Occasionally, I am reminded why I shouldn't read the comments here.

December 31, 2005 8:04 AM

Occasionally, I am reminded why I shouldn't read the comments here.

I guess I'm soft-hearted or something, but I thought that yankeefog's link was a pretty good one: inspiring, heart-warming, maybe a little fluffy, but it's the holidays. So, after I read the article, I clicked back to the comments and the first half dozen replies are people whining about having to register to read it. Particularly annoying is thirteenkiller's one word dismissal. I'm sure a lot of thought went into that. I mean, what purpose does that kind of post serve other than to make yourself look like a complete dick? Seriously, you have time to dress up your user page with ironic hideously stupid rainbow shit, but you don't have time to swipe a password from bugmenot? Yeesh.
posted by MegoSteve to Etiquette/Policy at 8:04 AM (54 comments total)

Damn, I thought MeTa had the automatic [more inside] widget.
posted by MegoSteve at 8:05 AM on December 31, 2005

I flagged my comment as "offensive." Feel better?

The Wiki advises against posting to content that requires registration. I find it mildly irritating, I'm not alone. Meh.
posted by Gator at 8:07 AM on December 31, 2005

Yawn.
posted by Kwantsar at 8:12 AM on December 31, 2005

That Most Chronically Unimpressed medal is MINE, Kwantsar. Back the fuck off.

I mean, uh, whatever. Meh.
posted by Gator at 8:14 AM on December 31, 2005

The registration for the article in question was a bit more than the normal "tell us a little bit about you" that NY Times or Boston Globe requires. Telephone number is a required field, for instance, and then after registering (using my junkmail email addres) I find that I need to go into that email and fish out something else in order to complete registration.

I'm sure the story was heartwarming. I don't mind sites with simple registration. But I had to jump through five pages of crap before I was told "now go to your email and check...." and then I, frankly, gave up.

How that paper thinks its getting any useful information at all from that complex registration is frankly beyond me
posted by anastasiav at 8:28 AM on December 31, 2005

too late Gator you lost it.
posted by dabitch at 8:28 AM on December 31, 2005

Sorry about that. I don't like sites that require registration, either, and I normally don't post links to them. But I must have registered with the LA Times years ago, because it didn't ask me for registration when I went to the site this time, and I therefore posted the link in blissful ignorance.

MegoSteve, I'm glad you persisted in getting through, and I'm glad you found the story as touching as I did. Were you able to get a BugMeNot password for the site? For some reason, I'm having a hard time doing so. If somebody has one they can post here or in the thread, that would be great.
posted by yankeefog at 8:34 AM on December 31, 2005

This is the thinking behind a "talk" channel for each thread -- it'd be a place where those comments could be posted happily by pepole away from the main comments area.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 8:39 AM on December 31, 2005

Yes. Their registration process sucks, but that investment of two little minutes of your life will result in access to some of the best journalism and criticism in the country. Your call.
posted by RJ Reynolds at 8:40 AM on December 31, 2005

Since the BugMeNot passwords weren't working, I went and registered a new login at the LA Times:
USER: [e-mail]
PASSWORD: fakelogin

(People weren't kidding about the LA Times website, by the way-it's a really invasive and annoying registration process.)

Moments before I posted the login info to the thread, somebody posted the complete article there, so it's now a moot point, but perhaps the login will be useful for another occasion.
posted by yankeefog at 8:43 AM on December 31, 2005

Just say you're from the UK - it gave me very little hasle to register.
posted by dash_slot- at 8:46 AM on December 31, 2005

I've found that using either:

dailykos/dailykos

or

[e-mail]/dailykos

as a username/pw on most sites will get you in sans registration.
posted by empath at 8:58 AM on December 31, 2005

Whoops. I just posted almost the same thing inthe blue. My bad.
posted by nevercalm at 9:04 AM on December 31, 2005

Nice that the giant pill exposed Matt to violating US copyright law by reproducing the article in full.
posted by birdherder at 9:04 AM on December 31, 2005

SORRY
posted by thirteenkiller at 9:21 AM on December 31, 2005

But my userpage is pretty awesome
posted by thirteenkiller at 9:27 AM on December 31, 2005

Flagging? Moving on? I mean, thirteenkiller was being petulant with that one-word yawn, but it wasn't exactly an elaborate derail, and the post was presented very Lifetime-y and hence likely to draw some ire (and then there's the weird Lewinsky conflation, and the shitty, shitty registration just to see the content...); why the personal callout and the dig on the userpage?
posted by cortex at 9:28 AM on December 31, 2005

thirteenkiller was very drunk pls2forgive
posted by Protocols of the Elders of Awesome at 9:47 AM on December 31, 2005

Overall, a poor excuse for an FPP.
posted by mischief at 9:59 AM on December 31, 2005

but I thought that yankeefog's link was a pretty good one ... So, after I read the article, I clicked back to the comments and the first half dozen replies are people whining about having to register to read it.

