English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

I got the short one, so I'm probably staying

because the number of hours meetings is equal to the number of people being sacked.

2:03 PM

Or maybe, you got the short one because you're getting laid off, and the longer ones are for the people who are getting their positions restructured.

Oh. Good.

I am good at being awful and unreassuring.

I'm in two mind. on the one hand: yay! continuing money. On the other: boo! double the workload for no etxra pay.

So keep looking.

yeah, I am.

And shut off that damn alarm, people! shouts, shakes fist out window

But see, I told you they'd keep you because you were cheaper!

Yay for being cheap!

you did :D

2:06 PM

Why are you laying people off? I thought the economy was strong?

yeah, we've had the best profits ever

I'm not.

so, you know. time to lay folks off

More sponduli for everyone who stays.

Greedy-greedy never gets.

2:07 PM

essentially it's bean counting because we're not meeting the targets set by the higher ups. It doesn't have to make logistical sense, just financial sense

20 hours ago, by RegDwighт

Greed was John's peril, as the Russian proverb goes.

and even then, it's dubious

So they are not uploading my project today, either.

Pennywise and pound foolish.

@RegDwighт sad panda

You know what, go support this one instead.

2:08 PM

:(

But...don't they know who you are?

@RegDwighт the tags are interesting

Haha yes!

@KitFox Cupiditas radix malorum est.

I thought that was the love of money.

I mean, specifically money.

2:12 PM

Greed.

Avarice.

Cupidity.

Stupiditas radix malorum est.

> This Latin phrase is a translation of the original Greek manuscripts of the Bible. The most reliable Greek manuscripts cite "ῥίζα γὰρ πάντων τῶν κακῶν ἐστιν ἡ φιλαργυρία (1Ti 6:10 GT)". This is literally translated into English, "Root for all the evil is the love of money."

> Daniel Wallace states that ῥίζα (root) is qualitative, since it lacks an article. [1] A more idiomatic understanding of this phrase is, "For every possible kind of evil can be motivated by the love of money." Meaning, greed can lead to any number of different kind of evils, not that all evil is rooted in the love of money.

@KitFox How stultiloquently put!

@MattЭллен sounds like my wife's workplace.

I too often wish that the close-box were a select-as-many-as-you-want widget, not a highlander one.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 are they sacking people too?

2:16 PM

Only dwarves.

WTF.

@MattЭллен not yet. But they are cutting back on all kinds of expenses and putting in hiring freezes. this despite my wife's dept being a) extremely profitable, and b) everyone there working 50-80 hour weeks.

Got an email from CUUSOO, my project was rejected because the photos were too grainy or blurry.

@RegDwighт What? Bastards!

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 If people put in 40 hours, then that would solve that.

2:18 PM

That is the first image.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 everyone seems to be being super conservative at the moment.

This is the second.

> Your project does not meet one or more of these quality standards outlined in the Basic Project Quality Standards section of the Project Guidelines and House Rules (lego.cuusoo.com/guidelines).

maybe they wanted 1080p images?

> Here is what we found, in your case:

- Photos are too dark, too light, grainy, or blurry. Please take clearer photos.
- The text, drawings, or composite work in your images is of too low quality. Images manipulated in an image editor need to be clear and easy to read.

@MattЭллен they are the ones who determine the size.

@tchrist It is coming to that. Some staff members have started drawing a line in the sand, daring the management to fire them.

2:20 PM

oh

@RegDwighт Those are completely different issues. Grainy is mumblespeak for too much noise in an image, these days typically caused by using too high an ISO-equivalence in capturing the shot for the sensor involved. Blurry is bumblespeak either for camera motion, inaccurate focus, or insufficient depth of field on the subject.

And being a web designer I actually went ahead and counted the pixels and submitted images that were exactly of the size they use.

Then too dark?

Other people just submit stuff willy-nilly that then gets cropped automatically.

@KitFox or too light?

It's a boilerplate reason.

@RegDwighт Are you sure there aren't a couple extra pixels in there, just like the extra 1x1 tiles and cheese slopes that are inevitably in every lego box?

2:21 PM

@RegDwighт Yes. You cannot tell a damned thing from it.

Are these photographs or CGI?

The images have been up on dozens of sites for a year now. Nobody has every complained about their quality. Not even on flickr.

@tchrist photographs.

