Request for new feature. March 1, 2011 7:49 AM   Subscribe

Request for new feature.

I am respectfully asking for another option when flagging a post. Something along the lines of "why is this post anonymous." This post, among many others, makes me wonder why the mods aren't more discerning in allowing anonymous posts.

I try to live by jessamyn and cortex's rule of "flag and move on," but in cases like this, it's not appropriate to flag using the current options.

The flag doesn't even have to do anything. It can just be there to make angry little trolls like me feel better.

I'm sure the OP had a very good reason as to why he/she thought it was incredibly important to keep his/her identity secret, I just can't, for the life of me, figure out what it could possibly be. Maybe the IRS has someone specifically trained to watch metafilter for situations exactly like this

posted by TheBones to Feature Requests at 7:49 AM (69 comments total)

You're welcome to use "breaks the guidelines." People prefer anonymity for money and relocation and work reasons sometimes. I figured any one of those could have been the basis for wanting the post to be anonymous. Sometimes, though rarely, the OP will actually include a note to us explaining why it's anonymous and we'll remove that before posting.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 7:53 AM on March 1, 2011


I'm sure the OP had a very good reason as to why he/she thought it was incredibly important to keep his/her identity secret, I just can't, for the life of me, figure out what it could possibly be.

I'm sure you have a good reason why you care that this or any post is anonymous, I just can't, for the life of me, figure out what it could possibly be.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 7:54 AM on March 1, 2011 [42 favorites]


This feature would be pointless. All anon posts are mod approved a priori, all a flag does is call mod attention to something. There is no utility in calling mod attention to something that they have not just seen, but actually approved. Use the contact form or make a meta post if you want to complain.

I'm sure the OP had a very good reason as to why he/she thought it was incredibly important to keep his/her identity secret, I just can't, for the life of me, figure out what it could possibly be.

I know this is intended to be sarcastic, but I have bolded the important part for your reference.
posted by atrazine at 7:54 AM on March 1, 2011 [9 favorites]


I just can't, for the life of me, figure out what it could possibly be.

Good for you that's not a requirement for going about your day.

I too often have no idea why some people want to keep certain things secret, but people are weird. What wouldn't bother me at all to have people know would drive other people crazy. I could care less if my medical records were on line for all to see for example, but would be terribly embarrassed to have any financial things out there.

I think the bigger problem with the linked question is that there's no way to answer it without knowing a lot more (as commented in the first response).
posted by cjorgensen at 7:56 AM on March 1, 2011


There is no utility in calling mod attention to something that they have not just seen, but actually approved.

It says "I disagree with your decision as a mod." Why wouldn't that be something you want to be able to communicate?
posted by smackfu at 7:59 AM on March 1, 2011 [2 favorites]


Although I wonder if the mods even really evaluate whether a question should be anonymous when they are reviewing it. So you might actually be disagreeing with a decision that isn't even being made.
posted by smackfu at 8:02 AM on March 1, 2011 [1 favorite]


Mind your own business.
posted by nasreddin at 8:02 AM on March 1, 2011 [6 favorites]


Like jess said, if flagging is the problem you're trying to solve here then just use "breaks the guidelines" or other. We're not adding a new flag for this, and we certainly wouldn't be giving it any added or special weight upon use.

Beyond that, what has changed since you made this post last summer? I feel like we covered a lot of ground in there.
posted by cortex (staff) at 8:02 AM on March 1, 2011 [1 favorite]


Although I wonder if the mods even really evaluate whether a question should be anonymous when they are reviewing it.

We do. There's a list of things we think about before approving anon questions [mostly me because it's my general area] and "does this need to be anon?" is one of them. We err on the side of inclusion unless it's really been busy. If you disagree with that assessment, that's probably a time for email, not flagging.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 8:06 AM on March 1, 2011


Wait, wait, wait. It's a question about laws and taxes and you can't figure out why the asker might want to be anonymous??
posted by kmz at 8:06 AM on March 1, 2011


I'm all for anonymous posters taking the initiative to explain why their post is anonymous--I think it adds something to the question (i.e., "anon because I don't like to talk about my finances online; anon because my colleagues read this and don't know I'm moving to the head office yet").

