Comments on: 11: Music Challenge, TravelFilter, and the Party

11: Music Challenge, TravelFilter, and the Party

mathowie — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 15:53:22 -0800

Here's show 11 of the podcast for July 6, 2007. It's about an hour long (links inside)

By: mathowie

mathowie — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 15:54:10 -0800

Podcast Feed RSS (Subscribe to the MeFi Podcast in iTunes)
Direct mp3 download

Stuff mentioned in this show:

The mefimusicchallenge songs (permalink this challenge). Songs played included Sailing on Right By and Rain in the Desert

RSVP to the Portland 8th Anniversary MeFi Party located at Ground Kontrol.

ludwig_van's tour announcement and his music site

TravelFilter. Location demo: NYC, New York State, entire US. The URLs are hackable, so plop any country name you can think of or chop off the city name to see state or country level questions. My first demo Trip Report on Maui.

MeFi recaps:

gamers and their avatars

Chess tactics in English & three blind mice's story about chess

Public Domain photos via MeFi Projects

The life of Otokichi (adrift across the ocean and back)

Olympics best forgotten

Nature reclaims amusement park

Ask MeFi recaps:
Dirty Jokes for Grandma

How do I find out about a murder? (photo!)

52 week challenge & Help me become better rounded

Decent financial advice

Single Forever

By: puke & cry

puke & cry — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 15:55:42 -0800

sweet

By: micayetoca

micayetoca — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 16:08:43 -0800

noooooooooooooooooooo, we almost had a full day without metatalk posts!!!! you should be banned!!!!!!!!

By: micayetoca

micayetoca — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 16:09:23 -0800

oh, shit, it's you, sorry, #1.

By: cortex

cortex — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 16:10:51 -0800

Oh, man, I wouldn't have dropped a silly comment into Matt's Maui post if I'd know Travel was going semi-live today.

By: chuckdarwin

chuckdarwin — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 16:13:43 -0800

Thanks for the shoutout... I realised that you could just click on the tag AFTER I made the playlist. What error were talking about fixing, again?

By: mathowie

mathowie — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 16:23:19 -0800

pb fixed the "permalink" in the notes above so that it works (no music player yet though).

By: klangklangston

klangklangston — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 16:58:33 -0800

Doobiedoobiedooo... So, in the apologizing-is-better-than-asking, the "travel" implies that you're coming from some other place to this place, rather than already living there and wanting more to do (because it would be places.metafilter.com, or PlaMe instead of TraMe). But I'm going to "travel" from my house to a pool if I can find one, and the goddamned LA parks and rec websites are ass...

By: CitrusFreak12

CitrusFreak12 — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 17:22:28 -0800

Yay! Something to listen to at work! Finally1

TravelFilter is purdy, too. Nice job.

By: Stan Chin

Stan Chin — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 17:24:31 -0800

Will there eventually be a ticketstubs functionality on TravelFi? Some way to upload and storytell would be nice. /ikidbcilove

By: delmoi

delmoi — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 17:29:17 -0800

What song was done by a "someone who produces for an actual famous person in europe"?

By: micayetoca

micayetoca — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 17:33:39 -0800

I didn't realize until I heard it in the podcast, that the title of my song might have not come across as a joke. I didn't intend to mock the challenge or attack Jessamyn at all.

In all fairness, I think that any theme would have been as hard, it's the actual challenge that is, well, challenging. (And worsened if you are, like me, musically challenged to begin with).

In any case, I just wanted to mention this, because it seems like the "joke" didn't really came across as such. The challenge is a great thing and it revived Music. Didn't mean the title of my song to be read as "harsh" or a real complaint. My apologies.

By: delmoi

delmoi — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 17:38:01 -0800

The yellow/orange bar on travelfilter really clashes. Other then that, it looks nice.

By: Steven C. Den Beste

Steven C. Den Beste — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 17:46:46 -0800

Jeeze, we almost made it through an entire day without a MeTa post...

(I guess #1 gets a by, though, it being his sandbox and his baseball bat.)

By: boo_radley

boo_radley — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 17:48:27 -0800

"europe-famous" ++ Good stuff.

And seriously, I'd love to participate in the music challenges, but the last softwares I used was Acid Music before sony bought them. Recommend something?

By: Hildegarde

Hildegarde — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 17:49:14 -0800

*is a chatty cathy*

By: sleepy pete

sleepy pete — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 18:06:49 -0800

Wow, when I fast forward by moving the bar and then stop it, the greatest delayed dub moment happens. Anyone else getting that? No, I'm not high.

By: delmoi

delmoi — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 18:12:17 -0800

Rather then showing °F for U.S. cities, and °C for international cities, you should simply show both.

