39: Tenth Anniversary Plans

March 28, 2009 11:54 PM

Right out of the gate we talk about our ideas for the tenth anniversary party coming up in July, then follow it up with the best bits from the month of March. It was recorded on the 23th of March and runs just over an hour.

direct link

Helpful links
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Music Mentioned
Harpy Go Lurky by ORThey
Together (You are not alone) by sputgop
I Command You to Be My Woman by frenetic
The Score by clcapps
Son of a Gun (Vaselines Cover) by grubi
Tao XLVII + XLVIII + XXXVI by man vs sun

MeFi Jobs
Redesign a community site for a good cause

MeFi Projects
The Saddest Bear of All kid story
Bugs drawn on an iPhone (background info)

MeFi Posts
Broken Picture Telephone (metatalk thread about it, examples 1, 2, 3)
What were arcades like?
Free first person shooters for all!
TetrisHD
Libraries' Surprising Special Collections
Douglas Rushkoff signs in to respond
Wells Fargo customer outreach on Ask MeFi
Scrabble rule changes (old Ask MeFi scrabble question)
Kutiman remixes YouTube

Ask MeFi posts

Wedding questions: Have to get a gift? and Is it tacky to ask for money on wedding invites?
What are the studioes like at Charlie Rose (featuring this great detail)
What common questions do librarians hear?
Random acts of kindness?

MetaTalk threads

Favorites
What does the dot mean? (every old mention)
MeFi usage venn diagrams

posted by mathowie to MeFi Podcast at 11:54 PM (113 comments total)

Oh, by the way, after we recorded this, a quick chat with pb and we realized we could have easy to understand URLs like anniversary.metafilter.com/country/state/city for all the little meetup subsites.
posted by mathowie at 12:10 AM on March 29

mmm... airport codes-
posted by localhuman at 2:40 AM on March 29

Airport codes! Haha! Fuck you Wyoming!!
posted by sambosambo at 2:48 AM on March 29

SYD reporting.
posted by tellurian at 3:28 AM on March 29

11th or 19th July. What say you?
posted by tellurian at 3:35 AM on March 29

"I guess I'll cover the entire tab for Portland"

Come see the injustice inherent in the system!
posted by Meatbomb at 4:49 AM on March 29

The weekend of the 17-19th was what we decided on, though it's okay to do anything pretty much that week. The 4th of July is pretty big in the US holiday-wise and for people who were travelling, having two "holiday" weekends in a row seemed like it was going to be a mess. For people for whom that date is terrible, any date in that range is okay. The actual date is the 14th.
posted by jessamyn at 5:35 AM on March 29

This time I'm not going to mess up, I'm going to load the podcast in a new window and keep this one open to follow links from. No more reloading the page a dozen times for me! No sir!
posted by Science! at 5:49 AM on March 29 [1 favorite]

I'm super-excited about probably being in the Seattle in July and hopefully swinging by the too-many-cooks-in-the-kitchen meetup.

And clearly the t-shirt should be MetaTalk gray.
posted by Kattullus at 6:39 AM on March 29

Even though the moderators have abandoned New Orleans (just like the entire US government), I am hereby announcing the 10th Anniversary New Orleans Meetup on the weekend of July 17 and July 18. There will be teeshirts! There will be posters! And to sweeten the deal, I promise to personally match the mathowie bar tab stipend dollar-for-dollar!

Come to New Orleans! Drink twice as much! You'll need the extra fluids.
posted by ColdChef at 7:27 AM on March 29 [2 favorites]

You should probably even just post a meetup thread sometime soon, ColdChef. I bet there are plenty of folks who will want to hit the NOLA meetup who could use the lead time to nail down air travel and such.
posted by cortex at 8:28 AM on March 29

I think the term is a turd not "a poop" as Jessamyn kept saying.
posted by wheelieman at 8:31 AM on March 29

Crap. Won't be able to make the New Orleans meetup.

All right, I'll take responsibility for a Twin Cities meetup.
posted by Astro Zombie at 8:35 AM on March 29

Wow, mods - thanks for all the praise. I am seriously humbled. I sense free albums in all your futures, for how many times you've put me in the podcasts and said all those nice things.
posted by ORthey at 9:39 AM on March 29

OMG! OMG!

I shall have to concoct some bullshit dream assignment - Rebirth of the Sazerac part IX - to be in New Orleans for ColdChef's luscious fluid-guzzling liver test.

But will any working editor buy it in these desperate times? Methinks not.

Still, Ive just opened my diary and I'm looking at the taunting emptiness of that weekend.

The drinks! The bonomie! The drinks! The camaraderie! The drinks! The friendshiperie!

