Happy stories wanted for the Podcast

June 18, 2008 4:14 PM

For next week's podcast: call in (either use the widget after the jump or call [phone] and leave a message) and tell us your happiest MetaFilter story ever.

We're recording a podcast next week and we realized that while the call-in shows are fun to hear everyone's voices, they're almost always mefi-specific questions directed at me and Jessamyn and you can only go so far with that subject. So, for the next podcast I wanted to try a theme for calls and here it is:

Happy Stories: call in and tell us your happiest MetaFilter-related memory. Did you meet your beloved at a meetup? Finally get an answer a long-nagging question on Ask MeFi? Get reunited with your childhood friend in a MeFi post? Ring us up and let us know your best time you've ever had in and around MetaFilter.



We'll pick the best 5 or 6 stories and post it next Friday. Thanks!

posted by mathowie to MetaFilter-related at 4:14 PM (39 comments total)

Can't wait to hear the stories!
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 4:24 PM on June 18 [1 favorite]

Jump for joy.
posted by tellurian at 5:00 PM on June 18

Oh crap, I just found out there is a 3 minute max. Sorry first caller, but your third story got cut off a little bit.
posted by mathowie at 5:20 PM on June 18

Have any mefites every gotten married after meeting through the site? That would be pretty cool. I wasn't invited to the wedding(s) though. Fuckers.
posted by bardic at 5:41 PM on June 18

Sorry, bardic. I'm sure your invite must have gotten lost in the mail. Onlyconnect made a point of inviting every user under 20,000.
posted by NortonDC at 5:49 PM on June 18 [1 favorite]

Where is this "jump"? I see a widget, but it comes after a period and a line break. Are we calling periods/full stops "jumps" now? Or did you mean the jump to the next line?
posted by Eideteker at 6:03 PM on June 18

Eideteker, if you listened to the last podcast, you'd know what mathowie is talking about.
posted by jessamyn at 6:05 PM on June 18

I meant from front page to this page.
posted by mathowie at 6:10 PM on June 18

Criss Cross makes Matt want to put portions of his post text in the [more inside] section.
posted by cortex at 6:10 PM on June 18 [1 favorite]

One of my fav, already posted to MetaTalk. There was something about the person touches that reminded me that real live people are out there on the internet and not all of them are assholes.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 6:22 PM on June 18

Sorry, but I got only bitter, heartbreaking stories that'd bring everybody down. Dashed dreams, unfulfilled expectations, misunderstandings and miscommunications. 70,000 ships that passed in the night, oblivious, all heading inexorably toward their date with an iceberg. All I can do now is hang my head and cry.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 6:26 PM on June 18 [7 favorites]

"Eideteker, if you listened to the last podcast, you'd know what mathowie is talking about."

No good. I'm still on the Jill Sobule interview. Get back to me in September.

"I meant from front page to this page."

I thought those were called "links."

"Criss Cross makes Matt want to put portions of his post text in the [more inside] section."

Okay, so now "more inside" is called "the jump"? Or "a jump"? I don't get where the jumping comes in.

*cries and cries*
posted by Eideteker at 6:34 PM on June 18

Please don't take Eideteker seriously. It's not good for your blood pressure.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 6:36 PM on June 18

Eidetaker, honey, you need a hug. And maybe some pie.
posted by misha at 6:47 PM on June 18 [1 favorite]

Can I take Eideteker brazenly, under the cold light of an autumn moon?
posted by cortex at 6:49 PM on June 18 [1 favorite]

Okay, so now "more inside" is called "the jump"?

I think Jason Kottke said it best. Oh, how it makes me cry and pound my fists on the desk!
posted by dhammond at 6:53 PM on June 18

"I think Jason Kottke said it best."

Ooh, I have a new addition to my list of final things to say before suicide.

So after the jump = film @ 11. Where'd it come from?
posted by Eideteker at 7:14 PM on June 18

This idea makes me happy.
posted by onlyconnect at 7:16 PM on June 18

I expect at least one glamorized, toothsome yarn of dubious veracity.
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 7:31 PM on June 18

No, kottke's just wrong. Pithy, but wrong.

You pick up a newspaper. You grab the sports section. There's a few column inches down on the bottom left of the front page, about Kobe getting fined after he kicked a puppy during half-time. After a few paragraphs, it breaks off abruptly with "cont'd E7". If you care about the rest of the story, you flip over to E7, find "Kobe's Kicking", and continue where you left off.

That's the jump.

