It began with the forging of the Great Rings.

Three were given to the Elves; immortal, wisest and fairest of all beings.

Seven to the Dwarf Lords, great miners and craftsmen of the mountain halls.

And nine…Nine rings were gifted to the Race of Men, who above all else desire power.

For within these rings was bound the strength and will to govern each race.

But do you recall… The most famous one ring of all

people only started using the new pronunciation in the last 10-15.

As someone else pointed out already, this is untrue. While it may not have been popular in your circles, it definitely was in others. I’ve been saying it with a hard g as long as you have with a soft and I’m not the originator either.

English linguistics doesn’t indicate anything at all.

They absolutely do. That’s why you can sound out a word you’ve never seen before. You may not always be right when you do because they indicate, they don’t define.

There are no rules about word construction or pronunciation.

There are, there are just exceptions. For example, an e at the end of the word is silent. I’m certain you can give me a word where it’s not, but there are at least six in this paragraph alone where it is.

if you are understood then you have pronounced them correctly

In this logic if someone has been pronouncing a word all their life with a single pronunciation and travels to another location with a much different accent they can only now be pronouncing the word wrong.

If understanding is also the only metric then a hard g would still be preferable. Not only does a written g tend to make people lean to a hard g in my experience, but there’s more words that could be mistaken for a soft g pronunciation.

You could argue that the original pronunciation is archaic,

Could I not argue that the original pronunciation has fallen out of favor?

the word itself is like 35 years old

Is there a time requirement for pronunciations to become archaic?

since there was only one acceptable pronunciation

Which isn’t a time that existed, as we’ve established

who aren’t likely to change.

Given your stance on language this is absolutely a you problem. If the rest of us collectively decided to understand it as only with a hard g, you would not be understood and therefore be pronouncing it wrong by your own logic.

Become popular? It’s been popular roughly for the lifespan of the format. It’s hardly language’s fault the developer wanted to make an unfunny reference to a since forgotten peanut butter slogan.

On the other hand linguistics indicate a hard g sound with the construction of the word, constituent words aside. Plenty of four letter words starting with the gi combo have a hard g, including but not limited to gift which you may notice is very similarly constructed.

Whatever else the English language may throw at us, people appreciate consistency because we can make some sense of the world. A hard g is the consistent, predictable, sensible choice for the limited availability of those virtues English offers.

Pretty sure that’s the fog that turns you inside out

Which is Treehouse of horror… 5?

Florida attached to Europe looks mildly like a penis.

Southern is fairly fluid depending on who you ask. A Floridian thinks they’re southern but an Alabaman likely doesn’t.

Texas is, well, Texas.

A while ago I was outside Saint Louis and one of the guys who traveled down there with me kept calling that the south.

If you wanna be Midwest you can be. If you wanna be Southern or Western I think that’s alright too.

Sure, we’re told that, but we’re not shown it. I’ve heard that a given person is the only one that can do a thing and it’s rarely true. While these are not ordinary circumstances by any means, just being told such is just that. And if we want to get very technical we would need to acknowledge Tom Bombadil.

Sam was tempted, sure, but Frodo was already being tempted before they left the Shire. Hiding behind a tree with a Nazgûl leaning over I don’t believe for a moment it was Frodo wanting the ring on and I think the way he snaps back supports that. The Ring grew stronger as they grew closer. It’s like chronic pain. If you deal with a certain kind of pain every day it’s tiring but you get accustomed to it. If someone just going about their life gets sudden pain to the same level it might bring them to their knees. It doesn’t mean anything accept that you’ve had time to adapt and they have not.

Do you honestly believe that Frodo’s sense of sense of goodness, humility, and self-sacrifice is greater than that of Sam or really most of the fellowship? If that’s what it comes down to then he would need to be far more advanced in those than everybody else. I think Sam easily demonstrates as much if not more of most if not all of those. If you think about it Frodo isn’t shown to have much holding him to the Shire apart from Bag End. Sam has a life, hopes, and dreams. He left all that to go with Frodo, and was prepared to drown to continue to do so when Frodo was going to set off on his own. If there’s not mountains of goodness and self sacrifice there I don’t know where there is. And I really don’t think I need to give examples of humility in Sam.

If goodness and self sacrifice are such a huge part of it too then how was Gandalf so readily susceptible? He may not be as humble as a Hobbit but he was clearly prepared to give his life for the fellowship.

I think we are to accept that there’s a quality to Hobbits and the lives they choose to lead. I think, in fiction, the biggest part of Frodo entering the journey is the fact that he inherited the ring. As we know the ring chooses who carries it I think it’s not unreasonable that it could have had some influence on moving to Frodo. Bilbo having second thoughts doesn’t change that. Bearers from Isildur to Gollum didn’t want to give it up. If anything the fact that he could may demonstrate the ring’s influence. Surely it wouldn’t choose someone it thought could destroy it. Without Sam I think it’s pretty clear to say that’s accurate. Frodo nearly fails more than once but Sam gets him back on track. The Ring cab choose its bearer, but not the people around them.

To me Frodo being the single most important part of success is a lot like so many people who think Romeo and Juliet is a romance. We’re not shown that Frodo is unique or special in his ability to carry the ring to Mount Doom (especially since he clearly couldn’t on his own) but that we can accomplish great things by working at them together. Tolkien’s life before he wrote it feels like an important piece of support for that idea.

I see what you’re saying, but Frodo literally couldn’t have done it without Sam. We see that directly.

We don’t know if it could happen the other way around or not because that’s not the story we were told.

I’m not trying to diminish what Frodo did but it seems to me the statement “Frodo was the only individual in the world that could do what he did” does so for Sam’s contributions.

Honestly all of it wouldn’t have worked without all of the surviving Fellowship’s (plus Gollum) actions, but Sam’s are the most direct.

It seems to me there’s a reason that Aragorn didn’t bow to Frodo, but all four of the Hobbits. They were all simple folk, not warriors who achieved great things with plenty of sacrifice. Elevating Frodo does a disservice to the others.

That’s why I put the extra bit at the end. I think FOSS is or is becoming synonymous with open source.

FOSF isn’t terribly pronounceable, but would technically be a thing too.

Technically speaking shouldn’t this be FOSH?

I know the term has taken hold and is more googlable. Just pedantically speaking.

Fair enough. Nothing indicated to me it was supposed to be today’s date.

The times are different. What’s the other one?

Ah but what is enough money for you or I is not enough money for the bigwigs. And since they’re obviously more important, as they’re at the top, we have to have sure they get enough money even if that means you don’t.

But they’ll get you a ping pong table so you can stop thinking about how you don’t know what you’re going to feed your family tonight