Who Are the Babble People Part II
After you, Boomer. That 5-year nap will have revived your powers of observation from up there near(er) the Arctic Circle. Washington Irving had Rip awaken to a post-revolutionary situation in 'Merica. (It was Napoleon, another revolutionary product that got the Dutch into taking on names like Rip, and Splinter. They had lots of FUN! There was LAUGHTER even in defeat. "Going Dutch" and "Dutch treat" were born.
From the previous thread, George Victor wrote...
"People seemed to enjoy themelves in this thread, four years ago. For one thing, the oldtimers might now consider saying how babble/the world, has changed in the interim. Their take on things. What have emerged as concerns that were only budding at the time, etc."
Well babble sure as bajeezuz changed for me. Like whoa!
Generally though, there have been two major "before and after" moments on babble. One was the schism, and the other was the relaunch. Someone in the other thread asked how many of the older posts were lost in the changeover. Good question. Actally i don't think anything was actually lost. Something I've always wanted to lobby for, but I've not had time so far, is bringing all the archives back and making them available. I think they'd have to be read only, unless rabble.ca wins a huge lottery. They are however, the history of this community, and I think it's important for them to be there.
Another change is just how much we've grown. In that first innocent summer of 2001, before September 11, I used to read every post on every thread. Now I'm a moderator, and I probably scan 10% of the place. We were such a great little community then, but as Tom Wolfe said, you can never go home. We're still a great community though. New people are always keeping us fresh.