Month: March 2018

Okay, OK …

A little something captured from the NYT this morning:

Back Story
It’s a shortcut used the world over — and even beyond, having been uttered at least once during a space mission.
On this day in 1839, The Boston Morning Post published “O.K.” for the first known time, using the abbreviation next to the words “all correct.” (It’s not written “okay,” The Times stylebook says.)
It’s all correct.
It’s all correct.
Frank Duenzl/Picture-Alliance, via Associated Press
There have been many theories about its origin, but the most likely is that O.K. was an abbreviation for the deliberately misspelled “orl korrect” (all correct), and the expression gained prominence in the mid-19th century.
Allen Walker Read, a longtime English professor at Columbia University, debunked some theories in the 1960s, including that the term had come from Andrew Jackson’s poor spelling, from a Native American word or from an Army biscuit.
Today, O.K. is “an Americanism adopted by virtually every language, and one of the first words spoken on the moon,” the Times obituary of Mr. Read noted in 2002.
The professor didn’t “appreciate having ‘O.K.’ overshadow the hundreds of other etymologies he divined,” it continued. He also tracked early uses of Dixie, Podunk and the “almighty dollar.”
In the 1920s, Mr. Read hitchhiked through western Iowa hunting down the word “blizzard.”
“A man called Lightnin’ Ellis had first used the word for a snowstorm in 1870,” he learned. “Within 10 years, it had spread throughout the Midwest.”
Charles McDermid contributed reporting.

A Word About What’s Happening Online

Most of my non-virtual, real friends know that I generally avoid Facebook and most social media. This mostly came out of my experience over the years working with my ISP (internet service provider) colleagues, as it became obvious to us long ago that FB was harvesting data much more aggressively than most “civilian” FB users may have realized. Furthermore, as a programmer and web designer myself, I had the tools and skills to create a web presence for myself that was completely unique and custom (and I didn’t like to be forced into a personal online scenario that looked and operated just like everyone else), and did not have to rely on advertising. Finally, I found the concept of “likes” and “friending” to be shallow and rather meaningless. Admittedly, I have swallowed the kool-aid in the case of Google, as many of its services have proved to be pretty much essential to my online negotiations. And I’m not dismissing social media out of hand. Look at the wonderful Netflix documentary, “Twinsters”, to see what can come of it, for example.

Lately, you have undoubtedly been hearing of Russian troll factories and deceptive political advertising that have been used in an attempt to undermine American democracy and US citizens’ faith in its political and governmental institutions, including most recently the Cambridge Analytical scandal (examples here and here).

Anyway, I want my viewers to know that my sites do not grab any data from you, nor do they track you. (Your browser knows where you have been, of course, but that is not shared with me.) And I intend to never inflict any advertising on you when you visit my custom-built family, photography, car or music sites.

Have a decent day.

P.S.: Here’s something I noticed in today’s incoming …