(Moan)
posted by MiguelCardoso at 9:47 AM on March 29 [2 favorites]

Girl shirts! Yay!
posted by donnagirl at 9:49 AM on March 29

And clearly the t-shirt should be MetaTalk gray.

This is a big issue that will require great gnashing of hands and wringing of teeth, but I have joined the hunt. Swatch catalogs, followed by tense negotiations, is apparently the next step.
posted by Devils Rancher at 9:57 AM on March 29

I sense free albums in all your futures...

Yeah, well, I sent the mods free albums, and didn't get so much as a thank-you note. Be prepared for disillusionment.

Though, if you're a musician, disillusionment should be nothing new.

And I still like the mods. Really, I do.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 9:57 AM on March 29 [1 favorite]

And clearly the t-shirt should be MetaTalk gray.

MeFiMu black! MeFiMu black!

but, is that really black? I can't tell...
posted by flapjax at midnite at 9:59 AM on March 29

Can we have white shirts for those of us who go with the plain background pages?
posted by Astro Zombie at 10:16 AM on March 29 [1 favorite]

Sponsorship level by population, not city! $100 in NYC ain't gonna go far.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 10:23 AM on March 29 [1 favorite]

There were already several of us interested in planning the NYC meetup, btw.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 10:27 AM on March 29 [1 favorite]

There were already several of us interested in planning the NYC meetup, btw.

Duh.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 10:49 AM on March 29

It wasn't a sitcom but there was a show named after an airport code: LAX.
posted by Rhomboid at 11:14 AM on March 29

I support giving Meatbomb a hundred bucks to be a Sofia Meetup of One provided he livestreams the entire thing.

And he uses the puppets.
posted by The Whelk at 11:17 AM on March 29

The Sofia Meetup of One
Meatbomb is sure to have fun
The puppets he'll bring
He'll livestream the whole thing
Go Meatbomb, you son of a gun!
posted by flapjax at midnite at 11:23 AM on March 29

Tetris HD thread ruined my work life because of this comment. Someone save me. There is now only one high score on the board that isn't mine, and yet I CAN'T STOP PLAYING IT.
posted by Night_owl at 11:26 AM on March 29

With regard to the 'round-the-world coordinated party, last night I went to the "global RPM listening party" for the RPM project, the main branch of which was held here at HQ. There were a dozen listening parties around the country (and CA) connected by webcams linked on Mogulus and fed into one channel on the RPM website. It all seemed pretty low to the ground and was fun. I'm sure some of y'all techy folks could set that up....so that if we end up with the many different sites we could link together for a sense of "big giant party."
posted by Miko at 11:57 AM on March 29

Here's your text mode tetris.
posted by Rhomboid at 11:57 AM on March 29 [1 favorite]

I sent the mods free albums, and didn't get so much as a thank-you note.

To : flapjax at midnite
Date : Feb 2, 2009 6:42 PM
Subject : Re: Feb. Music Challenge
Message : got the CD today, haven't listened to it yet. Thanks!

J

AHEM.
posted by jessamyn at 12:00 PM on March 29 [1 favorite]

Oh dear. I stand corrected. Sorry, Jess.

So... it was the GUYS who didn't send thank you notes. Typical.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 12:02 PM on March 29

Also, on the topic of companies doing customer relations on Metafilter, there was a Time Warner guy that showed up in a thread on the blue back in Feb.
posted by Rhomboid at 12:05 PM on March 29

Oops, I wrote that before I heard mathowie dis "stupid live streaming."

Sorry for being stupid.
posted by Miko at 12:07 PM on March 29

If Migs comes to Nawlins I will too.
posted by mr_crash_davis mark II: Jazz Odyssey at 12:13 PM on March 29

I already wanted to go (I think I might have even originally suggested it) but I will make it for damn sure if Migs comes. And take him to dinner anywhere he wants to go. Maybe finishing with a brandy at the Monteleone.
posted by CunningLinguist at 12:16 PM on March 29

I forget to call my parents on their birthdays. Expecting social niceties from me is a mug's game, sad to say. But thanks for the CD, dude.
posted by cortex at 12:31 PM on March 29

I have also listened to it.
posted by jessamyn at 12:35 PM on March 29

Yay! And like I said before, I still like you mods. I sure as hell do.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 12:39 PM on March 29

Yeah, I got the CD, but I haven't ripped it yet so I haven't listened, but thanks!
posted by mathowie at 1:09 PM on March 29

