Ceding FPP ownership

May 10, 2010 12:26 PM

Filthy light thief's WIP FPP for Frank Frazetta's is a considerably greater tribute and memorial to the man than what I wrote. Can I cede thread content/ownership somehow?
posted by griphus to MetaFilter Gatherings at 12:26 PM (30 comments total)

...and I post this in the wrong category. Splendid.
posted by griphus at 12:27 PM on May 10, 2010

I think you just got your wish fella!
posted by Jofus at 12:28 PM on May 10, 2010

Just favorite and move on.
posted by koeselitz at 12:29 PM on May 10, 2010 [4 favorites]

On one of the deleted threads, someone said this and I favorited it but now I'm not sure and am wondering what others think:

"if there ever was an argument for a 24 wait period when someone dies this (the 3 posts right in a row) is certainly it."

I would hate hate hate for obit posts to go away -- even if they are just chock full o' dots. But it seems that some sort of 'best practices' that isn't some sort of hard rules.

If people are going to yell at me when I respond @likethis and get me to change my mind, then it seems we can use that same sort of power for even further greater goods.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 12:34 PM on May 10, 2010

Honestly, I don't have a problem with this as a one-off weird way to deal with it if both of you are on board, so if FLF wants to go ahead and post that I'll nix the current one and toss in a link. But it is kind of a weird shuffle, not something I'd be hot on seeing on a regular basis.
posted by cortex (staff) at 12:38 PM on May 10, 2010

MCMikeNamara: yeah that was me. I know people have idly talked about the concept before, and I don't think it's a bad idea because of the rush to be first out of the gate practice (as we just saw), but I seriously doubt it'd be adopted. There is a certain resistance to attempts at significant change here, mostly because it'd involve a lot of additional work, and people generally hate change.



I say that not as a pissy complaint, but as an accepted and understood part of MeFi
posted by edgeways at 12:43 PM on May 10, 2010

I've posted a couple of obit FPPs about interesting people. I waited until at least 24 hours for several reasons:

1)to allow better news stories to be generated about them
2)to give someone else a chance to make the post
3)to spend some time finding decent links about the person
4)realizing that Metafilter isn't Headline News and there's really no reason to rush a post on a story that isn't developing.

They're dead, they'll be dead tomorrow (unlike maybe a breaking story like an earthquake or something where people can add firsthand accounts, new angles, etc---the dead kind of stay dead). Bearing that in mind may help relieve the itch to POST IT NOW GOTTA MAKE A POST OH GOD FIRST POST!
posted by Burhanistan at 12:55 PM on May 10, 2010 [1 favorite]

I waffled, then I edited and posted a revised comment as a FPP. If mods are having second thoughts, I'm OK for this FPP to disappear and keep it as a comment.
posted by filthy light thief at 1:07 PM on May 10, 2010

And I tip my hat to griphus.
posted by filthy light thief at 1:17 PM on May 10, 2010 [1 favorite]

Christ, what a reasonable bunch of fellows.
posted by The Whelk at 2:27 PM on May 10, 2010 [10 favorites]

This is a problem I've noticed with Metafilter. The kudos and favorites from being the one to post a newsworthy front-page-posts results in hastily-written posts. How could this site improve this problem? Something like a "Vote for this post to replace the FPP" option?
posted by 7-7 at 2:49 PM on May 10, 2010

This is the worst flameout I have ever witnessed.
posted by Elmore at 2:56 PM on May 10, 2010

I think it says a lot about our community that we have too much Frank Frazetta coverage.
posted by Think_Long at 3:24 PM on May 10, 2010 [6 favorites]

But I am really curious to see what this meetup is going to be like. Whats the date and location?

I say a snow-covered peak in an age long past, but that's just my personal preference.
posted by Think_Long at 3:25 PM on May 10, 2010

Clever way of posting so that the thread can remain open for six months, leaving ample time for discussion, followup and adding photos after the event.
posted by Elmore at 3:38 PM on May 10, 2010

This is a problem I've noticed with Metafilter. The kudos and favorites from being the one to post a newsworthy front-page-posts results in hastily-written posts. How could this site improve this problem? Something like a "Vote for this post to replace the FPP" option?

