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User: upchuck605

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  1. Re:credit where credit is due... on George Lucas C&Ds 'Lightsaber Laser' · · Score: 1

    You've got is backwards. The "Norse myth" that you claim George Lucas plagiarized to create Star Wars is in fact a spoof written by a Jackson Crawford, who has an interest in Icelandic Sagas and language. His article "If Star Wars Were and Icelandic Saga" is a linguistic and cultural translation of George Lucas's Star Wars story, not the other way around. Author's comment from his article on WordPress (http://tattuinardoelasaga.wordpress.com/2010/03/01/tattuinardoela-saga-if-star-wars-were-an-icelandic-saga/): "It’s both a linguistic and a cultural translation of Star Wars in addition to everything being in Old Norse, I converted the story into a Norse reference frame, changing it into a story of family and treachery in the North Atlantic in the 900s. This original bit was framed quasi-seriously, as it was just a Facebook note shared with colleagues, pretending to be a scholarly article or introduction about a neglected piece of the manuscript tradition that supposedly underlies Star Wars (I had been reading a lot of Icelandic sagas and the standard editions are all preceded by introductions like this, except much longer and in Modern Icelandic). But I made up the manuscripts out of whole cloth." It is very well written and I will admit that I was fooled at first, but reading through the comments easily dispels any notion that this Norse myth actually existed prior to the author adapting the Star Wars Saga for his own purposes.

  2. Re:Best Buy Experience on Computer Buying Experiences at B&M Stores · · Score: 1

    I agree with both of you, if that's possible. I worked for Best Buy while I was an Engineering/Computer Science student at the Colorado School of Mines. I started out with a fair amount more knowledge of computers (hardware and software) than most of the other associates. I was actually supposed to work in the tech area, but they decided sales wasn't a huge difference. I was probably the worst associate on the floor by the management's standards because I told people exactly what I knew and nothing more. At first I asked my supervisor the questions I wasn't able to answer myself, but it quickly became obvious that he knew less than I did. I started asking the techs up front instead and that worked well for a while because of one guy, then the management heard what I was doing and told me to "stop bothering the techs." In the end I tried to be a conscientious salesman and only offer what I knew and not be a dick about stupid things like Service Plans and other crap, but when the supervisor and managers starting telling me to tell customers untrue facts and incorrect information I decided it was time to leave. The bottom line is you can be informed and know a lot and try to use that knowledge in a helpful way, but as soon as what's correct and true interfere's with the company's profit margins they decide the truth should be different, so it is. Working at Best Buy I was not on commission, so there was a lot of pressure to perform. I know at Circuit City sales associates work on commission, so that's all fine and good if you just let people do their thing, but remember the company still wants you to sell, and if you don't make a decent profit margin for them, the pressure's on. I hope you graduate soon--I wouldn't wish a job like that on anyone.