(Silly) Subscripts on pronouns

[thehumangame.livejournal.com]

I had a textbook about a year ago which had three coauthors (Network Security: Private Communication in a Public World, Second Edition, by Kaufman, Perlman, and Speciner). They had a novel way of indicating whose opinions were whose: they would use personal pronouns throughout, but attach numbered subscripts to indicate a specific author. (Luckily, they always wrote their names in the same order. I guess you could use letters instead of numbers...)

Some of the better samples:

The control zone is the region that must be physically guarded to keep out intruders that might be attempting to eavesdrop. A well-shielded device will have a smaller control zone. I₁ remember being told in 1979 of a tape drive that had a control zone over two miles. Unfortunately, most control zone information is classified, and I₂ couldn't get me₁ to be very specific about them... (NS, p. 17)

It does nothing other than its intended purpose (I₁ have analyzed the thing carefully and I₂ have complete faith in me₁)... (NS, p. 21)

If you really care about all this, we_1,3 recommend my₂ book Interconnections: Bridges, Routers, Switches, and Internetworking Protocols. (I₂ modestly abstain.) (NS, p. 427)

I_1,2 found all of this very amusing. (They also quoted Alice in Wonderland at random intervals, which made it approximately the best textbook ever.)

(Cross-posted to Relative State)

Comments

[stealthdragon.livejournal.com]

Hee! It's a bit cumbersome to be using sub/sup tags every time we use a pronoun, but the result is pretty cool.

[luwana.livejournal.com]

*Bizarre*

But wickedly cool. Great for those days when you're just too blendy and switchy to label blocks of text as "By Xyz"

[tessagratton.livejournal.com]

how interesting. did they adress it at all in the introduction or preface, and explain why/how they came up with that method?

[flyawayjenny.livejournal.com]

haha how weird (but in a cool way) ^_^

[ex-khailitha846.livejournal.com]

Yeah... that's pretty cool.

[kasiawhisper.livejournal.com]

could get to be a hassle if there are more than 10 in your group.. you'd have to make a number key! ^_^ but nifty..