By: CitrusFreak12

CitrusFreak12 — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 18:18:04 -0800

The yellow/orange bar on travelfilter really clashes. Other then that, it looks nice.

What yellow/orange bar...?

By: jessamyn

jessamyn — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 18:41:03 -0800

Didn't mean the title of my song to be read as "harsh" or a real complaint.

I think I took it in the spirit it was intended, I just thought it was very amusing.

By: delmoi

delmoi — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 18:55:41 -0800

The one that has the date and time on the right hand side, and is connected with the TravelFilter logo on the left side.

Below " MetaFilter AskMeFi Projects Music Jobs Podcast MetaTalk" and above "Home Archives Tags Search"

By: jonson

jonson — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 19:14:59 -0800

"I think people went on a jonsonfest" is the best thing I've ever heard.

By: DaShiv

DaShiv — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 19:58:29 -0800

Thanks for the warning about how dark Ground Kontrol is, mathowie. It'll be right up my alley.

By: mds35

mds35 — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 20:26:02 -0800

Thanks for episode 9, btw. The interview with Cold Chef was so great I lost track of time while waiting in line at the Massachusetts RMV!

By: Tuwa

Tuwa — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 20:55:08 -0800

Travelfilter looks good. Will there be anywhere to tuck in trivia on existing posts (e.g. if I don't really want to do a whole trip writeup and don't want to ask a question pretending not to know, but wanted to discuss what to do for vegetarian eats in Heidelberg Germany) (visit the one decent veg*n restaurant which also has ridiculously limited hours, and stay somewhere with a stove)?

Another note entirely: Matt, you seem to have styled the favicons for each branch, but I think you forgot for Travel (at least, it's green like AskMe's).

By: Tuwa

Tuwa — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 21:13:26 -0800

Jebus, you'd think I'd notice that "totally alpha" notice at the top of the page (and remember that posting a comment makes the podcast quit playing).

By: Abiezer

Abiezer — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 22:33:54 -0800

I was coshed from behind at the last jonsonfest and awoke much later with no wallet and a sore groin.
Definitely going again next year!

By: janell

janell — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 22:39:54 -0800

maybe I missed it, but what are the song credits for this ep?

By: mathowie

mathowie — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 22:46:30 -0800

janell, it's in the first comment.

By: janell

janell — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 22:51:47 -0800

gar. Eyes slipped right past all that yellow.

Going back to the dumb-cave now.

By: SassHat

SassHat — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 23:04:51 -0800

I have to say that the podcast has quickly become one of my favorite MeFi things. The highlight, for this episode, comes around 31:50, where Matt says this about Second Life:

"Once every two weeks I'll get an email like, 'Cassimus Platimus wants to give you a jewel' or something and I'll be like 'Aarrrg, god...I'm not even interested!' "

The same thing happens to me, but it's the delivery that just cracks me up. I think #1 should consider moonlighting in observational comedy.

By: jouke

jouke — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 00:09:31 -0800

Wrt travelfilter; interesting idea. But I have 2 remarks:
- it's not linked from the top bar. I guess not a lot of people will visit it.
- I'm not sure I will be visiting travelfilter to answer questions. Scouring askmefi is already quite a lot of work.

By: ludwig_van

ludwig_van — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 00:11:29 -0800

Hey, what do you know. Thanks Matt, and see you tomorrow jessamyn!

Yeah, that's right.

By: ludwig_van

ludwig_van — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 00:27:10 -0800

I mean, Matt Haughey web 2.0'd my site and I'm going to rock out with Jessamyn in Vermont. Take that, cortex.

By: SassHat

SassHat — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 01:07:35 -0800

By: voidcontext

voidcontext — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 05:34:24 -0800

Jouke, it's not linked from the top bar because it's still not finished, and in the podcast Matt and Jessamyn talk about how the questions from travel will show up alongside askme questions, so you don't need to keep tabs on two sites.

By: jouke

jouke — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 06:10:51 -0800

Ok. Tx.

By: Plutor

Plutor — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 06:38:53 -0800

SassHat: "I would also add that keeping the TravelFilter questions out of AskMe (as opposed to having the questions in two places at once) would probably help a bit in thinning out the question population on AskMe. "

1) This is going to be extremely difficult. A lot of people are going to end up mad with deleted questions. Matt, you should a) probably come up with some way to move questions from AskMe to TraMe (and maybe back) easily, b) add code to the AskMe form so that if someone chooses the "travel" section, it gives them a big red notice that says "are you sure this shouldn't be in TraMe?" or maybe just automagically cross-post for them.

