Beating a dead pony, but with pictures.

August 6, 2010 10:05 AM

I'd like an image preview like we have youtube previews.

Metafilter doesn't have image tags, and I'm fine with that. But we do have a youtube viewer. Would it be possible to ad an image viewer that more or less does the same thing?

I'd put in a link to recognized image hosting sites (say flickr, picassa, imgur for starters). The engine recognizes the link to a known image host and in addition to the link, puts in a little camera icon that I can click and get a pop up window with the image in it.

It's really weird that we have superior support for moving images than we do for still images.

posted by chairface to Feature Requests at 10:05 AM (112 comments total)

We have youtube previews? I had no idea.
posted by nevercalm at 10:08 AM on August 6, 2010

This is the best pony I have ever seen to attempt the great ride around the img tag ban.
posted by stoneweaver at 10:09 AM on August 6, 2010 [17 favorites]

That's what that little 'play' icon does? Damn. This is going to be like the day I simultaneously learned a) the word 'Beatles' has 'Beat' in it, and b) everyone else in the entire world already knew.
posted by Catseye at 10:14 AM on August 6, 2010 [3 favorites]

I wish to ride this pony.
posted by special-k at 10:19 AM on August 6, 2010

Catseye: This is going to be like the day I simultaneously learned a) the word 'Beatles' has 'Beat' in it, and b) everyone else in the entire world already knew.

I had that moment with U2 a few years ago.

If this isn't more difficult to implement than I think it is, this seems like a good pony. The rest of the internet is scary, the less I have to leave the soothing blanket of MetaFilter, the better.
posted by Kattullus at 10:21 AM on August 6, 2010

It's really weird that we have superior support for moving images than we do for still images.

still images are the enemy. they're worth a thousand words and this site is full of serious writers. movies on the other hand are just idiot fun and not to be taken seriously.
posted by philip-random at 10:21 AM on August 6, 2010

Yes. I like it. I like it a lot. I think it's fantastic. I think it's a fantastic idea. /Seinfeld
posted by Jaltcoh at 10:24 AM on August 6, 2010

I would cook this pony and eat it with a piece of homemade bread.
posted by nomadicink at 10:24 AM on August 6, 2010

This is going to be like the day I simultaneously learned a) the word 'Beatles' has 'Beat' in it, and b) everyone else in the entire world already knew.

I had that moment with U2 a few years ago.

Hate to tell you this, but 'U2' doesn't contain the word 'beat' in it.
posted by kmz at 10:28 AM on August 6, 2010 [19 favorites]

This is going to be like the day I simultaneously learned a) the word 'Beatles' has 'Beat' in it, and b) everyone else in the entire world already knew.

Wait what

Wait.

what?
posted by Tomorrowful at 10:31 AM on August 6, 2010 [11 favorites]

This pony is a good pony.
posted by reductiondesign at 10:32 AM on August 6, 2010

I thought the whole point behind not allowing images to be viewed inline was that malicious codes and redirects can be added to images which can't be filtered out. Am I wrong?
posted by zarq at 10:32 AM on August 6, 2010

I think this is a better candidate for a greasemonkey script. What's nice about youtube videos is that they're all the same size so we can serve up a perfectly sized window that includes the embeded player. Images come in all shapes and sizes. We could simply calculate an image size and scale the tag size, but that would severely impact the quality of the image. Another option is finding an image ID and using the API these services offer to grab an appropriate size. That would be nifty, but writing that code for a dozen image services would probably be more maintenance than it's worth.

Might be worth doing some analysis to see how often people link directly to a single image. Just offhand it seems that links more often point to galleries or photostreams.
posted by pb (staff) at 10:32 AM on August 6, 2010 [1 favorite]

Yeah, that's something else to consider zarq. We definitely would not want to host images on MeFi from just anywhere. It would need to be an image-hosting service that takes some measure to sanitize the images.
posted by pb (staff) at 10:33 AM on August 6, 2010

I had that moment with U2 a few years ago.

