where do i belong

July 27, 2012 8:56 AM

I posted this to the blue last night, and it was (rightly!) deleted by Taz because of the self link (I should note that she gave me the chance to delete the self-link and I didn't want to). My question is, where is a good place to post it?

I apologize for forgetting about that rule. You'll see the self-link the last para. So, my question is, what's a good place to post it? Reddit's folk music categories don't seem to allow posts structured like this, with all the links embedded in the text etc; is there another site that would be a better fit? I wanted to keep the self-link in, as that was what was the impetus for writing the article and doing the research, and the only reason I write these folk music posts once every 4 or 5 years on the blue is that Mefi is sometimes missing a little ... I dunno, soul? maybe. Too much dry talk about world politics and science and technology, and dry bios, and nothing to tie it into individual human lives. So I wanted to keep that in to show how I was integrating the song into my life, and I didn't feel like it belonged in a comment (but that was a good idea, @Taz, so I appreciated it).

I'm really just wondering where a good place to put it is. I figure there must be some place with the right audience, since it garnered more favorites in 1 hour than anything I've ever posted had before.

posted by luriete to Etiquette/Policy at 8:56 AM (95 comments total)

The usual place for this is on your own blog.
posted by elizardbits at 8:58 AM on July 27, 2012 [16 favorites]

When you re-post the self-link to the grey, it appears as though you are trying to circumvent the rule against self-linking. I would have asked this question without including the link.

You can't self-link here. Ask someone else to post it for you.
posted by amro at 8:59 AM on July 27, 2012 [4 favorites]

And, really, you've been here long enough and been an active enough participant to know this.
posted by amro at 9:01 AM on July 27, 2012 [1 favorite]

@amro actually, not a very active participant. come in maybe a few times a year to ask questions in green, once every 4-5 years to post something to blue. that's about it. i really had no idea, honestly, that the video would be considered a self- link- for some reason i thought you had to link to a site that belonged to you for it to be considered a self link.

No, I don't want to have it posted here, because I think that needs to be part of it. I want it on another site but I'm having trouble thinking of something that's appropriate. If you can't help with answering the question, that's fine, but don't use it as an excuse to make fun of my now knowing the rules.
posted by luriete at 9:06 AM on July 27, 2012

I don't know any other metafilter users to post it for me, and that seems like cheating, so i don't want to do that.
posted by luriete at 9:07 AM on July 27, 2012

Hey, amro! *hug*

(thought you might need one)
posted by benito.strauss at 9:07 AM on July 27, 2012 [4 favorites]

I removed the link from the post. However good your intentions, relinking it in here feels like a really problematic sort of work-around of the fundamental issue at play here.

That aside: if you have some work you've done that's interesting and you want to share with the Metafilter community, you can make a Projects post. Whether a given sort of thing is a good fit or not for that is something we can totally talk about.

The post you made, aside specifically from the self-linky stuff, was a good Metafilter post and I think it'd be be great if you reposted that with personal narrative and self-link stuff at the end lopped off. If you don't want to, that's fine and that's your call, but it is in terms of how mefi works kind of a weird line in the sand to draw since the post is otherwise fine but the personal stuff is an absolute non-starter.
posted by cortex (staff) at 9:07 AM on July 27, 2012 [6 favorites]

I don't know any other metafilter users to post it for me, and that seems like cheating, so i don't want to do that.

You can always memail people out of the blue and just ask, esp. if they're people you've seen commenting/posting in related subjects. The worst you'll get is a no (or just no response).

Anyhow, that isn't even remotely cheating. Especially compared to, say, posting a self-link.
posted by hermitosis at 9:08 AM on July 27, 2012 [2 favorites]

Anyhow, that isn't even remotely cheating.

It's only cheating if you have them make a post that includes your self-link. The self-link needs to not be part of any future MeFi post. I'm sorry this is problematic but it's a bright line rule and we need people to be mindful of it.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 9:10 AM on July 27, 2012 [2 favorites]

luriete, that looks like it would be a really interesting post, but with the amount of it generated by you it probably falls out of the "cool thing I've found" category and into the "cool things I want to say" category. The former is MeFi fodder, the latter isn't. I've got a few subjects that I'd like to research & write up something about, but they suffer from the same problem.

Maybe it's time you bit the bullet and put up a blog. I believe Blogspot still offers free ones, and you don't have to post to it every day.
posted by benito.strauss at 9:11 AM on July 27, 2012

No, I understand that it's a rule. I don't want a way around it. I was asking about advice as to a good community to post it to. Since I only write one of these every 4-5 years, I'm not going to put up a blog to do it - and who would want to read that anyway?