But isn't that the point? You came back with a load of warm fuzzies whilst everyone else was sitting there saying "what a wanker, he could have provided a login name at least". Of course it's going to seem tasteless to you, but to everyone who can't read the article it's rather mild.

This callout seems rather lacking in direction, you start out by bashing mefi's distinguishing trait? Do you have a purpose other than to take potshots at another user? I'm baffled.

(A "talk channel" sounds pretty good though, aye up pony.)
posted by hugsnkisses at 9:59 AM on December 31, 2005

Previous discussion of the "talk page" idea. I still don't really care for it, m'self. As scarabic and others point out in that thread, it would take away from the "self-policing" concept of MeFi, and it would create extra work for the admins.
posted by Gator at 10:03 AM on December 31, 2005

I, too, have a reg to The LA Times, but even had I not, I can't imagine whining and whining about registration.

Good post, btw.
posted by leftcoastbob at 10:11 AM on December 31, 2005

Gator, people would choose to put their editorial comments there, it wouldn't all be me doing it by hand. It was meant to reinforce the self-policing.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 10:13 AM on December 31, 2005

Sure, I understand that. And you could add a "talk page" flag to the flagging system, so people could help you out with that. And it would probably keep a certain amount of clutter out of MeTa (one would hope, at any rate).

But the extra work for you would be, in addition to moving people's comments, having to keep a moderator's eye on that talk page and deal with the inevitable barrage of complaints from people whose comments were moved.

Just out of curiosity, would the comments on talk pages be flaggable as well? If not, that's an invitation for abuse, and if so, that's yet more extra work for you to slog through.
posted by Gator at 10:22 AM on December 31, 2005

it wouldn't all be me doing it by hand.

Gator and the other mods would have to do it by hand.
posted by Kwantsar at 10:24 AM on December 31, 2005

Also also, people will almost certainly find ways to get around having their comments moved -- making an editorial remark and then tacking something substantive-looking onto it, just as an example. People who snark want their snark to be read.
posted by Gator at 10:24 AM on December 31, 2005

mego = my eyes glaze over
posted by fixedgear at 10:41 AM on December 31, 2005

Particularly annoying is thirteenkiller's one word dismissal.

at least he didn't fart.

Nice that the giant pill exposed Matt to violating US copyright law by reproducing the article in full.

*farts*
posted by quonsar at 10:54 AM on December 31, 2005

Wow, what would the talk page on a meta post look like, I wonder.
posted by Paris Hilton at 11:00 AM on December 31, 2005

a "talk" channel for each thread

"Talk" as in IRC? Skype? Something else?
posted by scarabic at 11:04 AM on December 31, 2005

Just an observation but what does it mean when we have more comments on our MeFi process than the article itself?
posted by Mr Bluesky at 11:05 AM on December 31, 2005

the post was presented very Lifetime-y and hence likely to draw some ire

WTF? Has it really gotten to the point that if a post isn't presented with an ironic smirk, it deserves to get trashed? I agree with MegoSteve's irritation (though he was a little over-the-top about it): the post and article were excellent, many of the comments were childish and embarrassing. Oh boo-hoo, registration, how will we survive? If you don't feel like registering, fine, don't, skip it and move to the next thread. What's gained by filling the thread with dumb snarks?
posted by languagehat at 11:05 AM on December 31, 2005

*farts*
posted by quonsar at 11:07 AM on December 31, 2005

Hey, leave thirteenkiller alone; her rainbows are not on trial here.
posted by jenovus at 11:07 AM on December 31, 2005

oops. i was farting at scarabic.
posted by quonsar at 11:07 AM on December 31, 2005

Some people get something out of peeing on every thread right away. I can hardly think of a valuable comment that's among the first five in any thread. It's an irritating habit, but I don't think there's anything that will mitigate it.

