Milan Kundera, Czech author:

"I learned the value of humor during the time of the Stalinist terror. I could always recognize a person who was not a Stalinist, a person I needn't fear, by the way he smiled. A sense of humor was a trustworthy sign of recognition. Ever since, I've been terrified by a world that is losing its sense of humor."

Bill, who's lost his mind, but is regaining his sense of humor.

GO FORUM!!!!!!

-- William J. Schenker, MD (wjs@linkfast.net), March 04, 2000

Answers

I feel like posting here at this board is my patriotic duty or something. The real little dirty secret of this board was that we were becoming the rip and read source for a lot of news organizations. It's interesting how it was squashed...

-- INever (inevercheckmy@onebox.com), March 04, 2000.

I'm new to this forum, but was pointed here by a regular who has followed most of the action. My impression was that the loony, LL, spammed the original forum nearly to death, so the forum moved and instituted stiffer security -- but I also hear certain people who posted controversial stuff, so the relocation banned them. And I note that the "replacement" TB2K forum is on ezboard, where I'm already a global user, so the security isn't much.

Personally, I believe in Bill of Rights enforcement, and the First Amendments is one of my favorites, right behind the Second. I really LIKE a place where censorship is nil. One of my favorites at a gun show I regularly attend is a "politically incorrect bookseller." He used to post signs saying "We have something to offend everyone." Pretty true, actually, and a beautiful illustration of the First Amendment in action.

HELLO, DOC! Hear anything from Will? BTW, I'm still trying to keep that positive outlook...

I agree 100% that sense of humor is essential. No matter what sort of strange beings we meet in the cosmos (I grew up on original Star Trek, among other things), I believe that if we can share jokes, we'll get along.

Well, Y2K (the actual rollover, not the $ trillion global remediation expenditure) was not the "trigger" event that I expected. I feel we've been given a gift of some more time -- but we do not have an accurate calendar; Y2K was that, or so we thought. Certain events are unavoidable.

This looks like a dandy forum. GO,GO,GO!!! See you later.

"An armed society is a polite society."

-- Hamilton Felix (skagity2k@hotmail.com), March 04, 2000.

This forum has spontaneity, flexibility, and a wide range of interesting subjects and views.

Thanks, Sysop, for bringing back the old TB2000 format.

Another important fact is that this board usually managest to stick with real-world issues and doesn't degenerate into lengthy discussions of various members personal lives.

I also like the old Greenspun format much better than EZBOARD and the others. Long Live this board and all you interesting contributors!!!

-- Flash (flash@flash.hq), March 04, 2000.

The Greenspun format is far superior to EZBoard (or any other board I've seen) I can see banning spammers like LL...in fact, I think spamming like that is an act of aggression and should be prosecuted

However, I have no problem reading posts from people I don't agree with, and choosing whether to ignore them or not.

It seems perfectly obvious to me which posters are "insane" or "13 yrs old", and I don't think they need to be "banned" unless they pull a LL.

I mainly lurk,interested in picking up news items, I've also visited Ed's new forum.

-- LSRY2K (admin1@lsry2k.net), March 04, 2000.

Censorship will make the new TB boring.

-- NO (No@no.no), March 04, 2000.

The very threat of having your posts edited, corrected or deleted, plus that of having threads CLOSED at will by sysops, is stifling to the liberty of the exchange of ideas -- whether or not it constituted censorship. Chilling effect.

-- Squirrel Hunter (nuts@upina.cellrelaytower), March 04, 2000.

Are you still there, Doc?

Still trying to keep that Positive Mindset.

-- Hamilton Felix (skagity2k@hotmail.com), March 05, 2000.

Hello, Doctor,

I've been noticing that the posts on this forum are never dull. I'm very impressed and reminded of WAAAAY earlier last year when I first became excited about meeting lively thinkers in cyberspace. I'll try not to offend anyone, especially Y2K Pro, because I was wrong in many of my expectations regarding Y2K. However, I still maintain that the NASDAQ bubble will crash big time and pull the global stock markets down with it.

Yeah, I'm still a doomer...

-- dinosaur (dinosaur@williams-net.com), March 06, 2000.