Totally fine if nobody wants to answer, I just thought someone here would have some good advice on the proper place for it as it stood.
posted by luriete at 9:13 AM on July 27, 2012

Also, I see how your post leads up to your video singing with your kid, and I'm guessing that was part of the motivation for exploring it. I think it makes it better, and you shouldn't drop it just for the sake of getting it on MeFi. Blog it somewhere, throw it out to the world as is, and if someone on MeFi posts about it, lucky MeFi.
posted by benito.strauss at 9:14 AM on July 27, 2012

Projects, maybe?
posted by the man of twists and turns at 9:18 AM on July 27, 2012

No, I was hoping more for a suggestion of another site that it would be a better fit for.
posted by luriete at 9:22 AM on July 27, 2012

I was asking about advice as to a good community to post it to.

And that's fine but people may not have a lot of ready answers for you. I'm guessing a couple people will but it's hard to say.

I think people are likely to respond to the Metafilter-specific angles on this a bit even if that's not what you were hoping, since Metatalk is more a policy-and-community metacommentary space than a recommendation engine for other sites, so there may not be a whole lot of suggestions in here. Just something to take into account.
posted by cortex (staff) at 9:23 AM on July 27, 2012 [3 favorites]

Reddit allows text posts, which can contain multiple links. If you are unfamiliar with reddit, some users here could help you use their formatting style.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 9:43 AM on July 27, 2012

@cortex thank you, that does seem to be what has happened :/

@TMOTAT I will look into that. I didn't realize I could make it work there. Thank you.
posted by luriete at 9:44 AM on July 27, 2012

I was also deleted by Taz last night. Now I exist as an absence or lacuna in the normal MeFite-continuum, an "anti-user" if you will; consisting of a negative energy state and reversed quantum numbers. Subsequently the other mods put me and normal, positively-charged users into a large tunnel in Switzerland and forced us to run at one another and collide. Damn you, mods - damn you all and your perverted love of "science". I will NOT run into other metafilter users just so you lab-coated freaks can watch us break down into smaller and smaller MeFites, ultimately revealing the mysterious Higgs mefite who is responsible for giving all metafilter comments the property of ass. You need your HEADS examined because what you are doing is fundamentally WEIRD. I, for one, will have no truck with your dangerous experiments.

OK, see you all on Monday, I'm off to the pub.
posted by the quidnunc kid at 9:45 AM on July 27, 2012 [36 favorites]

Whither banhammer?
posted by Sys Rq at 9:47 AM on July 27, 2012 [4 favorites]

I was also deleted by Taz last night. Now I exist as an absence or lacuna in the normal MeFite-continuum, an "anti-user" if you will

Vote quidnunc kid #-1?
posted by Rock Steady at 9:50 AM on July 27, 2012 [11 favorites]

You really should repost to MeFi without the self-link at the end. It's a well-formed post, and the rule-offending youtube video is totally separable, structurally as though an afterthought regardless of it being your original impetus for putting the post together.

(And wouldn't it be sort of alright for luriete to then add the youtube link/paragraph as a comment? Haven't there been similar cases in the past?)
posted by nobody at 9:51 AM on July 27, 2012

Whither banhammer?

In the case of things that seem like genuinely well-meaning confusion from a long-timer user, there's a reasonable chance that Mjölnir will merely stir blearily, have a nip of aquavit, and return to its long slumber.
posted by cortex (staff) at 9:59 AM on July 27, 2012 [32 favorites]

wouldn't it be sort of alright for luriete to then add the youtube link/paragraph as a comment? Haven't there been similar cases in the past?

In the past we've been okay with people making a big post to something and then in a comment significantly later in the whole process being like "Oh and my mom did the decorations for it, here's a link to her stuff" But in a case like this where a post has been deleted for self-linking making the post again and then putting the self-link into a subsequent comment makes the post look pretty much like what luriete said it was, a collection of links that are made around the one YouTube video of him singing with his kid.

And there's nothing at all wrong with the video or wanting to create a blog-style post around it, it's just not okay for MetaFilter and doing some sort of letter-of-the-law end run isn't going to really be okay.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 10:01 AM on July 27, 2012 [3 favorites]

cortex: "have a nip of aquavit"

Still having trouble finding my favorite aquavit in NYC. Should've had my wife bring home a case from London when she moved back!
posted by Grither at 10:04 AM on July 27, 2012

luriete: " i really had no idea, honestly, that the video would be considered a self- link- for some reason i thought you had to link to a site that belonged to you for it to be considered a self link."

