Monday, August 25, 2003
 
I'm Taking the Exclamation Point

Pud's linking to a story in which Abercrombie and Fitch are claiming ownership on the number 22 on clothing. More to the point, American Eagle Outfitters shouldn't be allowed to use it, because Abercrombie and Fitch were the first to devise the addition of eleven and eleven. Perhaps both Abercrombie and his faithful henchman Fitch were polydactyl and each had six fingers on his left hand, so 22 is an important sum for ANF.

But if the next intellectual property grab is going to be numbers, alphabetical characters, or glyphs, I right now want to stake my claim on the exclamation point (!). Back off, you hosers, it's mine!

The wonderful exclamation point, known to some as a bang (translated from the German "nicht"), is not just a character, it's a way of life. !me, !now.

!funny to the non-geeks in the readership, but who cares? Any time they're excited and say, "I love you!" in a love note, I'm suing. Werd.

 
To say Noggle, one first must be able to say the "Nah."