That said, I think anyone talking about their taxes should go in anonymous. Most of the job-related questions could be anonymous. A lot of the "I may be moving" threads could be anonymous if the poster hasn't finalized or announced their plans.

I think you picked a pretty bad example if you're trying to make a point about unnecessary anonymity--that thread has these issues in spades.
posted by Admiral Haddock at 8:09 AM on March 1, 2011 [1 favorite]


When I see stuff that bugs me that I know it's not going to be worth debating in public I like to kind of raise both hands palm-up to the ceiling like I'm calling unto The Lord you know and say "what the fuck, man?" to the ceiling. I mean it helps that I work out of the home but you don't have to actually say it out loud.

The flag doesn't even have to do anything.

I think this could be a definition of a bad feature request. If it doesn't have to do anything it is not worth asking.

Regarding the question itself - to quote, I'm in a situation where I might need to move for work soon.. Maybe this situation involves a potential job offer the current employer doesn't know about. Perplexed by this post.
posted by nanojath at 8:12 AM on March 1, 2011 [2 favorites]


HELLO LEADERS OF METAFILTER. WE ARE ANONYMOUS. OVER THE YEARS WE HAVE BEEN WATCHING YOU, YOUR CAMPAIGNS OF BEANPLATING, YOUR SUPPRESSION OF SLYT AND YOUR SNARKY NATURE. ALL OF THESE THINGS HAVE CAUGHT OUR EYE. WITH THE LEAKAGE OF YOUR LATEST PROPAGANDA PODCAST INTO MAINSTREAM CIRCULATION THE EXTENT OF YOUR MALIGN INFLUENCE OVER THOSE WHO HAVE COME TO TRUST YOU AS LEADERS HAS BEEN MADE TO CLEAR TO US. ANONYMOUS HAS THEREFORE DECIDED THAT YOUR ORGANIZATION SHOULD BE DESTROYED.
posted by Joe Beese at 8:13 AM on March 1, 2011 [8 favorites]


Of all the fights you could have picked, you chose this one?
posted by londonmark at 8:14 AM on March 1, 2011


Posters shouldn't have to justify anonymity. If I don't want anyone to know it's me asking about a name for my cat, that's up to me, not the community.

This strikes me as "you don't need to be anonymous unless you've done something wrong".
posted by blue_beetle at 8:14 AM on March 1, 2011 [1 favorite]


I'm sure the OP had a very good reason as to why he/she thought it was incredibly important to keep his/her identity secret, I just can't, for the life of me, figure out what it could possibly be.

OK, I'll take a shot at this. The OP says, "I'm in a situation where I might need to move for work soon." It's possible that the OP doesn't want people to know s/he's planning to move because his/her co-workers read Metafilter and s/he doesn't want the word to spread around the office because that could hurt his/her reputation and s/he would prefer to exit on his/her own terms and schedule.

There, isn't that a possible good reason? (You wondered what the explanation could "possibly" be.)

Having a flag for this would serve no purpose.
posted by John Cohen at 8:15 AM on March 1, 2011


NO, WE ARE ANONYMOUS! AND WE ARE NICE. WE ARE SO NICE.

WE FORGIVE.
WE FORGET.
EXPECT KISSES.
posted by FAMOUS MONSTER at 8:15 AM on March 1, 2011 [9 favorites]


Of all the fights you could have picked, you chose this one?

I totally disagree with the feature request, but characterizing the OP as "picking" a "fight" is a little over the top.
posted by John Cohen at 8:16 AM on March 1, 2011 [1 favorite]


You can't figure out why someone might want a tax question to be anonymous?
posted by DU at 8:20 AM on March 1, 2011


I totally disagree with the feature request, but characterizing the OP as "picking" a "fight" is a little over the top.

Meh, it's a snark at an AskMe masquerading as a feature request. But if it makes you feel better, I'll rephrase to 'point of discussion'. And anticipating future objections, by snark I mean disagreement.
posted by londonmark at 8:23 AM on March 1, 2011 [1 favorite]


Considering that the mods do weigh "why is this anonymous", I'm surprised that isn't added as a field for anonymous questions. It seems like judging something based on not having enough info.
posted by smackfu at 8:24 AM on March 1, 2011


characterizing the OP as "picking" a "fight" is a little over the top

I agree, but there does seem to be a bit of an ongoing issue over the justifications of anonymous AskMe posting which makes framing it as a "feature request" a little disingenuous and invites Cortex's question of what the poster hopes to gain or learn in the discussion beyond what's already been said about the mods' general practices WRT anonymity.
posted by nanojath at 8:24 AM on March 1, 2011


This:
Considering that the mods do weigh "why is this anonymous", I'm surprised that isn't added as a field for anonymous questions. It seems like judging something based on not having enough info.

