Topical Topics March 26, 2012 2:50 AM   Subscribe

Editorial handling of longitudinal and/or multi-faceted topic posts.

What I mean by way of example is a topic like "Occupy Wallstreet." A topic that generates news and commentary over a lengthy period of time and also has many different aspects of commentary and meta-commentary.

Is there a general editorial policy on how FPP approved or deleted based on sub-topics of on-going news stories?

I ask because I recently had an FPP deleted, I assume it was because it had the words "Travon Martin" in it. The article was indeed a response to the Travon Martin murder, but it wasn't specifically about Travon Martin per se.

Where is the cut-off? For example, in yesterday's NYT Opinion column, Paul Krugman implicates the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) in the killing of Travon Martin (among other things). The piece only briefly references the Travon Martin murder, but if posted, would it be deleted for that sin?

I think big news stories shouldn't necessarily be contained in a single FPP, especially ones that evolve and grow over time.
posted by j03 to MetaFilter-Related at 2:50 AM (58 comments total)

You can ask mods questions, you know. They're people, not a mindless wall of bureaucracy.
posted by le morte de bea arthur at 2:58 AM on March 26, 2012 [5 favorites]


I suppose this post is really about seeing what the mods think about this idea and generating some discussion about the general philosophy of how multifaceted topics should be handled. Hearing what the mods have to say about it will give myself and others a better idea of where the line generally, normally, usually lies.
posted by j03 at 3:01 AM on March 26, 2012


I was thinking about this topic recently myself. I understand that Metafilter is not a news site, and I think that's a good thing most of the time, but I'm also occasionally unsure why certain news-ey posts get deleted and others don't. For example, I believe the first post about Trayvon Martin was taken down but the following one wasn't. My best guess is it has to do with how "big" the story is, considering within that lapse of time it became a story with more national focus.
posted by Defenestrator at 3:16 AM on March 26, 2012


It's a fuzzy line. A lot of the time there are recent threads on such topics that are still buzzing with activity even though they may drop off the front page. If there were a burst of posts on the same topic, the discussions in each of those threads would lose coherence and the discourse would necessarily become shallow and repetitive. So one criteria to use is whether a post is continuing an existing conversation that is still vibrant, in which case it should be posted as a comment in that thread; or whether instead the post is bringing new information or a new framing to a conversation, in which case the discussion would benefit from a reboot. Every new post on a topic is an argument that the existing discussions should be wound down and restarted under your banner, which is why the bar is particularly high for big stories that many many people want to post about.
posted by PercussivePaul at 3:20 AM on March 26, 2012


I'm the only moderator on at the moment, since it's between 3 am - 6 am for the others, so they'll weigh in as they come online, but for big news stories, the danger is that all the offshoot articles, news updates, opinion pieces and developing information can result in a lot of different posts with the conversation repeating and scattered across a lot of different threads, so new posts on a current topic when there's already a post on it needs to be distinct enough on its own that it's a different discussion.

In this case, I'd say that instead of what is basically a single Op/Ed personal reflection on this issue, it would be great to begin with this line from the author "We -— all who have suffered similar experiences, regardless of race -— can begin sharing our racial abuse narratives in the public sphere," and develop that as the linchpin of the post by finding other similar posts/articles, or site or central spot that is spotlighting such stories ... or something similar to this.

Further problems with that post were that the main text was a quote, but it wasn't indicated as a quote either using quotation marks or italics (this may seem like a minor thing, but accounts for an awful lot of complaints, and is disorienting at first – "who is speaking? the poster? the author? someone else from the linked piece?); the title makes it seem like it is going to be about a Twitter thing, but the Twitter mention is actually a very small part of the article; and then the more inside section makes it seem that it's probably about the hoodie symbol, but again, that is sort of a side commentary of the article. The sort of jokey manner that this bit is introduced is also weird, and there's no real explanation of that. It's a lot more like a comment, and doesn't really hang with the rest of the post.

Is the post about Twitter? About hoodies as they relate to this case? About the experiences of people who have been racially profiled? It needs to identify the topic, introduce who is speaking and why, and offer a new and different perspective from what is already being discussed in the open thread. If the post doesn't create a strong enough presentation to provide discussion that won't be a duplicate of hundreds of comments discussing the case generally, it will probably be deleted.

