Fw: [libreoffice-users] Re: brochure templates for letter and A4 sizes

-----Original Message----- 
From: Virgil Arrington
Sent: Thursday, February 21, 2013 2:20 PM
To: James Knott
Subject: Re: [libreoffice-users] Re: brochure templates for letter and A4 
sizes

I'm old enough to remember the push back in the '70s to move to the metric
system in America. At the time, it made a lot of sense to me simply because
everything metric is in multiples of 10. But, I think the biggest bugaboo
for Americans was that we just couldn't get the handle of visualizing and
conceiving the actual size of things in metric units. I can visualize and
estimate a foot, a yard, even a mile. I have a harder time estimating a
meter or kilometer.

In terms of absolute size, there is nothing about an inch that is any more
or less arbitrary than a centimeter. Both are identifiable and equally
arbitrary spans of space. A yard is no more or less arbitrary than a meter.
It's just that a meter is broken down into subparts measured in multiples of
ten, whereas the yard is broken down into units of three feet and 36 inches.
Certainly, the metric system makes more sense internally, but for those of
us accustomed to inches, feet, and yards, we see no problem with it.

And, I think that is the reason things won't change here. Until we perceive
our system as broken, we won't look for ways to fix it, especially if it
costs money to do so. It works for us just fine, thank you, even if it is
goofy.

Virgil



-----Original Message----- 
From: James Knott
Sent: Thursday, February 21, 2013 1:54 PM
To: LibreOffice
Subject: Re: [libreoffice-users] Re: brochure templates for letter and A4
sizes

Tanstaafl wrote:
> Opinions are...
>
> > Reagan was a "stick in the mud" conservative who didn't want change.
> > Economics would have meant moving to it, to keep up with the rest of
> > the world.
>
> Economics meant it would have cost the govt a TON of money to change over.
>
> Arguments can be made for LONG-term savings, but the reality is, short 
> term it would be a huge expense.

The longer the wait, the greater the long term cost of remaining with an
obsolete system.  Regardless, my opinion of Reagan stands. He
demonstrated similar behavior on other issues too.  He was an old geezer
who liked things the way they were, progress be damned.



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