And yes, in this particular thread it was very annoying.
posted by argybarg at 11:16 AM on December 31, 2005

And yet I smelt it!

*lights match, accidentally sets thread on fire*
posted by languagehat at 11:24 AM on December 31, 2005

What's gained by filling the thread with dumb snarks?

says the man whose comment history recently is starting to look like a transcript of oscar the grouch.
posted by shmegegge at 11:44 AM on December 31, 2005

I blame myself.

I, and others like me, have behaved badly over the years. Our actions have implied that snarky, asshole behavior is acceptable forms of interaction on Metafilter. Newbies come along and want to fit in with the likes of me and quonsar and others, and so they, either consciously or unconsciously, decide to adopt that blase "ho-hum" superiority bullshit. And the new users who followed them did it, too. And in the end, we have a giant snowball of self-satisfied know-it-all jackholes who can't risk showing a little humanity or risk ridicule and ostracization from the rest of the Lords of the Flies.

So, it's my fault, Megosteve. Blame me.
posted by crunchland at 11:46 AM on December 31, 2005

Registration?
Registration?!?
Registration is the first step towards confiscation; don't believe their lies, comrades!!!
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 11:53 AM on December 31, 2005

Could we also get a "Talk" page for each "Talk" page? I might disagree with the way someone's editorial comments are presented and need a separate, impartial, appropriate venue in which to complain, and, furthermore, eggs cheese toilet paper toothpaste cdrs picture hangers(?) ass beads firewire cord
posted by gramschmidt at 12:02 PM on December 31, 2005

Hey! It's crunchland's fault! Lets get him!!!
posted by yhbc at 12:10 PM on December 31, 2005

It should be a hell of a lot easier to get banned here.
posted by LarryC at 12:20 PM on December 31, 2005

It should be a hell of a lot easier to get banned here.

Nonsense. People simply need to try harder.
posted by trondant at 1:12 PM on December 31, 2005

Has it really gotten to the point that if a post isn't presented with an ironic smirk, it deserves to get trashed?

Nope, not at all. The point is that if a post is presented as a heart-warming tear-jerker, it is likely to get some guff from the cynics. Ease up; there's a world of difference.
posted by cortex at 1:14 PM on December 31, 2005

Fair enough. But I still don't see why people get so upset about registration. It's a mild annoyance (or in this case perhaps a major annoyance), but it hardly seems worth derailing a thread for.
posted by languagehat at 1:47 PM on December 31, 2005

People over-react to it, I think, because it's a recurring issue. It's not that it's all that much work to register for one link; it's that any given registration-required link builds on all the negative feelings about all the other reg-required links and gets people pissy.

Throw in the general futile absurdity of the registration process in the first place, and you get some ticked off internetters. Doesn't make derailing right, but it does explain the bitterness.
posted by cortex at 3:19 PM on December 31, 2005

This is the thinking behind a "talk" channel for each thread -- it'd be a place where those comments could be posted happily by pepole away from the main comments area.

Or you could just delete the tedious bullshit comments complaining about free registration when they get flagged.
posted by monju_bosatsu at 6:01 PM on December 31, 2005

I, and others like me, have behaved badly over the years. Our actions have implied that snarky, asshole behavior is acceptable forms of interaction on Metafilter. Newbies come along and want to fit in with the likes of me and quonsar and others, and so they, either consciously or unconsciously, decide to adopt that blase "ho-hum" superiority bullshit. And the new users who followed them did it, too. And in the end, we have a giant snowball of self-satisfied know-it-all jackholes who can't risk showing a little humanity or risk ridicule and ostracization from the rest of the Lords of the Flies.

Ain't that the truth.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 6:03 PM on December 31, 2005

Crunchlands mea culpa is the most honest & genuine mea culpa i've ever seen here, for which I thank him.

Here's to a great new Mefi year!
posted by dash_slot- at 6:51 PM on December 31, 2005

sorry for the redundancy there - mea culpa!
posted by dash_slot- at 6:52 PM on December 31, 2005

I've never registered at the LATimes, and if I go here it doesn't ask me to register before reading the article...
posted by blue_beetle at 7:46 AM on January 1, 2006

Meta culpa?
posted by klangklangston at 3:06 PM on January 1, 2006

Heheh. Good pun!
posted by dash_slot- at 4:08 PM on January 1, 2006