2) Putting "n answers" as the link from the front page to each thread in TraMe isn't right. For instance, this isn't a question, and the responses aren't answers. (On that page itself, it does say "comments".) Also, it's hard to see which posts might be questions and which might be reviews. Some indication on the front page of "this thar is a question" would be nice.

I think TraMe has a lot of potential, here. Just navigating by location is a big win.

By: cortex

cortex — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 07:30:40 -0800

Take that, cortex.

*shakes tiny fist*

By: jessamyn

jessamyn — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 07:37:57 -0800

I would also add that keeping the TravelFilter questions out of AskMe (as opposed to having the questions in two places at once) would probably help a bit in thinning out the question population on AskMe.

The good news is that with two mods, thinning out the AskMe questions is less of a priority. As I envision it, the TraMe posts appear on the AskMe from page somehow but the final posts sort of "live" on the travel part of the site. So, for archival purposes, you'd look up location-based questions that are travel-applicable on the travel site but you'd see them as they're asked coming across AskMe as well.

I'm really pleasantly amazed at all the work mathowie and pb put into this. Even at an "80-90% done" level this site is pretty great.

By: bonehead

bonehead — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 07:56:55 -0800

"answers", "comments", feh! On travel, they should be "advisories"

By: CitrusFreak12

CitrusFreak12 — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 08:10:54 -0800

TraMe? No no no. "TravFi." Or "TraFi." Because it's TravelFilter, not TravelMeta.

Personally I think MetaTravel would work best as far as abbreviations go. "MeTrav" or "MeTravel."

Just not TraMe.

By: cortex

cortex — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 08:36:42 -0800

I've got this crazy inclination to call it "Travel".

By: mdonley

mdonley — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 08:46:15 -0800

MeFi Travel. Like MeFi Music, and MeFi Jobs.

By: goodnewsfortheinsane

goodnewsfortheinsane — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 08:56:40 -0800

Metafilter: freakin' cellos and tubas and shit.

By: five fresh fish

five fresh fish — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 11:28:15 -0800

An hour long? Good god, who has that kind of time?

By: Afroblanco

Afroblanco — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 13:55:46 -0800

I think it's really cool that the tagline for TravelFilter is a line from the Steve Miller Band's "Jet Airliner."

That song has special meaning to me.

By: danb

danb — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 14:56:41 -0800

Just wanted to say that I thought the threads you highlighted in the green were great. I especially look forward to the Ask MeFi recap since it's increasingly difficult to keep up with all the threads.

Also, I'm glad the Music Challenge is taking off. I should be in the mix soon!

By: CitrusFreak12

CitrusFreak12 — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 15:00:30 -0800

I've got this crazy inclination to call it "Travel".

....

That was going to be my next suggestion

...Damn you, cortex.

By: delmoi

delmoi — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 17:48:46 -0800

TraFi.

By: geoff.

geoff. — Sun, 08 Jul 2007 08:53:27 -0800

It would be cool if we could add a travel guide to cities in addition to the questions. I don't know how viable a wiki would be, but it would be very useful.

By: mathowie

mathowie — Sun, 08 Jul 2007 09:13:46 -0800

geoff., we were thinking 2 or 3 trip reports about a place would serve as a sort of travel guide. You could put a lot of hotel, food, and transportation tips in a trip report.

By: Megafly

Megafly — Sun, 08 Jul 2007 09:32:38 -0800

TravelFilter-TraFi-TraFic Report

By: carsonb

carsonb — Sun, 08 Jul 2007 10:30:03 -0800

You could put a lot of hotel, food, and transportation tips in a trip report.

I can't quite wrap my brain around how to go about it, but could there be a way to cross-reference detailed answers to "Where to go?" questions with the trip report category? [eg.]

By: carsonb

carsonb — Sun, 08 Jul 2007 10:32:44 -0800

On reflection, I s'pose I should just write it up properly and post it to the trip report category.

By: Plutor

Plutor — Sun, 08 Jul 2007 10:53:43 -0800

MeTr, pronounced /ˈmiːtə(ɻ)/ (like the word "meter")

By: jessamyn

jessamyn — Sun, 08 Jul 2007 10:59:28 -0800

MeTr

Of course!

By: lampoil

lampoil — Sun, 08 Jul 2007 19:19:03 -0800

For the first time, I listened to this podcast on my ipod with headphones. Two new things happened:

1. I fell asleep. But that's probably because I was on a bus and had taken a Dramamine. So I listened again.

2. There were times, when I was just zoned out enough but still paying attention (and also probably a bit groggy from the drug-induced nap), when I felt like Matt and Jess could hear me too. Maybe it was because having it right in my ear like that, and it being so conversational, made it feel like being on the phone. There was one moment where I almost responded out loud to something. And there was another moment when there was a baby crying on the bus, and for a split second some part of my brain worried that it was bothering them. Weird.

