How did it all turn out?

September 1, 2010 3:57 AM

Some of the more interesting or emotional questions and discussions on AskMe leave me wanting a final follow-up from the original poster. How did it all turn out?

I do get invested in some threads. Outside of messaging the question asker (impossible with anon + it seems intrusive) or repeatedly asking for one within the thread, is there any way to mark a post or indicate that you really would love a follow-up/resolution to the narrative? Is there something about 'follow-up' or 'resolution' I'm not understanding? Do the mods ever request this from question askers (especially those we might be worried about)?

posted by Pennyblack to Etiquette/Policy at 3:57 AM (48 comments total)

I agree very much with this suggestion.

Might it be possible to trigger an automatic reminder after n days, along the lines of:

- was your question resolved to your satisfaction?
- many MeFites will be interested in how things turned out: would you like to post a follow-up to let them know?

or something similar?
posted by aqsakal at 4:50 AM on September 1, 2010

Matt's answer in a previous thread may be of interest:

We send out an automated email 30 days after you ask a question asking for a followup, and we explain the "resolved" tag that can be added to it.

You should follow the resolved tag, it's pretty cool and sometimes stuff that is a year or two old pop up in the feed. Check out the Answered tab of Ask MeFi's front page, and in the sidebar are all the recently resolved questions and a link to a feed for it.

posted by Horace Rumpole at 4:51 AM on September 1, 2010 [8 favorites]

Thanks Horace, I'd never thought of that.
posted by arcticseal at 5:02 AM on September 1, 2010

I'm sorry, I don't know quite how to break this to you, so I'll just be straight. Your pony is dead. I know you took good care of it and you rode it every day, but it's dead and there is no way to compel it (aka the question asker) to rise again.
posted by unliteral at 5:15 AM on September 1, 2010 [1 favorite]

Question for the mods: While browsing through the 'resolved' tag, I noticed this question, which is anonymous and I thought was posted anonymously, yet it has best answers marked.

Was it originally posted anonymously and the user marked best answers or did the anon user email the mods about which answers to mark 'best'?
posted by nomadicink at 5:22 AM on September 1, 2010

I'd like to genetically engineer this pony a little or at least make a suggestion. Real stories don't usually have endings. That guy that wasn't sure if he could screw up the courage to ask out that girl? Final ending: They got married. Awwwww. 2 years later, divorce. Or maybe kids. Or possibly double homicide. Does the thread get updated again with that new "final" ending? Less dramatically, I tried to post updates to some past questions after a longer and longer timespans gave me more perspective but eventually I had to stop because it was closed. (i.e. my wife is getting close to banhammering the cast iron pan I bought)

So my genetic engineering would be: Let the original poster post in that thread even after it is nominally closed.

But that's not going to happen, so my suggestion is: When you can and when you want people to know how it turned out, make your final update a link to a blog or an invitation to email you or something.

And if they don't, you'll just have to stay curious. Maybe they don't want to tell you.
posted by DU at 5:25 AM on September 1, 2010 [2 favorites]

Was it originally posted anonymously and the user marked best answers or did the anon user email the mods about which answers to mark 'best'?

My guess would be that it was originally posted non-anonymously and the asker marked some Best Answers, then later decided they didn't want the question linked to their username and asked the mods to anonymise it.
posted by EndsOfInvention at 5:46 AM on September 1, 2010

Might it be possible to trigger an automatic reminder after n days

Its already done. The exact text is (snipped form a reminder to me):

[snip]
Subject: Ask MetaFilter Follow-up
Message: About a month ago you asked a question on Ask MetaFilter:

I am an author; now how do I convince others of that fact?
http://ask.metafilter.com/140003/I-am-an-author-now-how-do-I-convince-others-of-that-fact

Since then, your question has received 17 answers from 15 members. How did the answers work for you? If you have any follow-up information or a resolution, please comment in the thread.

Consider adding a 'resolved' tag to the thread if your problem was solved. This will let other members know your question was answered and will help others find any follow-up information you add. You can add the tag by clicking this link:

http://ask.metafilter.com/contribute/resolve.mefi?id=140003

Thanks for participating in AskMe.
[snip]
posted by googly at 6:02 AM on September 1, 2010

Has anyone ever written a follow-up to a relationship question?
posted by smackfu at 6:45 AM on September 1, 2010

At least one.
posted by gleuschk at 7:01 AM on September 1, 2010

Since the OP has asked 14 questions to AskMe I wonder if the 30-day follow-up email doesn't get sent if one doesn't 1) have an email listed in their profile or 2) doesn't have MeMail set up.
posted by terrapin at 7:04 AM on September 1, 2010

♪ Some will win
Some will lose
Some were born to sing the blues
Oh
The movie never ends
It goes on and on and on and on. ♫


♫ Don't stop believin'
Hold on to the feelin'
Streetlight people--- ♬

Don't stop....
posted by zarq at 7:06 AM on September 1, 2010 [1 favorite]

There was the guy who has an female Asian roommate who had fallen for her and was reluctant about taking this to the next level. So he suggested they find over arrangements when the lease was up, which threw her into a fit. After he finally came clean about his feelings to her, she was pissed, but only because he wanted so long to say anything and suggested they split up as roommates.