@RegDwighт I wonder if they take issue with your background?

Actual models from actual bricks.

Maybe they expected individual images?

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I have no idea.

2:22 PM

Or ones that would be able to be blown up?

@KitFox that's my only theory right now, that the main image is too busy for them.

Maybe they expect higher-resolution images to be submitted, which they then munge into ugliness.

@RegDwighт Personally I'm not fussy about the background. But it doesn't bother me much.

@tchrist you should see some of the images other people submit. Mine are exceptionally awesome.

The backgrounds are dark with the hippos. This is considered good subject-isolation, not cause for complaint.

2:24 PM

legocuusoo.uservoice.com/knowledgebase/articles/…

> Lack of attention to spelling and grammar.

Yeah right.

there's the culprit ;)

> When taking photos, use a white or neutral background such as a piece of poster board or a sheet.

Maybe it is the background then.

Here is sample spelling and grammar they accept: lego.cuusoo.com/ideas/view/32389

In fact the project was titled "Burger´s and Fries" until I complained in the comments.

2:26 PM

Oh honey. hugs @Reg

@RegDwighт gah! make it stop

And yes, that's not even an apostrophe, that's an acute accent.

lego.cuusoo.com/ideas/view/35223

This one has a busy dark background.

Just like my hippo.

So really, of the reasons they list only the last one applies. My last shot is an LDD screenshot with the basis plate.

I like this one, but I'm not sure how awesome a lego kit it is. It loses some of the magic in the translation to a static toy: lego.cuusoo.com/ideas/view/18258

I will change that and resubmit.

Have to get home first, though.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Does it really glow?

2:29 PM

Can it make my minifigs teleport?

What a pickly reason that'd be.

In fact the plate is useful, it helps you assess the size.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 imagine if LEGO invented real portals!

lego.cuusoo.com/ideas/view/20323 The photography here isn't perfect

38 points of articulation? Good lord.

2:32 PM

@KitFox You could make it glow under certain circumstances. But to achieve anything like what's in the real game you'd need to attach it to a computer.

@tchrist I'm no professional photographer but my wife is. I used her camera and she saw my work.

Which would be really awesome and someone should do that but it'd cost like $400

ponders

Pond!

James Pond!

2:33 PM

@RegDwighт I'm going to guess that they either don't like the mosaic for the large image, or they don't like your choice of background. There are blurrier pictures and pictures with busier backgrounds.

@RegDwighт Robocod!

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I really think, and really hope, that it's just the LDD bottom plate.

And FFS they should spell it out before people submit.

It'd have been a ten-second fix for me at the time.

@RegDwighт can you export from LDD into some kind of rendering tool?

Now I had to wait for 3+ days, and have to wait some more hours before I can fix it, and then wait another 3 days to see if it passes.

the LDD models that are on cuusoo don't look so good.

2:35 PM

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 not really, people use MLCAD/LDraw to recreate models from scratch, and then POV to render them.

@RegDwighт I made no complaint.

@RegDwighт yeah I knew about that particular workflow. was wondering if there was an ldd analogue.

@tchrist I know.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 LDD can only export to HTML, not even sure which image format, and then connect to LEGO.com and submit the model to their gallery.

LDD has like three buttons and two menus with one entry each.

And half of them don't even work.

Not that I'm complaining.

lego.cuusoo.com/ideas/view/35469 The author even acknowledges that Lego already made one of these.

Except actually I am, because that "export without the bottom plate" feature is not documented anywhere.

I read the docu. All five paragraphs of it.

2:39 PM

But is it the bottom plate that's the problem? Surely they're aware of their own tool's limitations!

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 the post I linked to mentions a fix. Ctrl + K or something.

It's not a problem for me.

I can remove the plate pixel for pixel in GIMP, if need be.

My beef is that they don't say it right away.

Seriously why would lego approve for cuusoo a model that's basically a rip-off of their own model.

just an inferior copy, even

And explicitly against their guidelines.

2:42 PM

and anyway why would anyone buy the speeder anakin stole by itself? the beauty of that kit was that it came with two speeders

Maybe one of the approvers is someone who felt slighted by EL&U at one time or other

Can you actually access this URL? lego.cuusoo.com/ideas/view/39075

Hello.

no

Hello.

@RegDwighт Nope.

2:43 PM

Too bad.

