If you are able, or you have time to read the previous post on this blog, the post entitled "Was Jesus a Poor Man?", you may or may not find it interesting, and you may or may not disagree with the opinions expressed therein. I am happy either way, the opinions are mine, the speculations are mine, I happen to think they are reasonably sound, and I am happy to stand by them. But I am also happy to allow others to disagree with them if they wish. They are just opinions.
In order to provoke what I hope will be a lively and fruitful discussion, I posted the article on Qassia. I should say that I think Qassia is a very good site in its way, apart from one or two faults. The principal of these is the practice of screening. When an article is submitted by a member, it has to be "screened" by at least 12 other members before it can be published. This involves giving a grade fron 0 (awful) to 5 (outstanding) and then these grades are averaged out when the article is published. Thus the article for ever after has that grade on Qassia. The article that I mentioned ended up with a grade of 3.50 which I suppose is not bad, and seems to show that 6 voters went for a 3 (average) and 6 went for a 4(good job).
The reason I mention this in such detail is that it gives very ignorant and dogmatic people a chance to have an influence on events. Another feature of the screening system is that you are allowed to click on a statement that will give feedback to the author, supposedly designed to help the author of the article, but most often used by said ignorant, dogmatic people to try to show off their feeling of superiority. To cut a long story short, one reader flagged the article for, and I quote, "Some or all of the information is not true."
What information? The article doesn't give any information. It's pure speculation from beginning to end, it's a statement of OPINION. How can this be helpful feedback? Well, of course, it isn't designed to be helpful at all, but to be spiteful. What the critic is trying to say, is that they don't AGREE with the article, and if they had come right out and said so in a comment, they would have made themselves more worthy of respect. To say that someone whose opinion they do not agree with is, by definition, not telling the truth, shows a deep vein of arrogance, which, however, they are not prepared to back up by putting forward in public their own counter-opinion.
It's possible (and again, this is pure speculation LOL) that the person thought the article author was trying to undermine Christianity in some way. But, as was said in the footnote to the original article, nothing could be further from reality. The author of the article is actually trying to work to strengthen Christianity by moving away from fundamentalist dogma, and from useless myths perpetuated by careless reading of the text.
Another user, whose (very interesting) article I read last week, told us that her article had been flagged as having grammatical and/or spelling mistakes. This was preposterous. We all went throught the article carefully and could find nothing wrong. No errors of grammar. One word ("focussed") had a British spelling, which, given that the author herself was British, was hardly surprising. Our conclusion was that the person who did the flagging was self-important and a bit loopy.
So, all in all, Qassia is a good idea, but it suffers from its policy of allowing the idiot element to have too much power.
Sphere: Related Content
Showing posts with label Qassia. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Qassia. Show all posts
Friday, 3 October 2008
Thursday, 25 September 2008
Change Is The Only Thing That Never Changes
Bonjour, mes amis!
I have a lot to tell you. Indeed, I may not be able to relate all the facts and events of the last few days before I run out of time, and have to spill this post over into another day. Ah, the suspense!
Well, to begin. You may (or possibly may not) know that there are, and have been for several weeks now, no less than TWO versions of this blog. No, no, I hear you say, isn't one enough, or even more than enough. I do sympathise, dear reader, but que voulez-vous as the French say. This is how it all started.
The original blog was entitled "How I Became A Zen Catholic" and those of a perceptive disposition will still be able to discern the abbreviated username style version "zencath" in all kinds of dodgy, and even occasionally not-so-dodgy, places on the web. That blog was inaugurated on a snowy day in early 2008. Later the name was changed, for reasons which I actually can't remember, to "That Reminds Me."
That blog was on Wordpress. Anyway, after a while I decided that it would be better to move the whole thing, lock, stock, and barrel, to Blogger. The main reason was, because in some ways Wordpress seems, you know, a little bit too serious? a bit earnest? or is it just me? Secondly, you can't use Java on Wordpress, and I had a deep yearning to paste on to my blog some of those jolly looking adverts that flash on and off. Also the ones that guess what your visitors would like to have, you know, AdSense? I love to see what they'll do next.
