today's fan mail

What's a xer?

From: morfordc@yahoo.com
Subject: your web rant
Date: July 18, 2005 6:48:30 AM PDT
To: jwz@jwz.org

Wow. Just fell upon your rant because your pages were taken down.

Waaaaaaa.

Wow. Think you're the only person in the world whose bosses had them stop doing something that would look bad to the public? Waaaaaaa.

Spoiled little Xer. Can't have my widdle webpage that I authored on company time and is posted for free. Waaa.

Tags: , ,

57 Responses:

  1. britgeekgrrl says:

    beats me. Gen X'er, maybe?

  2. candid says:

    Probably "[Generation] Xer."

  3. Apparently it's too hard to actually type all of "Generation X" these days, especially when you're a middle America soccer "booster" webmaster on a self-righteous kick.

  4. msjen says:

    I think he means GenXer. Did you get ten other replies saying that already? I didn't check. Waaah. ;)

  5. rly says:

    I think they just dropped the "Gen" for some reason.

  6. dt says:

    If you read this word in Russian it means "dick". Not sure that this guy knows Russian pretty well.

  7. avva says:

    Hey, I'll bet I know what it is: he meant Generation X'er!

    In Russian, kher is a rude euphemism for penis, and the letter 'kh' is written like Latin x.

  8. ctakahara says:

    Gen X-er, I assume. Someone sounds bitter.

  9. merovingian says:

    I assume it's short for Xerxes.

  10. tfofurn says:

    Ten-to-one he wasn't even capable of reading the web in 1998.

    I chuckle even more that the subject is "your web rant", as though there were but one. He knows nothing of your work.

  11. substitute says:

    He's the webmaster for the Red Bird Soccer Booster Club of DePere High School in DePere, Wisconsin!

    • tfofurn says:

      The name attributed to that email is Craig Morford. I can't help but notice that there's also a Craig S. Morford who has been known to do some lawyering for the federal government. Probably a coincidence.

      Deputy U.S. Attorney General James Comey praised Morford, a lanky, self-effacing 6-foot-6 man.

      "Because I am one, I have a soft spot in my heart for tall, slow guys who can't jump, but Craig Morford represents the best of the Department of Justice," Comey said Tuesday.

      "He is smart, careful, fair, decent and funny. He cares passionately about achieving justice, which is more than just winning. He is one of the good guys, and the people of the United States are lucky to have him as one of their lawyers."

      From Morford finishes up in Detroit

  12. rsdio says:

    Well it OBVIOUSLY stands for hippopotamus.

  13. lizard_lord says:

    Possibly, it's just a crossed-out expletive? As in "spoiled little ****er"? He just doesn't seem one for unwarranted repetition, so maybe he decided that one X's enough.

  14. jonxp says:

    Perhaps he meant Mac OSX user: OSXer.

  15. srattus says:

    clearly the friends list doesn't read comments before posting answers.

    • korgmeister says:

      I find if they even read the post before posting answers they're doing better than usual.

      • gths says:

        Yeah. This seems to happen particularly often with technical queries.

        A bit like our host buying a Mac a few weeks back. I couldn't understand the "OMG JWZ bought a Mac! WTF????" response from some. He bought a Mac, what's the big deal?

        • korgmeister says:

          Considering I'm relatively new to JWZ fandom, I couldn't really say with any great certainty. However, JWZ is considered a big man in Unix, this much I know. Do keep in mind that what follows is merely my opinion and shouldn't be confused for a knowledgeable or authoritative explanation.

          For a long time, if you used Unix, it was probably Linux. BSD wasn't so much a competitor as an alternative niche. Now Mac OSX has joined the Unix party and it's causing an emigration of users from Linux to OSX because (shock horror) OSX has usability that doesn't completely fucking suck.

          And amongst the hardcore penguinheads (which JWZ most emphatically wasn't) there's something of a seige mentality going on where OSX is being seen as a threat to the Linux userbase. They're already jumpy because Torvalds is using a Mac, now JWZ made the switch. These big name switches may be seen as symbolic defeats to the Apple marketing juggernaut.

          Frankly, I think OSX is the best damn thing that ever happened to Linux. The competition's finally given the pathetic state of Linux usability a desperately needed kick in the pants. Also, it's brought about improvements in hardware compatibility as well, which will only be improved when OSX x86 comes out.

          I must admit the only reasons I personally haven't switched is because I consider Macs to be poor value, I don't like the way Steve Jobs does business and I really can't stand mac-o-philes. (But then, Linux fanatics are just as obnoxious, something I know all too well.)

          • kiztent says:

            For a long time, if you used Unix, it was probably Linux.

            Interesting definition of 'long time'

          • Isn't Linus running Linux on his Mac, rather than OS X?

            I personally find Linux more usable than OS X, though I appreciate it's a matter of taste. The main thing that annoys me about the whole thing is ex-Linux users still going on about Free Software while using a propriatery operating system. Seems a little hypocritical to me.

            • korgmeister says:

              He is indeed. But the penguinheads sure were twitchy about it at the time.

              *shrugs* I'll leave the "How proprietary/free is OSX" debate to greater minds than myself. I think I've satisfied my quota of "Making a dick of myself in other people's blogs" for today.

              Although I'm still using Linux. But that's because I'm a cheapass and I'm trying to get out of the modern habit of pirating stuff.

              • hawkeyemi says:

                Indeed, who needs pirating when the really useful stuff is free? (not that some non-free stuff isn't useful... but you get the idea, right?)

                When I was younger I was quite the pirate (arr!) but I erased all of that stuff a long time ago. It doesn't run on my OS(es) of choice.

          • king_mob says:

            ...JWZ is considered a big man in Unix...

            Dick joke goes here.

  16. sixty4k says:

    Someone's a little behind the times.

  17. fo0bar says:

    Sounds scientology-related.

  18. fxl says:

    My question is: Which rant?

    I do not recall that particular rant, but I have a good feeling this was not about the bathroom at the Maritime (or DNA).

    url me.

  19. xenogram says:

    The temptation to screw with this arse-hat's head must be pretty high.

  20. sherbooke says:

    Xer definition (that's if you take answers.com as authoritative). Or maybe you prefer Bridging the Boomer-Xer Gap

    Yrs, Lazyweb

  21. bitpuddle says:

    I think it is a typo. Meant to call you an xor. A subtle joke suggesting you can have your job or your web page, but not both.

  22. fantasygoat says:

    We all know you love the abuse.

  23. jkonrath says:

    I think he was referring to X11. Probably a bitter NeWS developer.

  24. ewindisch says:

    Does anyone know under which rock this guy found this rant? Jamie has so many...

  25. evan says:

    More so than the email, I especially enjoyed the guy talking about being new to "jwz fandom". I'm waiting for the fanfic.

    • artlung says:

      disturbing. inevitable?

      jwz/rms slashfic
      jwz/esr slashfic

      a "join us now and share the software" serenade should be in there somewhere.

      • zuvembi says:

        I'll nominate this into the running for the "Most disturbing Idea Of The Year" awards personally.

        Fuck, how will I ever sleep again?

        *twitch*

  26. dzm6 says:

    Surely our fanboy is referring to the schism between XEmacs and Emacs.

  27. wdr1 says:

    Wow... considering a simple google pulls up not just his full name, but phone number, I think I might feel bad for this guy.

  28. kaneda_khan says:

    An ancient Sumerian diety, of course. "There is no Jamie, only Xer."