@Reg What did you need me for? My morning brain refuses to understand. shakes brain

We don't need you anymore.

We needed when we spake Dutch.

But we no speak Dutch no more.

Ah.

I saw you incorrectly inserted -t- before -je.

smartje pants

Haha.

And only nouns can get -je.

Mattje.

2:45 PM

:D

I like that

Is it related to Russian -ya?

wonders whether Mattie or Matty is preferred — and where and why

As in Tanya, Alyosya...

In the UK, I'd say Matty. Although I don't prefer either :D

Mattie would be fore Matilda

ah

2:47 PM

I'd be likely to call you Matts or Matt-Matt.

My youngest gets the doublebanger.

Gramma calls him by his diminutive, which I hate.

My mother used to call me Matty Batty, but she seems to have stopped that now I'm over 30 :D

So like last month then?

two years, now

@KitFox Yeah, -s is interesting.

@Cerberus You aren’t in morning; you’re postprandial.

2:49 PM

It counts as morning.

Or at least, postantejentacular.

I have a friend Myrte whom we often call Myts.

Bertha > Bits?

But I'm not sure whether the Dutch -s is really a borrowed English -s or not.

Berts.

2:50 PM

@tchrist Naah not in Dutch.

Besides, only cows are named Bertha.

@KitFox Would people say that?

and large stationary robots

You just called Bertha a cow!

Haha, large stationary robots?

@MattЭллен Steamshovels.

@Cerberus I dunno. I would.

2:51 PM

I haven't seen those in Dragon Age yet.

@KitFox OK.

Bertha (TV series)

Bertha is a British stop motion, animated children's television series about a factory machine of that name, comprising 13 episodes that aired from 1985 to 1986. Other major characters in the series were Mr Willmake (factory owner), Mr Sprott (Bertha's chief designer) and Tracy (Mr Sprott's young assistant). All the characters were designed by Ivor Wood, and the series was produced by his company, Woodland Animations. It was broadcast on BBC Television. A series of six storybooks based on Bertha was published by André Deutsch at the same time as the series was broadcast. They were ad...

We used to call our dog Berts sometimes.

I'm trying to explore this -s.

Also Matts.

The -s happens on nicknames.

2:52 PM

@Matts Would you use this -s?

no

I don't think so

@tchrist Yeah, but when exactly? And can it be used with any short name on -t?

we tend to use -y or -o

I'd use it for comic effect, to sound like a foreigner saying "maths."

Ah, -o! The possibilities are endless.

2:53 PM

Which would be flattering to our dear Matthew.

> A shortened form of the hypocoristic dim. suffix -sy suffix1, added to the same classes of words, as Babs, Toots; ducks (see duck n.1 3c), moms.

yay!

-o is a bit...comical, isn't it?

oh! yes, we shorten Barbara to Babs

Babs and Toots were the names of our cats. How coincidental.

2:53 PM

Ya think so, Doggo?

Eh, boyo?

Ahh I remember we used to call our friend Anne Barbara "Annebabs"!

Nice.

lol

We were 10 or so.

I really don't think we got it from English.

Is it that international?

2:55 PM

possibly

Or did we borrow it from English decades+ ago?

So to @Kitts the ending -ie is more or less equivalent to -y, whereas to @Matty-o it's feminine?

But surely not after -v-, as in Stevie?

Mahnax

Cerbie?

How about that?

Cerbo!

Cerbs.

Cerbalicious.

Cerbaceous.

I think you people call me Cerbie and Cerbs often enough. But Cerbo is a first.

Mahnax

2:58 PM

@KitFox Fergalicious?

@Mahnax I don't understand.

shudders

Oh no.

"Fergalicious" is a song performed by American recording artist Fergie for her first studio album The Dutchess (2006). It was written by Fergie and Black Eyed Peas bandmate will.i.am, who also produced the song as well as providing the instrumentation. The song was slated as the second single from the album and released for airplay on October 23, 2006. "Fergalicious" is an electro song with R&B and hip hop characteristics. It contains compositional samples of "Supersonic", a song written by Dania Maria Birks, Juana Michelle Burns, Juanita A. Lee, Kim Hazel, and Fatima Shaheed and performe...

Cerbmissive.

2:59 PM

Cerb-a-lerb-a-ding-dong

@Mahnax Oh.

Cerbtastic.

Mahnax

@KitFox I recommend avoiding it.