Instead of talking about other people, I'm going to talk about myself. This way,I hope people will understand my point without taking personal offense.

Many people who know me (electronically AND personally) might say that I'm a non-stop talker and will often take an issue to "extremes" during a conversation. I might get off on a tangent or say things that people think are silly or strange. It's often hard to tell if I'm really serious, sometimes. From time to time, I say REALLY offensive things without thinking. It's not on purpose but other people don't know that. After a while, most people just say to themselves, "Oh! There goes Randy again.", and blow it off.

Problem is that talking on the internet is so "impersonal" that it's easy for me to say things without fear of criticism. One time, a while back, I said (on this forum) that some people who worked for a certain company might be "Dumb as rocks." To me, it was clearly a funny joke. I got a private response from a guy who worked for that company and he was not very happy! After listening to him I realized that there are some things I say that piss people off even if I don't mean it. I have to learn how to think twice before I say some things.

Since that time I try to make sure I say things clearly. Often, you will see me write things like, "correct me if I'm wrong", or "I understand <the subject> is/are...". It's my way of saying things in a way that won't make people think I'm attacking them. Of course I realize this is the "real world" and you can't live your entire life trying not to offend everyone. Some people just won't be satisfied no matter what you say. At least when somebody DOES get upset with me, I can be reasonably sure it's THEIR problem, not mine.

As far as ME being offended by something OTHER PEOPLE said on this forum... There has only been once. It was VERY minor. We "settled out-of-court", so to speak. The other person might not have known that I was upset.

I'm fairly new to your site, and have only posted several times. I do enjoy it very much and find in extremely informative. I was disapointed that the site about leaving a frame on the leader and tail was discontinued, as I had just completed reading all the listings and had wanted to make a comment. Yes, I agree...it had been beaten to death and was probably going nowhere at this point....but there was one thing that I found missing, unless I missed it somewhere (there was a lot to read). First though, before I get to that, let me inform you that I have been a projectionist for over thirty years and was trained by the union when it was required to serve a six month apprenticeship before taking the state exam. I was taught to leave one frame by them.
During the past week or so, while following this forum, I made it a point to contact all the old timers (projectionists) around here to see if anyone knew how to identify the proper leaders and tails to the proper reels using the soundtrack and film edge. Some of these guys have operated for up to sixty years and not one of them ever heard of your method. I think of myself as a good projectionist, and have trained many others over the years myself. Now I wonder how I missed this. No one ever taught me, so I couldn't teach anyone else your secret. If you are the worlds greatest projectionist as you seem to want us to believe, and are truly concerned about how film is handled and presented....and realize that virtually none of us have had the proper training to be able to identify the correct leaders and tails...WHY DON'T YOU TELL US HOW TO DO IT? You will have served the industry well by doing that, and had you done it at the beginning, maybe the forum would not have run on so long.

Second, many other operators I know of can do the reading the optical track/edgemarking trick, so perhaps it is just your part of the country or local that the tricks never circulated around. That being the case, then your request is indeed a fantastic idea for the projectionist community!

In situations like this, I always yield to the guy with the kill switch.

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Better Projection Pays!

Actually, if someone feels offended by inferrence, contact that person via email for clarification. More often than not, offense was not the goal or intent.

I, for the life of me, can not understand how this has gotten blown out the way it has. I will say it has been unpleasent reading in some parts and informative in others, thank god.

If you all don't watch out, I'm gonna start a thread on "HPS-4000, better with or without an ID frame!"

Steve (the other one)

I look forward to talking with all of you in future threads!

Now Mr. Kraus has taken it upon himself to spam this site for email addresses and has sent out emails over it to many forum members in an attempt to turn everyone against me. Well, if anyone is offended at the way I handled the situation regardless of just how much of the info you have on the subject, you are free to leave. I took action because there were other forum members who contacted me, as well as myself, who were offended at Mr. Kraus' remarks and that is that. I do not force anyone to be here and work extremely hard and spend quite a lot of money keeping this site up and running. Sure I could easily go out and get banner ads and program in those annoying popups to make back that money through advertising, but I feel the service I am offering here is worth the cash out of my pocket every month.

I am not against Mr. Kraus having a differing opinion of my own. If that was the case, I would've banned Steve Guttag the first day...but Steve G. is in my opinion a benefit to all on this site with his expertise. (For those who do not follow all the threads, Steve G. and I like to "fight" the old platter vs. changeover thing virtually every few months. However, we make it clear by the use of expressions that we are only teasing. ) I have no doubt Mr. Kraus is also an excellent operator, but if I am going to have to deal with his rantings on a daily basis (yes, every single day since he signed up), then no one on this planet is worth that amount of effort to me.

Mr. Kraus has apparently decided that since someone has a differing opinion than his own (mine in particular) that he will stop at nothing until I admit I am wrong and beg for his forgiveness. At least that's the way I perceive it because he created this "censorship" thread after I closed the "ID frame" thread (which was turning into a rant and was going nowhere) in which he has simply moved the rantings from that thread onto this thread. Now Mr. Kraus has commenced email spamming above to an unknown amount of members here and finally, started this entire argument again over on a newsgroup! This is just completely taking it too far. Not once did he bother to send me an email during all of this, he just decided to "get even" like an immature child. The man has rubbed me the wrong way too much at this point and I will stand my ground.

Mr. Kraus, please grow up a bit and remember, it's just a web site. Your life is not over, and also remember that the newsgroup is "unmoderated" so you can rant over there until your heart is content.

I would hope we can all get back to productive discussions now. I am closing this thread in an attempt to put an end to this nonsense. If anyone has something else to say on this issue, please email me.