Enhance 224 to 176.
U2

Enhance, stop. Move in, stop.
U•2

Pull out, track right, stop. Center in, pull back. Stop.
U•2

Track 45 right. Stop. Center and stop.
U•2


Enhance 34 to 36. Pan right and pull back. Stop
U^beat2

Wait a minute, go right, stop. Enhance 57 to 19.
U^beat2


Give me a hard copy right there.
posted by niles at 10:36 AM on August 6, 2010 [96 favorites]

How does lightbox do it? It resizes images automatically.
posted by terrapin at 10:39 AM on August 6, 2010

pb: Can we do this for Flickr as a start? Most identify this pictures seem to be posted on flickr. Someone can cook up a greasypony for the rest. What say ye?
posted by special-k at 10:40 AM on August 6, 2010

Actually, if you're requiring known photo-sharing sites, then you could actually have embedded images with no security problems, right?

But really, Metafilter is long past the IMG era.
posted by roll truck roll at 10:41 AM on August 6, 2010

How does lightbox do it?

Lightbox scales the images by tag like I mentioned. If you have approximately the right-sized image or bigger it's great. Smaller, scaling up it's terrible.

I think there are some good Greasemonkey scripts out there for this. Try out Greased Lightbox. It doesn't put an image inline, but it does bring up directly-linked images in a lightbox.
posted by pb (staff) at 10:46 AM on August 6, 2010

Could we get an inline pdf viewer too? How about a Word .doc viewer? Maybe an XML viewer?

Here's a crazy thought, how about an inline HTML viewer? And the HTML viewer would have an HTML viewer inside that.

Also, this could be solved with a Greasemonkey Script.
posted by blue_beetle at 10:48 AM on August 6, 2010

Yeah I also didn't realize the beatles had the word "beat" in it. So to get back at the world, every time I hear a rolling stone's song I look at the person closest to me and completely deadpan tell them that this is my favorite beatles song. People have a hilarious visceral reaction to that until they realize im joking.
posted by pwally at 10:49 AM on August 6, 2010 [6 favorites]

The Beatles are funny, because they probably have the stupidest name for a band in history, and they got so famous that it didn't matter. When they started out, they were a merseybeat group – geddit? Beatles? Hilarious, right? No. Awful.

Just goes to show: get big enough, and it won't matter that your band name is really, really dumb.
posted by koeselitz at 11:11 AM on August 6, 2010 [2 favorites]

That's true of The Rolling Stones too (they play rock n' roll... get it?! GET IT???!!!). And, as I mentioned above, U2, but also Led Zeppelin (lead balloon), Queen (that Freddie Mercury's a happy lad, no?) and Metallica (how metal are they? So metal they have metal in their bandname!).
posted by Kattullus at 11:20 AM on August 6, 2010

People have a hilarious visceral reaction to that until they realize im joking.

I'm sorry, the Beatles? Who are they?
posted by griphus at 11:32 AM on August 6, 2010 [3 favorites]

The Beatles are funny, because they probably have the stupidest name for a band in history

Not as stupid as !!! or ...And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead.

However, even though the Beatles are my favorite band, their name is a pretty dumb pun. And even though I'm not a big Stones fan, I have to admit that the Rolling Stones is a much cooler name.
posted by Jaltcoh at 11:32 AM on August 6, 2010

It was a long, long time before I found out INXS wasn't pronounced "inksez".

...and even I knew about the Beatles thing
posted by Riki tiki at 11:32 AM on August 6, 2010

This is going to be like the day I simultaneously learned a) the word 'Beatles' has 'Beat' in it, and b) everyone else in the entire world already knew.

When you see the arrow in the FedEx logo, you can never un-see it.


From the way the idea is described here, I'm not really sure what it's adding. If it's going to appear as a pop-up window, why wouldn't you just click it and then close that window? With the rise of YouTube videos occasionally being the central part of a post, the inline viewer made complete sense to not take you away from the site, but this just seems like a way of getting around the deliberate omission of image support.
posted by cgomez at 11:37 AM on August 6, 2010

When you see the arrow in the FedEx logo, you can never un-see it.