10th Anniversary MetaFilter East Coast City Crawl: NY (Friday), Philly (Saturday), DC (Sunday)!
posted by greekphilosophy at 2:41 PM on March 29

twenty-thirth!
posted by cowbellemoo at 2:42 PM on March 29

How about large regional gatherings? That is one New England meetup, one Scotland meetup, one Scandinavian meetup and so on. That would seem to me a compromise between a lot of small ones that are like the normal meetups and bigger deal parties.
posted by Kattullus at 3:06 PM on March 29 [1 favorite]

I made this for you.
posted by notquitemaryann at 3:14 PM on March 29

If you're not really into American Apparel due to Charney Factor, you might look into Alternative Apparel. I got the chance to fondle about 80 of them at youngamerican's place yesterday and they were super-soft, took the screen printing well, and looked good.
posted by fairytale of los angeles at 3:30 PM on March 29 [2 favorites]

I strongly suggest that people still try to make a megameetup happen in New Orleans.

We can do this, and it'll be fucking awesome.
posted by loquacious at 3:49 PM on March 29

How about an Agathie Christie-styled meet-up? Random users are sent cryptic invitations for a costume ball at an old mansion. Everything is going fine, until suddenly - a blood-curdling scream! Everyone rushes to the parlor to find User X dead, slumped over in an upholstered leather chair. And that's when the real party gets started. It'll be a night of danger and intrigue! Who's with me?
posted by Marisa Stole the Precious Thing at 3:54 PM on March 29 [2 favorites]

I really dig the music wrap-ups in the podcast.Like Cortex and Ask, I don't really ever go into music, so I dunno if there's enough stuff to do a weekly wrapup, but I would honestly listen the fuck out of one.
posted by boo_radley at 3:58 PM on March 29

As envisioned, I don't think it's *nearly* grandiose enough.

I'm picturing that the event should most closely resemble the 2008 presidential elections. That there's a central, CNN-type control room, and a giant touch-screen type world map, where little dots show central meeting points, and areas are color coded to reflect the number of metafilter users in the area, as well as the number of likely meetup participants.

There would be weekly (maybe even daily, as the event grew closer) streaming video news reports, where central control will check in with the captains in various cities, who would report on how events are proceeding, maybe even video clips of man on the street interviews to assess how the public feels about the impending meetup. They would report on the number of people who report that they are very likely or somewhat likely to attend the meetup. This would create a keen sense of competition between locales, spurring everyone on to create the biggest, best meetup anywhere.

On the evening of the event, live video feeds would come in all day, to reflect the global nature of the event: "Hello Copenhagen! Are you there?" And the video would switch to where ever it is that the Danes are carousing, with all kinds of shoutouts being screamed while the local captains lead a toast to the mods.

I'm sure corporate sponsorship for the live streaming coverage could be obtained - PBR, Jose Cuervo, supporting grants from Apple, Dell, Intel, maybe even Yahoo Answers, BoingBoing or GoDaddy could buy an ad ("Congrats to Metafilter on 10 amazing years!").

But we've GOT TO STOP TRASHING Microsoft, so they'll sponsor us too!
posted by jasper411 at 4:01 PM on March 29

Will there be an official hotel of the 10th Anniversary PDX-travaganza?

And can it NOT be the Ace?
posted by dw at 4:04 PM on March 29

And a shoutout to Devils Rancher about T-shirts! After all that "oh I don't have useful niche knowledge" at the Austin meetup his niche knowledge may be useful.
posted by dw at 4:10 PM on March 29

jasper: the hell with microsoft. Matt oughta hit Amazon up for his relentless but goodnatured Kindle love. Honestly, if he's up at the bar for a Big Oprah Style Reveal, would you rather get a Zune or a Kindle?
posted by boo_radley at 4:13 PM on March 29

I could still be convinced to go to a NOLA meetup. Let's talk more as the time approaches.
posted by Afroblanco at 4:18 PM on March 29

I could still be convinced to go to a NOLA meetup

Me too. Therein's the imperfect ear of maize - or nubbin - of the matter.

Let ColdChef convince us it's worth our while to dislocate our earthly bodies to this saintly, drunken city.

His plea is public for all to see.

Our concern and interest are genuine.

Yet we lack the basic facts of our accomodation and leisure.

And we are wanting.

Let this man do his magic, we say.

And we are hoping.

And using gerunds willy-nilly.

Because we are love.
posted by MiguelCardoso at 4:51 PM on March 29 [1 favorite]

I really dig the music wrap-ups in the podcast.Like Cortex and Ask, I don't really ever go into music, so I dunno if there's enough stuff to do a weekly wrapup, but I would honestly listen the fuck out of one.

I have thought idly about trying to make a bit more of the music stuff in the podcast, and if I can come up with some way to make it into more of a Thing in a way that's interesting and fits well with the podcast as it is, I may do that. Maybe a sort of drop-in here's some awesome stuff five minute segment or something? My only concern there is that the podcast currently has a very organic, unplanned, conversational feel, and throwing a canned music round-up thing into it instead of just sort of chattering about stuff I liked (and Matt and Jess liked) might be weird.