Is reasonably answered by this:
I'm sure the OP had a very good reason as to why he/she thought it was incredibly important to keep his/her identity secret
posted by L'Estrange Fruit at 8:32 AM on March 1, 2011


Considering that the mods do weigh "why is this anonymous", I'm surprised that isn't added as a field for anonymous questions. It seems like judging something based on not having enough info.

Most anonys that we approve are pretty transparently explicable as anonymous; some of the remainder were made explicable by the submitter in a since-deleted note-to-the-mods, but we don't expect that sort of note to be provided and we sometimes see it added totally unnecessarily to "yes this should obviously be anonymous" submissions. Sometimes when it's a bit of a shruggo situation we'll give 'em the benefit of the doubt, but that's the fuzzy territory between stuff that's obviously anony and the odd stuff that's really obviously not something for an anony post.

So, mostly it's one of those things where it's not really (in our collective modly opinion) a big problem as it stands. The odd cases we'll sometimes chatter about, jess will ask for a second opinion or whatever, but at the end of the day there's no great flood of why-is-this-anonymous? bafflers coming through the gates.

And we don't really want to make people write little arguments for why they can do this or that thing on the site. I mean, a small part of my brain does want that, but that part of my brain probably just needs a blog. Generally speaking, putting extra barriers between people who are overwhelmingly using the site in good faith and the good faith uses of the site they want to pursue is not something we want to do.
posted by cortex (staff) at 8:35 AM on March 1, 2011 [1 favorite]


I totally disagree with the feature request, but characterizing the OP as "picking" a "fight" is a little over the top.

Coming from the same guy who already had a whole thread about anonymous AskMes last year, it's more than a little fighty.
posted by scalefree at 8:37 AM on March 1, 2011


I just don't get why it seems to cause some people physical personal pain, that another human being somewhere else on the planet wanted a question to be anonymous.

I once submitted a totally nonlethal question as anonymous. It was about something totally innocuous and mundane. But it had to do with a big secret shiny dream of mine, something precious and personal, and after a lifetime of watching my dreams get kicked in the teeth I didn't want this one out in the open under my name to be pitied, mocked, eyebrow-raised, nuthin. And lo, I got my advice and my dream still slumbers, untarnished and shiny, and that much closer to being something I can sneak off one day to do it and revel in.

So suck it if you don't like anonymous questions. Your self-inflicted offense doesn't trump my choice whether or not I want to associate information with my username.
posted by L'Estrange Fruit at 8:41 AM on March 1, 2011 [13 favorites]


Is the mod stance still that sock puppet AskMe posts are preferred over posting as Anonymous? I remember reading that at some point in a previous MeTa.
posted by burnmp3s at 8:48 AM on March 1, 2011


The complicated stance is in short that for someone with an ongoing need to use anonymous questions to address a developing situation or otherwise having a specific need to separate a more than every-once-in-a-while asking situation from their main account, setting up an anonymous sockpuppet is probably the better long-term solution.

It's a distinction that you really only even need to worry about if you feel like you fall into the group of people who would answer yes to either "do I use the anonymous feature more than once in a great while" or "do I have specific plans or expectations for future anonymous questions I intend to ask". If so, maybe a thing to consider. If not, it's a non-issue. For the vast majority of users it appears to be more non-issue territory.
posted by cortex (staff) at 8:53 AM on March 1, 2011


I'm in a situation

That.
posted by staggernation at 8:55 AM on March 1, 2011 [1 favorite]


fwiw, TheBones, I've contemplated asking a totally innocuous question anonymously so I could share the link with a friend without disclosing my Mefi identity. I've never actually done this, but it might put your mind at ease to assume something like this? And mods, if doing that would somehow break the guidelines, please do let me know!
posted by estlin at 8:57 AM on March 1, 2011


Can I ask a different pony?