Whoa.
posted by devinemissk at 11:48 AM on August 6, 2010

Yeah, I just found out about the sideways house in exit signs.
posted by pb (staff) at 11:51 AM on August 6, 2010 [5 favorites]

When you see the arrow in the FedEx logo, you can never un-see it.

Yup. It's been years now, and every time I look at it, it's like the only thing I see. And everyone I point it out to is surprised.

Also, I've read in many different sources that the BEATles are spelled that way for the Beat generation.
posted by nevercalm at 11:55 AM on August 6, 2010

I've been putting MetaFilter on top of my peach cobbler in great wobbly piles, but last night after dinner I dropped some on the floor and had to clean it up with a paper towel. When I picked up the paper towel my floor was sparkly clean!
posted by carsonb at 11:57 AM on August 6, 2010

I had that moment with U2 a few years ago.

Really, you, too?
posted by Pope Guilty at 11:58 AM on August 6, 2010 [1 favorite]

When you see the arrow in the FedEx logo, you can never un-see it.

Oh holy crap, I just saw it. After staring at a FedEx logo for a honest three minutes going "What arrow?"

Perhaps not quite a satori moment, but I feel like my life has just been changed.
posted by grapefruitmoon at 12:00 PM on August 6, 2010

the day the fnords wore off...
posted by ServSci at 12:01 PM on August 6, 2010 [1 favorite]

I had that moment with U2 a few years ago.

Really, you, too?

You two should go see the spy plane exhibit.
posted by kmz at 12:03 PM on August 6, 2010 [1 favorite]

I have a phobic response to the name Gary Powers, sorry.

*runs off screaming*
posted by Pope Guilty at 12:05 PM on August 6, 2010

If a greasemonkey script is the way to go, then why is that not the way to go for youtube? I'm not really arguing hard for this feature, just pointing out how damn weird it is that youtube gets special treatment when flickr and friends do not. Heck, flickr even supports video.
posted by chairface at 12:19 PM on August 6, 2010

I still try to say it I-N-X-S. And then I remember the wrongness, but resent the fact that "I in excess" kind of works as a thing. Like, if you had too much ego. "I in excess."
posted by redsparkler at 12:20 PM on August 6, 2010

> That's true of The Rolling Stones too

Are you kidding? The Rolling Stones is a terrific name. Learn your rock and blues history, Mr. Jones!
posted by languagehat at 12:28 PM on August 6, 2010

Oh please oh please oh please
posted by interrobang at 12:28 PM on August 6, 2010

Other musical realizations:

* "Barenaked Ladies" isn't pronounced "bar-EN-ah-kid LAD-ee-yes"

* "The White Stripes" contains the word "strip".

* "The The" and "Duran Duran" could conceivably form two bands, both called "The Duran."

* ABBA is both a palindrome and a rhyme scheme.

* Indigo is a shade of blue, and the Indigo Girls are blues singers.

* Beck and Jeff Beck are not related.

* Billy Idol, despite dressing like a punk rocker, is actually a middle-of-the-road pop singer.

* It's not "The Pixies," it's just "Pixies." Now, do you want extra foam on your latte?

* If Lady Gaga married Madonna, she'd be Lady Madonna. (Submitted by my Uncle Hal.)

* They Might Be Giants' songs for grown ups and their songs for children are the same damn songs.
posted by lore at 12:30 PM on August 6, 2010 [15 favorites]

lore: "They Might Be Giants' songs for grown ups and their songs for children are the same damn songs."

When they were promoting their first children's album, I heard a radio interview where they called it No Swearing.
posted by roll truck roll at 12:36 PM on August 6, 2010

Would it be so hard hard to identify any link to a URL ending in .jpg, .gif, or .png and throw it into a lightbox? I heartily endorse the suggestion.
posted by The Winsome Parker Lewis at 12:36 PM on August 6, 2010

So hard hard hard, I meant. Clearly I was missing a third "hard."
posted by The Winsome Parker Lewis at 12:37 PM on August 6, 2010 [2 favorites]

Yeah, I just found out about the sideways house in exit signs.

wut.
posted by elizardbits at 12:37 PM on August 6, 2010

* Billy Idol, despite dressing like a punk rocker, is actually a middle-of-the-road pop singer.