I suppose the other possibility would be to do a b-side Music-roundup podcast on odd weeks as more of a long-form thing, playing five or six tracks in full with a little bit of interstitial chatter. Which could be pretty awesome, I guess, but that's suddenly a bit more work yet, and I hate to bite off more than I am going to have the inclination to chew in the long run. But something like that would be a great format to work in like a regular interview segment, play a few songs by various folks and also two or three by that weeks guest and talk to him or her a bit about music stuff.

Alvy was doing a Music-centric podcast at one point; I will sheepishly acknowledge not having kept track of it at all, so I'm not sure what the status of that is at this point, but it was a nice notion in any case.
posted by cortex at 4:56 PM on March 29

Back when podcasts first started I suggested that you make the podcasts like a radio broadcast. You guys chat and then there's a music break and then more chat. For instance;

* Intro music.
* Mods introduce themselves, date the podcast, maybe give an indication on what they'll be talking about this time, Matt or someone introduces the first song.
* Full length song from MeMu.
* Mods talk about MeFi posts and then introduce next song.
* Full length song from MeMu.
* Mods talk about AskMe posts and then introduce next song.
* Full length song from MeMu.
* Mods talk about Projects posts and then introduce next song whose creator will also be the guest interviewee this podcast.
* Full length song from MeMu.
* Interview with creator of last song.
* Mods talk about MeTa & Jobs posts, or in lieu of that do a call in segment or whatever, and then they introduce song to take us out with, see you next time.

This way there's structure but also allows for the "organic, unplanned, conversational feel" you guys seem to be going for. And it features 4 or 5 songs from MeMu, so it meets everyones needs.
posted by Effigy2000 at 5:15 PM on March 29

I suppose the other possibility would be to do a b-side Music-roundup podcast on odd weeks as more of a long-form thing, playing five or six tracks in full with a little bit of interstitial chatter. Which could be pretty awesome, I guess

I personally would love it. But Effigy2000's idea is good too. I find the little bits of songs frustrating, but I'm usually too lazy to click the song links after I've listened to the podcast.
posted by languagehat at 5:32 PM on March 29

The main concern with Effigy's notion is that 4-5 full length songs means adding 15-20 minutes to the running time of the podcast, and they already clock in at 50-60 minutes as is. Depending on how much we run on during recording, we're already looking at significant edits to get it down to size—our raw running time for this last one was something ridiculous like 80 minutes or so, and I think Matt had to do a bunch of work just to get that cut down to a more reasonable length.

I'd like it if there was some more awesome and automagical way to go from "ooh I like this snippet" to "I am listening to this whole song", but as it is dropping the links into the writeup and promoting the latest songs to the top of that "Featured Tracks" list in the Music sidebar is a decent compromise.
posted by cortex at 5:41 PM on March 29

wait a minute upyourbutt.metafilter.com doesn't exist what the fuck is this weak-ass crap

i quit

this is bullshit
posted by Mikey-San at 6:18 PM on March 29

cortex: "The main concern with Effigy's notion is that 4-5 full length songs means adding 15-20 minutes to the running time of the podcast, and they already clock in at 50-60 minutes as is. Depending on how much we run on during recording, we're already looking at significant edits to get it down to size—our raw running time for this last one was something ridiculous like 80 minutes or so, and I think Matt had to do a bunch of work just to get that cut down to a more reasonable length.

I'd like it if there was some more awesome and automagical way to go from "ooh I like this snippet" to "I am listening to this whole song", but as it is dropping the links into the writeup and promoting the latest songs to the top of that "Featured Tracks" list in the Music sidebar is a decent compromise."

Why do we not want 80 or 90 minute podcasts? I assume it's largely because it's a lot of work for Matt to edit a podcast of that length, yes? If so, I sincerely get that. With a site to run and a baby he know doubt wants to spend time with and a family and of course all his side projects, it'd be unfair of us to ask Matt for more of his time.

But if the main reason against this is all the extra work it would create for Matt, there are ways around that. As you'd know having been a part of the MeFi Collaborative Novel cortex, there's a bunch of very talented MeFites who would probably be willing to offer their assistance in editing this thing for free if they were only asked to do so.