There was another about a guy who caught his wife cheating and whether they should work it out. He updated later to say they were.

Anyone have links?
posted by nomadicink at 7:07 AM on September 1, 2010

As Horace Rumpole noted, we do a reminder email automatically one month out. That seems like a decent compromise and has produce some results; we're not going to send further pokes after that because we don't really want to annoy people.

Your two best bets for watching for updates to questions in general are to subscribe to the resolved tag (or just check in on that page manually now and then, I suppose) and to watch the Answered tab from the front page of askme.

If you want to watch for updates in specific questions, you have two additional options: if you contributed an answer to the thread, just keep an eye on Recent Activity (linked at the top of every page on the site, if you haven't noticed it before) and new answers will pop it up to the top; if you didn't answer the thread, you can favorite it and then check in on the My Favorites tab of Recent Activity and it'll pop up there along with updates to any other thread you've faved.

And that's about it. You can of course write a quick polite note to the poster now and then, but best to not do a whole ton of that. And we generally prefer people don't post contentless "what happened?" comments in old askme threads; we'll often delete those if there's not a really, really clear reason for them to be there beyond just idle curiosity.

Was it originally posted anonymously and the user marked best answers or did the anon user email the mods about which answers to mark 'best'?

EndsOfInvention has it right—it had to be someone who decided on anonymity after the fact and asked us to go make it so. There is no facility, for user or mod, to add best answers to a currently-anonymous question.
posted by cortex (staff) at 7:09 AM on September 1, 2010 [1 favorite]

cortex, just because I am now curious, does the asker receive that email if they don't have a public email address or is it sent to the email required for membership that only the mods see?
posted by terrapin at 7:21 AM on September 1, 2010

Here is the roommate one that noma is talking about ... and then she kissed him
posted by mlis at 7:21 AM on September 1, 2010

There is no facility, for user or mod, to add best answers to a currently-anonymous question.

Waaaaaay back in the day, however, there used to be. Back when we had access to account passwords [which we haven't had in forever] we could technically log in as Anonymous and Best Answer things. I believe I did that once. The resolved tag is our most popular tag.

Do the mods ever request this from question askers (especially those we might be worried about)?

Generally, no. It's a little easier for me since I tend to comment in a lot of threads so I can follow them via recent activity. But we do not want to get into the business of interacting with the OP about how their thing went. We encourage people with a follow-up email in the way cortex said, and we have wrap-up Meta threads sometimes, but otherwise it's up to individuals how much resolution they want to add to a thing.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 7:26 AM on September 1, 2010

does the asker receive that email if they don't have a public email address or is it sent to the email required for membership that only the mods see?

That message, and other admin messages, goes only to MeMail. We don't have anything other than a confirmation email that goes to a user's email address [unless we contact them specifically as mods] I guess if you have MeMail disabled you don't get the mod MeMail.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 7:27 AM on September 1, 2010

Here is the roommate one that noma is talking about ... and then she kissed him

That one was definitely sweet... but I still want to know how it worked out after the initial snuggling. Considering today's FPP about living in Google's panopticon, surely there is a free google app that would provide these intimate details of someone else's life, no?
posted by Forktine at 7:30 AM on September 1, 2010

Considering today's FPP about living in Google's panopticon, surely there is a free google app that would provide these intimate details of someone else's life, no?

"I'm feeling stalk-y."
posted by zarq at 7:37 AM on September 1, 2010 [3 favorites]

we could technically log in as Anonymous

If you have the password, you can log in as anonymous? That's awesome.
posted by grouse at 7:40 AM on September 1, 2010

"I'm feeling stalk-y."

Some of us were born stalk-y.
posted by Forktine at 7:42 AM on September 1, 2010

Some of the stuff that shows up in the "recently resolved" feed only seems resolved in the asker's mind.
posted by smackfu at 7:48 AM on September 1, 2010 [1 favorite]

Some of the stuff that shows up in the "recently resolved" feed only seems resolved in the asker's mind.

I feel your pain. Some of the things that show up as questions don't really seem to be questions, either.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 7:50 AM on September 1, 2010 [12 favorites]

If you have the password, you can log in as anonymous? That's awesome.

There's a lot of things that we could in theory do and that would in some narrow sense be awesome that is nonetheless sequestered in We Are Never Going To Do That* territory. Such is the burden of having root.

* or maybe "WANGTDT Again" for historical curiosities long passed.
posted by cortex (staff) at 7:55 AM on September 1, 2010 [1 favorite]

Such is the burden of having root.

You have root? I don't have root.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 7:57 AM on September 1, 2010 [1 favorite]

Hey, anyone seen cortex lately?
posted by nomadicink at 7:59 AM on September 1, 2010

There's a lot of things that we could in theory do and that would in some narrow sense be awesome that is nonetheless sequestered in We Are Never Going To Do That* territory.

