Re: What IS is with people from America On-Line?

[Jeffrey Pittman <Jpittman49 -at- AOL -dot- COM>]

In a message dated 95-09-11 10:55:07 EDT, titanide -at- MICRO -dot- ORG (Patrick
O'Connell) writes:

>AOLers (people connecting to Internet resources via America On-Line) have
>a bad reputation among more experienced Net users, and this guy is a
>REALLY good example of why.
>>>Flame on<<<
Techwhirlers:
     The Soviet Union may have fallen, but elitism is still alive and living
on the Net.  As a person with an AOL account, I am an AOLer.  I also have an
account with a direct internet node, (all commands are in UNIX), I am beta
testing the GNN web browser, I have a CompuServ account, I don't like the
service, and I teach internet classes in my community.  In fact, between my
wife and myself, this household has eight accounts with four different
providers.  I also teach internet access to the faculty members of a local
college.  These highly educated sages have no more idea of how to use the
internet than any of the offending AOLers.  The only difference between the
faculty members and the uneducated AOLers is that the faculty members can
call me and ask for help (i.e. last Saturday night at 11:00 pm).
     Rather than complaining about the great unwashed, Patrick would be
better served to keep Eric's info message on file and then to forward this
message to anyone who sends an unsub message to the wrong address.  This is
what I do.  Helping someone may be less satisfying than flaming those whom
you perceive as being at a lower educational level than you, but it does
nothing to solve the problem.  And speaking of foolish mistakes, take a long
look at the subject line of the original post.  People who live in glass
houses...
<<<Flame off>>>
Good luck,
J.P.