AP: Free-republic gets ready to do battle again: "We've got people just spitting nails."

[sabra]

http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/sciencemedicine/story/7EA474F14283EEF486257506000805FE?OpenDocument

Pioneer behind grass-roots conservative Web site gets ready to do battle again

ASSOCIATED PRESS


This year, as Barack Obama prepares to sweep into office on another tide of Democratic votes, Robinson and denizens of that Web site, freerepublic.com, are preparing to do battle again.

"We'll double and redouble our efforts to fight for what is right," Robinson says. "We've got people just spitting nails."

Free Republic, founded by Robinson in September 1996, doesn't attract much attention from the national press and is not well-known among political experts. Many of its postings have a decidedly fringe feel.

...

And Free Republic played a key role in driving an anonymous chain e-mail that falsely claimed Obama had concealed ties to radical Islam, according to Danielle Allen, a professor of social science at the Princeton, N.J.-based Institute for Advanced Study who studied the rumor.

...


For instance, Allen said, Free Republic was the first to let users set the agenda -- an approach later copied by the left-leaning Democratic Underground.

:eyes:

[sakabatou]

1. Except we're a much, MUCH better site

[Xipe Totec]

2. "doesn't attract much attention from the national press"

Says the national press...

:eyes:

[EFerrari]

9. They get attention when their members are arrested, though.

:)

[Justyce]

3. We're only left "leaning"?? LOL. nt

[Ellen Forradalom]

6. I'd say we fell right over

Or should I say left over.

[Lasher]

7. Well they couldn't call us leftists.

See, you have to be south of the Rio Grande before you can be a leftist.

[MessiahRp]

22. apparently the media came here and read how so many DUers are in love with DLC and GOP control of

Obama's cabinet and how they're acting exactly like how Conservatives acted any time Bush made a poor decision and was questioned on it... fiercely defensive and WRONG.

It'd be easy these days to come here and wonder just how progressive this place is when the progressives who see ZERO progressives in Obama's Administration thusfar and show concern are shouted down as if they have no right to have any opinion that is contrary to our party's elected leader. I wonder how this would have went had Joe Lieberman been the Democratic Nominee and won....

Rp

[MiniMe]

4. Hope they had their tetanus shots

They could get a disease from all that rusty metal.

[Richard D]

14. Uh huh

They should be swallowing the nails.

[OffWithTheirHeads]

5. Awwww...is da poor widdle witch burners upset?

Life is just full of little traumas.

[hlthe2b]

8. So, after 12 years, are they finally going to revamp that terrible

interface? Now, granted, I don't go over there, but the sample postings that make there way here are ridiculously hard to follow (and not simply because of the lack of grammar, punctuation, spelling, and thought)...

[amdezurik]

10. reminds me a bit of how Steve Job's whines

about how Microsoft "stole" their GUI that they had stolen from Xerox...

[emulatorloo]

29. Do some research about Apple and Xerox Parc and stop spreading misinformation

(even if it is to bash Freepers which is fun)

from wikipedia :

"Jobs and several Apple employees including Jef Raskin visited Xerox PARC in December 1979 to see the Xerox Alto. Xerox granted Apple engineers three days of access to the PARC facilities in return for US$1 million in pre-IPO Apple stock. Jobs was immediately convinced that all future computers would use a GUI, and development of a GUI began for the Apple Lisa."

Xerox was well compensated and nothing was "stolen"


p.s. Steve Jobs doesn't whine

[mkultra]

32. do some research about apple and microsoft an stop being an apple fanboy

jobs bitched constantly about microsoft and eventually sued them. microsoft licensed the windows elements it used FROM apple and won the suit based on this fact.

[emulatorloo]

38. The statement you made makes no sense.

Think about it -- if MS liscenced "windows elements" from Apple, then that means Apple would have given MS permission. There was a lawsuit around 1988 that Apple lost for "look and feel," but Jobs was NOT involved with the company at time. He left Apple in 1985.

Maybe you are thinking about the Quicktime lawsuit, in which MS was using Apple QT code in Video For Windows w/o permission, This was settled out of court in 1997 with the following results:

-- Gates agreed to purchase $150 million of non-voting Apple stock
-- MS and Apple agreed to collaborate on Java technologies, cross-license all existing patents, and new patents for the next five-years
-- Apple made IE the default browser, and MS pledged to continue developing Office for Mac.

At any rate, you don't know me, you don't know what kind of "Fan Boy" I am. I would have to say Beatles and Beach Boys, but I like modern rock too.

I do not understand Apple Hatred. Just let it go. It is a company, a fairly good one with some good products which are well reviewed in the mainstream PC press. It inspires other companies to create good products to compete. It is not asking for a bailout. It supports liberal causes.

[mkultra]

44. jobs should be mostly blameless

but apple is not. Im referring to the case in 88. The way i remember it, MS had licesned several pieces from apple and when they came out with 2.0, apple was unhappy because they had "strayed" from the apple vision. So they sued claiming that the modifications where an unlicensed infringement. Yes, it made no sense because it was stupid, they where trying to bully Microsoft out of the market.

as far as apple hatred goes, im only sick of the apple fan boy retardation. apple makes great consumer products but their computing just doesn't stack up and most apple fans fail to understand how that can be true. Their vision is to make super simple products that are highly creative and useful. This applies well to devices with limited scope but a computer is essentially a massive multi-tool. Unix is better for business processing and windows is better for desktops.

Most people who use macs are just people who cant manage to work on a regular machine. I have NEVER meet a super technical person who prefers macs for any singular reason and i have never found a reason to prefer macs myself.

In summary:

Mac computers are the equivalent to left handed scissors. Only needed by a few. useless to the rest of us.