You can totally redo this post, and if you'd like, run it by us via the contact form, or else ask another user (or more than one) whom you respect to look it over and offer their thoughts.
posted by taz (staff) at 3:27 AM on March 26, 2012 [4 favorites]


My best guess is it has to do with how "big" the story is

If by "big" you mean how many other areas of society the story makes waves in, you may be right. That Martin story started out as a local-police thing, which is normally not suffered gladly here, but after a couple of days, we see the President talking about it. By then, its ramifications WRT existing and pending legislation in other places made it a bigger deal, and more interesting.
posted by Kirth Gerson at 3:27 AM on March 26, 2012


also, to be clearer, when I said "begin with this line from the author," I didn't mean you need to begin the post with that quote, but that you could use it as basically the "thesis concept" of the post itself – what the post will be about.
posted by taz (staff) at 3:30 AM on March 26, 2012


"Travon Martin"

Trayvon, btw.
posted by inigo2 at 4:02 AM on March 26, 2012 [5 favorites]


But in the end, its not about policy, its about what fits the decision that is first made by the mod who feels strongest about the thread/situation in question. Yeah. Policy is "whatever mods want" rather than "here are guidelines the community knows about".

This is one perspective. We have a lot of guidelines that the community does in fact know about, but very few hard and fast rules. This works for most people but does not work for some others. The guidelines are interpreted by the mods according to a lot of things including the context of how a post appears [what's already being discussed, what the tenor of the site and MeTa has been lately, who's made the post and whether they seem to have an agenda, etc], the framing of a post [ranty? crappy provocative pullquotes? inappropriate sarcasm? weekend?], and how it's received by the community [flagging and comments in the thread, sometimes emails to us]. With big touchy topics--and there's not a super long list of touchy topics but race is definitely one of them, abuse and murder of children is another--especially about stuff that's in the headlines, we do have to make some judgment calls about what should go in the existing thread and what merits its own post.

These are tough decisions to make because with hot button topics whatever we decide gets a lot of attention often by people who are already a bit upset [either about what happened or about our mod decision] and so it can make a small site decision turn into a big policy discussion. However we're happy to talk about this sort of thing, either at the time [here or over email] or you can email us beforehand if you want to run something by us. One of our essential guidelines is that MetaFilter is not primarily a news site. People discuss the news here but it's not the site's main purpose [this is also something that people disagree on, fyi] and so stuff that is "news of the day" needs to also be put into a good post that people here have likely not seen and that will inspire some sort of discussion.

As we ramp up to election time in the US we are even more mindful that there are many many other places on the internet where you can go for news. Also a lot of people read the site via Recent Activity [see the link up top] and so even if a story has dropped off the front page, there may be a very active discussion going on there. I think taz has addressed the main points of your post's deletion, but feel free to ask more questions if you have them.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 4:41 AM on March 26, 2012 [1 favorite]


The article was indeed a response to the Travon Martin murder, but it wasn't specifically about Travon Martin per se. -- If we wouldn't have known or been interested in the article had it not been for the over-arching news story, even if it's only tangentially related, it's best to stick it in the post about the news story that already exists.

This is known as the "ericb gambit."
posted by crunchland at 4:41 AM on March 26, 2012 [6 favorites]


I ask because I recently had an FPP deleted, I assume it was because it had the words "Travon Martin" in it.

The deleted post and its deletion reason: The current Trayvon Martin thread is still active, and while it's definitely a developing situation, new posts need to be framed a lot better than this to stay up.

Maybe your question should be the more specific "How could I have framed my post better?"
posted by mediareport at 4:45 AM on March 26, 2012


Yow, apologies, that came out much snarkier than I intended.
posted by mediareport at 4:50 AM on March 26, 2012


Have we coined the term 'broccupy' yet? No need for a FPP when we do though...
posted by fuq at 5:21 AM on March 26, 2012


Have we coined the term 'broccupy' yet? No need for a FPP when we do though...

