RE: Grammar - The Gotcha Microsoft Gives

Subject: RE: Grammar - The Gotcha Microsoft Gives
From: "Combs, Richard" <richard -dot- combs -at- Polycom -dot- com>
To: "mattgras -at- comcast -dot- net" <mattgras -at- comcast -dot- net>
Date: Thu, 8 Sep 2011 09:08:26 -0700

mattgras -at- comcast -dot- net wrote:

> You miss my drift.

No, I don't. I'm all too familiar with your drift; I just reject it.

> I am a person.

Is that all? And only that? You're never a writer, reader, a driver, a buyer, ... ? In your documents, when you have to refer to someone other than the reader, do you always and exclusively refer to them as "a person" with no other identifying information?

> I am not a "user," a "customer," or a "consumer."

You are when you use, buy, or consume something.

> All those terms present me in relation to products or services, and
> regard me as a cog in a corporate machine.

They present you in relation to the things you use, buy, and consume. Or are you living in an ethereal world where you don't actually interact with _things_?

They present you as an _actor_, suggesting volition and control, and thus as the _opposite_ of a cog.

> This is, I think, a major problem in our world and one of the reasons
> why profits are more highly regarded than people.

Oh, puh-leez.


Richard G. Combs
Senior Technical Writer
Polycom, Inc.
richardDOTcombs AT polycomDOTcom
303-223-5111
------
rgcombs AT gmailDOTcom
303-903-6372
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Follow-Ups:

References:
RE: Grammar - The Gotcha Microsoft Gives: From: Combs, Richard
Re: Grammar - The Gotcha Microsoft Gives: From: mattgras

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