But anyway, is that the main reason against it? Or is there something else? I only ask and say all this because those of us who like and listen to the podcast would probably argue that an extra 15 or 20 minutes of podcasty goodness is not a bad thing at all, especially if it means we're getting a bunch of awesome music thrown at us during the course of it.
posted by Effigy2000 at 6:36 PM on March 29

damn, missed the special library collections things... Visual History Foundation. Working on a FPP about it.
posted by zengargoyle at 7:11 PM on March 29

I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with an hour-and-a-half-long podcast, but I'd say it's probably fair to say that the likelihood of a given person carving out a chunk of time to listen to a podcast decreases as the size of that chunk of time increases.

An hour is a nice reasonable threshold that I think it's easy to sell people on (a half hour is easier, ten minutes easier yet, three minutes easier still...) and gives us time to hit most of what we want to talk about and throw in splashes of music we liked as bumpers. It's not the only possible configuration, but it's what's been happening for a couple years now and it seems to work pretty well. I'd be nervous about suddenly bloating that up some more and thereby turning the podcast into a no-go for a lot of people.

I don't know for sure that that's a big issue, but it has the potential to be one, and I like the idea of exploring other ways to supplement the content of the podcast other than just increasing the running time by half—something more a la carte seems more friendly, and gives folks with limited time the option of choosing what they want to listen to while still allowing the voracious folks the ability to get it all.
posted by cortex at 7:37 PM on March 29 [1 favorite]

Why do we not want 80 or 90 minute podcasts?

Because I'm still on podcast #25, and I have a 15-minute commute? (Music is good)
posted by Devils Rancher at 7:44 PM on March 29

I don't know what I could do -- I'm a web nerd by profession, and there's plenty here already -- but however I could help make a music podcast happed, I'll do.
posted by boo_radley at 8:24 PM on March 29

Personally I will be very unlikely to be able to travel much on July 18th, what with an expensive Tokyo trip in May and Comic Con the following weekend (7/23- 7/26) and being in the midst of summer school, the insanely intensive graduate version, and tickets to PDX being over $200 and me having a plus one to fly up, too, I think I'll have to be at the LA meetup. Someone break dashiv's legs so he has to stay home so we have the most beautiful satellite meetup, k? (Not that LA's mefites are anything less than the most commercially polished to begin with.)
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 8:24 PM on March 29

If Miguel and mr_crash_davis go to New Orleans, I will ask ColdChef for the money to get myself down there as well.
posted by yhbc at 8:28 PM on March 29 [1 favorite]

Why do we not want 80 or 90 minute podcasts? I assume it's largely because it's a lot of work for Matt to edit a podcast of that length, yes?

Nope, if we pushed a 90min podcast out the door, it'd be less work. I'm editing out tons of ten minute tangents to try and get things in under an hour. The first podcast we ever did was an hour long recording cut down to 20 minutes and it literally took me about twelve hours of listening to it over and over again to cut out any dead spots or uninteresting bits. Editing stuff down is Hard Work, keeping them long is super easy.

But 90 minute podcasts that I enjoy are very few and far between. There's one comedic podcast I listen to that runs that long but both people on it are very funny and I enjoy most all of it. I frankly don't think I'm that funny and I think going to an hour is really pushing our limits with people's attention span and interest. I think we need to punch up the podcasts more, like more interviews and whatnot (which require a ton of additional editing) so the whole thing comes out as more fun and interesting.

I think it'd be kind of cruel to just throw up the 90-to-120 minute recording session we usually bullshit on. There are some funny bits but tons of dead air and lots of tangents that end with "what the hell were we talking about again?"
posted by mathowie at 9:28 PM on March 29

To be honest there aren't that many songs on memu that I'd want to listen to all the way through. I'd probably just stop listening to them if there was that much music being played.
posted by empath at 11:21 PM on March 29

...there aren't that many songs on memu that I'd want to listen to all the way through.

And here I had my finger halfway to the "add empath as a contact" button... scratch that!
posted by flapjax at midnite at 12:27 AM on March 30

What's the comedic podcast that you like, mathowie?
posted by exceptinsects at 12:45 AM on March 30

Is it beta? Is it beta?
posted by chillmost at 2:17 AM on March 30

Hey, UK Mefites. Is anyone talking about the UK event(s) anywhere yet? I've been meaning to have a Manchester/NW meetup for oooooh 3 years now. Am wondering whether the 10th Anniversary would be a good time to start or whether we shouldn't all just pop down for the (arguably more inevitable) Enormous London Meetup.

Any thoughts?
posted by Jofus at 6:15 AM on March 30

Oh man, July is going to be just a blur in my memory if I can remember it at all. July 4, followed by my brother's wedding the next weekend (open bar!), and then the anniversary party? Probably means I won't travel anywhere further than, say, NYC, but I will be there if I can.
posted by backseatpilot at 8:13 AM on March 30

What's the comedic podcast that you like, mathowie?