He stole his look from Spike anyways.

* It's not "The Pixies," it's just "Pixies." Now, do you want extra foam on your latte?

Similarly, it's not The Counting Crows, it's Counting Crows. The band's name is a verb phrase, not a noun.
posted by kmz at 12:47 PM on August 6, 2010

"Barenaked Ladies" isn't pronounced "bar-EN-ah-kid LAD-ee-yes"

I heard when they first started up they wanted to get people to come see them. So they came up with a name that they thought they could put on posters that would ensure people, or at least men, would come.
posted by P.o.B. at 12:47 PM on August 6, 2010

Oh and the arrow in for Amazon goes from A to Z and it's a smirky smile.
posted by P.o.B. at 12:48 PM on August 6, 2010

Neil Young's best-known song is called Old Man. BECAUSE OF THE ILLUMINATI
posted by shakespeherian at 12:53 PM on August 6, 2010

More seriously, I wonder how many people realize that "Chubby Checker" is a play off of "Fats Domino".
posted by lore at 12:54 PM on August 6, 2010 [9 favorites]

Yesterday, I found out that curry is a spice mix. There is no curry plant. There are no curry leaves or curry nuts or curry berries. Nobody harvests the humble curry; you do not grow different varieties or grow the plant in different ways to get hot or medium or mild curries.

It's just a spice mix.
posted by Shepherd at 12:54 PM on August 6, 2010 [4 favorites]

If a greasemonkey script is the way to go, then why is that not the way to go for youtube?

Sorry this seems inconsistent and unfair. Sometimes we try things here as an experiment and they stick. Sometimes we try things and they don't work. Just because one experiment succeeds, that doesn't mean that it sets a blanket rule for how things will work in the future. We go with our gut feeling on a lot of decisions. Right now it feels like this is more work than necessary for the utility and maintenance involved.

Within the last 30 days we've had 915 posts on MeFi. 241 included links to youtube, 31 included links to flickr, and 26 included a direct link to a jpeg. We've 52,705 comments on Mefi. 1,532 included links to youtube, 149 included links to Flickr, and 430 included direct links to jpegs. Over on Ask we've had 2,814 questions. 25 included links to youtube, 43 included links to flickr, and 51 included a direct link to a jpeg. There were 44,208 answers with 754 links to youtube, 108 links to flickr, and 228 direct links to jpegs. Right now there is more youtube traffic. Is that because we have the inline player? I don't know. I'm sure it has an impact, but right now the site is sharing more videos.

Not all of those Flickr links go directly to an image. And we wouldn't be able to embed all of the direct links to images. I've mentioned some of the problems with scaling images compared with youtube videos, and there are some alternatives out there if you really need this.
posted by pb (staff) at 12:56 PM on August 6, 2010 [1 favorite]

Similarly, it's not The Counting Crows, it's Counting Crows

Ditto Talking Heads and Throwing Muses.
posted by aught at 12:56 PM on August 6, 2010

zarq : I thought the whole point behind not allowing images to be viewed inline was that malicious codes and redirects can be added to images which can't be filtered out. Am I wrong?

When your avatar unrolls the scroll, it just looks like static... white noise... snow...
posted by quin at 12:57 PM on August 6, 2010 [2 favorites]

There are no curry leaves or curry nuts or curry berries.

Actually, there is such a thing as curry leaves, but they have little to do with the spice mixes that most of the world thinks of as "curry." (Sorry.)
posted by aught at 12:59 PM on August 6, 2010 [2 favorites]

Or the C in the Carrefour logo.

If Metafilter had an image viewer you could click it and the see this picture in the image viewer. But it doesn't. So you can't.
posted by jontyjago at 1:01 PM on August 6, 2010 [3 favorites]

As someone who codes for a living, I'm here to back up pb (not that he needs it) to say that until the volume of linked images goes up, and the majority of those are hosted in the same place¹, and that host has embedding code that deals with security and image sizing the way the YouTube embedded player does...this doesn't seem likely to happen.

