28 replies to this topic

[*Anastasia]

~

[ᗅᗺᗷᗅ]

It depends.  For small purchases, like a soda at a convenience store, usually cash.  For anything more than $10, usually a debit card.

 

I believe people who write checks in public (i.e. in check-out lines) should be shot.

[Redezra]

Visa Paypass! Or is it paywave? pay....woosh? Iunno... it's the RFID "blip" method of contactless payment. And I use it for neeeeaaaaarrrly everything.

[Phate]

I would use the paypass thing, except I can't find a reason to. Tapping the card isn't really any easier/quicker than sliding it. And it always confuses cashiers when I try which ends up making it take longer.

[*Anastasia]

I would use the paypass thing, except I can't find a reason to. Tapping the card isn't really any easier/quicker than sliding it. And it always confuses cashiers when I try which ends up making it take longer.

Not even available up here, so I have a question: do you still need to sign or enter a PIN? If so, then yeah, I can't see it being quicker. If not... how is that secure? ._.

[Thrash]

Missing Debit Card, Check is spelled wrong, poll invalid.

[*Anastasia]

Missing Debit Card, Check is spelled wrong, poll invalid.

Debit card is there, you're not looking hard enough. Cheque is spelled right, you philistine.

[Redezra]

No, paypass has no pin. It's not secure. It just can't be used for purchases more than 100 dollars and maxes out at a grand per day. It's also protected by the anti-fraud systems operated by whichever bank you're with.

 

Edit: Should add, it's also an encrypted rfid chip, so it's very hard, almost impossible, to steal the chips signature.

Edited by Redezra, 04 April 2014 - 08:16 PM.

[Thrash]

Missing Debit Card, Check is spelled wrong, poll invalid.

Debit card is there, you're not looking hard enough. Cheque is spelled right, you philistine.

 

to quote webster

 

 

a :  a :  a person who is guided by materialism and is usually disdainful of intellectual or artistic values

 

 

Wut? So because I never used or accepted cheque as the correct spelling of check in my life, since I learned it was spelled check, suddenly I am "a :  a person who is guided by materialism and is usually disdainful of intellectual or artistic values"?

 

Also, Interac, Cirrus... that's why I completely looked over debit. Why wouldn't you just say debit card?

[*Anastasia]

Missing Debit Card, Check is spelled wrong, poll invalid.

Debit card is there, you're not looking hard enough. Cheque is spelled right, you philistine.

 
to quote webster
 
 

a :  a :  a person who is guided by materialism and is usually disdainful of intellectual or artistic values

 
 
Wut? So because I never used or accepted cheque as the correct spelling of check in my life, since I learned it was spelled check, suddenly I am "a :  a person who is guided by materialism and is usually disdainful of intellectual or artistic values"?
 
Also, Interac, Cirrus... that's why I completely looked over debit. Why wouldn't you just say debit card?
 

I was being silly, but fair enough

As for why I didn't just say debit, I'm not sure. It probably has to do with the fact that where I'm at, people generally don't, we'd say Interac instead. Sorry.

[ᗅᗺᗷᗅ]

Cheque is the British spelling (also Australian, Kiwi, Irish, etc.).  Check is the American (and maybe Canadian — I don't think I've ever seen it spelled in reference to our neighbors from the North). 

 

I've always wondered how it came to pass that our spellings are so different.

[*Anastasia]

Cheque is the British spelling (also Australian, Kiwi, Irish, etc.).  Check is the American (and maybe Canadian — I don't think I've ever seen it spelled in reference to our neighbors from the North). 
 
I've always wondered how it came to pass that our spellings are so different.

Cheque is the proper Canadian spelling, and in actual fact, it's one of the few places where American spellings haven't crept into our daily use. It's entirely common to see words like honour and neighbour spelled without a 'u', and programme is almost always spelled without the ending '-me', but 'cheque' is pretty secure. I think the only comparable word with a spelling difference that we never see the American spelling of is 'dialogue', which never has its ending dropped.

As for how the different spellings arose, it actually crosses over to the other thread's discussion about dictionaries, and how they standardized the spelling of words. Samuel Johnson's 1755 dictionary, published in England, set the standard for what we consider modern 'British English', while American English was standardized in Noah Webster's eponymous dictionary published 73 years later.

[ᗅᗺᗷᗅ]

But that still makes no sense. 73 years is a long time, and Britain was producing a lot more publications than America at the time. So why weren't those British spellings already widespread when Webster wrote his dictionary? Especially considering that America was FOUNDED by British people! I wonder if it was a deliberate, conscious choice to differentiate ourselves from the mother country?

[Thrash]

Holy nerds

[*Anastasia]

That's possible, certainly, especially considering Webster's dictionary was published in the aftermath of two major wars with Britain.

But more likely, I feel it was just an act of simplification. Just as there are people now who advocate changing English spellings to be phonetic or otherwise simplifying our spelling and grammatical rules to be more approachable, the likes of Webster probably saw all those 'u's (which are probably the differences we're most familiar with, or are most visible, despite there being quite a long list of differences in all) and wondered, 'What the hell purpose do they serve?'

The only difference was back then, it was both easier and probably seen as less controversial to change, because English wasn't the global juggernaut of a language it is today, and while Johnson's dictionary was undoubtedly popular, spelling variations didn't magically disappear in the wake of its publication. The American population was also much smaller (scantly more than 1 million when Johnson's dictionary was published, and still less than 10 million at the time of Webster's publication), and public education was just coming into its own in the early 19th century. While 73 years is a long time, consider how long it is when there's no tradition of mandatory education to instill those spellings in youth: to this day, schools are probably the largest collective purchaser of dictionaries. Literacy rates weren't even first reported in the United States until 1870, so I daresay before the dawn of public schooling, there wasn't a lot in the area to brag about.

Webster's dictionary was first published only two years after the first public high school was established in Boston, and its growth in popularity coincided with the rise of public education. By the 1840 census, 55% of five- to fifteen-year-olds were attending primary schools: and you can bet your bottom that of those that could afford a dictionary (which I honestly couldn't estimate), they were far more likely to purchase a book published by an American than a Brit, if only because of availability and not for patriotic reasons.

[KiWi]

Anna made me happy in this thread.

[ᗅᗺᗷᗅ]

I bet that it comes down to some major public education system or other government entity deciding to adopt Webster's dictionary as the standard is what clinched it.  But otherwise I agree with Anna's assessment.  I would point out that there has always been some form of "public" education in this country, even in Colonial days, as education was by then standardized in England and we were, after all, still English.  Often it was provided by churches, but many villages and towns had officially-funded and sanctioned schools.  Of course nothing was standardized, and requirements varied wildly in some cases.  But still it was something, and if nothing else likely taught the majority of Americans who could do so to read and write.  Logic dictates that this teaching would have been done using materials in British English, so those spellings (which by the 18th century were much more standardized, even if informally so) would have been passed down, I would think.  I'll have to read more about Noah Webster.  Perhaps he was a visionary who set to, as Anna suggests, simplify language.  It seems almost Orwellian to us now, but throughout history events have often been shaped by one determined genius who either got lucky or was tenacious, or both.

[The Dark Empire]

I pay with precious metals and sexual deeds

[Infopowerbroker]

I use a credit card, and pay my bill every month. No balance rolling over? no interest. and they even pay me to use it.

If i'm going into the city for a night on the towne, i'll pull a mug20, but otherwise I tend to not carry cash.

[*Anastasia]

i'll pull a mug20

Huh?