It's Jordan Jesse Go, but I'd say you'd only like it like I like it if you listened from the first one forward. If you plop into the latest as your first listen, it might only be mildly listenable, I dunno.

If we ever moved to the full song break version, it'd have to be if there was a way to do chapters in the podcast (which is possible, but then the mp3 format would have to be abandoned for Apple's version) so that people could skip ahead to songs they liked or talking parts they wanted to hear if they ever got bored with the current section. I've listened to a few music podcasts that were of this kind of DJ curation type, and it's pretty much impossible to jump ahead if you happen to not enjoy 1 of the 9 songs mentioned -- there's no way to know where to fast forward to and most podcast players have clunky controls making it hard to skip 3 minutes ahead with any accuracy.
posted by mathowie at 8:21 AM on March 30

I think it'd be kind of cruel to just throw up the 90-to-120 minute recording session we usually bullshit on. There are some funny bits but tons of dead air and lots of tangents that end with "what the hell were we talking about again?"

Nobody's asking you to "throw up the 90-to-120 minute recording session we usually bullshit on"—that would be awful, and I'm very grateful for the work you do editing them down. The suggestion is to make them longer by adding a few songs, which shouldn't require any more work (though I'm talking out of my ass here). I personally would enjoy a little musical break between chunks of conversation, but that's just me.
posted by languagehat at 8:22 AM on March 30

(On non-preview:) Yeah, chapters would be great.
posted by languagehat at 8:23 AM on March 30

Chapters are something I'd love to do if there was a way to do it that worked for basically everyone. Unfortunately, "switch to proprietary apple format" doesn't seem like a great solution to that at this point.

We could think about publishing both a chaptered version and a plain mp3 version, maybe? I dunno, might be worth an experiment.

One thing I will say, listening back to this episode, is that even in the current glimpses-as-bumpers thing, we're way too uneven in the distribution. I think the jokey Mefi Music Minute thing actually sort of bit us on the ass in that sense, since it kind of obliged us to throw the samples in there at that point and clumped it all together.

Maybe we should try next time to just do whatever organic "ooh I really liked this song from Music" chatter happens and then go back and throw in a little after-the-intro segment mentioning the bumper music we end up using and then use the bumpers more evenly throughout the program after that. So, like:

1. Intro music
2. Welcome chatter, x minutes of initial whatever we start talking about
3a. Bumper music, either ducked under or followed by
3b. A quick one-minute long rattling off of the names of the songs used in this podcast
4. Another chunk of x minutes of talk
5. Another bit of bumper music
6 GOTO 4
...
7. Outro

3a and 3b would be the new formal thing; 4 & 5 is what we do already though some episodes we pace it better than others. We're already including the Songs Mentioned links in the podcast threads up top, so the rattling off in 3b might be a good way to reinforce that a bit for direct reference? I dunno.

I continue to think that an off-week Music-centric podcast is the ideal solution to the full-tracks thing. I like the snippets as bumper breaks, but 30 seconds of music is for me a nice way to come up for air whereas 3-4 minutes is just a good way to make me completely lose the thread of the conversation.
posted by cortex at 8:39 AM on March 30 [1 favorite]

To be honest there aren't that many songs on memu that I'd want to listen to all the way through. I'd probably just stop listening to them if there was that much music being played.

Ouch!
posted by ORthey at 8:48 AM on March 30

Whoops, I was one of the idiots that caused horizontal scrolling in the broken picture telephone thread. I was just following the crowd. Sorry mods.
posted by minifigs at 8:49 AM on March 30

I continue to think that an off-week Music-centric podcast is the ideal solution to the full-tracks thing.

I think you're right, and I hereby change my pony request to that. The regular podcasts really are quite long enough already.
posted by languagehat at 9:17 AM on March 30

Maybe I'll see if I can't just knock something together.
posted by cortex at 9:24 AM on March 30 [1 favorite]

Ow! Hey!
posted by Jofus at 9:34 AM on March 30

Oh sweet, MeFi Anniversary weekend isn't the Seattle to Portland bike ride weekend. Although, I had fantasized biking from Seattle as part of Team MeFi, straight into the Portland meetup on Saturday night. But who am I kidding, I'll never do 200 miles in one day.

Is this the biking event mathowie was referring to?
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 11:03 AM on March 30

Dear DMV-fites:

I have meant to go to meetups in the past, and always had to bail. But if there were some way to incorporate a karaoke version of I Command You to Be My Woman, nothing would stop me from rockingthefuckout.
posted by kittyprecious at 11:11 AM on March 30

I want to stake a claim for a SoCal meetup at Stone Brewery on the 19th, for the following reasons:

a) It's big, and there is ample parking
b) Stone Sour Fest
c) It's so close to my house, people who live farther afield could camp out in my enormous yard (the house is teensy, the yard is big)

...On the other hand, people will probably want to just understandably meet in LA, like they always do. Sigh.
posted by booknerd at 11:13 AM on March 30

Yeah, an off-week podcast of music would be pretty cool with a bit of DJ explanation action if you're up for it cortex (and then there will be interviews with the creators! and prizes! and a concert tour featuring the Monsters of the MeFi Music Podcast!)

