a few decades later we start to adopt as if we'd invented them :-) However the one word that still grates on my ears, several decades after I first heard it, is the business buzzword "leverage", as in "we will grow (*) our business in order to leverage an increase in market penetration". OK, I made that one up! I don't know whether it means anything because I've never known *precisely* what "leverage" means. And anyway, in the UK we pronounce the noun "leever" rather than "levver", so it would be "levverage" :-) The ultimate teeth-on-edge usage is when someone asks a waiter "can I get a cup of coffee" - meaning "will *you* get *me* a cup of coffee". "Can I get" suggests that I want to go to the machine and get myself a cup, which is not what you are asking the waiter. (*) That's another bugbear: the transitive use of "grow" in the sense of "cause to grow". You can grow flowers, but growing a business - what sort of seeds do you start with? ;-) |
#35
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OT: Microsoft Rewards? (now OT: grammar!)
On 06/28/2018 12:04 PM, NY wrote:
"Mayayana" wrote in message news * In the US there's little appreciation for the art of language. Like everything else, it's an athletic competition, with points being awarded for swagger and fashion, yo. America is great for coming up with new usages and phrases which we in the UK condemn as "too American", and then a few decades later we start to adopt as if we'd invented them :-) However the one word that still grates on my ears, several decades after I first heard it, is the business buzzword "leverage", as in "we will grow (*) our business in order to leverage an increase in market penetration". OK, I made that one up! I don't know whether it means anything because I've never known *precisely* what "leverage" means. And anyway, in the UK we pronounce the noun "leever" rather than "levver", so it would be "levverage" :-) The ultimate teeth-on-edge usage is when someone asks a waiter "can I get a cup of coffee" - meaning "will *you* get *me* a cup of coffee". "Can I get" suggests that I want to go to the machine and get myself a cup, which is not what you are asking the waiter. I would say the sentence should be "may I get a cup of coffee" if that was the intent, as I know I can, but may I? That's a teeth-on-edge thing for me, the can/may and their/there/they're issue. I stop or I'll go on for pages. :-) (*) That's another bugbear: the transitive use of "grow" in the sense of "cause to grow". You can grow flowers, but growing a business - what sort of seeds do you start with? ;-) Al |
#36
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Microsoft Rewards?
On 6/26/2018 7:42 AM, cameo wrote:
I keep getting this email from , but the email does not address me by my regular name just by my first name initial. Sounds like some phishing scam, so I don't click on its hot area. Has any of you got it, too? Call Micro$oft to confirm! -- @~@ Remain silent! Drink, Blink, Stretch! Live long and prosper!! / v \ Simplicity is Beauty! /( _ )\ May the Force and farces be with you! ^ ^ (x86_64 Ubuntu 9.10) Linux 2.6.39.3 不借貸! 不詐騙! 不*錢! 不援交! 不打交! 不打劫! 不自殺! 不求神! 請考慮綜援 (CSSA): http://www.swd.gov.hk/tc/index/site_...sub_addressesa |
#37
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OT: Microsoft Rewards? (now OT: grammar!)
