Author: Deano

Even if it was on a double-digital old school analog broadcast channel (okay, break out your time machines, I know), I couldn't help but sit down for The Final Countdown, pretty much every time[*].
(Image courtesy of http://amzn.to/iIsSQc)

Krull has no innocence of pleasure about it, though with a healthy dose of fast forward, it is thoroughly enjoyable. 😉

(Image courtesy of http://amzn.to/iGlj58)

And, to really blow the doors off, The Return of Captain Invincible is soooo soooo bad, and sooooooooo sooooooooo good, especially once it turns into a musical. Plus, who could be a more convincing invincible superhero than Alan Arkin?

(Image courtesy of http://amzn.to/j3fAB6)

[* My wife is Japanese, and even she enjoyed it… And then perversely lent it out to all her Japanese/American-coupled friends. Sick, sick woman. ]

What are the best "guilty pleasure" movies?

At a previous company, I had a subordinate who would do one of the following, they all mostly seemed to work after 1-2 times:

• Leave a note for the first offense
• Hide the phone somewhere in the employee's workspace and leave a note to that effect (often in the file drawer in a new folder labelled "HOW RUUUUUUUUDE")
• For phones with a removable battery, remove the battery, and stack phone, cover, and battery like a zen stone arrangement in front of their keyboard
• In one case, use the administrative "all page" function to blast the very distinctive (unique to the company) annoying ringtone across all the desk phones. Subtle!
• Holding the cell between thumb and forefinger, run (not walk) feverishly into the conference room the offender is meeting in, and with sweat on beaded brow, hand over the phone like a precious baby, or bomb to be defused

The number one key is to have a company culture that doesn't tolerate that sort of rudeness – even having ringtones go off when you had the phone on your person was considered really taboo – certain managers just wouldn't continue with a presentation/meeting until the offender had left.

People catch on pretty quickly, if you treat it as a serious disruption. If any of the above sounds, instead, like it would get you in trouble if you tried it, then it's probably best to invest in better headphones, and/or a cellphone signal jammer (er, I mean, cell signal testing equipment).

What is the protocol when a co-worker leaves her phone on the desk and it rings with a crappy ringtone? Should we ignore, relocate, or answer it?

Just a few tech support terms for the end user:

• luser – local user (or portmanteau of loser and user)
• PEBKAC – Problem Exists Between Keyboard And Chair
• Layer 8 – OSI layers 1-7 describe network abstraction levels, 8 is the user
• chainik – The Russian equivalent of "Dummies" in the X for Dummies series

What slang terms do different industries call their customers?

It depends on the definition of chivalrous to which the querent refers:

For those comprising a mounted warrior class, I'd say Tibet is most likely one of the last few outposts of chivalry in general, with particular utilitarian value for transportation and the elderly (two things mentioned in the question);

For those behaving in a moralistic and courteous fashion… Well, it varies a LOT based on the observer…

• Travellers tend to find Japan, Bali, and Fiji all amazing as countrywide oases of civility and compassion, though many residents would heartily disagree (for the record, I think most people, and especially drivers in Japan are very polite, but subway etiquette is totally cut-throat with respect to giving up seats to pregnant women, people travelling with small children, invalids, and the elderly).
• Residents (who know the "rules on the ground") often mention London of all places (though the rest of the UK gets pretty low marks). In the US, opinions vary widely, with cities like Minneapolis and Chicago often winding up side to side with New York City(??!?!?) in polls and surveys.

Overall, the common theme I've found in studying this issue, as well as my own travels, is that what represents courtesy (including things like not looking directly at strangers in Tokyo or NYC by default) varies quite widely, and that your best bet for being treated well in any city is to have respect for and understanding of the distinctive ways in which it operates to keep its residents from killing each other on the streets.

Wish I could be more helpful or specific than that, but the best counter-statement I would use is this: behaving in a foreign city as you would "back home", and expecting similar treatment, is one of the surest ways to ensure you will not be treated with respect and common courtesy.

In which cities around the world are people most publicly chivalrous?

Sometimes what appears to be an overly simple question may simply be misworded, or even accidentally cut off in posting… It's best to take every question as 100% serious, and allow any follow-on discussion/commenting help to refine/clarify the situation.

For questions that truly are quite simple and searchable, I'd tend towards answering clearly and completely, perhaps with references that help illustrate how best to perform a similar search in the future. For many people, simply understanding how best to surface answers in Google, using operators and the like, is like rocket science.

By helping show the way, you ultimately help educate your fellow Quorans in the "how" as much as the "what", which could lead to future dividends in terms of higher quality answers by these same querents.

Is it OK to answer a question on Quora with lmgtfy?