And I think your approach for how to lay out the podcasts is how we used to do it pretty much (always a snippet in between intro sections and talking about mefi, then another break to talk about ask mefi, then a full song on the way out) but since we've been talking about a ton of music and we had me and jessamyn going "ooh, aahhh this is a great song" on our first listen, I figured it was easier to splice them in than to push them around the podcast.

I like the little schedule you set up, it's a tad more regimented but I think it'd improve things.
posted by mathowie at 11:18 AM on March 30

Jofus: I'd been thinking about a Manc/NW meetup myself, having noticed a lack of them on trawling the MeTa archives. For the anniversary?, or should we have one before then anyway?
posted by Electric Dragon at 3:50 PM on March 30 [1 favorite]

I like the little schedule you set up, it's a tad more regimented but I think it'd improve things.

Yeah, and the nice thing is it doesn't really have to require much extra work; aside from the playlist segment idea, it's mostly an issue with the bumper music of looking for timely conversational breaks instead of waiting for like sectional breaks by subsite.

So if we spend twenty minutes talking about AskMe, we find a point or two in there to break it down with bumpers, instead of going twenty minutes without any music, etc.
posted by cortex at 4:08 PM on March 30

T-shirts should be white. This is the color of t-shirts. Eye-searingly white. [NOT COLORIST]
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 5:41 PM on March 30

...an off-week Music-centric podcast is the ideal solution to the full-tracks thing.

I think we need a team of ninja operatives (wearing eye-searingly white MeFi t-shirts) that will swoop in unannounced (much like a SWAT team) to random MeFier's homes. Random MeFier will be abducted and carried to a secret location where he or she will be forced to listen to a selection of MeFiMu songs, in their entirety, until random MeFier admits that there is, in fact, a good selection of interesting and worthwhile music at MetaFilter Music, and promises to drop in at the subsite more often to check out what's on offer there.

I also think that (given the general inattention from other MeFiers that the subsite has received since its inception) the proposed off-week Music-centric podcast should not only feature a selection of the most recent song posts, but should also go back through the archives and spotlight music from further back, cause unlike many posts to the blue or gray, MeFiMu posts don't become dated. Most are still just as fresh and attention-worthy as the day they were posted.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 6:51 PM on March 30

Another vote for more music-centered stuff, either inline with the current podcast or in a separate cortex-specific thing.
posted by odinsdream at 6:53 PM on March 30

A certain other site at which I spend some time (and I have seen mathowie drop in to) has a setup where songs which are shared for the enjoyment of the community are automagically whacked into a streaming playlist, into which one can tune and listen to random songs as they play.

This would suck bandwidth like nobody's business, I'm sure, but I would really love to see that for MeFi music, if 'twere possible. It just seems like so much work to browse from post to post hitting the flash player, but if I could tune in to Radio Metafilter with Winamp or something in the background and just click through to see what the current song is if I really like it occasionally, well, that would rock my trousers into next week.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 6:56 PM on March 30

And we're presuming those are eye-searingly white trousers, stav?
posted by flapjax at midnite at 7:53 PM on March 30

Oh, aye! I'm RicardoMantalbanning like there's no tomorrow over here!
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 8:56 PM on March 30

Alvy was doing a Music-centric podcast at one point; I will sheepishly acknowledge not having kept track of it at all, so I'm not sure what the status of that is at this point, but it was a nice notion in any case.

It was shuttered- BECAUSE OF YOUR INDIFFERENCE!!!

Also, I took a week off from the internet at one point, and when I came back felt like I was waaay behind on the MeMu contributions, and I was already sort of leery about doing the podcast as I have no sort of critical faculties or insight into music, and it deserved better than my no-budget approach allowed for. Honestly, I've been wanting to push for someone to resurrect the project ("Hey, cortex is a full-time mod and knows his music... ") but didn't know how to broach the subject without looking like a shirky doofus.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 10:25 PM on March 30

Also, I took a week off from the internet at one point, and when I came back felt like I was waaay behind on the MeMu contributions

Oh man, so let me tell you a story. When Music finally first (re-)launched, I decided I would slot everything that got posted into one of like five or six roughly partitioned playlists, to make it possible for people who had the same general music listening sensibilities as me to get a focused stream of one or another specific mood of music on demand.

