Posts by JohnDA@social.vivaldi.net
(DIR) Post #AVgjKDEF6oKconIpxg by JohnDA@social.vivaldi.net
2023-05-15T19:00:35Z
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_The Evening Post_, 16 May 1923:THE HELICOPTER PRIZESPrizes totalling £50,000 for the successful operation of a helicopter flying machine have been offered by the British Air Ministry… The problem of the helicopter has been attacked with an energy which many people think could better have been directed towards a more useful end… at this stage little prospect of the helicopter becoming a glowing success.…https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/EP19230516.2.29#OnThisDay #OTD #NewZealand #PapersPast #LawCourts #Helicopters
(DIR) Post #AVjXkdjMivkDt1h0OO by JohnDA@social.vivaldi.net
2023-05-17T03:38:01Z
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@grammargirl love it!I recently had an APA Style expert email reply to my query ~ in part ~ along the lines of "we could have a lengthy discussion about whether there should be a space between the A. B.", and I thought to myself "my kind of people"🤓
(DIR) Post #AVnhUrfauHIietsvQG by JohnDA@social.vivaldi.net
2023-05-19T03:46:02Z
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@grammargirl yes, they often seem a bit twee outside informal emails, etc, similar to emojis! 😀
(DIR) Post #AVpAqxIRl8EMJDu5Vw by JohnDA@social.vivaldi.net
2023-05-19T20:49:40Z
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@grammargirl I’m definitely in the ‘spell-check’ camp for the verb.Hyphen use keeps changing (e.g., ‘to-day’ was normal 100 years ago, in NZ and UK at least), with AmE more inclined to create a compound word when NZE/BrE keeps the hyphen (esp. for verbs) or uses two words.I’ve often wondered (without evidence) whether AmE was influenced in this by other European languages, such as German.To me AmE ‘preeminent’ looks weird and AmE ‘coworker’ is just hilariously bovine 😁
(DIR) Post #AW6E1QkmQou92cUO0m by JohnDA@social.vivaldi.net
2023-05-28T02:15:17Z
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@grammargirl fwiw APA 7th has considered this point https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/paper-format/accessibility/urls
(DIR) Post #AWQOc4IzGhGDiwhyCW by JohnDA@social.vivaldi.net
2023-06-06T19:48:11Z
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@grammargirl @jasonrush Same in New Zealand, though I suspect we got it from the U.S.I couldn’t find any mention of ‘third wheel’ in _OED_. Curiously, same with _Merriam Webster_, which does have ‘fifth wheel’ https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/fifth%20wheel_OED_ also lists ‘fifth wheel’ under the entry ‘Wheel’ with the note “chiefly U.S.”
(DIR) Post #AWVA8WBOd1kvvfyLaa by JohnDA@social.vivaldi.net
2023-06-09T02:59:32Z
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@grammargirl it seems an incompossibility that a statement is both true and false 😀(_OED_ quotations, a few from 19th C, seem to be theological or philosophical).
(DIR) Post #AWtkDPLit3ZNC4TPAO by JohnDA@social.vivaldi.net
2023-06-20T23:36:53Z
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@grammargirl Interesting! Accentuation marks (they look like apostrophes) are still used for chants or recited passages for evensong in NZ Anglican services.
(DIR) Post #AY8SVNafWmS0SAo1cu by JohnDA@social.vivaldi.net
2023-07-27T23:51:13Z
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@grammargirl New Zealand accent tends to drop r’s somewhat like (some) British English. The exception are the well-known (in NZ!) “rolled r’s” in Southland, at the bottom of the South Island https://teara.govt.nz/en/southland-region#:~:text=Southland%20is%20the%20only%20New%20Zealand%20region%20to%20have%20a%20distinct%20accentI’m pretty sure I say “FOURwid” and “parTIKyoular”, but “adVERSree” and “CATupilar”.Also, I was taught to pronounce ‘forehead’ as ”FORid’ (short o) and still do, but “FOURhed” is most common now in these parts.
