Conference quark::human_relations-v1

    
    It's a uniqueness thing, methinks.
    
    In a company this size, the odds increase that you have the same
    name as someone else.  I know for a fact there's at least one other
    Dave Wall in this company.
    
    It's an informal substitute for a signature, a way of saying "This
    is me, and no one else."  My roommate signs everything with stylized
    initials.
    
    Just setting ourselves apart from the masses.
    
    DFW

    
    
    	Ahhh! a *signature*, in ASCII. Which brings to mind one other
    question, if logo-ifying your name attempts to "add information"
    about yourself, what information is lost about someone due to the
    fact that these characters aren't handwriting?
    
    	Whatever happened to "the eagle"? I searched hard for his *.*
    and found no trace -
    
    	Joe Jas
    

    Re: .2
    
    "The Eagle" decided to delete all his notes from this conference.
    You can still find him noting in other conferences, such as
    WOMANNOTES.
    
    Signatures are a way of setting us apart from the crowd, as
    the straight ASCII text and usernames tends to depersonalize.
    The use of clever personal name strings helps combat that.
    I don't think that the signatures are an attempt to add any
    information other than an aid to identification.
    
    				Steve

    I chose to use a distinctive electronic "signature" quite consciously
    for two reasons:  to make it less likely that my mail messages and
    notes would be confused with those from various other "Bonnie"s
    I work with and to try to compensate for the absence of clues from
    voice, gesture, or handwriting.  
    
    I'm not sure what impression I convey with the one I picked -- the
    primary criterion was that it be easy to type!
    
    --bonnie
    

    
    	I think a certain cleverness is expressed by "dressing up" your
    name with the extra characters...and lotsa things could be implied
    by doing so. For example, I'd *guess* that folks who really adorn
    their name with the extras have a very positive self-concept, while
    those who sign with a single letter or dont sign at all are'nt feeling
    so "+"...Compare the impact of			vs
    				       !!!!!!!			-j
    				     [*Joe Jas*]
    				       !!!!!!!
    	(OK so I exaggerated a bit)
    
    	They say you can tell something about a person by their
    handwriting. Information is contained therein, but it's subtle,
    and you have to know where to look. Likewise, what you do with the
    type leaves a lot "between the lines" -
    
    	Joe Jas
     

        On the other hand, a quiet attitude can bespeak a strong
        self-assurance and comfort with one's own identity, and
        flamboyance can cover a lot of insecurity.
        
        JimB.
        
        PS: My own signature is somewhat derivative, being patterned
            after Mark Bramhall's MarkB, which distinguished him from 
            MarkG before Mr. Goodwrench started being called "Wrench".
            Whereas MarkB was a transcription of "Mark B." which we
            actually called him, no-one calls me Jim B. I tend to say
            that "JimB" rhymes with "limb", so maybe they do.

    And then there are those of us blessed with unusual names: if you
    know another Tatistcheff, s/he is a relative of mine.  And you
    are extremely unlikely to run across another Lee Tatistcheff (there
    aren't any within the 5-6th cousin level, although there is another
    Elizabeth, which is one of the reasons I am Lee instead of the longer
    version...).
    
    With a name like jasniewski(y?), why alter your signature?
    
    Lee

And then, in the old days, there were the VT100 escape sequences.
    
    
    
#3Bob #3Mc
#4Bob #4Mc


    

    Back when I whittled small pieces, I had a logo incorporating
    my initials into a helmeted head. I couldn't reproduce it on
    the terminal. So, a phrase of some sort to indicate sense
    of humor, values or whatever has to suffice. Changeable as
    moods pass.
    
    (don't know if I could draw it now. Or whittle without losing
    fingers ;-) )

    
    
    	I've been known as "mr. mike" for a long time now yet I never
    sign that.. It's my process name. (seen from a PHONE DIR). I've
    always signed my name with a lowercase "mike" way over on the
    right. Now I have AXEL and the monicker "Rebel without a Clue".
    Wait till ASCII isn't the only thing to design with on the majority
    of user terminals. :-)
    
    						mike

    Re my signature: I have been known as "The Colonel" for a long time
    (since I was a child in fact - the fact that I eventually reached the
    military rank of Lt. Col. is irrelevant). In the days when notes was
    Notes-11 I signed my notes in non-work related conferences as "The Colonel"
    and then adopted the "/ Ian .\" form because (a) a Christian name is
    more friendly than an anonymous handle, (b) I can put the nickname in
    my Notes personal name (that appears in the header), and (c) it is shorter.
    
    As for what it is the "/" and "\" represent the epaulettes of a military
    uniform and the dots represent the rank badges.
    
    /. Ian .\

    Shouldn't you have *2* dots then, Ian?
    
    						=maggie

    Pedant :-)
    
    /. Ian .\
    
    (actually yes, but...)

    
    I adopted my "Spex" logo long before I joined DEC. It was originally
    summat like o^o, but go developed into it's present form by sheer
    evolution. Of course, the fact that I wear spectacles does have some
    bearing... I have a tee-shirt presented to me by a DECcie when our
    second child was born which has the following logo's 
    
                                    <>^<>  (me)
                                     O^O   (wendy)
                                     *^*   (pippa)
                                     .^.   (simon)
    
    Nowadays we also have @^@ - Daniel!
    
