News: Annoying & Outstanding

[jesse_the_k]

I got scammed on the internet by an effective combo of wholesale scraping of publicly available data, search engine optimization, before-dinner drowsiness, and sneaky screen design. Only out $4.19, thank heavens.

I like to think that I'm "smarter than that," evidently not.

Moral of the story: if a site advertises a "free service" or a "free trial," and also asks for your payment info, run screaming to pictures of silly dogs on YouTube. Have a meal. Use the toilet. If possible, sleep on it. If not possible, go back and read everything, even the mouseprint.

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I attended a meeting tonight where someone advocated "handicap" is a bad word because it comes from "cap in hand," as a beggar. I know better, but I wanted to get the cites to prove it. I know my Uni library has the online service, but I thought I'd poke at the Oxford University Press site just in case they'd decided to make The Dictionary free.

Almost as good: they have two logins at their front page

http://www.oed.com/

one for individual subscribers (only US$300/year), and another for "Library Card Login." I plugged my South Central Library Service card number into the slot and fuckity wow! I was in.

(Around 1650 - 1660, "handicap" described a complex game with an umpire and two competitors. The latter two stuck one hand each in a cap and the ump decided who got money. The meaning bled to "something to even out the unfair differences between horses in a race or golfers." First use in U.S. English was the October 1888 issue of the American Annals for the Deaf: "The handicap of deafness is a perpetual one." In this case a hearing person "flips the script," using handicap as a disability epithet. The deaf person is described elliptically as someone who has been given an extra burden to handle. Read a more coherent, thoughtful, and funny explanation from s.e.smith)

Comments

[redbird]

Thanks; that is likely to come in handy sometime.

(Amusingly, my Seattle Public Library card works; my King County card doesn't. Anyone eligible for either of those is eligible for the other.)

[jesse_the_k]

Okay that makes no sense at all.

Huh, why parallel systems?

[redbird]

I suspect it's the same sort of historical reasons/bureaucratic inertia that have led to New York City having three separate public library systems, which don't work together as well as these two do and don't even have the same rules on who is eligible for a library card. (I couldn't get a Brooklyn library card because I lived first in Queens and then in Manhattan; anyone who lives, works, or goes to school anywhere in New York State could get a New York Public Library card.)

[emceeaich]

Going to try that with my San Jose/SJSU card.

Hooray for Shibboleth (the protocol that enables that, not the Old Testament business.)

[jesse_the_k]

Is Shibboleth different from Athena and the other academic/medical shared knowledge systems?

[firecat]

Oh looky, it works for my card too! Thanks for the tip!

[jesse_the_k]

:)

[jadelennox]

No matter how smart you are, you can get phished. Those assholes are smart.

Also, isn't OED access amazing?

[jesse_the_k]

OED access is one of the things I thought was cool about being a grownup. I couldn't lift the 2-volume Shorter, nor enter my father's study for the 2-volume with magnifier.

Is this a thing that's happening at public libraries in many US places? Mr Franklin would be delighted.