"NY" wrote
| However the one word that still grates on my ears, several decades after I | first heard it, is the business buzzword "leverage", as in "we will grow (*) | our business in order to leverage an increase in market penetration". OK, I | made that one up! I don't know whether it means anything because I've never | known *precisely* what "leverage" means. And anyway, in the UK we pronounce | the noun "leever" rather than "levver", so it would be "levverage" :-) | I think that kind of thing is getting worse because a lot of effort is going into calculating language for effect. White collar people often have jargon for their particular trade and also jargon to make them sound intelligent or dynamic or both. Microsoft uses leverage a lot: "Leveraging solutions across the enterprise". Which means make use of software in business. My understanding of that is that leverage, in that case, means the same thing as using a stick to lift a heavy load; accomplishing more with what you've got. Software is not a solution, of course, until it solves a problem. But the Microsofties like to grant it that status beforehand. In fact, at some point they switched from calling software projects in Visual Studio "projects" and started calling them solutions. They don't even exist as usable software yet, but they're already solutions. Personally I think that use of leverage is a case of wanting to seem dynamic. Impact is similar. As in, "that movie was so impactful I cried". Normally people would probably say they were affected by the movie. But that's qualitative. It can't be measured by science. It's all a way of rendering experience in terms that could almost be measured using physics equations: leverage and impact. And of course the psycho-babble "community" are only too happy to assure us that yes, indeed, with the new dynamic MRIs we can measure impaction scientifically. But it seems to be more extreme with tech people, who tend to lack a sense of poetry. They get used to thinking in concrete terms. 1+1 always equals 2. There's no qualitative aspect. No texture. No irony. No ambiguity. I notice that in myself when I do a lot of programming. Artfulness dissipates. Experience is another interesting word. Microsoft have adopted that in their marketing. They talk about their products providing experiences, as though experience itself were a measurable, buyable consumer product. I find the most extreme language aggression comes from what I think of as liberal fascists. The politically correct people who insist that everyone follow their way. The left-wing equivalent of the Trumpian redneck. For example, "cisgender", which means male or female. Or rather, it means a man or woman who actually believes themselves to be a man or woman, and not some creative gender hybrid. There's a lot of talk lately about non-binary gender, which of course is a contradiction. But these people assert their view that gender should be a lifestyle freedom by denying that it has real existence; asserting that it's merely a social device. Thus, cisgender, or someone believing themselves to be the gender that they are, defines one category of gender and thereby creates endless new categories. Cisgender implies the existence of transgender, bi, hermaphroditic, or the gender of the week, as all being equal *choices*. |
#38
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OT: Microsoft Rewards? (now OT: grammar!)
"NY" wrote:
America is great for coming up with new usages and phrases which we in the UK condemn as "too American", and then a few decades later we start to adopt as if we'd invented them :-) Or spelling which we (UK) think of as American but in many cases has origins in English/Latin/French and where both forms were used (e.g. by Shakespeare) before the UK and US standardised (standardized) on their own particular preferences. However the one word that still grates on my ears, several decades after I first heard it, is the business buzzword "leverage" "We must develop knowledge optimization initiatives to leverage our key learnings". http://dilbert.com/strip/1998-11-26 You can add to that my bugbear: "going forward". Well, where else is your business going - backwards, sideways? |
#39
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OT: Microsoft Rewards? (now OT: grammar!)
On Thu, 28 Jun 2018 22:19:21 +0100, "Apd" wrote:
"NY" wrote: America is great for coming up with new usages and phrases which we in the UK condemn as "too American", and then a few decades later we start to adopt as if we'd invented them :-) Or spelling which we (UK) think of as American but in many cases has origins in English/Latin/French and where both forms were used (e.g. by Shakespeare) before the UK and US standardised (standardized) on their own particular preferences. However the one word that still grates on my ears, several decades after I first heard it, is the business buzzword "leverage" "We must develop knowledge optimization initiatives to leverage our key learnings". http://dilbert.com/strip/1998-11-26 You can add to that my bugbear: "going forward". Well, where else is your business going - backwards, sideways? In addition to all of the above, I'll add any sentence that begins with, "At the end of the day..." -- Char Jackson |
#40
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OT: Microsoft Rewards? (now OT: grammar!)
On Thu, 28 Jun 2018 12:35:09 -0400, Big Al wrote:
On 06/28/2018 12:04 PM, NY wrote: "Mayayana" wrote in message news * In the US there's little appreciation for the art of language. Like everything else, it's an athletic competition, with points being awarded for swagger and fashion, yo. America is great for coming up with new usages and phrases which we in the UK condemn as "too American", and then a few decades later we start to adopt as if we'd invented them :-) However the one word that still grates on my ears, several decades after I first heard it, is the business buzzword "leverage", as in "we will grow (*) our business in order to leverage an increase in market penetration". OK, I made that one up! I don't know whether it means anything because I've never known *precisely* what "leverage" means. And anyway, in the UK we pronounce the noun "leever" rather than "levver", so it would be "levverage" :-) The ultimate teeth-on-edge usage is when someone asks a waiter "can I get a cup of coffee" - meaning "will *you* get *me* a cup of coffee". "Can I get" suggests that I want to go to the machine and get myself a cup, which is not what you are asking the waiter. I would say the sentence should be "may I get a cup of coffee" if that was the intent, as I know I can, but may I? That's a teeth-on-edge thing for me, the can/may and their/there/they're issue. I stop or I'll go on for pages. :-) "Can I get a cup of coffee" - you're asking the server to make a medical diagnosis as to whether you'd be physically able to do it. The literal answer is probably yes, seeing as how you were able to push the door open, walk in, make your way to a table and sit down. The server will automatically translate the question into one that makes more sense. "May I get a cup of coffee" - you're asking the server for permission to get up and get yourself a cup of coffee. Likely, they'll mentally reject that idea and simply offer to bring it, instead. "Will you please bring..." and "I would like to have...", and "May I have...", as examples, are probably closer to correct, but the wrong versions are so widely used that few even notice anymore. I'm not a language/grammar geek, so it's entirely possible that my usage is wrong, as well. I went to Public School. -- Char Jackson |
#41
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OT: Microsoft Rewards? (now OT: grammar!)
