[Dilangos]

Er...SOL stands for something else in English. It's sort of a negative response to an SOS. "SOS? Sorry, but you're SOL."

[rouletteroulette]

Oh right, good for morse coding.. that's three shorts, three long ones and then three shorts again.

But let's not get over our heads here. It's old now. We must update it. So that old people can't remember it and then we get rid off them people (who smell like their own pee!!).

[xtc2d6u8]

[vasyasvc]

Save Our Ship!

[ClorrerVeks]

"Mayday" comes from "m'aider", "help me" in French, IIRC.

[Abanijo]

Japher, that's maybe one of the best picture replies I've seen...

[EntectCelpelm]

I thought SOS was "Save our Ship" ?

[dWSOj26H]

Originally posted by Pekka
Why is it Save Our Souls? I mean, how about Save Our Lives?

You know, only the uberlord can save your soul, so that's either me or God. And I'm not reading any signs, that's a sign fo weakness. You work yourself out, you swim, kill the bastards, make a run for it, whatever you got yourself into, you have to make an effort first. You might fail, but hey, that's life and I guess it's up to God to save your soul if you failed miserably. And he don't like losers either so I wouldn't hold my breath.

So why is it SOS and not for example SOL? and even if it is "Save our Souls", it doesn't necessarily mean save your soul in the sense that your soul needs saving from Satan... I've heard the term soul referred to people. Old newspaper articles in America referred to "souls" as victims when a lot of people died... like "600 souls lost" when a ship was sunk... etc.

"Save our souls" could be referring to soul in the physical sense, because it's stuck in your body... not the spiritual sense.

If the body dies, the soul goes somewhere else. You see what I mean, Pekka?

[cargo_brad]

Originally posted by Serb
I heard in US they use Save Our Asses instead. No, thats France. What do they use in Russia? Save Our Soviets?

[outdog]

It doesnt stand for anything. The old British ships used to use CQD which stood for (seek you - distress) solely because seek you was the standard form of attempting to relay a general message to another ship.

However CQD was mistaken for many things and thus it was changed by the Germans to something which couldn't be screwed up by amateur morse operators: dot dot dot dash dash dash dot dot dot.

With voice recording something aural needed to be created and in the 1920s some bright spark in England suggested an anglicised for of the word m'aider be used (Mayday) because the planes from that airport only went to France.

What we don't have is a visual version of distress. I suggest feigning childbirth or people screaming in front of a camera or something.

[Petrushkaukrop]

Originally posted by Japher
awesome thread Pekka

Josie is working on a reply that explains your posts.

[MP+4]

Originally posted by civman2000
"Mayday" comes from "m'aider", "help me" in French, IIRC. LISTER gets up and starts to look for something to burn.

RIMMER: Mayday! Mayday! (To LISTER) I wonder why it's "Mayday?"

LISTER gathers some books from the trunk.

LISTER: Eh?
RIMMER: The distress call. Why d'you say "Mayday?" It's only a Bank
Holiday. Why not "Shrove Tuesday" or "Ascension Sunday?" (Mimics)
Ascension Sunday! Ascension Sunday! The fifteenth Wednesday after
Pentecost! The fifteenth Wednesday after Pentecost!
LISTER: It's French, you doink. It's m'aidez. Help me. Muh-aid-ay
(Sighs.) Everywhere I look reminds me of food. Look at these books:
Charles Lamb, Herman Wok, the complete works of Sir Francis Bacon, Eric
Van Lustbader...

[nonDosearrany]

Not ironic that it was developed by them though.

[HitAttetlyTek]

HA!

[avavavava]

Originally posted by Kalius
What we don't have is a visual version of distress. I suggest we use the BSoD (Blue Screen of Death).