Nah, that's already the word for when schoolkids stage a sit-in at the school cafeteria against broccoli.
posted by inturnaround at 5:49 AM on March 26, 2012


I really wanted to make a Brucolac joke here for Miéville fans, but I'm too dumb. "Bruccupy" just doesn't work at all. :(
posted by taz (staff) at 6:08 AM on March 26, 2012 [1 favorite]


Just out of curiosity, did j03's post get many of flags before taz deleted it?
posted by crunchland at 6:23 AM on March 26, 2012


Yeah. Policy is "whatever mods want" rather than "here are guidelines the community knows about".

Uh, no.
posted by rtha at 6:23 AM on March 26, 2012 [2 favorites]


I do think ALEC is worthy of its own post. One state bill a few weeks ago even had the ALEC name in it in a part that said "drafted by ALEC, please don't include this in the bill.
posted by Ironmouth at 6:34 AM on March 26, 2012 [3 favorites]


did j03's post get many of flags before taz deleted it?

It fell into the grey area where it could have gone either way. Sometimes a post has just a few flags and we'll usually leave it unless it's really problematic. Or sometimes there's a post we might not mind but it has a ton of flags and we usually talk to one another to figure out why it's getting flagged and often opt to axe it. This one was in the middle. And, as we've said before, taz often doesn't get the benefit of consulting with any of us when she has to make her decisions so we'll chitchat with her in the morning if something looks weird [we can all see whatever mod actions the other mods take] but this one seemed like a pretty standard deletion to me.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 6:38 AM on March 26, 2012


Me, too. I was just thinking that if it received a lot of flags, the community agreed as well.
posted by crunchland at 6:46 AM on March 26, 2012


(Actually, that was restless_nomad, not me, but I would have also deleted.)
posted by taz (staff) at 6:48 AM on March 26, 2012


Whoops, right. taz had just done such a thorough job explaining, I presumed it was her deletion. Apologies.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 7:01 AM on March 26, 2012


For example, I believe the first post about Trayvon Martin was taken down but the following one wasn't. My best guess is it has to do with how "big" the story is, considering within that lapse of time it became a story with more national focus.

That's definitely part of the calculus, yeah. Mefi, like you noted and other mods have said in this thread already, is not a news site, but even more than that it's not a tragedy-news site and when the Trayvon Martin thing first got posted pretty much the entirety of the story for folks not already invested in it was "a kid got shot by some neighborhood watch guy, now the family is suing".

Which is a terrible situation but without something making it clearer why this specific terrible situation is reaching a noteworthy "we should talk about this terribleness" level, a post about it falls into that weird territory of Mefi being a News Of The Terrible outlet, which we really don't want the site to be.

And it's a hard line to walk because we're not down on those posts because we don't think they're terrible or don't understand why people wouldn't want to post about them or anything like that; we just don't want the front page of Metafilter to be a Blotter of Terrible News, and that's a direction it could really easily go in if we didn't draw the line on this stuff at some basic level.

At the point that there was not just this terrible thing that happened but a lot of discussion of and national reaction (if not world reaction, I don't know what sort of penetration the Martin case has had outside the US other than "those people, with the guns, geez!") to and misc. developing elaborations on the impact, social and legal and legislative, of what had happened, we got a post that did a decent job of framing the situation in the terms of that larger context, and that was a more understandable way to make it a post. And so we've had a post, and it's been a sort of predictably rough ride but that's the way it goes with bad news.
posted by cortex (staff) at 7:19 AM on March 26, 2012 [1 favorite]


crunchland: " This is known as the "ericb gambit.""

Also: The Homunculus Maneuver.
posted by zarq at 7:22 AM on March 26, 2012 [2 favorites]


What I mean by way of example is a topic like "Occupy Wallstreet."

Strictly as a curiosity, there are 54 posts across the site that contain the phrase "occupy wall street", but zero users with that name. Hm.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 7:30 AM on March 26, 2012


The blog entry that was the crux of your deleted FPP was very thin for a single-link post. Generally, blogs rarely make good secondary links, let alone primary.
posted by Ardiril at 7:30 AM on March 26, 2012


The Blotter of Terrible News sounds like a novelization of The Wire by Lemony Snicket.
posted by griphus at 7:45 AM on March 26, 2012 [13 favorites]


The Blotter of Terrible News sounds like a novelization of The Wire by Lemony Snicket.