Is there any chance our wonderful mods could reject an AnonAsk if the asker doesn't say where they are and any answer is going to need that information?

The above AskMe is a great example - there's no way in hell that anyone can give a useful answer (other than "see a lawyer/accountant") without knowing which country or country&state the asker is in.

I know there's a risk I'm asking for the mods to be experts in everything, but...
posted by sodium lights the horizon at 8:58 AM on March 1, 2011


I just don't get why it seems to cause some people physical personal pain, that another human being somewhere else on the planet wanted a question to be anonymous.

I wish people wouldn't do this. Physical personal pain? Really?
posted by smackfu at 9:03 AM on March 1, 2011


Coming from the same guy who already had a whole thread about anonymous AskMes last year, it's more than a little fighty.

Yes, last year, he asked what the criteria are for an anonymous question. He specifically said he wasn't calling anyone out. Jessamyn gave a very detailed, informative answer, and TheBones simply replied: "Thank you jessamyn, I appreciate the response. I guess I could have pm'ed you and asked you or cortex privately, so if you want to close this thread, please don't hesitate to." I wouldn't call that "fighty."
posted by John Cohen at 9:04 AM on March 1, 2011


The tone of Cortex’s two latter responses in this thread is one he should pursue in preference to the tone of his first.
posted by joeclark at 9:11 AM on March 1, 2011


I just don't get why it seems to cause some people physical personal pain, that another human being somewhere else on the planet wanted a question to be anonymous.

I wish people wouldn't do this. Physical personal pain? Really?


Do which - phrase things badly, or extrapolate an excessive reaction into physical injury? If someone asking an anonymous question doesn't bruise you or make you bleed or trigger PTSD, why on earth should it matter so much?
posted by L'Estrange Fruit at 9:12 AM on March 1, 2011


*hugs a small part of cortex's brain*
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 9:16 AM on March 1, 2011


Is there any chance our wonderful mods could reject an AnonAsk if the asker doesn't say where they are and any answer is going to need that information?

If it's something gobsmackingly obviously problematic to the answerability of the question, that may get something passed over, yeah. A fair amount of what doesn't make it out of the queue is stuff that in one respect or another is a "this just isn't gonna work" situation, and lack of key geographic cues is just a subset of that.

As you say, part of the problem with that sort of metric is that we aren't and can't really be experts in everything. Ultimately, it's on the asker to provide the context necessary to get good answers to their questions, and if they put something up anonymously that lacks key details it may get approved and just not get great answers. Which is a bummer but not the end of the world.
posted by cortex (staff) at 9:16 AM on March 1, 2011


oh god... I think I'm going to pass out now.
posted by edgeways at 9:22 AM on March 1, 2011


If someone asking an anonymous question doesn't bruise you or make you bleed or trigger PTSD, why on earth should it matter so much?

Well, if that is your bar, nothing on this website meets it.
posted by smackfu at 9:22 AM on March 1, 2011


hugs a small part of cortex's brain

I see what you did there.
posted by Joe Beese at 9:38 AM on March 1, 2011 [2 favorites]


This post, among many others, makes me wonder why the mods aren't more discerning in allowing anonymous posts.

One possiblity seems pretty obvious:
I'm in a situation where I might need to move for work soon.
Their current employer might not know about this move.
posted by Mitheral at 9:43 AM on March 1, 2011


I'm sorry, you all are right, it was a little fighty and a little ranty. That is why I tried to qualify with "It can just be there to make angry little trolls like me feel better."

I tried to be proactive and come in here to suggest a new feature.

If I see something that I, IMHO, don't think should be anonymous, I will flag as "breaks guidelines.

I'm sorry for a 1/2 ranty, 1/2 fighty post disguised as a new feature.
posted by TheBones at 9:44 AM on March 1, 2011 [1 favorite]


*picks through edgeway's pockets*

Hey, what are you doing with the key to the liquor cabinet?!
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 10:02 AM on March 1, 2011


Their current employer might not know about this move.

Yeah the work stuff could totally be a reasonable explanation for wanting anonymity.

Now, why this needs to be anonymous I cannot fathom...
posted by dersins at 10:29 AM on March 1, 2011


Now, why this needs to be anonymous I cannot fathom...

