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A Fond Farewell

farmersalmanac.com

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Re: A Fond Farewell

#31

Post by aydyn »

jacquesm wrote: post #22
Shorn wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 01852, 173 years ago That's some serious forward thinking you've got going on with your date format there. I like it, I will be formatting all my years to 5 digits from now on. OTOH, if it was just a typo - keep it to yourself, I don't wanna know. I'm all in - 5 digit years is a thing now.

> I like it, I will be formatting all my years to 5 digits from now on. Please don't, it's highly irritating and usually just serves as a way to get people to discuss the leading zero rather than the subject they were really interested in in the first place. Leading zeros aren't a thing for a reason. It's about as useful as expressing the temperature in Kelvin.

Coincidentally, the temperatures in the Farmer's Almanac are all in Kelvin.

Re: A Fond Farewell

#32

Post by silisili »

Shorn wrote: post #8
kragen wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The original editor hasn't wanted to anymore since he died in 01852, 173 years ago, so that's not it. Surely what is happening is that people don't buy reference books much anymore, and the core market of farmers gets smaller every year.

> 01852, 173 years ago That's some serious forward thinking you've got going on with your date format there. I like it, I will be formatting all my years to 5 digits from now on. OTOH, if it was just a typo - keep it to yourself, I don't wanna know. I'm all in - 5 digit years is a thing now.

Nobody seems to care about the y100k problem this introduces.

001852 is safe for a million years!

Re: A Fond Farewell

#33

Post by 9rx »

jacquesm wrote: post #22
Shorn wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 01852, 173 years ago That's some serious forward thinking you've got going on with your date format there. I like it, I will be formatting all my years to 5 digits from now on. OTOH, if it was just a typo - keep it to yourself, I don't wanna know. I'm all in - 5 digit years is a thing now.

> I like it, I will be formatting all my years to 5 digits from now on. Please don't, it's highly irritating and usually just serves as a way to get people to discuss the leading zero rather than the subject they were really interested in in the first place. Leading zeros aren't a thing for a reason. It's about as useful as expressing the temperature in Kelvin.

> Leading zeros aren't a thing for a reason.

If they aren't a thing, why are we talking about them? Clearly they're a thing. And not even an obscure thing. If you've ever used commonly used representations like ZIP codes, bank account numbers, or serial numbers you'll no doubt have encountered it before. And that even goes for dates. ISO 8601, for example, requires leading zeros, including for the year component. "1" is not considered a valid year under that standard. It must be represented as "0001". Granted, ISO 8601 only requires a minimum of four characters to represent the year, but expecting at least five characters is conceptually just as valid.

Re: A Fond Farewell

#34

Post by shagie »

Shorn wrote: post #8
kragen wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The original editor hasn't wanted to anymore since he died in 01852, 173 years ago, so that's not it. Surely what is happening is that people don't buy reference books much anymore, and the core market of farmers gets smaller every year.

> 01852, 173 years ago That's some serious forward thinking you've got going on with your date format there. I like it, I will be formatting all my years to 5 digits from now on. OTOH, if it was just a typo - keep it to yourself, I don't wanna know. I'm all in - 5 digit years is a thing now.

RFC 2550 Section 3.1 has years from 0000 to 9999 as four digit but zero padded (so the fall of Rome was 0476). It then gets appropriately weird as it was published April 1, 1999.

You might also enjoy the Kurzgesagt human era calendar - https://youtu.be/29pN-2KM2DI - https://shop-us.kurzgesagt.org/collections/calendar

Re: A Fond Farewell

#35

Post by do_not_redeem »

jacquesm wrote: post #22
Shorn wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 01852, 173 years ago That's some serious forward thinking you've got going on with your date format there. I like it, I will be formatting all my years to 5 digits from now on. OTOH, if it was just a typo - keep it to yourself, I don't wanna know. I'm all in - 5 digit years is a thing now.

> I like it, I will be formatting all my years to 5 digits from now on. Please don't, it's highly irritating and usually just serves as a way to get people to discuss the leading zero rather than the subject they were really interested in in the first place. Leading zeros aren't a thing for a reason. It's about as useful as expressing the temperature in Kelvin.

Well said. Five-digit years are the Shadow the Hedgehog of rationalism. But he successfully derailed the thread and took the spotlight for himself, so... mission accomplished, I guess.

Re: A Fond Farewell

#37

Post by [deleted] »

kragen wrote: post #7
yieldcrv wrote: post #4

Interesting, I appreciate how they gave no reasons, I’m also curious if there is more details beyond “we don’t want to anymore” Would be pretty cool if it was that simple, that reason needs more representation and is how I run my entrepreneurial endeavors

The original editor hasn't wanted to anymore since he died in 01852, 173 years ago, so that's not it. Surely what is happening is that people don't buy reference books much anymore, and the core market of farmers gets smaller every year.

[deleted]

Re: A Fond Farewell

#38

Post by Waterluvian »

What exactly is the Farmer’s Almanac? I always thought it was basically a big set of historical data that helped provide a sort of statistical foundation for choices, even if the why isn’t explained.

Which seems like I can completely understand it as a practical tool in the past but fairly obsolete in modern times.

Or did it evolve, too, and was essentially modern science and maths, dressed in the trappings of a beloved cultural relic? Or is it more than ever a collection of stories and advice and other culture, and much less about the actual almanac?

Re: A Fond Farewell

#39

Post by chatmasta »

pjbeam wrote: post #30

Huh, this always seemed like such an institution it never occurred to me that people have to produce Farmers' Almanac. Which of course they do. Didn't have this on my bingo card today, makes me a little sad.

The brand has 200 years of value. They could easily sell it. It’s a respectable decision to shut it down instead.

Re: A Fond Farewell

#40

Post by Alive-in-2025 »

silisili wrote: post #32
Shorn wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 01852, 173 years ago That's some serious forward thinking you've got going on with your date format there. I like it, I will be formatting all my years to 5 digits from now on. OTOH, if it was just a typo - keep it to yourself, I don't wanna know. I'm all in - 5 digit years is a thing now.

Nobody seems to care about the y100k problem this introduces. 001852 is safe for a million years!

Only losers don't pad dates out to 10 digits to account for when Donald Trump passes off his earthly coil.
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