Or The Drudge Report.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 7:48 AM on March 26, 2012


So my observation is that a complex-issue FPP has the best chance of survival if a) there is more than one link to a source where the issue is discussed in depth, and b) the post is framed non-tendentiously.
posted by Sidhedevil at 8:07 AM on March 26, 2012


complex-issue FPP has the best chance of survival if a) there is more than one link to a source where the issue is discussed in depth, and b) the post is framed non-tendentiously.


You could look to the recent(?) 'where does life begin / what is the substantive ethical difference between a fetus just prior to birth and a newborn baby' series of deleted posts, MeTa, and successfully posted FPP to see that in action.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 8:13 AM on March 26, 2012


I think big news stories shouldn't necessarily be contained in a single FPP, especially ones that evolve and grow over time.

But there needs to be a cutoff somewhere, wouldn't you agree? Theoretically some of these stories could support a different FPP daily, maybe more. MetaFilter isn't a news site. The people who are so feverishly interested in a story that they want to read every various opinion piece, etc. about it can usually find those through Google and other channels without needing MetaFilter's help. And while the story might evolve and grow in some ways, after the second or third FPP you're mostly getting the same commenters in the thread, and they mostly have the same things to say.
posted by cribcage at 8:34 AM on March 26, 2012


"I do think ALEC is worthy of its own post. One state bill a few weeks ago even had the ALEC name in it in a part that said "drafted by ALEC, please don't include this in the bill."

*cough* previously.
posted by stagewhisper at 8:40 AM on March 26, 2012


Strictly as a curiosity, there are 54 posts across the site that contain the phrase "occupy wall street", but zero users with that name. Hm.

"Wallstreet" would be a nice username. Then every time anyone asked where Wallstreet was we'd be able to say "I guess he's otherwise occupied."
posted by yoink at 9:29 AM on March 26, 2012 [1 favorite]


I almost always prefer posting single links into existing articles, minimal time commitment. And I happy link people's deleted posts from active threads frequently.
posted by jeffburdges at 10:34 AM on March 26, 2012


taz had just done such a thorough job explaining, I presumed it was her deletion.

Taz did such a great job explaining, *I* thought it was her deletion for a minute. Basically the tone was all over the place, the post as written didn't do a very good job making clear what the actual subject was, and it's a fairly touchy topic in general. Taz has some excellent suggestions for reframing around that main article. (I'm not sure the hoodie tumblr really fits here at all.)
posted by restless_nomad (staff) at 10:35 AM on March 26, 2012


And I happy link people's deleted posts from active threads frequently.

This can be helpful but depending how contentious the previous deletion was can sometimes be a bit of "screw you mods" move. Not that I've ever recalled feeling that way about any of your "previously" links, but it needs to be done carefully.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 10:36 AM on March 26, 2012


Yeah, it's generally not a big problem to link in a deleted thread with some sort of clear good motive for it where you're trying to improve the current thread by its inclusion (e.g. "Oh, btw, there were a couple interesting comments about x in this previous deleted post") and if you're clear about that that's fine.

I think that goes sort of badly sometimes for a variety of reasons when it's not clear what the idea is, though. I've seen presumably well-meaning but terse "previously" comments that are not so great because people may think you're being a jerk about the current thread ("yeah, seen it, been deleted, you suck") or about the deletion of the previous thread, or complaining obliquely about double-posts, or so on. So being really clear about why you're including a link to a previous post is a good idea.

