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Having seen the coming-out-of-the-closet of the latest generation of lurkers/techdiver list newbies, I cannot help but comment on what seems to be the development cycles of said people, who I fondly refer to by their Latin name, Luorkius Strokeniur or "loser" for short. Because of the truly objective used during my investigations, I can with full confidence say that the following is backed up by hard science and practical experience. If you don't believe me, ask Bret Gilliam. Or the Doc on crack, they really know about these things and I see them as very valuable individuals capable of discerning between mumble bumble pseudo science and the real thing with a delightful precision. At any rate, or in doc's case rates, here are the development stages as identified and found, in chronological order. 1. Awareness of TechDiver stage During this initial phase, the loser is introduced to the techdiver list, either by other losers at higher developing stages, by sheer luck or by something akin to divine intervention. It is here we will find the first signs of personality traits such as arrogance and pride taking over, and the foremost thoughts in the mind of the loser is "cool, I'm gonna show these slapdick dudes just how it's done. My caged doubles look really techie, so they'll invite me into the old boys club directly. If not, I'll step on their balls." 2. Initial correspondence The second phase is the actual subscribing to the techdiver list, also referred to by losers as "being recognized as a great diver in the eyes of the unknowing". Quite basically it consists of a subscribe message, followed by an initial week of lurking and an attack of anger as the losers pride is hurt when it reads negative comments regarding its new and shiny Poseidon shower heads. But it is not until an evil gang of people in a gang named "DIR" start trashing the newly acquired tech bcd the loser really loses its temper. Typically as a result of this, an poorly spelled letter is sent with the main tenet being "hey man, Ive dived with this and i am not dead yett and you dont know what your talking about. shut up - loser@ho*.co*". 3. An emerging split For those losers who elegantly step over step 2, there is still hope. But undoubtedly they will be in a position similar to the step 2 losers. They'll read all responses and with a rather arrogant look on their face conclude "he who uses profanity first loses, nyah nyah nyah". 4. The actual split Here, the step two losers start attacking the DIR system, after learning that it was not a gang name after all. When such attacks prove futile and embarrassing to the attackers, they move on to attack the DIR proponents themselves - most notably George Irvine III. The latter, having a reputation as an uncompromising individual makes sure in no certain way that the attackers know his personal opinion about them, their diving style, their diving skills and explains in lucid detail just how closely related they are with other animal species. Unlike the the step 2 losers, the losers who managed to avoid step 2, now formally "lurkers" have begun a painful journey of realization. Slowly they're learning that expensive gear must be replaced and fond practices abandoned. Still, at this stage they consider DIR proponents rude assholes and have some problems seeing through the way the message is delivered and reading the message itself. 5. The Big Step During this phase, the losers/lurkers polarize. The losers, inspired by a fellow losers initial post, launch an additional offensive, competent that "stroke" is a compliment and that their knowledge has increased exponentially since their last attempt. Naturally, this is not the case and they are swiftly turned into chum. At this stage, some of the losers undergo a transformation and drop back to step 3, but it's a rather uncommon occurrence. The lurkers at this point has realized that the DIR system not only is a good alternative, but probably the *best* alternative and have secretly begun replacing their gear. At this point in time, they do not comment greatly on their strokish past, nor do they say much to their non lurking real life dive buddies, be they losers, lurkers or just tech diver list ignorants. 6. Final realization Here the losers in a last desperate attempt to preserve an already lost dignity mumbles secret chants, hoping that ancient gods such as Gilliam shall come to their rescue, or alternative resort to the old Adolf Hitler fascist name calling, before stating "hah, that showed you!" or " u r mean" and unsubscribing. Unfortunately, some of the losers suffer from a strange form of mental and physical amnesia, and are translocated back to stage 2 to go through the entire process again. For the lurkers, there's been developing a growing irritation regarding the losers, and more than a few have started to get pissed off when these idiots due to their unfathomable lack of intelligence fail to see the obvious - dead people because of dumb people using idiotic techniques/configurations. To these people, it becomes quite tempting to either try and educate losers or simply flame the hell out of them. Doubts about the DIR system have been removed by a combination of real life trial dives and polite and honest questions to the tech diver list. And it is from this position the lurker truly stands a chance of developing as a diver, his or her animal heritage non withstanding. Quite naturally, I exaggerate/polarize above and make gross generalizations but I feel to some extent it's true - you either wuss out due to too thin skin or you sit back, shut the fuck up and *learn*. I made some comments initially myself about the way the message was delivered. Thankfully, I learned to cage my pride/ignorance in time and sit back and listen. The best advice for new lurkers is to control those impulses to say "George is mean" - to grow a thick skin on your nose. Hell, if you getup and jumpy about some messages on an internet mailing list, what the hell will happen to you when something unforeseen happens in a wreck in some deep, cold poor visibility waters? Sorry for the long rant. My dry suit (a very old ill fitting membrane one) gave up on me and therefore I am not diving on this free day of mine. And I won't till my new Otter suit arrives, which pisses me off almost as much as the losers. Regards -- (Santa) Claus Lisberg http://www.geekcode.com -----BEGIN GEEK CODE BLOCK----- Version: 4.02 GCS dpu s:- a-- C+++ LU P L++ E W++ N+++ O? K? w- o- M-- V- PS+ PE Y+ PGP++ t+@ 5-- X++ R TV B++ D++ G++ e* h+ r* z* ------END GEEK CODE BLOCK------ -- Send mail for the `techdiver' mailing list to `techdiver@aquanaut.com'. Send subscribe/unsubscribe requests to `techdiver-request@aquanaut.com'.
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