Having said that: that would be totally awesome, and I support the idea of it even as I acknowledge the current impracticality of it.
posted by davejay at 1:08 PM on August 6, 2010

I had that moment with U2 a few years ago.

I have actually heard a person try to pronounce INXS as "innkss."
posted by Devils Rancher at 1:08 PM on August 6, 2010

¹after all, there's no inline Vimeo player, or TED talk player, for instance
posted by davejay at 1:09 PM on August 6, 2010

More seriously, I wonder how many people realize that "Chubby Checker" is a play off of "Fats Domino".

I once negged on a Chubby Check tossup in quiz bowl with "Chubby Checkers". Felt pretty embarrassed by that. My worst neg ever though, was when I somehow said "Chaka Khan" instead of "Chaka Zulu".

It's just a spice mix.

In fact curry is a generic term that covers a lot of different spice mixes and more. There's Chinese curry, various Thai curries, and at least dozens of Indian curries.
posted by kmz at 1:30 PM on August 6, 2010

Thanks for the stats, pb. That helps put it in perspective. I'm happy the idea is floating around at least.
posted by chairface at 1:31 PM on August 6, 2010

kmz: “Similarly, it's not The Counting Crows, it's Counting Crows.”

Ah, very true. But what many people often forget is that, while it's written "Counting Crows," the name of the band is pronounced "lame 90s sentimental alt-craprock."
posted by koeselitz at 1:38 PM on August 6, 2010 [8 favorites]

I had that moment with U2 a few years ago.

What moment? Please explain, it seems like there's something I'm missing.
posted by sveskemus at 1:42 PM on August 6, 2010

I assume the thing is that it sounds like "you too" (or "you two").
posted by Jaltcoh at 1:44 PM on August 6, 2010

But what many people often forget is that, while it's written "Counting Crows," the name of the band is pronounced "lame 90s sentimental alt-craprock."

Hey, they had two great songs.
posted by Jaltcoh at 1:45 PM on August 6, 2010

Are we talking about the letter you and the numeral, too?
posted by chairface at 1:51 PM on August 6, 2010 [1 favorite]

Hey, they had two great songs.

Ok, Helter Skelter was one, what was the other good song they covered?
posted by Elmore at 1:53 PM on August 6, 2010

Hey, you two, stop discussing this or I'll have to beat you, and you too.
posted by Elmore at 1:54 PM on August 6, 2010

Referencing Pixies and Counting Crows in any comparative sentence is sacrilege. Unless that sentence begins, "Unlike terrible band Counting Crows, Pixies..."

A wave of mutilation on you and Mr. Jones.
posted by Babblesort at 2:02 PM on August 6, 2010 [1 favorite]

pb: EXIT sign & house? Please explain because I have hurt my neck trying to see that one.
posted by futz at 2:03 PM on August 6, 2010

With all due respect to pb, I still think this is a good idea. Using the embedded YouTube video is not very convenient, since I can't continue to view the metafilter page while I watch the video. However, images seem like the ideal content to embed in this way, regardless of how often images are posted here. I would use this a lot more than the embedded YouTube feature.

Instead of clicking the link, viewing the image, then having to click back, you just click the link, view the image for two seconds, and go on about your day. It would just be a much more enjoyable way to view images on this site.

This is by far one of the most plausible feature requests I've ever seen here.
posted by malapropist at 2:04 PM on August 6, 2010

I missed out on a joke, right? *whoosh*
posted by futz at 2:05 PM on August 6, 2010

malapropist, set your preferences to open a link in a new tab.
posted by futz at 2:07 PM on August 6, 2010

pb: EXIT sign & house?

The negative space between the E and X form a little house turned 90°. The X is the roof, and the middle line of the E is the door.
posted by pb (staff) at 2:08 PM on August 6, 2010 [1 favorite]

I wonder how many people realize that "Chubby Checker" is a play off of "Fats Domino".