And unfortunately every once in a while someone is actually explicitly trying to be a jerk when they do that, so it's doubly good to save yourself the potential grief of having people think you're doing the same.
posted by cortex (staff) at 10:58 AM on March 26, 2012


There were a few times I intentionally skipped linking deleted posts, but I suspect only because a text search found the relevant links up thread. Yes, a lone cryptic "deleted thread" doesn't sound ideal, although I've probably done that when I didn't care enough to write a real comment.
posted by jeffburdges at 11:42 AM on March 26, 2012


And...it's Trayvon, is it not? He's dead, we could at least get his name right.
posted by agregoli at 12:49 PM on March 26, 2012


Are we talking about Hunger Games posts? Surely there must be more aspects of this movie that haven’t had their own posts yet.
posted by bongo_x at 12:56 PM on March 26, 2012 [1 favorite]


You're starving for more posts on the subject?
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 1:14 PM on March 26, 2012 [1 favorite]


Has there been anything about the cuisine?
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 1:50 PM on March 26, 2012


No, but here. Gratis.
posted by mediareport at 2:00 PM on March 26, 2012


Is it just me, or do we need a group sockpuppet for the mods called "mindless wall of bureaucracy?"

One the one hand, it would be kind of awesome.

On the other, it would probably go badly.
posted by GenjiandProust at 3:49 PM on March 26, 2012


(if not world reaction, I don't know what sort of penetration the Martin case has had outside the US other than "those people, with the guns, geez!")
posted by cortex


At the time of the first post's deletion, here in Canada, at least ( yeah, America Lite™), the story had appeared in the local and national newspapers, as well as local and national television news. The story has been continuously updated in those outlets, definitely emphasizing the ubiquity of hand-guns in the U.S., and questioning the logic of Stand Your Ground laws.

When the first post was deleted the story had appeared in pretty much every one of the dozen web sites I'd visited that day, and was a main story on every news site. It badly failed the test of "something cool you found on the web that most users haven't seen", and I am unconvinced that the subsequent post really was much better. My own guess at the time was that it was collectively felt that it was inevitable that this was going to become a FPP, might as well get it over with. I didn't participate in, or even read, the post that stood, as I really didn't think that there was much to say, and I also prefer to wait for more facts when this kind of thing occurs.

I seem to recall that Matt has gone on record as believing that Metafilter is probably not an ideal channel for breaking news stories; something I strongly agree with. Rushing to judgement about these kinds of things seems ill-advised at best, lest new facts leave one looking foolish. This is not to say that I necessarily buy this recent justification of the shooter's behaviuor, but I think it illustrates why breaking news stories really ought to have more substance to them to be worthy of a post in this specific venue.
posted by PareidoliaticBoy at 5:20 PM on March 26, 2012


Just by way of two-centing, I don't particularly engage with MeFi threads diachronically. I see a thread pop up, read what people have to say, and move on, returning only in the rare event that I comment and someone seems likely to respond. I thought j03's post was interesting and I never would have gone back into 'the' Trayvon thread and seen it if it were posted there. I'm willing to own up to using MeFi wrong if that's the case; it's interesting to see the differences in how people interact with the site, though!
posted by threeants at 6:09 PM on March 26, 2012


I'm willing to own up to using MeFi wrong if that's the case; it's interesting to see the differences in how people interact with the site, though!

No worries, it's not any kind of wrong, it's just how you read the site. But it's also the nature of the site that that kind of reading habit means you may miss a thread about topic x. Which is fine; site search is great for finding existing discussions about stuff (just type in "Trayvon" for example and boom, done).

About all we ask is that people make an effort to do that—to look a little bit for a topic they're interested in if they think they might be late to the party—rather than expect to have threads show up in a timely fashion for them or whatever.
posted by cortex (staff) at 6:14 PM on March 26, 2012


Generally, the mod policy is to use words like "generally", "normally" and "usually" to define policies. But in the end, its not about policy, its about what fits the decision that is first made by the mod who feels strongest about the thread/situation in question. Yeah. Policy is "whatever mods want" rather than "here are guidelines the community knows about".

This first comment assessment made by a user who has been here less than two months.

User tip: don't make assumptive statements about the policies of a site where you haven't been a member even long enough for your pet to get pregnant and give birth.
posted by hippybear at 6:52 PM on March 26, 2012


A rabbit can crank out a set of kits in 30 days with a 30 day break. Their pet might be on their second litter already.
posted by Mitheral at 7:16 PM on March 26, 2012


that most users haven't seen

Is this part of the guidelines/suggestions now? It seemed a bit contentious.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 7:50 PM on March 26, 2012


It's been part of the posting guidelines since the site started having guidelines. And yes there some debate about what exactly it means.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 7:55 PM on March 26, 2012


Yes, the man of twists and turns, the idea behind the community has always been to be refreshing and interesting, and in this way is different from most of the rest of the net. This is the "filter" part of the equation, and it plays a big factor in why the user-experience here is so much more fulfilling (to me, at least) than the vast majority of other sites out there.