In message , Char Jackson
writes: [] I'm not a language/grammar geek, so it's entirely possible that my usage is wrong, as well. I went to Public School. Even there, you can't escape the "two nations divided by a common language" matter! What I think is called a public school, or the public school system, in the USA, is called a state school, or other terms, in the UK. In the UK, "public school" usually means the ones (mostly) attended by the privileged - i. e. fee-paying. (The well-known ones like Eton and Harrow, but really any fee-paying one.) I've never been sure why we call them "public schools" - I think the argument might be that they are _open_ to any member of the public who can afford the fees, though if that _is_ the argument it's a weak one, since many have entrance exam.s. Further: US usage, I understand, uses "school" to include both child and adult education; in UK, with certain (mostly subject-specific) exceptions, where you go to get your degree is "university", "school" being for age 5 to about 16 or 18 only. (So "where did you go to school" has a different meaning in the two countries: isn't often asked in UK.) -- J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf Of course, this show - like every other cop show on earth - massively overstates the prevalence of violent crime: last year, in the whole of the UK, police fired their weapons just three times. And there were precisely zero fatalities. - Vincent Graff in RT, 2014/11/8-14 |
#42
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OT: Microsoft Rewards? (now OT: grammar!)
"Big Al" wrote in message
news The ultimate teeth-on-edge usage is when someone asks a waiter "can I get a cup of coffee" - meaning "will *you* get *me* a cup of coffee". "Can I get" suggests that I want to go to the machine and get myself a cup, which is not what you are asking the waiter. I would say the sentence should be "may I get a cup of coffee" if that was the intent, as I know I can, but may I? That's a teeth-on-edge thing for me, the can/may and their/there/they're issue. I stop or I'll go on for pages. :-) Yes I was ignoring the dreaded can/may problem. I almost take that as given, these days, along with the illogical "I could care less" instead of "I couldn't care less" (the latter implying that I care so little that I could not reduce my level of care to a lower value; the former means - well, not a lot! |
#43
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OT: Microsoft Rewards? (now OT: grammar!)
"Apd" wrote in message news
"NY" wrote: America is great for coming up with new usages and phrases which we in the UK condemn as "too American", and then a few decades later we start to adopt as if we'd invented them :-) Or spelling which we (UK) think of as American but in many cases has origins in English/Latin/French and where both forms were used (e.g. by Shakespeare) before the UK and US standardised (standardized) on their own particular preferences. I'm fairly relaxed about UK versus US spelling. The U in colour, humour etc, has no purpose and could be removed; likewise it is perverse that we reverse the R and E in theatre. But since that's what British spelling rules say, then I will fight to the death to spell the words that way :-) Cheque/check is an interesting one. British spelling allows a clear written distinction between the piece of paper which is an authorisation to pay money, and the crosshatch pattern on clothing or the verification of the state of something; American spelling doesn't. When corresponding with Americans, it's easier to spelling it "check" to avoid any hassle with "what does this word cheque mean?". |
#44
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OT: Microsoft Rewards? (now OT: grammar!)