I should add that I didn't want the adverts in order to make any money from them. So if you see one on this blog, whatever you do, do NOT click on them, or else I will end up with far too much money that I will not have ANY idea what to do with it!
So anyway I decided to move to Blogger. After protracted negotiations with the Zencath International Fan Club (as it was then named before the change), working out of its World Headquarters in downtown Ulan Bator, the move was made, and I set up this blog where you now are, under the name Journal of an Ex-Philosopher. I put up a "WE HAVE MOVED" sign on the front door of the Wordpress version, and there I thought the matter would end.
However, I noticed that the people were still going to the old place to read my ancient articles from former times, notably it seems the article "Normandy - Some Interesting Facts" was still a consistent success. Considering it does not contain any interesting facts about Normandy or anywhere else, I found its popularity puzzling. The title was actually meant to be an ironic joke. Those who have followed my adventures will know that I occasionally sojourn in the fair land of Normandy, and that I have been inspired sometimes to write of my experiences there. These stories have included the strange antics of mon voisin francais and his girlfriend, that formidable woman, and his blasphemous budgerigar, Claude. There are one or two examples of them in THIS version of the blog. Anyway, "Normandy - Some Interesting Facts" was actually a rather insipid, vapid, and unspectacular episode in that long running saga. Why it continues to hog the popularity ratings is beyond me.
So the upshot is that I decided to re-open the Wordpress version, but I didn't have the heart to close up this one. So there are now, and probably ever shall be, not one but two versions of this blog. I hope you're keeping up with this. You know you really should pay attention; I shall be asking questions later!
Incidentally, I posted one of the Normandy experiences on the new Qassia website, which is a kind of social network/forum/search-engine/article-submission site. My post came in for some criticism from a couple of people who said that they hadn't a clue what it was trying to say, they couldn't make head nor tail of it, it was so coming out of left field, it should be given a complete overhaul etc etc. Fair comment. It was so rambling! It seemed, to start with, that it was to be about Spain, and my Spanish vacation, but really it was a rather lengthy account of the singularly dramatic events that followed the disappearance of Claude. Some of my other efforts that I contributed to Qassia have been a bit more successful at cracking the nut, cutting the mustard, putting the icing on the cake, and so on.
The Worpress version of this blog is now called Everything Is Radio for reasons which you will find out when you go there.
A bientot! Sphere: Related Content
I have a lot to tell you. Indeed, I may not be able to relate all the facts and events of the last few days before I run out of time, and have to spill this post over into another day. Ah, the suspense!
Well, to begin. You may (or possibly may not) know that there are, and have been for several weeks now, no less than TWO versions of this blog. No, no, I hear you say, isn't one enough, or even more than enough. I do sympathise, dear reader, but que voulez-vous as the French say. This is how it all started.
The original blog was entitled "How I Became A Zen Catholic" and those of a perceptive disposition will still be able to discern the abbreviated username style version "zencath" in all kinds of dodgy, and even occasionally not-so-dodgy, places on the web. That blog was inaugurated on a snowy day in early 2008. Later the name was changed, for reasons which I actually can't remember, to "That Reminds Me."
That blog was on Wordpress. Anyway, after a while I decided that it would be better to move the whole thing, lock, stock, and barrel, to Blogger. The main reason was, because in some ways Wordpress seems, you know, a little bit too serious? a bit earnest? or is it just me? Secondly, you can't use Java on Wordpress, and I had a deep yearning to paste on to my blog some of those jolly looking adverts that flash on and off. Also the ones that guess what your visitors would like to have, you know, AdSense? I love to see what they'll do next.
I should add that I didn't want the adverts in order to make any money from them. So if you see one on this blog, whatever you do, do NOT click on them, or else I will end up with far too much money that I will not have ANY idea what to do with it!
So anyway I decided to move to Blogger. After protracted negotiations with the Zencath International Fan Club (as it was then named before the change), working out of its World Headquarters in downtown Ulan Bator, the move was made, and I set up this blog where you now are, under the name Journal of an Ex-Philosopher. I put up a "WE HAVE MOVED" sign on the front door of the Wordpress version, and there I thought the matter would end.