O_o
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 2:08 PM on August 6, 2010 [1 favorite]

Portly Rook
posted by Babblesort at 2:10 PM on August 6, 2010

Doubling Cube
posted by Elmore at 2:12 PM on August 6, 2010

pb, that was I thought you meant but you don't think it is intentional do you? It is just reading something into the happenstance of those 2 letters being next to each other?
posted by futz at 2:17 PM on August 6, 2010

nah, not intentional. Just something I hadn't noticed before that I can't unsee now.
posted by pb (staff) at 2:19 PM on August 6, 2010

Got it.
posted by futz at 2:27 PM on August 6, 2010

Dumpy Dice
posted by Devils Rancher at 2:28 PM on August 6, 2010

Can't we just start uploading our pictures to YouTube?
posted by ODiV at 2:36 PM on August 6, 2010

I Dig a Pygmy, by Charles Haughtry and the Deaf-Aids! Phase one, in which Doris gets her oats.
posted by drjimmy11 at 4:04 PM on August 6, 2010 [2 favorites]

They call me Tubby Jenga.
posted by boo_radley at 4:09 PM on August 6, 2010 [1 favorite]

still images are the enemy. they're worth a thousand words and this site is full of serious writers.

Yeah, let's all work on getting our prose plumb, shall we, before we start fretting over jpeg joinery.
posted by drjimmy11 at 4:09 PM on August 6, 2010

Hefty Go!

Ewe too.
posted by carsonb at 4:36 PM on August 6, 2010

The word curry comes from the Tamil word for the curry tree " Kari patha" iirc.
posted by dhruva at 4:37 PM on August 6, 2010

lore: "More seriously, I wonder how many people realize that "Chubby Checker" is a play off of "Fats Domino"."

Huge Risk Token.
Obese Othello Chip
Flabby Boggle Board
Beefy Battleship Boat
Plump Go Stones
Potbellied Perfection Piece
Meaty Crokinole Disc
Ginormous Monopoly Car.

Nope, sorry, this is inadequate fodder for a Band Name generator (Chubby was a one-off). And now the brain - it hurts.
posted by Hardcore Poser at 5:54 PM on August 6, 2010

I offered some code to do this a few years back. Nothing came of it. I believe security concerns were cited.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 6:24 PM on August 6, 2010

Using the embedded YouTube video is not very convenient, since I can't continue to view the metafilter page while I watch the video.

ProTip: you'll have a little bit of the page visible on the bottom. Watch the video in the "popup", and then pretend that you're continuing to read the page through a window shade.
posted by niles at 6:38 PM on August 6, 2010

And if you have a scroll wheel mouse you can still move the page by scrolling off to the side of the video.
posted by cjorgensen at 6:44 PM on August 6, 2010

Just goes to show: get big enough, and it won't matter that your band name is really, really dumb.

Too bad, Hoobastank!
posted by stennieville at 7:25 PM on August 6, 2010 [1 favorite]

Chubby Checker used to do Fats Domino impressions (amongst others) hence the sly hat-tip there.

The Beatles (partially) named themselves after The Crickets as they were Buddy Holly fans.

Also, clicking my scrollwheel opens a new tab in Firefox. I haven't used the 'back' button since 2002.
posted by bdave at 8:22 PM on August 6, 2010

named themselves after The Crickets

Ow, my eyes!
posted by Jaltcoh at 8:25 PM on August 6, 2010 [1 favorite]

"Just goes to show: get big enough, and it won't matter that your band name is really, really dumb."

Somewhere, Hoobastank weeps.
posted by klangklangston at 8:40 PM on August 6, 2010

I really like this idea and think it would increase my pleasure in perusing MeFi. I also think that we don't often link directly to images because of the lack of inline viewing options. I know that, were it to be a normal thing, I'd certainly utilize it to illustrate my points more clearly on AskMe, for example, and I've got a couple posts in the works that are crippled due to wanting to link to images with context that isn't necessarily right next to them on the pages in question. (This is the hyper perfectionist in me. I'm not gonna make a FPP till it's exactly how I want it!) I also pretty much hate having to load a Flickr page to look at one picture, with the myriad noise that shows up around it, just like I dislike going to Youtube and immediately being linked to a sidebar of related videos I don't give a damn about.