I find it so strange that people can understand the letter of self-linking but not the spirit.
posted by Plutor at 10:18 AM on July 27, 2012 [4 favorites]

I, for one, will have no truck with your dangerous experiments.

This, after we've sped eyeball kid up to 99/100ths the speed of light. I was seeking the hate quark!
posted by Devils Rancher at 10:20 AM on July 27, 2012

How about someone else just repost the post without the self-link? Isn't that what we always do?
posted by StrikeTheViol at 10:24 AM on July 27, 2012

No, I was hoping more for a suggestion of another site that it would be a better fit for.

Ah. This was not clear to me from the text of this post.

As cortex says, MetaTalk will probably serve you poorly here. I would suggest asking the same question in AskMetafilter (with a description of your work, but not linking to it). A different and far more helpful crowd hang out over there and can probably point you towards a good forum to share your work in.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 10:26 AM on July 27, 2012 [1 favorite]

I was asking about advice as to a good community to post it to.

I'm thinking that this post would probably be better for AskMe than MetaTalk, then.

If you can't help with answering the question, that's fine, but don't use it as an excuse to make fun of my now knowing the rules.

I wouldn't say I was "making fun" of it. You've been here longer than me and been almost as active on the blue. I was genuinely surprised.
posted by amro at 10:29 AM on July 27, 2012 [1 favorite]

Or what Tell Me No Lies said.
posted by amro at 10:30 AM on July 27, 2012

Oh, and I do hope you'll change your mind and consider your post to Metafilter (sans self-link) to be a worthy work on its own. You clearly have multiple talents, and one of them is the ability to pull together interesting information in a very cogent way. Accept some applause for that too.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 10:34 AM on July 27, 2012 [1 favorite]

...the case of things that seem like genuinely well-meaning confusion from a long-timer user...

Sure, but is this:

the self link (I should note that she gave me the chance to delete the self-link and I didn't want to)

that?
posted by DU at 10:42 AM on July 27, 2012

I find it so strange that people can understand the letter of self-linking but not the spirit.

I think it's that a relatively small number of users hang out in MetaTalk reading administrative posts all day. It would be easy to miss just how loathsome self-links are considered and figure that there's some wiggle room.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 10:44 AM on July 27, 2012 [1 favorite]

Honestly, just put the link in your profile if it's something you're proud of. That's your personal space. Self-links are expected there.
posted by inturnaround at 10:56 AM on July 27, 2012 [1 favorite]

the self link (I should note that she gave me the chance to delete the self-link and I didn't want to)

That was luriete feeling strongly about the post as a whole being what they intended, which is why we deleted the post rather than editing it. As in "no, I'd rather you delete the whole thing", rather than "no, self-linking is awesome and great". Insistence that the post cannot and must not be deleted because there's nothing wrong with it would be something else entirely.

I mean, look. I'm all about banning folks who fuck with the site for self-promotional reasons. I have a possibly unhealthy enthusiasm for combating that stuff on Metafilter. There's a lot of casual spam and genuinely mal-intended linking that we clean up when we see it, and when someone (brand new or established user) is being weird or cagey or jerkish about some mercenary bit of self-promotion that's really angling for a verbosely grumpy me and a quick trip to Bansylvania.

So if we do decide from what we know of a situation that righteously smiting someone isn't the call we want to make, that in a given case it makes sense to go a little softer and make it more of a "we need to be really clear about this" situations, that's a considered position. It's something we're doing deliberately. It's generally not something that's really up for debate. Please keep in mind that we have conversations with people privately in addition to anything that gets discussed on Metatalk.
posted by cortex (staff) at 10:59 AM on July 27, 2012

When someone doesn't link to the post under discussion people yell at them. When they do include the link it gets removed. No wonder no one can remember the rules around here!

(I'm kidding.)
posted by cjorgensen at 11:12 AM on July 27, 2012

I thought it was a superb post & I Favorited it (now my fav. is gone!). I also noticed that at the end of a many-linked documentation, there was a Youtube clip of the OP singing with their kid.
I don't care to get into the intricate discussion about the self-linking rule, but it's a pity that the post is not available any more. I'll check the 'Deleted' blog later.
posted by growabrain at 11:13 AM on July 27, 2012

When someone doesn't link to the post under discussion people yell at them. When they do include the link it gets removed. No wonder no one can remember the rules around here!

(I'm kidding.)