People can use the jump obnoxiously. Some do. But it's fine. It works. It's the difference between putting full long-form blog entries on your front page and putting excerpts. On mefi, it's the difference between a great big rambling thing on the front page (and attendant cries of "more inside is your friend" and piles of flags and some editing work for us) vs. putting the key stuff above and the details inside.
posted by cortex at 7:39 PM on June 18

Related Question
posted by cortex at 7:42 PM on June 18

The newspaper continues stories on different pages because that makes you look at more ads.
posted by TheOnlyCoolTim at 7:46 PM on June 18

That's the jump.

Yup. And cortex has been getting the jump on me lately!

Reckon I deserved it, too.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 7:47 PM on June 18

The newspaper continues stories on different pages because only one story on the front page of a section would be a totally retarded layout on any day that didn't involve a nuclear exchange. That more ads get seen is a bonus, but most papers don't jump ten times per story.

I'm looking at you, shitty commercial blogs.
posted by cortex at 8:18 PM on June 18

Kobe Bryant kicking a puppy is my happiest Metafilter story. That and that time with the dancing Metafilter Girls halftime show.
posted by Burhanistan at 8:20 PM on June 18

True enough, it's the magazines continuing stories that are really out to get you.
posted by TheOnlyCoolTim at 9:02 PM on June 18

High five.
posted by cortex at 10:20 PM on June 18

I'm looking at you, shitty commercial blogs.

Yes, that's what I was referring to. I agree that "after the jump" seemingly has a purpose but nearly every time that I see it now, it's done by a site that's using it to boost page views or because they think it sounds fresh.

In reality, I think it's just tacky and almost always superfluous. Nearly all blog platforms have a built in [more inside] or [click here to continue reading] functionality, so unless you're Gawker (who essentially originated the phrase in its online context as a nod to the publishing background of its founders and initial readership), it's a rather unoriginal stylistic flourish that, in a perfect world, would wither away and die.

p.s. Yes, I have too much time on my hands.
posted by dhammond at 10:22 PM on June 18

I have no happy memories of Kobe Bryant. The most memorable thread that I recall was the pile on suffered by troutfishing. I was young and naive then, but desperately wanted to comment "So long and thanks for all the trout", but I just could not bring myself to that level of nasty. I am much meaner now.
posted by Cranberry at 10:57 PM on June 18

Oh, happy memories are supposed to be called in? I'll get back to you.
posted by Cranberry at 11:06 PM on June 18

I can't think of anything particularly happy-story-ish, so I wrote this instead. I dunno, it must be the weather.

Seven and a half years of bitter tracks of Metafilter tears
Remember that time when that guy said that thing?
Man, that sure was great

Or that time with those other people, those happy handsome people
Dashiv showed up and took some pics and they looked so good and nice
Oh yeah, totally great

Here I am still in Korea, though, same old desk on a Friday night
Drinking the same old beer and fighting those same old fights
About politics and Apple and fatties and Freud
And etiquette and policy and gays and gals and god
But I still love the Metafilter, it still pulls me in like crack
And by crack I mean those little rocks those people smoke
Man, that stuff is great

Eyeballkid, he hates us all, or so he says at least
Me, I don't hate anybody
Except that guy who steals my milk
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 12:40 AM on June 19 [2 favorites]

Me, I don't hate anybody
Except that guy who steals my milk

Really, stav? Not even the folks who write... SLYT? ;-)
posted by flapjax at midnite at 2:09 AM on June 19

Ah. Never read a "news-paper". TFTI!
posted by Eideteker at 4:26 AM on June 19

*waggles cane dismissively*
posted by cortex at 6:44 AM on June 19

Okay, since this is the web, howzabout we update it to

More after the GET

posted by Deathalicious at 6:47 AM on June 19

Well how can he read a newspaper when he's so busy running all over your lawn?
posted by inigo2 at 6:49 AM on June 19

Do we have to keep it clean? Because I could see this turning into an interesting meme.

Dear Metafilter Letters, I never thought it could happen to me, but boy was I wrong...
posted by quin at 8:01 AM on June 19 [1 favorite]

Prominent cult members get their panties in a wad and raise legal hell whenever I recount my Happiest MetaFilter Story. So I'll call in with the second choice, the one where I reached 1000 favorites. With the hookers. And the blow.
posted by carsonb at 3:29 PM on June 19

Okay, so now "more inside" is called "the jump"?


Aw, hells no.



HELLZZ NO!
posted by [more inside] at 3:50 PM on June 19