"NY" wrote
| I'm fairly relaxed about UK versus US spelling. The U in colour, humour etc, | has no purpose and could be removed; likewise it is perverse that we reverse | the R and E in theatre. But since that's what British spelling rules say, | then I will fight to the death to spell the words that way :-) | And don't forget aluminium. It's much more fun than our aluminum. Aluminium feels like a long, hilly sleigh ride, what? |
#45
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OT: Microsoft Rewards? (now OT: grammar!)
"Wolf K" wrote
| "Public school" in the USA and Canada usually means primary and usually | also middle school (years K to 8). It's often is used in contrast to | faith-based schools. The upper grades are "high school". | They're all known as public school, as far as I know. And they contrast to private schools, which are commercial. Taxes pay for public school. Tuition and private funding pay for private schools. That could be a Catholic school, but perhaps just as common are "academies" for the wealthy and gifted. And probably increasingly common are evangelical schools, with textbooks showing Moses riding a dinosaur. | Grammar is taught in public school. High school English/Language | curricula generally assume knowledge of that grammar. It's very badly | taught, mixing grammar and usage indiscriminately, and using conflicting | and sometimes incorrect linguistic concepts. I don't think you can generalize accurately about American public schools. Since they're mostly funded by local property taxes, the quality of teaching varies quite a bit. It also varies by culture. Not long ago, basic writing and math were all anyone needed. Kids took off from school to help with the harvest. Today, many rural areas may avoid investment in public schools. Many urban areas may not be able to afford it. But in between, the property values in the suburbs are largely assigned based on school quality. Parents want the best schools they can afford. So one school has 35 kids in a class, with few if any electives. Another school has bottled water dispensers in the hallways, small classes, top teachers, and an MRI in the science lab. What I find more striking today is the poor quality of college education. People are getting bachelors degrees who are all but illiterate and can't think analytically. At one time college was meant to teach future leaders to think and to provide them with well-rounded knowledge. Today it's a required step to get a no-skills office job. The graduating student may have gone to college mostly to avoid adulthood. At best it provides them with a cultural language and connections to reach a white collar lifestyle. | It is IMO the | main reason Americans tend to be more anxious about their public | language, and often over-correct and use unnecessarily elevated vocabulary. | I once read an interesting [British] book. I can't remember the name of it now. It detailed the creation of made-up words in the Colonies, where people were intimidated by educated Brits arriving in the New World. So they made up "highfalutin" words "out of whole cloth", to sound important. The same thing then repeated as people moved west and rural settlers felt intimidated by Easterners. That may partially account for the general American trend toward valuing ignorance and even conflating it with decency. A smart kid is a showoff. Giftedness undermines democracy. Thus, we should all be trained to equality in all things. It points to the central American confusion. We idealize equality while trying to escape it. We reject class while pursuing it. In Britain, class is an accepted part of the social order. In the US, we like to pretend it doesn't exist. We'll talk about sexism, racism, etc but it's very hard for people to recognize the fundamental inequality of wealth. More recently, though, I think the awareness of language as a social and business tool has become much more sophisticated than it used to be. People often speak in a technical manner, often favoring Greek and Latin roots over Germanic, because it seems authoritative. (Handiwork becomes manual labor. Boyfriend/girlfriend becomes significant other.) I had a work estimate recently for a woman who's a Shakespearean professor of English. She said something on the phone that I can't quite recall now, in reference to our trying to find a time to meet. I think it was something like, "Let me know when you're free. We'll get this coordinated." Breathtaking artlessness from an English professor. And impersonal. But it sounds official. (The estimate never happened, though. She was an important person, always on the go, and didn't even listen to her phone messages. There was no way to "coordinate" with her!) Another interesting language change: I know very few people today who have a regional accent. That's another thing that college now does. Eliminate cultural flavor that might be assoicated with ignorance, so that everyone sounds like they're from Ohio, with the exception of whiny young celebrities who employ a nearly constant vocal fry to sound upper class. It's almost Orwellian. All quirks must be erased in the successful person, so that they act almost as an automaton. So there are a lot of factors there in both the breakdown of literacy and the rise of official-speak. I just saw a video of Stephen Colbert interviewing Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who just won an upset election in NYC. She's well spoken, seems both intelligent and decent, yet her speech is peppered with, "so I was like", "so he was like", "so I go", "so he goes". She talks like a teenager. So I'm like, way to not intimidate the electorate, dude. |
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