Admittedly, the ship has since long since sailed on the concept of "best of the web", and certainly it's safe to say that obscurity isn't necessarily a valid parameter of what is a worthwhile post here for many users. However, an ugly news story that has appeared pretty everywhere else and is being beaten to death mercilessly, is, in-no-way-at-all being filtered.

The growing popularity of the site naturally leads to what some users, such as myself, consider to be a dilution in quality of submitted links. Those who flag such posts as being "outside the guidelines" are struggling to maintain a least a modicum of the standards that seem so surprising to others less engaged. If I want to discuss the latest outrage, I have literally dozens of places to do that. This is the place that users such as myself come to in order to discover fresh ideas. The value here for me is the interesting perspectives and nuances that the membership here brings to complex subjects. Mere outrage about injustice is remarkably common online. The bar for submitting a post here has been set a bit higher. It's quite rare, and in my opinion, is worthy of at least an attempt at preservation.
posted by PareidoliaticBoy at 8:46 PM on March 26, 2012


This first comment assessment made by a user who has been here less than two months.

The username has been registered for that long. You have no idea how long the user has been posting, let alone reading the site. The comment borders on ad hominem based on user number, something that I believe is discouraged. If you disagree with the content of the supposed newcomer's comment, say that, and maybe talk about why you disagree.
posted by Kirth Gerson at 3:12 AM on March 27, 2012 [3 favorites]


I'd say that after trying a second time and having my post deleted on a technicality, I'd probably just give up. Sometimes I wonder about the barriers we throw up that inhibit all but the most dedicated from participating.
posted by crunchland at 7:29 AM on March 27, 2012


Not wanting to frustrate the hell out of j03 was the biggest vote against deleting that this morning and is why we talked about it a bit on the mod side and why the deletion reason is unusually lengthy and explanatory. I think it could work fine minus the more inside stuff that is essentially a showstopper, but, you know, it's a showstopper.

I can respect that j03 might get tired of trying, and I sympathize if they're frustrated, but this is more an odd exception case than it is a middle-of-the-road example of how "the barriers we throw up" manifest regarding posting.
posted by cortex (staff) at 7:37 AM on March 27, 2012


Having a post axed because in the "more inside" part of your post you directed the userbase to not talk about a specific thing really isn't a technicality. I know it stings and we did review the other parts of the post to say "Hey that looks good, post that" but with the more-inside directive and the title we felt that it fell into "Still not good for MetaFilter" category and we talked about it at length.

And nothing about the OP here specifically, but there are a lot of different people who participate here; this site is 100% voluntary. If the things you like to or want to post about don't fit in here for whatever reason, you are welcome to go any place else on the internet. I know to a lot of people there is an aspect of clubbishness or cliquishness to this sort of approach, but I don't see that as totally avoidable on a site that has any sort of personality or flavor. We don't feel like every single person needs to be able to find a way to participate here, we feel like we want to help the people who want to find a way to participate here to learn what their path to that might be. And sometimes if you're coming from another place where they do things differently or interact with the community differently, that way might be bumpy.

Add to that the constant low level grind of people's anxiety and snark and sarcasm and negativity and I'd say there are a lot of reasons people don't decide to continue to participate here only a few of which are under mod control.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 7:40 AM on March 27, 2012


I'd say that after trying a second time and having my post deleted on a technicality, I'd probably just give up. Sometimes I wonder about the barriers we throw up that inhibit all but the most dedicated from participating.

The overwhelming vast majority of posts do not get deleted.
posted by Mitheral at 8:21 AM on March 27, 2012


only a few of which are under mod control. --- I know. I did say "the barriers we throw up."
posted by crunchland at 10:33 AM on March 27, 2012


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