The Vent and Rant Thread

[dreams]

Originally Posted by SneakySnake

It is actually made of tea and some flowers. You drink like normal green tea. Apparently they are good for about 5 infusions with each one tasting slightly different. I will have to get a tall see-through tea glass to enjoy it with.

Thanks for explaining. Make sure to take a pic and share with us. I would like to see what it looks like, when not in a promo pic, and if it tastes good.

[ProfCrash]

They really do look like the promo pictures

[Rumpelteazer]

Last night my city football/soccer team, FC Utrecht, played against their "arch enemy" (according to various news websites) Ajax from Amsterdam in the Utrecht stadium. After Ajax scored their third goal the Utrecht "fans" started misbehaving; singing racist songs and throwing items and fireworks on the pitch. The referee stopped the game for fifteen minutes to cool down the "supporters". Eight people were arrested.

What makes me really angry was the reaction of the boss of FC Utrecht. He told the media that maybe next time it might be a better idea not to allow Ajax fans into the stadium. He acknowledges that they weren't the ones misbehaving, but "they evoke those feeling in the Utrecht fans". Normally when fans misbehave they get a ban to enter the stadium for a certain amount of time but the Utrecht boss said that wasn't possible this time because so many people were misbehaving, they are going to think about how to deal with what happened last night.

I'm fuming because IMHO they should ban all Utrecht fans from visiting any game for a while. Last year they rioted at a game, injuring 8 police officers. I realize that real fans, that don't misbehave, will be affected by this but if you can't/won't identify the culprits it shouldn't result in no one being punished, especially with the recent history of misbehaving.

[ProfCrash]

I would think that the people who were arrested should be banned and anyone that they can identify on video should be banned.

I have never understood how losing in a sporting event equates with it is acceptable to chant racist crap.

[HomeInMyShoes]

Kirk: "Just goes to prove my theory."
Bob: "What theory is that?"
Kirk: "People are garbage."

[Rumpelteazer]

Originally Posted by ProfCrash

I would think that the people who were arrested should be banned and anyone that they can identify on video should be banned.

I have never understood how losing in a sporting event equates with it is acceptable to chant racist crap.

The problem is that so many people were singing racist songs the can't be identified all, or so says the director of the club. And they don't want to ban people who were innocent so they now want to play the next home game against Ajax without Ajax supporters (who were also innocent).

I think it's time that police, clubs and the national football club became a bit more aggressive against persecuting so called football fans.

One of my biggest problems is that all of this is happening with my tax money. Every couple of years the club almost bankrupts, the council helps with a loan and then something happens so the loan doesn't have to be paid back. A couple of years ago the loaned the money as a sort of subsidy to the main sponsor, a building company, so it could build the new stadium. The building company went bankrupt so now than can't or won't have to pay the loan back. Meanwhile playgrounds are being closed because there isn't enough money to maintain them.

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by Rumpelteazer

The problem is that so many people were singing racist songs the can't be identified all, or so says the director of the club....

That may be true. If that is indeed the case, the only solution I can see is to ban those who can be identified in a high profile manner to make examples of them.

[ProfCrash]

Ban them all. Maybe then people will to speak up when others are being jackasses.

[Rumpelteazer]

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe

That may be true. If that is indeed the case, the only solution I can see is to ban those who can be identified in a high profile manner to make examples of them.

From the interview yesterday the director gave the impression that he was reluctant to ban anyone who wasn't arrested.

Originally Posted by ProfCrash

Ban them all. Maybe then people will to speak up when others are being jackasses.

That's my opinion, too. It's happened so often now without any real repercussions that it's time for some drastic measures.

The club does offer people who live around the stadium something to make up for all the problems the fans cause: they can come to a game for free

[Ravenswd]

Just here to grumble and complain about how the internet, as a whole, is useless as a research tool.

I'm trying to write an article about online publishing. My article contains this sentence:

"The first ebook readers appeared on the market in 1992, but they didn't gain popularity until 2008, because"

There's nothing after the "because" because I don't know what should go there. Nobody seems to have the answer to this. No-one even addresses the question.

After a while, I decided to simply assume (bad reporting here: I'm making things up and passing it off as research) that before then there was no content available for download because of DRM issues. So I look up the history of DRM on ebooks...

...and I can't find anything about that, either. Everything I can find talks about the current state of DRM only, not the history of it or how we got here.

I'm trying very hard not to simply quote Chuckie Finster and end my article with:

"Why did it happen? How did it happen? Nobody knows."

[SneakySnake]

You need to bait your hook with something better than a moan about how unsuccessful your reasearch has been!

[CWatkinsNash]

Originally Posted by Ravenswd

There's nothing after the "because" because I don't know what should go there. Nobody seems to have the answer to this. No-one even addresses the question.

Visibility.

The available ereading devices weren't being marketed in a way that people could find them or even know what they were. I'd look at the history of the devices and their marketing patterns and the resulting sales. There's a reason why Kindles became the the Kleenex of ereaders - few people knew ereading was even a "thing" until Amazon branded it. The first Kindle launched in late 2007. Sony instroduced eink the year before, but I never noticed and I imagine most other people missed it as well. Amazon already had a huge base of customers to market to directly, many of whom were already buying books.

[CWatkinsNash]

Oh, I forgot to rant about something.

RUDE, INSENSITIVE, UNCARING PEOPLE SUCK!

No, that was not just made up for the occasion, it's really bothering me lately.
/end rant

[Stitchawl]

Fashion... I guess that's what it has to be called.
37 different pieces of metal stuck through different parts of the face; spikes, safety pins, rings, lightning bolts, spirals, etc., etc. Through lips, noses, eyebrows, cheeks, foreheads, ears of course, chin....
One young girl I saw yesterday looked as if she were the victim of a fragmentation grenade! She must have had 10 different rings just going through her lower lip, to say nothing of all the metal piercing the rest of her face.

(I remember as a teeth braces-wearing teenager being worried about kissing a girl also wearing braces, fearing we'd get locked together. What do these kids do?!?)

On the other hand, I do sort of dig the purple and green hair...


Stitchawl

[SneakySnake]

I am frightened of green hair. Many moons ago as a young bank teller in Sydney a customer came in with green haired girlfriend(I think she had face metal too), she was also chubby and spotty. Anyway he didn't have any money left in his account (because he had probably spent all his dole on drugs ). She threatened to kill me! I made sure some other staff walked to the bus stop with me in case she was hiding around a corner.