However, I noticed that the people were still going to the old place to read my ancient articles from former times, notably it seems the article "Normandy - Some Interesting Facts" was still a consistent success. Considering it does not contain any interesting facts about Normandy or anywhere else, I found its popularity puzzling. The title was actually meant to be an ironic joke. Those who have followed my adventures will know that I occasionally sojourn in the fair land of Normandy, and that I have been inspired sometimes to write of my experiences there. These stories have included the strange antics of mon voisin francais and his girlfriend, that formidable woman, and his blasphemous budgerigar, Claude. There are one or two examples of them in THIS version of the blog. Anyway, "Normandy - Some Interesting Facts" was actually a rather insipid, vapid, and unspectacular episode in that long running saga. Why it continues to hog the popularity ratings is beyond me.
So the upshot is that I decided to re-open the Wordpress version, but I didn't have the heart to close up this one. So there are now, and probably ever shall be, not one but two versions of this blog. I hope you're keeping up with this. You know you really should pay attention; I shall be asking questions later!
Incidentally, I posted one of the Normandy experiences on the new Qassia website, which is a kind of social network/forum/search-engine/article-submission site. My post came in for some criticism from a couple of people who said that they hadn't a clue what it was trying to say, they couldn't make head nor tail of it, it was so coming out of left field, it should be given a complete overhaul etc etc. Fair comment. It was so rambling! It seemed, to start with, that it was to be about Spain, and my Spanish vacation, but really it was a rather lengthy account of the singularly dramatic events that followed the disappearance of Claude. Some of my other efforts that I contributed to Qassia have been a bit more successful at cracking the nut, cutting the mustard, putting the icing on the cake, and so on.
The Worpress version of this blog is now called Everything Is Radio for reasons which you will find out when you go there.
A bientot! Sphere: Related Content
Saturday, 30 August 2008
The Qassia Intelligence Engine
I've just been putting some intel on to the Qassia site. It's what they call an intelligence engine. I've been enjoying it tremendously, in the two or three days that I've been a member.
The idea of it is that you add intel (that is, intelligence) to the site. It can be anything, like an article, or a snippet of information, an experience you had, or just anything really. In return for posting your intel, you get two things. You get a backlink to your website or blog (this blog, in my case) which is what they call a QUALITY backlink, a backlink that the search engines will follow - in the jargon, it is not a nofollow backlink. And you get your account credited with a currency called Qassia dollars, Q$. Those users with more Qassia dollars end up with their intel appearing higher in the tag rankings, so they are more visible.
I'm really enjoying it, because you are allowed to post anything you want to, just as in a blog post (obviously subject to the usual guidelines against porn, spam, and blatant advertising).
If you want to take a look at Qassia, I will be most grateful to you if you click through my link here. This is because if you go through my link I will get 100 Qassia dollars if you do sign up with Qassia, so I am being honest with you about it.
Of course if you prefer to go to the main page at Qassia.com, that is OK by me. I know some people prefer to find their own way, and dislike using affiliate links. But anyway, please do leave a comment on an intel of mine just to say hello!
I'm going back there now to post some more intel. Maybe see you there! Sphere: Related Content
The idea of it is that you add intel (that is, intelligence) to the site. It can be anything, like an article, or a snippet of information, an experience you had, or just anything really. In return for posting your intel, you get two things. You get a backlink to your website or blog (this blog, in my case) which is what they call a QUALITY backlink, a backlink that the search engines will follow - in the jargon, it is not a nofollow backlink. And you get your account credited with a currency called Qassia dollars, Q$. Those users with more Qassia dollars end up with their intel appearing higher in the tag rankings, so they are more visible.
I'm really enjoying it, because you are allowed to post anything you want to, just as in a blog post (obviously subject to the usual guidelines against porn, spam, and blatant advertising).
If you want to take a look at Qassia, I will be most grateful to you if you click through my link here. This is because if you go through my link I will get 100 Qassia dollars if you do sign up with Qassia, so I am being honest with you about it.
Of course if you prefer to go to the main page at Qassia.com, that is OK by me. I know some people prefer to find their own way, and dislike using affiliate links. But anyway, please do leave a comment on an intel of mine just to say hello!
I'm going back there now to post some more intel. Maybe see you there! Sphere: Related Content
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