It was a decent idea, though there are changes I would make now to the partitioning.

But it's a moot point because I did the exact same thing: got a little behind and was all "oh no, I am behind!" and then got more behind and then it was all fucked from that point on.

I think that was like three years ago.

Here's to fresh starts!

and I was already sort of leery about doing the podcast as I have no sort of critical faculties or insight into music

Neither do I! I am excited and brimming with confidence!
posted by cortex at 10:31 PM on March 30

Alvy, just wanted to say "shirky doofus" is my new favorite word combination. Shirky doofus! Shirky doofus! If I hadn't just decided to drop the 'Lyric Challenge' from the monthly Challenges over at MeFiMu, I'd have chosen it for its poetic grandeur and undeniably musical rhythmic character (that's right, I'm lookin' at you here, cortex).

Also, all you Mefites indifferent to MeFi Music, or too lazy to head over there and click on a song every so often are going to get the RicardoMantalbanhammer from RicardoMantalbanning stavrosthewonderchicken. Dressed head-to-toe in eye-searing white, smelling of kimchee and whistling "La Bamba", he is going to smack you in the ear with it.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 12:02 AM on March 31 [2 favorites]

flapjax at midnite: "Also, all you Mefites indifferent to MeFi Music, or too lazy to head over there and click on a song every so often are going to get the RicardoMantalbanhammer from RicardoMantalbanning stavrosthewonderchicken. Dressed head-to-toe in eye-searing white, smelling of kimchee and whistling "La Bamba", he is going to smack you in the ear with it."

I go over there every once in a while and enjoy it when I do but I'm tempted to stop entirely just to personally witness this particular spectacle play out.
posted by Effigy2000 at 2:13 AM on March 31 [1 favorite]

While Matt's offer of a couple hundred bucks is very generous, I'd have to say at least $1500 was spent on booze at the Toronto meet-up in January. I'll match whatever he puts in for Toronto... unless of course, we're having a big shit show in Winnipeg?
posted by gman at 6:32 AM on March 31

Hey, if the Lyric challenges had had more punchy iambs like that, people'd probably have run with them more often. Heh. (Actually, altering it from a Lyric challenge to a Keyword challenge might be an alternative to scrapping it; give people a tiny little phrase to incorporate instead of a longer line, and it'd be easier to work with.)
posted by cortex at 7:37 AM on March 31

...and it'd be easier to work with

Hey, it ain't about easy, soldier. This is art, see, and you gotta sweat bullets for it.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 7:52 AM on March 31

...altering it from a Lyric challenge to a Keyword challenge might be an alternative to scrapping it...

Let's try that in some of the upcoming months, then, maybe.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 7:54 AM on March 31

Ow! My ear!
posted by subbes at 8:10 AM on March 31

Who the hell doesn't like Frog and Toad?
posted by escabeche at 9:57 PM on March 31

Who the hell doesn't like Frog and Toad?

I know, right?
posted by jessamyn at 10:16 PM on March 31

I don't think I ever read Frog and Toad. And I was an avid reader as a child.
posted by Night_owl at 12:01 AM on April 1

I'll come to New Orleans for a 10th anniversary meetup. Yes, please.
posted by y6y6y6 at 1:52 PM on April 4

ColdChef: "Even though the moderators have abandoned New Orleans (just like the entire US government), I am hereby announcing the 10th Anniversary New Orleans Meetup on the weekend of July 17 and July 18. There will be teeshirts! There will be posters! And to sweeten the deal, I promise to personally match the mathowie bar tab stipend dollar-for-dollar!

Come to New Orleans! Drink twice as much! You'll need the extra fluids."

I love you ColdChef. And I am marking my calendar right now.
posted by radioamy at 7:32 PM on April 7

Not being exactly sure what I am signing up for, and since I am poor and can't bar-tab-match like Coldchef, I volunteer to be the New Orleans coordinator, whatever that entails.
posted by radioamy at 7:40 PM on April 7

I think it means you're the DD.
posted by subbes at 7:36 AM on April 9

haha okay!
posted by radioamy at 8:31 PM on April 9

Re: Custom-Dyed T-shirts

You could always, um, adjust the, er, the colors of the, like, sorry about this, yeah, the colors of the site.

("Special Anniversary Edition!")
posted by Sys Rq at 10:19 AM on April 19

...the colors of the site.

Music could use a makeover for sure... I mean, what's wrong with, like, reddish, y'know? Or, like, electric lime green?
posted by flapjax at midnite at 8:10 AM on April 20

I would like to believe there was awkward silence following my track in this podcast.
posted by frenetic at 5:44 PM on April 24