    My logo helped make me famous - and I kid you not. Time was that I met
    someone at the airport, I held up a sign with the logo on and they
    rushed straight over to me, knowing *exactly* who I was.
    
    If I stood in the foyer of ZK today, there'd still be quite a few
    that would recognise the logo - and I'mm a lot less active in Notes
    than I was!  Logos stick in the meory better than names do.
                   
    In the days of Kawell notes when no personal name field existed (circa
    1983), I used to hack the author field to read "Andy <>^<> Leslie" -
    see very old versions of CTnotes for this. It made my notes
    recognisable and I quickly built up a rapport with those who recognised
    mlogo and associated it with (said he, modestly) interesting notes. 
                   
    Also, because hacking the author field was easy (e.g. DEFINE SYS$NODE
    "ANDY <>^<> ") several other variants on that occurred.
    
    I'm sure there were logo signatures before mine, I just can't remember
    them right now.
    
    BTW you missed out what I consider to be the absolute best logo ever,
    Roger Goun's speeding wheelchair. I'll go look for it in WHOAREYOU,
    it'll be there!                   
    

    This is Roger Goun's logo. Marvellous, innit!
    
					  -  o
					 - -/-->
					-  @~\_

    ah, yes, Roger's logo is the best ever... but he'll have to create
    a new one for the wondrous tandem bike he and Jody have purchased... 
    
    grins,
    Marge

        Memories....  :*)  I  don't  remember who hung the "Marauding
        Scottish Werewolf" tag on  me  a  couple  of  years  ago in a
        notesfile far far away, but  this  was  mine...(and  the howl
        used to flash too!) 
        
         /\   /\
        /  ~~~  \
        { .   . }
         \  "  / 
          \{Awwwwwoooooooo!!
         *M*S*W*
         

    When I was in college I was a user of the PLATO IV system, a
    computer aided instruction system based at the University of Illinois
    in Champaign-Urbana, but with (then) about 1000 terminals at various
    locations across the country.  The terminals were plasma-display
    graphics devices (U of I patented plasma displays and licensed them
    to IBM), and you could do simple graphics, including user-defined
    fonts, in a normal character stream.
    
    Most of the programs ("lessons") allowed a 30-character pseudonym
    string.  Some of the more clever people did embed graphics
    and other interesting visuals in these strings.  In the equivalent
    of NOTES (in fact, VMS MAIL and NOTES and even PHONE are based on
    equivalent tools on PLATO, since several prominent VMS developers
    were previously PLATO systems programmers), one could get even more
    elaborate (up to 80 characters, I think).
    
    My pseudonym was HOLMES4, and my "logo" had "HOLMS4" slide out from
    the right, then the letter E would come over, rise up above the
    other letters, the "S4" would slide over and the E would drop in.
    This was trivial compared to what some of the people went through!
    
    Nowadays, I just sign my notes "Steve", but I'm considering doing
    something a bit more memorable because there are just too many
    Steves floating around here!
    
    					Steve

    you've spurred my interest...
    
    Mike ______`=[O~~O>
    

In re .15-.17:

You guys could give a fellow a swelled head!

I suppose I'd better explain the history of the "flying wheelchair" logo.
Warning:  this is going to be long and boring.

Way back in my high school and early college days, I was an avid wheelchair
sports enthusiast.  I was perhaps one of the dozen best wheelchair table
tennis players in the country, if I do say so myself.  (This was before I
discovered that there were a number of conventional sports in which I could
participate on an equal footing with able-bodied people, but that's another
story.)  In 1978, while a student at MIT, I competed in the New England
Wheelchair Games, held that year at Brown University.  Contrary to tradition,
it was the second year in a row that the games were held at Brown, because
no other site could be found to host them.

When I got back to school, it occurred to me to wonder out loud in the
presence of an MIT safety officer, a man who was and is still a good friend
of mine, whether the Institute might be interested in hosting the games the
next year.  He proceeded to introduce me to the members of Alpha Phi Omega
National Service Fraternity, who had helped run similar events in previous
years.

By and by, I became a brother of APO, and co-coordinator of the New England
Wheelchair Games '79 (proving that DEC isn't the only organization
believing that "he who proposes, disposes"), which were in fact held at MIT.
It happens that many APO brothers develop a signature logo, so it seemed
natural for me to use a stylized version of the New England Wheelchair
Athletic Association logo:  a man in a wheelchair, carrying a javelin, with
speed lines streaming out behind him.

A year or so later, a friend and I spent a few hours late one night in the
EECS terminal room designing the original ASCII version of the logo, when we
should have been doing something else.  It looked like this:

					  -  o
					 - -/-->
					-  O~\_

Later, I replaced the capital "O" with an at-sign to better represent the
hub of a wheelchair wheel:

					  -  o
					 - -/-->
					-  @~\_

and the rest, as they say, is history.

> but he'll have to create a new one for the wondrous tandem bike he and Jody
> have purchased...

I believe I've been issued a challenge here. :-)  I'll work on it.

The tandem Marge mentions, for anyone who's still reading, is an 18-speed,
half hand-powered recumbent, half foot-powered upright, tandem bicycle.
It's being custom built for us by a little company in Seattle called
Counterpoint Conveyance.  ETA is next month.

					  -  o
					 - -/-->
					-  @~\_

					Roger

    We'll look forward to the next edition, Roger!
    
    grins,
    m

     
    I do believe we can have a Logo party in August when I visit!
    
    `{o}^{o}'