(DIR) Post #AYk6ZIWhfGsxA3ShhQ by JohnDA@social.vivaldi.net
2023-08-15T03:44:25Z
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@grammargirl there's a great page on Wikipedia about Muphry's law https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muphry%27s_law
(DIR) Post #Aahow7D28kRkveL5kG by JohnDA@social.vivaldi.net
2023-10-12T16:32:33Z
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_The Evening Post_, 13 Oct 1923:ROSS SEA WHALESA DANGEROUS VENTUREEXPEDITION FROM SEATTLE…Ready to take part in a whaling venture in Ross Sea that will rank as one of the most dangerous and spectacular ventures of the kind, the steam steel whalers Star I., Star II., and Star III., of Seattle, will leave this port [Seattle] in a few days and begin a 7000-mile voyage to Auckland, New Zealand, which port is to be their base of operations for the next seven years. The three whalers were purchased recently by the Hvalfangst Rosshavet Company, of Sandefjord, Norway, from the United States Whaling Company. That whales exist in Ross Sea in abundance was reported years ago by Captain Roald Amundsen and by Captain Robert Falcon Scott, the British naval explorer, who lost his life while seeking the South Pole. The Norwegian venture will utilise the knowledge gained by the two great explorers during their cruises inside the Antarctic ice barrier.…https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/EP19231013.2.20#OnThisDay #OTD #PapersPast #Whaling #RossSea #Antarctica
(DIR) Post #AahxEP7B6brlJ8peVM by JohnDA@social.vivaldi.net
2023-10-12T22:34:34Z
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@grammargirl This reminds me of a long-ago controversy about ‘reliable’ – noted in _OED_ but I think I read about it first in Fowler – because, it was argued, it should be ‘rely-upon-able’ or ‘rely-on-able’.Perhaps the argument is strictly true, but it was never going to win over English speakers, surely!
(DIR) Post #AbRxZJQ2h282mn1VOi by JohnDA@social.vivaldi.net
2023-11-04T03:14:47Z
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@Wolven also add the Unpaywall extension on your browser to see easily if an eprint is out there already.
(DIR) Post #Abfs7n4H5PQr4fL0Hw by JohnDA@social.vivaldi.net
2023-11-10T20:19:57Z
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@grammargirl many thanks for highlighting Perplexity AI. I got round to trying it this morning and it is likely something I’ll try out a more bit in future.Three things I liked are: (1) the summarising, (2) the clear indication of its sources and (3) the “Related” questions at the bottom. The “Related” were often very handy, either suggesting a query that gave a better summary or were complementary queries that help to explore further.Limitations appear to be that sources are only from the open internet (no different from search engines, of course) and the summary doesn’t always match the question or can miss important elements.After more straightforward questions, I decided to ask it about a contentious political topic in New Zealand. It’s clear from that that it is important to evaluate the reliability/biases of the sources Perplexity AI uses, just as would be needed with search engine results.
(DIR) Post #AcBjl0tYBaEMMJ7fZg by JohnDA@social.vivaldi.net
2023-11-26T05:17:02Z
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@grammargirl @swelljoe ah, right! Voted "No": I've not seen the movie plus it's an ordinary word in NZ, too!
(DIR) Post #AcY9iR2HPWJaqlktVY by JohnDA@social.vivaldi.net
2023-12-07T00:51:33Z
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@grammargirl likely an opportunity for the sender rather than the recipient 🤔
(DIR) Post #AdTfvTTcD8qtv8DVaK by JohnDA@social.vivaldi.net
2024-01-03T18:51:01Z
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@grammargirl It’s a concern in New Zealand, too. A 2018 news article reported research indicating that 40% of NZ adults were below a functional reading level.The OECD 2014–2015 adult literacy and numeracy survey put NZ well above the OECD average (the US at about average), but there has been a comparative decline of NZ adult literacy and numeracy being picked up in international surveys since 2018.I also found a 2020 report on school-age student literacy, which stated it has declined in comparison with other countries noticeably since 2009.
(DIR) Post #Adb0qdurQbT7zgDYEy by JohnDA@social.vivaldi.net
2022-11-23T18:37:56Z
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A short, overdue #introduction.I’m John, an academic #librarian working and living in #Christchurch, #NewZealand.Interests include #Classics and #AncientHistory (especially #Roman) and discoveries in #science.I enjoy #reading: mainly novels, across most genres and as #ebooks ideally (creating a personal library of out-of-copyright ebooks is a peculiar hobby of mine).I like #gardening in my small vege patch – Samuel R. Ogden from Vermont was a boyhood idol 😀
(DIR) Post #Adb1c0MLnlyhD9exhw by JohnDA@social.vivaldi.net
2024-01-07T07:57:04Z
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@HMLivy Yes, and have downloaded a few from there in the past. These days, though, I largely look to the following: RSS feeds to Standard Ebooks and MobileRead, daily check of Fadedpage.com and Roy Glashan's Library websites. These tend to have better formatting and text checking, esp the 1st and 3rd of those. MR is a little more variable, but some contributors do an impressive job.