I realize that the use of the “@”* is from Twitter, but why add an extra character to a form of address that doesn’t need it? Is it just being cute, hip, and stylish**? Does it mean the person is posting FROM Twitter (but I don’t see how that would work).
Extra points if you know what that @ doodad is called. I’ll bet most of you do, and I’m the only one who doesn’t. Story of my life. The points will be added to your Permanent Record Card. Well, it’s not a *card *anymore. It’s digital, but we still call it a card.
**If so, no wonder I have to have it explained to me.
Its used on boards or comment threads without an easy to use system to quote other peoples posts, to make it clear who you’re responding to. Sometimes people get used to using it one place, and then it ends up even on boards like this one where there is an easy to use quote button.
@ThelmaLou: I sometimes use the “at sign” (or “commercial at”, though it has picturesque names in non-English languages – kanelbulle in Swedish, a sort of Chelsea bun) to denote who I’m responding to if I’m not including a quote. I don’t do this to be “hip” or “trendy” (I am so awesomely hip that I have never used Twitter! :D) but just to make it unambiguously clear that the comment is directed to a poster, rather than just starting with a weird word or phrase for some inexplicable reason!
We have people who still haven’t mastered hitting the quote button. They are probably initially composing their replies in notebooks*, transferring to a typewriter, and only then typing it in with their newfangled computer, and you think they might be cute, hip, and stylish?
*Only because their cuneiform stylus is bent.
I love all the names of the @ sign! I’m saving them up to use on future cats!
To me, writing the following
Bob: Your comment was lame.
means I’m addressing Bob like you do at the beginning of a letter, to wit,
*Dear Bob:
Your comment was lame. *
I can see that the use of the cinnamon bun strudel thingy (Passover ends tomorrow, and not a moment too soon) makes it absolutely clear that you are addressing your remarks AT Bob, 'cause that’s what the “@” says to me, “at.”
So, yeah, it removes any ambiguity. And may even fight entropy. I might start using it.
I don’t understand this statement, as the **@ ** symbol is not used to introduce a quote **BY **Bob, but to introduce a comment **TO **(or AT) Bob, namely that his comments were lame. Where does the quote button figure in to the use of the @?
I have noticed the use of bolding on poster’s names. I thought it happened by magic if you were special enough. Or after you passed 15,000 posts or something. So you do it manually, eh?
It figures in the fact that without a quote, it’s not clear and certainly not obvious who you’re replying to. Some configurations of vBulletin provide a “Reply To” annotation at the beginning of the post, but here we have to make it explicit.
ETA: Even when there is a “Reply to” (or an @) sometimes the previous poster has made a lot of posts and I have on occasion when reading replies not been able to figure out what the hell the poster is replying to. So in cases of ambiguity, my own policy is to always include a quote.
I usually bold the name of the person I’m replying to; it makes it easier to pick out. That was how it was done in the early days of the SDMB, and it seems to carry on here.