Although I understand that it isn't worth pb's time or might be too difficult to make happen, I'd welcome and enjoy it. Additionally, I wouldn't mind the image being resized with diminished quality, as long as it would be an easy click-through to the full sized image hosted off-site. A preview, after all, doesn't need to give 100% of the information to be effective.
posted by Mizu at 9:13 PM on August 6, 2010

Ahem .. The Indigo Girls? Or ... Indigo Girls? If only we could harness the latent energy of all those dropped letters! I guarantfrikkentee you that Sting, Prince and Madonna could finally afford surnames. Don't even get me started on all those dropped "u"s, piled up along the Canadian/American border.
posted by PareidoliaticBoy at 9:32 PM on August 6, 2010

stavrosthewonderchicken: “I offered some code to do this a few years back. Nothing came of it. I believe security concerns were cited.”

Well, that and the fact that you wrote it in SNOBOL. Geez, man.
posted by koeselitz at 12:04 AM on August 7, 2010

Don't eat the yellow SNOBOLs.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 12:40 AM on August 7, 2010 [1 favorite]

- The bear in the mountain on the Toblerone logo
- Amazon logo is both A-Z and a smile
posted by djgh at 7:10 AM on August 7, 2010

mouse gesture up - open link in new tab
mouse gesture down - close current tab
FireGestures. I want it on my whole system.

Also: Lardass Mahjong
posted by Trochanter at 8:01 AM on August 7, 2010

Who's the fat private dick that's a sex machine to all the chicks

LARDASS

Can you dig it?
posted by Trochanter at 8:03 AM on August 7, 2010

- The bear in the mountain on the Toblerone logo

Is that bear about to throw a discus?
posted by grapefruitmoon at 9:27 AM on August 7, 2010

Snobolds? You mean those things nobody can be bothered to kill on Gormok?
posted by Pope Guilty at 10:08 AM on August 7, 2010

No Longer Hungry Hippos
posted by The corpse in the library at 1:37 PM on August 7, 2010 [3 favorites]

Instead of clicking the link, viewing the image, then having to click back, you just click the link, view the image for two seconds, and go on about your day.

Click back? Have everything open up in a new tab instead. Or new window.
posted by oneirodynia at 5:56 PM on August 7, 2010

So I only started seeing the arrow in the FedEx logo after seeing the Arabic logo, where it's much more obvious.

And the other day I realized that the bread sold in Britain in the 1980s, VitBe, with its unbelievably stupid and annoying and haunting-me-to-this-day advertising jingle "It be VitBe, it be!" was called VitBe for a reason. And suddenly I understood what that reason was.
posted by lapsangsouchong at 2:04 AM on August 8, 2010

I made a proof of concept userscript using oEmbed to display flickr images (as well as vimeo, more can be added). It's not recommended for use, but if someone wants to hack good lightbox integration and delay loading the remote stuff, it should make a nice enhancement to the MeFi experience. I'll be away for two weeks and won't be able to work on it until then.
posted by Tobu at 5:09 AM on August 8, 2010

Actually the number of images currently posted is sort of a non sequitor, I suspect many people don't post images because of the slight impedance in viewing them. Picking a few or even one blessed image host and allowing some kind of in-place modal viewing would probably drive those images-posted numbers through the roof.

That said the focus on mostly plain text here is a feature not a bug (though somehow youtubery seems to work nicely in a way I wouldn't have predicted so wtf do I know).
posted by Skorgu at 7:39 AM on August 8, 2010

The greasemonkey script that pb recommended above is all kinds of awesome. I didn't understand why anyone would want this pony until I installed that script. Of course, now that I have the script, I don't need the pony.
posted by donnagirl at 9:14 AM on August 8, 2010

There's also Text-to-Image that does that same thing, more or less. Only for Firefox, though.
posted by dg at 9:30 PM on August 8, 2010

Test links here for greasy monkey testing. Non-pro accounts have different URLs, I think.

(self link)
posted by chairface at 1:09 PM on August 11, 2010