"Thorsten Froehlich" <tho### [at] trfde> wrote in message
news:4173e6bf$1@news.povray.org...
> The word "midnight" is not ambiguous at all.  It is well defined in every
> English dictionary.
>
> Personally I am really disappointed that a few people here try to infer
> bad
> intentions by default and challenge even the most basic and common terms
> of
> every day life.

My guess is that you were part of the rules-making process.  If so, I think
you did a great job!  But with anything new, there were bound to be some
misunderstandings.  If several people have the same stupid question,
sometimes it's worth clarifying.  That doesn't mean that the rules
themselves were misleading, it simply means that the same sentence can mean
different things to different people.

There were a few comments made regarding rule changes, but most of the rest
of the discussions simply related to possible interpretations of the rules.
I don't know if you generally read through the IRTC newsgroups, but rules
questions often come up there as well, and the IRTC is an established
competition.  I don't think anyone honestly believes that the organizers
created this contest in bad faith or with bad intent.  Clarification of the
rules is part of the process.  In the end, everyone involved benefits from
this discussion.

For me, the competition was a very positive experience.  I'm aware of
several people dropping out, but they dropped-out for personal reasons
unrelated to the competition itself.  I hope there was a large drawing,
because I would like to see more competitions like this in the future.  And,
I'm looking forward to seeing the other entries!  I like to be awed.  :-)

> IMHO this is not only inappropriate but also uncalled for.

I'm sorry you feel that way.

If you would like to continue this discussion in off-topic, I'd be happy to
respond, and perhaps others would feel more free to respond there as well.
My impression is that this competition has been very positively received,
but perhaps I'm not seeing the bigger picture.

-- 
Jeremy
www.beantoad.com

Thorsten Froehlich wrote:

> The word "midnight" is not ambiguous at all.  It is well defined in every
> English dictionary.

Whatsamatta? Hasn't anyone here ever hit a deadline before? ;-)

-- 
  Phlip
  http://industrialxp.org/community/bin/view/Main/TestFirstUserInterfaces

Thorsten Froehlich wrote:
> The word "midnight" is not ambiguous at all.  It is well defined in
> every English dictionary.

The problem is that although midnight is defined as "the middle of the
night", or 12 o'clock, if you say "Tuesday at midnight", it is unclear
whether you mean the midnight at the beginning of Tuesday, or the midnight
at the end of Tuesday.

> Personally I am really disappointed that a few people here try to
> infer bad intentions by default and challenge even the most basic and
> common terms of every day life.  IMHO this is not only inappropriate
> but also uncalled for.

Even in everyday life people get confused with dates and times when not
explained exactly.  That is why the ISO-8601 standard exists and is used by
anyone who has anything important to do with date and time.

I'm sorry you feel it was uncalled for, but I was only just suggesting that
for next time it would be far simpler just to follow the standard rather
than getting arguments from people.

In article <4174cc02@news.povray.org> , "scott" <sco### [at] spamcom> wrote:

>> The word "midnight" is not ambiguous at all.  It is well defined in
>> every English dictionary.
>
> The problem is that although midnight is defined as "the middle of the
> night", or 12 o'clock, if you say "Tuesday at midnight", it is unclear
> whether you mean the midnight at the beginning of Tuesday, or the midnight
> at the end of Tuesday.

There is only one 12 o'clock in the evening, and it is the one that follows
the 11 o'clock in the evening.  If you wish to discuss the philosophical
aspects of "midnight", please do so in p.off-topic and please do not attempt
to create ambiguity where there absolutely is none.

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

Thorsten Froehlich wrote:
> In article <4174cc02@news.povray.org> , "scott" <sco### [at] spamcom>
> wrote:
>
>>> The word "midnight" is not ambiguous at all.  It is well defined in
>>> every English dictionary.
>>
>> The problem is that although midnight is defined as "the middle of
>> the night", or 12 o'clock, if you say "Tuesday at midnight", it is
>> unclear whether you mean the midnight at the beginning of Tuesday,
>> or the midnight at the end of Tuesday.
>
> There is only one 12 o'clock in the evening, and it is the one that
> follows the 11 o'clock in the evening.  If you wish to discuss the
> philosophical aspects of "midnight", please do so in p.off-topic and
> please do not attempt to create ambiguity where there absolutely is
> none.

Calm down! I never said there was any ambiguity with the rules (although it
appears there was), I was only suggesting that you might use the correct
standard in future to be sure of avoiding any ambiguity.

In article <4174ef6a@news.povray.org> , "scott" <sco### [at] spamcom> wrote:

> Calm down! I never said there was any ambiguity with the rules (although it
> appears there was), I was only suggesting that you might use the correct
> standard in future to be sure of avoiding any ambiguity.

Be honest to yourself: How many people do you think are able to read ISO
8601 times and dates correctly?  More than who understand the word
"midnight"?  BTW, these are rhetorical questions.

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

"Thorsten Froehlich" <tho### [at] trfde> wrote in message
news:4174f293@news.povray.org...
[deletions]
: Be honest to yourself: How many people do you think are able to read ISO
: 8601 times and dates correctly?  More than who understand the word
: "midnight"?  BTW, these are rhetorical questions.

What I find interesting is this from the standard itself:
===============================================
An example time is

  23:59:59

which represents the time one second before midnight.

=Bob=

On Mon, 18 Oct 2004 17:52:31 +0200, "Thorsten Froehlich"
<tho### [at] trfde> wrote:

>
>Personally I am really disappointed that a few people here try to infer bad
>intentions by default and challenge even the most basic and common terms of
>every day life.  IMHO this is not only inappropriate but also uncalled for.
>

A contest with such a large prize tends to bring this out
in people.  I'm just amazed it's not gotten even worse
than it has.





-- 
to all the companies who wait until a large user base becomes
dependant on their freeware, then shafting said happy campers with
mandatory payment for continued usage. I spit on your grave.

Come'on now, ya gotta think it's pretty ironic that the
ISO standard has that exact verbiage...


: What I find interesting is this from the standard itself:
: ===============================================
: An example time is
:   23:59:59
: which represents the time one second before midnight.
: =Bob=

Continued in off-topic.
(My last post is no longer here, so I think that was a hint.)
-- 
Jeremy
www.beantoad.com