By: madamjujujive

madamjujujive — Sun, 08 Jul 2007 22:42:01 -0800

Good podcast, and many many thanks for all the work on TravelFilter - it's lookin' good!

By: dg

dg — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 00:40:53 -0800

... having it right in my ear like that, and it being so conversational, made it feel like being on the phone. There was one moment where I almost responded out loud to something.
Oh, good, it's not just me that does that.

By: carsonb

carsonb — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 01:20:03 -0800

I listen to a lot of talk radio since my iPod broke. =( This podcast (kitchencomputercast?) is consistently more entertaining than 95% of everything else I hear on the airwaves. I really enjoy it. My favorite part is following your notable threads. The combination of kick-ass links/questions and your unique perspectives on them is a great new way to peruse the site. The inclusion of MeFi Music invariably sends me over to the black.

I notice that a lot of what's featured seems to come from the favorites aggregation or the flag queue. Is that why there hasn't been a cool Project post featured? Or a notable job opening?* I think pulling an example or two from the other subsites, in the way you use a song or two from MeFi Music, would set more listeners towards those sections of the site.

* I could very well be misremembering/wrong—have there been any Projects or Jobs mentioned/linked in a previous podcast?

By: cortex

cortex — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 06:16:54 -0800

having it right in my ear like that, and it being so conversational, made it feel like being on the phone. There was one moment where I almost responded out loud to something.

There've been a couple times that I've had a podcast playing right when Jess IMed me about some tremendous bit of awfulness going down on the site, and it's produced some of the weirdest cognitive dissonance: like, how can you be so happy and conversational when someone just did that on the OH RIGHT NOT LIVE.

By: jessamyn

jessamyn — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 06:43:16 -0800

I think pulling an example or two from the other subsites, in the way you use a song or two from MeFi Music, would set more listeners towards those sections of the site.

I was thinking that too. I don't check Jobs much because I have a job, but there have been some great projects that have really made me happy. I think part of it is there's no way to aggregate your "votes" on the Projects page into a list the same way you keep your favorites. Maybe we can jigger that up some so it's easier to track. The Public Domain Photos post we mentioned did start life as a project and actually that's where I saw it originally.

By: LordSludge

LordSludge — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 12:02:23 -0800

Single forever -- AskMe thread, referenced late (last?) in the podcast.

Missed this the first time around; admins, ya might add it to the list o' podcast links.

By: jessamyn

jessamyn — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 12:10:11 -0800

Cool I EDITED MATHOWIE'S POST to add it. Thanks for the catch.

By: carsonb

carsonb — Tue, 10 Jul 2007 06:13:49 -0800

O SHI SOMETHING HAPPENED WITH YOUR EDIT TO FUCK UP MATHOWIE'S POST.

I see the 'posted by' bolded, in normal size, and on the line above the rest of the comment tag line. Looks like a malformed link.

The Public Domain Photos post we mentioned did start life as a project and actually that's where I saw it originally.

Yep, I had just finished listening to the 'cast when I wrote that—I claim short-term memory loss due to the amount of Simple Green I incorporated during that hour.

By: carsonb

carsonb — Tue, 10 Jul 2007 06:18:53 -0800

Here it is:

<a href="http://ask.metafilter.com/65718/Single-forever">Single Forever<a/><br>

By: jessamyn

jessamyn — Tue, 10 Jul 2007 06:33:04 -0800

fixed.

By: your mildly obsessive average geek

your mildly obsessive average geek — Wed, 11 Jul 2007 03:26:25 -0800

lampoil: " There was one moment where I almost responded out loud to something. Weird."

Seconded - during the conversation on Mefi Travel, #1 mentions that country/city-specific RSS feeds are not yet done and those are still needed. And I actually said out loud "Yes, please. And soon!".. In the middle of my morning jog.. with people around me... hopefully they just thought I was talking in my sleep (or something).

As always, loved the podcast. I especially loved the opening and closing songs for this episode. The female vocals on "sailing on right by" are especially haunting.

By: stavrosthewonderchicken

stavrosthewonderchicken — Thu, 12 Jul 2007 02:09:43 -0800

Finally listened. The party sounds pretty much like my teenager-dream, too. Beer, old vid games? *cries*

Wish I was either a) rich b) in North America or c) both.

Ah well. You kids have fun now, y'hear?

By: smackfu

smackfu — Thu, 02 Aug 2007 17:35:04 -0800

BTW, the link to Sailing on Right By is bad. It links to all the challenge songs.

(Yes, I am a bit behind on the podcast.)