Seriously, get a life, SCO and SNCP. In case you haven’t heard, SCO filed chapter 11 bankruptcy protection last year as a result of its failed lawsuits against Linux vendors and customers. Now it has courted a new suitor, Stephen Norris Capital Partners, to the tune of $100 million to continue it’s nonsensical war against open source and Linux.

At least companies that put out crappy software and/or fall seriously short in the ethics department still actually try to innovate and compete (e.g., Microsoft – though conspiracy theories abound that say they’re behind all this nonsense). This cause, however, is only about greed, opportunism, desperation, and psychopathy, pure and simple. Perhaps these guys ought to try to better life on the planet with their “largesse.” Perhaps someone could actually innovate with that money. You know, find a cure for cancer, or develop social programs to eliminate poverty. I certainly hope the bankruptcy court sees this for the extortionist fraud it is and severs it off at the head.

Even if their case has some merit (which it certainly doesn’t appear to given what’s transpired and SCO’s own tactics of declaring bankruptcy weeks before going to trial), from a moral perspective what they’re doing is simply wrong. With all that’s at stake, with users and governments around the world benefiting from the spread of free software, this is analogous to a rogue enterprise waging a trillion dollar intellectual property battle to blot out the use of antibiotics. It doesn’t make economic sense, legal sense, or business sense, and smacks of moral turpitude.

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. . . for saying stupid shit like that!

This language abuse has reached epidemic proportions. I don’t know when or how it happened; it kind of sneaked up on all of us. Allow me to decline the personal pronoun, I.

This is the nominative case of the personal pronoun. This form is used in the subject of a sentence. I go to the store. You go to the store. He and I went to the store. He and I went to Margarita Friday. We went to the bar. They should get a life. Note compound subjects still use the nominative case of the pronoun. A compound subject is defined as the use of one or more subjects joined by a conjunction but that have the same predicate.

Let me decline the accusative form of the personal pronoun:

The accusative case is used in the object of a sentence. I gave the present to her (this is actually the Dative case but let’s not split hairs). The bartender served him a drink. I lectured them about bad grammar.

The abuse seems to be limited to the use of compound subjects. I haven’t heard someone say lately, “Me like Mexican food,” for example. Here’s a tip when trying to figure out which form to use in a sentence. Before using compound subjects or objects, use one of the subjects alone and determine which form you would use. Then use the same form with the compound use. For example, the sentence “I like Mexican food” uses the nominative form, so “She and I like Mexican food” also uses the nominative form. “He and I went to the concert” is another example. Similarly with the accusative form, “They gave the drinks to me” becomes “They gave the drinks to Fred and me.” Not “They gave the drinks to Fred and I!!” Grammar gods, save us please!

Spread the word.

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Ok, I feel I need to do drivers and humanity at large a service. Allow me to translate the meaning of the ubiquitous “Exit Only” phraseology present everywhere on highway signage to soccer moms, people yapping on the phone, or perhaps using this reading device whilst driving an 8 ton Cataract Escapade or your weapon-of-mass-planet-and-brain-cell-destruction of choice.

The phrase “Exit Only” apparently is transmogrified in many clueless drivers’ minds as “Only Exit.” I don’t know why dyslexic interpretation of street signs is so pervasive; perhaps that’s another topic of research entirely (maybe I’ll apply for a research grant to research stupidity on roadways).

Anyway, “Exit Only,” much to the dismay of many, actually means just that, Exit Only. That means the lane designated thusly is, you guessed it, an exit only!! Wow! It does not mean, to the consternation of many drivers, the only exit. So if you see a two lane exit and the right lane is designated “Exit Only,” it is not necessary to panic, drop your phone, beer, bluetooth headgear or hairdryer, and move your big ass vehicle into my lane to exit. You can stay right where you are, please.

I hope I’ve cleared that up for good.

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