Thai blog with the best commenters | 7.10.05
It’s official! Sarasonteh has the best commenters of all Thai blogs. (Do you read even any of them? —Ed. Nope, but as the song goes: I know what I know, if you know what I mean.) Many thanks to Post Staffer and JW for the excellent contributions, which can be found in under the following posts:
- Wan Kadir vs. Amir Taheri
- Pornthip Rojanasunand vs. the NRC
- Sanitsuda and me
- With Reconciliators like this…
Unlike your average Thailand-based correspondent, both these guys speak and read Thai and put their skills to good use. Well, actually, I’m not sure reading Thai newspapers on or off-line constitutes “good use” — and Post Staffer and JW certainly do more of that than I do — but at least that means they know Thailand’s god-awful media for what it is.
Too bad I can’t join them tonight, having dozens of schoolchildren’s letters waiting to be translated into French. And after that, I’m determined to finish the long-promised article this weekend.
Meanwhile, gentle reader, you’re invited to read the comments if you haven’t already done so and perhaps even write a couple of your own. Perhaps some of you (Post Staffer and JW included) may want to learn a bit about the Textile markups. A quick and easy guide is already provided by the comment box, but it doesn’t cover how to make a block quote using the bq. syntax, so let’s do it here really quickly.
Imagine the block below as a comment box:
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Maecenas eros eros, bibendum in, tincidunt id, interdum et, quam. Donec rhoncus nunc eu eros.
bq. Mauris venenatis. Donec pulvinar turpis vitae pede. Fusce eget purus non tortor hendrerit aliquet. Quisque enim. Nullam non est eget magna mollis porttitor.
Vivamus nonummy, dolor vitae venenatis placerat, dolor nunc blandit sem, in porttitor augue elit vitae erat.
That will turn into:
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Maecenas eros eros, bibendum in, tincidunt id, interdum et, quam. Donec rhoncus nunc eu eros.
Mauris venenatis. Donec pulvinar turpis vitae pede. Fusce eget purus non tortor hendrerit aliquet. Quisque enim. Nullam non est eget magna mollis porttitor.
Vivamus nonummy, dolor vitae venenatis placerat, dolor nunc blandit sem, in porttitor augue elit vitae erat.
See? Now what if your quote is more than one paragraph long? Easy, just add another period to the bq. and the block quote will go on indefinitely until you signal the return to normal paragraphs with the p. syntax. Example:
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Maecenas eros eros, bibendum in, tincidunt id, interdum et, quam. Donec rhoncus nunc eu eros.
bq.. Mauris venenatis. Donec pulvinar turpis vitae pede. Fusce eget purus non tortor hendrerit aliquet. Quisque enim. Nullam non est eget magna mollis porttitor.
Vivamus nonummy, dolor vitae venenatis placerat, dolor nunc blandit sem, in porttitor augue elit vitae erat.
Pellentesque sit amet velit eget quam porta vehicula. Donec aliquam tempor massa.
Nunc nisl dui, eleifend a, faucibus id, sollicitudin sed, purus. Quisque et odio.
p. Vestibulum convallis, ipsum in laoreet luctus, libero justo eleifend magna, ut convallis lectus sapien pulvinar odio. Nullam euismod magna vel nunc.
Nulla suscipit consequat arcu. Donec facilisis, augue in ultricies mattis, magna eros faucibus augue, ut porta dolor nulla vitae mi. Aliquam erat volutpat.
Will turn into:
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Maecenas eros eros, bibendum in, tincidunt id, interdum et, quam. Donec rhoncus nunc eu eros.
Mauris venenatis. Donec pulvinar turpis vitae pede. Fusce eget purus non tortor hendrerit aliquet. Quisque enim. Nullam non est eget magna mollis porttitor.
Vivamus nonummy, dolor vitae venenatis placerat, dolor nunc blandit sem, in porttitor augue elit vitae erat.
Pellentesque sit amet velit eget quam porta vehicula. Donec aliquam tempor massa.
Nunc nisl dui, eleifend a, faucibus id, sollicitudin sed, purus. Quisque et odio.
Vestibulum convallis, ipsum in laoreet luctus, libero justo eleifend magna, ut convallis lectus sapien pulvinar odio. Nullam euismod magna vel nunc.
Nulla suscipit consequat arcu. Donec facilisis, augue in ultricies mattis, magna eros faucibus augue, ut porta dolor nulla vitae mi. Aliquam erat volutpat.
Easy right? Now to indicate the source of your quote, wrap ?? around them and the cited source will appear in italics. You can even use that in conjunction with a hyperlink. So:
"??Bangkok Post??":www.bangkokpost.net
Will turn into:
Without getting too fancy, making a bulleted or numbered list is really easy, too, provided you don’t forget to separate it from the preceding paragraph with a blank line.
Alright, this post is as usual way longer than I intended. Have fun, I’m back to work. Thank God It’s Friday, indeed.
22:19 ▪ announcement
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- 1
- post staffer 10.10.05
Your use of the word ”commenters,” Tom, and all that ugly looking Latin, seems to have caused a crisis of confidence on the board.
Your regular ”commenters” seem to have lost confidence in your abiity to use correct English. I suggest you delete that ghastly word ‘commenters’ immediately, so that normal business may resume.
- 2
- Tom Vamvanij 11.10.05
Post Staffer:
I think the crisis of confidence has more to do with my tardy posting. But people will get used to it, just as you will the word “commenters” (3,740,000 hits and counting) :-)
That “ugly looking Latin” is the Lorem Ipsum, a widely-used example text that serves the purpose well. Or would you rather I used Sanitsada op-ed?
- 3
- post staffer 11.10.05
No, no, please…not the Sanitsuda op-ed..I beg you!
You really do know how to punish a guy, Tom.