Because when the soup turns out too salty, they don't people to see they asked a question about it!

Pretty much anything can be rationalized if you assume people are as neurotic and anxious as we all know they are.
posted by smackfu at 10:34 AM on March 1, 2011


Now, why this needs to be anonymous I cannot fathom...

And it is stuff like this that makes me feel better about my decision to step away from metafilter for a little while. The rest of the day if I'm lucky. Damn you metafilter for being worse than herion.
posted by TheBones at 10:51 AM on March 1, 2011


I can't see why someone would want to flag for being anonymous. There's no way for us to know why a question needs to be confidential. Justifying that anonymity could compromise it. We have to trust that team mod judged the question and forunt it worthy in some way. They've almost always made the right call in the past. Getting cranky because they can't tell you their reasoning with possibly giving away secrets which aren't theirs to tell doesn't strike me as productive.

It only matters if the OP hasn't been clear enough, and that's usually solved by having a mod post a follow-up anyway. The system works pretty well now, I think.

Otherwise, my philosophy is to work with what's on the page. If someone has a problem and if I'm motivated to contribute some free advice, then it doesn't matter to me if the question is anon or not. I can bloviate either way with the same efficiency.

A lot of users have little hisory on the site and no useful information in their profiles. Many of the questions on AskMe are functionally anonymous. If someone explicitly goes to the trouble of submitting an anon question, I don't see why that should make a huge difference to us answerers.
posted by bonehead at 10:56 AM on March 1, 2011


If anonymity means the difference between an asked question and an unasked question, then please, anon away. If it didn't bother the mods enough to reject the question, then why on earth should it bother you?
posted by litnerd at 11:09 AM on March 1, 2011


Aside from an inability to make clarifying follow ups, I don't really understand how one person's choice to post a question to Ask Metafilter anonymously in any way inhibits another person's ability to read and possibly answer their question. Can someone explain it to me?
posted by crunchland at 11:12 AM on March 1, 2011


Now, why this needs to be anonymous I cannot fathom...

How about this for a guess... The poster's other half really loves soup and might guess that soup + lots of people = surprise party?
posted by sodium lights the horizon at 11:14 AM on March 1, 2011 [1 favorite]


Can someone explain it to me?

I think it's mainly because the anonymous question process is pretty limited. If anon questioners could respond / clarify / accept best answers, I don't think anyone would care.
posted by smackfu at 11:30 AM on March 1, 2011


I love non-obvious anonymous questions! Love 'em. I like to figure out why they are anonymous. For example, the soup/salt question:

* People who know the asker and also read Metafilter might wonder why anonymous is cooking huge amounts of soup, and they weren't invited.

* The asker is throwing a surprise party (with soup!) for someone and that someone reads MeFi

* The asker has told friends who read the site that the soup is his/her "secret recipe"

* Al Qaeda!
posted by taz at 11:44 AM on March 1, 2011 [5 favorites]


the mods absolutely consider whether something should be anonymous before approving. a couple years ago i asked a baking question and included why it was anon at the bottom (present for someone who knows my mefi id) - team mod missed the bottom part and didn't approve the message - i emailed, we discussed, i rewrote the question and it was posted. the system works! seriously, the mods are very nice when you email them.

in all this discussion, TheBones, you keep clarifying your statements with things like "that I, IMHO, don't think should be anonymous" and ", I just can't, for the life of me, figure out what it could possibly be" - have you considered that making you personally aware isn't one of the criteria? there are more things in heaven and earth, horatio...
posted by nadawi at 11:59 AM on March 1, 2011


I totally disagree with the feature request, but characterizing the OP as "picking" a "fight" is a little over the top.

Meh, it's a snark at an AskMe masquerading as a feature request. But if it makes you feel better, I'll rephrase to 'point of discussion'. And anticipating future objections, by snark I mean disagreement.


I just pointed that out because I find it interesting how words like "fight" and "fighty" are often used as code for "I disagree with what this person is saying." So we seem to be in complete agreement.
posted by John Cohen at 12:08 PM on March 1, 2011 [1 favorite]


I know exactly why they wanted it anonymous, and it's right there in their question. They would have to pay back the homeowner's tax credit if they did what they want to do in the post. Prudence would seem to indicate that they not broadcast a possible tax violation to the internets.