That sounds like Reddit, which MeFites don't generally support.

But I am really curious to see what this meetup is going to be like. Whats the date and location?

Though tales disagree, some have mapped this land.
posted by filthy light thief at 3:47 PM on May 10, 2010

Anonymous AskMe's go into some sort of posting queue, and have to be approved before they go live. Could we do that with obit threads? Maybe add an "is this an obit?" checkbox, or just watch for tags or something.

It would solve the multi-deletions that occur every time someone famous enough dies.
posted by graventy at 3:50 PM on May 10, 2010 [3 favorites]

The simple answer is that if anyone notable has died they get placed in the Realm Of the Undead - both in a state of Not Living and Not Dead until such a time as a post can be created. Once removed from the Realm, they have a 50% chance of remaining dead and thus the post can continue.

If they don't, . we've got shotguns.
posted by The Whelk at 3:53 PM on May 10, 2010

Nice day for a
Whelk wedding
Nice day to
Start again.
posted by flabdablet at 5:27 PM on May 10, 2010

Dressmaker: We dressmakers have a very strict code, so I need to know. Do you deserve to wear virginial white? Because if you don't, you'll have to wear an off white, what we call a "hussy white". So which will it be? White white?

Margo Sherman: Yes... um, except for the gloves.
posted by The Whelk at 6:08 PM on May 10, 2010 [3 favorites]

Doffin' my hat to you, there, griphus. That was a classy move.
posted by solipsophistocracy at 11:00 PM on May 10, 2010 [1 favorite]

i think it looks like the same thing might happen to this thread. zarq's post is much better.
'
posted by lester's sock puppet at 6:09 AM on May 11, 2010

Hmmmm. Twice in too days is a little much. Can I respectfully ask that we not do this again? It's making me kind of dizzy.
posted by GenjiandProust at 6:15 AM on May 11, 2010

dizzy, spinning ....and twrilling ...twrilling toward freedom!
posted by The Whelk at 6:22 AM on May 11, 2010

griphus, you are a man and a gentleman!
posted by orange swan at 7:45 AM on May 11, 2010

Can I respectfully ask that we not do this again? It's making me kind of dizzy.

Yeah, I'm sorry about that, it is probably a bad precedent to set because then it creates a situation where simple posts might be seen as placeholders until the megapost comes around, and everything in between just ends up being an awkward double and headache for the mods.

The only reason I asked that it be replaced is that it was a million times better and a comprehensive resource for photojournalism in general. It wasn't just 'oh here's a better obit,' that kind of thing seems to happen a lot and there are a few MetaTalk threads about it. It was more of a 'whoa, this is several orders of magnitude more important.' It just seemed important enough to highlight as something that was truly best of the web. Again, sorry to put the mods out and I hope it doesn't set a bad precedent.
posted by infinitefloatingbrains at 8:29 AM on May 11, 2010

My husband is a big Frazetta fan so I sent him the griphus link when it was brand new. I caught the replacement post just as we were heading out the door to see IM2 last night and mentioned I'd be sending him a new link. Anyway, he wondered why the links and comments weren't all merged into one post. I thought it might become difficult to follow the thread if three conversations became one but wanted to confirm that this is the reason versus a technical one.
posted by victoriab at 9:17 AM on May 11, 2010

Yeah, we don't like the idea of creating some weird false continuity by moving comments around, basically. This sort of situation is uncommon enough, and the stakes of a deletion low enough (worst case scenario is someone repeats a comment in the new thread) that building in some mechanism to try and glue threads together is not something we want to do.
posted by cortex (staff) at 9:22 AM on May 11, 2010

That totally makes sense. Thanks.
posted by victoriab at 9:36 AM on May 11, 2010

This is why we occasionally have nice things. well done, griphus.
posted by theora55 at 1:05 PM on May 11, 2010