So my dream of having anonymous spouse me is out? Thanks for killing my tiny little personal pony, cortex.
posted by grouse at 8:12 AM on September 1, 2010

Don't worry, I love you too. Josh is just so . . . gentle.
posted by Meta Filter at 8:15 AM on September 1, 2010 [1 favorite]

Everybody WANGTDT Chung tonight.
posted by not_on_display at 8:36 AM on September 1, 2010

nomadicink: do you mean this one? (relationship filter with follow up)
posted by ZakDaddy at 9:42 AM on September 1, 2010

Yes, thanks.
posted by nomadicink at 9:50 AM on September 1, 2010

You have root? I don't have root.

There is no mod cabal.
posted by timeistight at 10:32 AM on September 1, 2010

I guess NOT.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 11:12 AM on September 1, 2010

For varying gestural notions of "root", needless.
posted by cortex (staff) at 11:14 AM on September 1, 2010

I only want a follow-up if there's a happy ending. If there's not a happy ending, particularly because the OP didn't follow anyone's advice, I'd rather they just disappear into the mist.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 1:36 PM on September 1, 2010

I dunno, ThePinkSuperhero, I think some of those would be useful as cautionary tales for what happens when you don't obey the hive mind.
posted by grouse at 1:53 PM on September 1, 2010

OBEY. OR ELSE.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 1:59 PM on September 1, 2010

ThePinkSuperhero said: I only want a follow-up if there's a happy ending. If there's not a happy ending, particularly because the OP didn't follow anyone's advice, I'd rather they just disappear into the mist.

Yeah, but, think of the smug satisfaction we could all derive from seeing an OP come back to say "OMG, you all were SO RIGHT! [insert litany of woe that resulted from not following AskMe's advice] Och, alas! IF ONLY I HAD LISTENED!"
posted by amyms at 2:08 PM on September 1, 2010

I only want a follow-up if there's a happy ending.

Yeah don't we all, unfortunately there are laws against that.
posted by gman at 2:36 PM on September 1, 2010

I only want a follow-up if there's a happy ending. If there's not a happy ending, particularly because the OP didn't follow anyone's advice, I'd rather they just disappear into the mist.

Subject: Ask MetaFilter Follow-up
Message: About a month ago you asked a question on Ask MetaFilter:

Since then, your question has received 421 answers from 312 members.  
It also spawned a post by someone who announced they were "utterly 
horrified" in MetaTalk. Congratulations!

Did Ask.Metafilter Solve Your Problem?
( ) Yes

Will You Visit Us Again In The Future?
( ) Yes

Please add a comment to your post telling us how awesome we are. 
Caution: This comment will be placed in a moderation queue for 
approval by the site's administrators to ensure it is properly 
fawning and sycophantic. 

Consider adding a 'resolved' tag to the thread if your problem was 
solved.  This will let other members know your question was answered
and will help others find any follow-up information you add. You can 
add the tag by clicking this link:

http://ask.metafilter.com/contribute/resolve.mefi?id=140003

Thanks for participating in AskMe. 

posted by zarq at 3:11 PM on September 1, 2010 [1 favorite]

"Question Resolved Error

The question could not be marked as resolved. Only the author of a question can mark it as resolved. If you feel this message is an error, please contact the site administrators and describe your problem."

but I AM the site's administrator!
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 3:15 PM on September 1, 2010 [1 favorite]

Uh... you folks haven't told jessamyn yet?
posted by grouse at 3:31 PM on September 1, 2010 [1 favorite]

Sorry... I keep putting it off, grouse. I'm going to visit jessamyn for her birthday this weekend, so that's when I'll probably tell her that she's been deemed redundant by our fearless and wise leader. Oooo, and that means I'll be getting her desk and iPhone, along with a big check from Matt for wielding the axe! I think it'll go great!

What, this mic is on?

uh oh.
posted by not_on_display at 4:17 PM on September 1, 2010

For my part, I have been replaced by a dirty mop taped to a Casio keyboard stuck on demo mode.
posted by cortex (staff) at 4:33 PM on September 1, 2010 [5 favorites]

gman writes "Yeah don't we all, unfortunately there are laws against that."

In Canada the public solicitation of funds for happy endings is illegal, happy endings and the exchange of money for same however is legal.
posted by Mitheral at 6:29 PM on September 1, 2010

cortex: "For my part, I have been replaced by a dirty mop taped to a Casio keyboard stuck on demo mode"

Play them off, Keyboard Mop.
posted by subbes at 7:41 PM on September 1, 2010 [3 favorites]

If you want to watch for updates in specific questions, you have two additional options: if you contributed an answer to the thread, just keep an eye on Recent Activity (linked at the top of every page on the site, if you haven't noticed it before) and new answers will pop it up to the top; if you didn't answer the thread, you can favorite it and then check in on the My Favorites tab of Recent Activity and it'll pop up there along with updates to any other thread you've faved.

There is a third, still imperfect option: subscribe to the question's rss feed and you will get any future comments (from the OP and others) if there are any.
posted by QuakerMel at 6:55 PM on September 3, 2010