I mean, I don't know how serious that is because I am too commitment-phobic to ever buy a house, but it seems like the less you publicize possible tax shenanigans the better.

I think that people do all sorts of stupid things on askme. Anonymous questions aren't even in the top fifty stupid things.
posted by winna at 12:33 PM on March 1, 2011


Sometimes, though rarely, the OP will actually include a note to us explaining why it's anonymous and we'll remove that before posting.

Why not make this a requirement, in a separate field? "Why are you asking this question anonymously?" It might make people think twice about using (abusing) this feature, and would take some guesswork out for the mods.
posted by Conrad Cornelius o'Donald o'Dell at 2:32 PM on March 1, 2011


Why not make this a requirement, in a separate field? "Why are you asking this question anonymously?"

Because most of the time it's obvious. And on the rare times it's not, it's usually something we could guess at. Or if we don't see it, we don't approve it and people can get ahold of us. Unlike other aspects of the site, the onus is sort of on the user to make sure it's understood why a question is anonymous. Adding a field that maybe 5-10% of users will use seems like overkill. It's not an abused feature.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 2:36 PM on March 1, 2011


I know you guys review things, but if the salty soup question got approved, I can't imagine what wouldn't, to be honest.
posted by smackfu at 2:57 PM on March 1, 2011


smackfu, it specifically says that they won't allow revenge or suicide questions, so you know they have been submitted in the past and rejected. In a post last year it was stated that only 85-90% of anonymous posts are approved.
posted by soelo at 3:21 PM on March 1, 2011


How about this for a guess... The poster's other half really loves soup and might guess that soup + lots of people = surprise party?
posted by sodium lights the horizon at 11:14 AM on March 1 [+] [!]


Eponysterical? Mildly eponymusing, anyway.
posted by gingerest at 3:43 PM on March 1, 2011


I've let someone sit down and post a question using my account, but I didn't want it to be a question from "me" and thought saying "posted for a friend" wouldn't get genuine results or might result in MeFites memailing me about it. So, I asked my friend to submit it anonymously, so the answers would be as unbiased as possible.

So, you know, there's that thing.
posted by Unicorn on the cob at 3:46 PM on March 1, 2011


The ability to post anonymously is brilliant - like the time I had the 'iggly wigglys' in my 'pee wee snug'* and could ask people for help without giving away personal details.

Mods: please make this response anonymous, thanks.


* centipedes in my vagina
posted by panboi at 3:47 PM on March 1, 2011 [1 favorite]


a usage of anonymous posting i didn't realize until a former thread like this one - some people post questions anonymously so their real account isn't linked to them. like - for the soup one - they could talk about all sorts of personal stuff in their metafilter account, but really need to ask about soup - they know if they ask about the soup, all their friends will know it's them and then they'll click on the account and realize it was their friend who gives great sex toy advice. to avoid all that, they ask the identifying question anonymously and keep their secret identity secret.
posted by nadawi at 4:44 PM on March 1, 2011 [2 favorites]


So, you know, there's that thing.

I'm cheap too, but in this case pony up the $5 and let you friend have a metafilter account. Few of the good names are taken.
posted by cjorgensen at 4:55 PM on March 1, 2011


...herion?
posted by nanojath at 4:59 PM on March 1, 2011


Yet you read through all of the responses and posted a response anyway.
posted by TheBones at 8:03 PM on March 1, 2011


Yeah, but cjorgensen, we were drunk and it was girls night and you have to wait a week to ask your first question, and it was about grooming pubic hair or something equally stupid, and I didn't care.

Just like any other Monday, really.
posted by Unicorn on the cob at 8:57 PM on March 1, 2011


If you assume the person who posted the soup question was either a notable chef who should have known it already or somebody who campaigns against the evils of adding salt to food and didn't want to look like a hypocrite, the need for anonymity becaomes clear.

Mefi's own Jamie Oliver? I am outing you.
posted by the latin mouse at 10:30 PM on March 1, 2011


How about a "didn't RTFA" flag? And the "A" could stand for "article" or "askme". I know it won't happen, but a girl can dream.
posted by Night_owl at 6:26 PM on March 2, 2011


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