[amdezurik]

34. stop taking a wiki as gospel

and grow-up to face the facts

[emulatorloo]

35. I've read non-wiki based computer history. Let go of your Apple hatred.

Seriously, I don't understand the need to hate. Its just a company, it has some good products, it drives other companies to compete with good products. Just as microsoft does.

It certainly isn't comparable to Free Republic in anyway.

[liberalhistorian]

41. I'm sorry, but Wikipedia is not

a solidly reliable, dependable, knowledgeable source. People can write what they want there and they are often wrong. It amazes me how much supposedly independent-thinking, intelligent people here rely so much on that site of sand.

[emulatorloo]

43. I am not RELYING on WIKI -- I have read several computer industry histories

but as you know WIKI is convenient to site sometimes when you don't want to waste a ton of time googling.

[hoboken123]

48. ?

What does this have to do with the ill-informed Apple basher getting the story completely wrong?

[liberalhistorian]

51. Read a bit more carefully. He was using

Wikipedia as his source and I was calling him on it.

[Drunken Irishman]

11. Copied? That's like saying the NBA copied the NHL.

:eyes:

[progressoid]

12. "We'll double and redouble" ... our fundraising drives

[bluestateguy]

13. If you don't support the president, and his policies you hate America

The country is the leader and the leader is the country.

Anything less than full support is to play into the hands of Al Qaeda.

[Bobbie Jo]

15. "decidedly fringe feel." = wack jobs

:crazy:

[Cassandra]

16. Let them join Habitat for Humanity...

as long as they're spitting nails, may as well make themselves useful.

[rasputin5]

18. They'd throw away half of them. Got the heads on the wrong end.

;-)

[hootinholler]

28. No those go on the other side of the house!

Sheesh!

-Hoot

[uppityperson]

36. That was my first thought also. Line them up with Habitat.

as if any of them would

[malaise]

17. That explains the PAC hack on GEM$NBC this morning

mentioning DU re Sarah Palin. Bwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah! Bring it on Freepers !! :rofl:

[Ganja Ninja]

19. "We've got people just spitting nails."

How those nails got into a bag of Cheeto's is a mystery.

[gratuitous]

20. "A key role in driving" a false claim

Well, that's certainly a cause for celebration, and for AP to take such a website seriously. How, exactly, does spreading a lie contribute to "efforts to fight for what is right"? By definition, if you have to lie, aren't you in the wrong?

[NoGOPZone]

21. Free Republic was 'founded by Robinson in September 1996'

and he hasn't updated its software since!

[LWolf]

23. DU hasn't leaned left for quite a while now.

Users don't set the agenda; the rules determine what can be discussed, and what cannot be.

Users decide what rises, and what sinks, of course, within allowed topics.

[G_j]

30. well maybe, lean..

in the general direction,
some who have leaned too far perhaps,
are no longer here.
Although folks like you and I and others, who are genuinely on the left, follow the rules and may often self-censor.

[LWolf]

31. Yes.

Self-censorship is a given; it's pretty upfront when you first register. ;)

:hi:

[IDemo]

24. "Many of its postings have a decidedly fringe feel. "

seriesly casting moranic asparagus hear, r we knot?

[Cheap_Trick]

25. "Spitting nails"? Great, you freepers...

Take those nails you're spitting, get some wood, build a bridge and GET THE FUCK OVER IT! YOU LOST, LOSERS.

And if that bridge you build happens to be as sound as that bridge in Minneapolis, oh well........:evilgrin:

[Hissyspit]

26. They forgot to mention that we don't murder people.

[man4allcats]

27. Freepers are upset? Gee...

I have only this to say to them: "We won. You lost. Get over it."

Damn that felt good!

[Bluebear]

33. "Many of its postings have a decidedly fringe feel." = kerrrrrazy

[Lex]

37. The frothing-at-the-mouth freepers helped kill the Repub party anyway.

I hope they finish it off with their 'nail spitting.'

[ProfessorGAC]

39. "A Decidedly Fringe Feel"

So, i'm asking: Why is AP covering a fringe site?
The Professor

[guitar man]

40. "spitting nails" lol

more like "shitting fails" :rofl:

[Lex]

42. Hahhaahaa!

!!!!

[burythehatchet]

45. also heard was...

"was it over when the Germans bombed pearl harbor?"

[walldude]

47. LMAO....

Not to rain on your day but do you realize that was 30 YEARS ago? Only half of DU will even get that joke. Sadly I'm in the half that does :(

[burythehatchet]

50. I used that line once before and several youngsters "corrected" me.

Yup, 30 years ago. I was a college freshman. I thought togas were standard campus attire.

[bunkerbuster1]

46. Wow, editorialize much, AP?

"the controversial community organizing group ACORN."

Controversial to whom? The Freeptards? Seriously, who else?

[Catherine Vincent]

49. Speaking of spitting nails.....

This is from a freeper regarding Tom Delay getting that warrant for his arrest:

Sweet Jesus, I LOATHE these folks!! I hate them with a passion hell couldn't describe!! SOB'S and F--KERS!! Are we ready to FIGHT??!! LISTEN UP!! ARE WE READY TO GIVE THE F--KING RATS A FIGHT? VA state folk this is your wakeup call, DON'T LET KAINE WIN.... HELL, I HOPE THIS HAS LIT A FIRE UNDER OUR party ARSES!! I'm so angry I'm spiting nails! The freakin RATS have fired the first shot, it's time to defend ourselves....FTS!!!!! I for ONE will NOT bend over!!

Hitlery is guilty as CHIT and the bit** SLIPPED away quite nicely!!

ENUFF!!

40 posted on 10/19/2005 12:24:23 PM PDT by RoseofTexas