It was a link to a DropBox hosted copy of the post with self-link intact, not the post itself.
posted by zamboni at 11:23 AM on July 27, 2012

This is the post he is talking about. The link removed from this post was a dropbox version of the post including the self-link.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 11:27 AM on July 27, 2012

Oh goodness. That was a fantastic post; I never noticed the self-link at the end, and I'm sad the other content is gone. Luriete: please do consider reposting it without the self-link.
posted by nebulawindphone at 11:29 AM on July 27, 2012 [1 favorite]

Yeah, I mean, I get why the YouTube link meant so much to you, but why didn't you let them take it out? Seems a waste.
posted by inturnaround at 11:30 AM on July 27, 2012 [2 favorites]

@zamboni i didn't know i could still link to the post once it was deleted. is it still available somehow to the author? i didn't know.

oh i see it in Jessamyns post not. I didn't know you could do that!

ouch, sorry, didn't mean to start a discussion of banning users or anything like that. was just looking for advice. obviously this is not the place for such a request, and i apologize profusely.

i wish all the favorites didn't disappear when the post was deleted. i would have liked to been able to contact the favoriters and tell them wherever i reposted it, in case they cared.

i had never had a post get so many favorites so quickly. not that this is a defense against the rules - obviously rules are useless if there are exceptions or if they are unpopular or whatever. i understand that. i just wanted to see who favorited it, that was kind of self-aggrandizing i guess :)
posted by luriete at 11:34 AM on July 27, 2012

@inturnaround because she's my child and us singing the song together was the entire reason i decided to write the post, and because a rule on a site with some people who i like to read things by but don't actually know is not a good enough reason to remove the entire context of the article.

i write those folk song pieces to counter the mechanistic and technologic focus of the site, the rigidity that i see in metafilter, and nothing encapsulates that better than the entire genesis of the article, which was a parent singing with a child. when i was informed that this was in violation of the rules, i didn't argue about it, or beg or plead or anything like that. i simply accepted it and asked that the article be removed.

it was a rational decision.
posted by luriete at 11:36 AM on July 27, 2012 [1 favorite]

nthing the fascinating FPP topic given that I learnt variations of that song in two different countries far far away as a kid and would have loved reading all the background and history.

As for self links being on personal sites or others, I know I've been paranoid enough to worry about Core77 being considered a self link on some days. So, maybe this is a good decision to have this discussion once more on when and where we draw the line or at least, how the humble user can assess without panicking whether its a self link or not.

For example, I wanted to post this today. Nope, I'm not the site owner, blog author nor any of the people linked but I did get paid by the company as a subcontractor in 2008. And thought 10,000 times before going for the garbage can.
posted by infini at 11:44 AM on July 27, 2012

i would have liked to been able to contact the favoriters and tell them wherever i reposted it, in case they cared.

Put a link in your profile.
posted by elizardbits at 11:49 AM on July 27, 2012

Is it kosher for someone else to copy and paste the whole thing, minus the last paragraph/self-link and just repost it?

Just curious as I'm not a metafilter poster myself, so I am not familiar with the norms/policies over there.
posted by Grither at 11:52 AM on July 27, 2012

And thought 10,000 times before going for the garbage can.

You can always email us and ask. People do this all the time. While there is definitely some wiggle room, posting a video of yourself is not in the wiggle room area. No harm no foul with luriete, but just making that very clear.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 11:52 AM on July 27, 2012 [2 favorites]

This Fall On TLC: Pimping Out Your Daughter For Favourites
posted by gman at 11:54 AM on July 27, 2012 [3 favorites]

Is it kosher for someone else to copy and paste the whole thing, minus the last paragraph/self-link and just repost it?

It's not a violation of a rule or anything, and it's something that's been done every once in a while in the past when for logistical reasons that was a good solution to some issue with a deleted post.

That said, in this case I think it'd be sort of weird since luriete obviously has misgivings about the idea of reposting it himself in said modified form, so probably better to give that a pass. If nothing else someone could probably revisit the content in a post of their own manufacture at some point a little ways down the road; that seems like a better way to handle it, to me at least.
posted by cortex (staff) at 12:02 PM on July 27, 2012

Count me as another who thinks that would be a great post without the self-link part and that removing the self-link would not actually weaken the post.
posted by Lexica at 12:04 PM on July 27, 2012

Right, I can see how the personal connection would be the main point of the post for you. So, yeah, the question is where that sort of personal-reminiscing-posts-on-a-topic-of-general-interest would be welcome?

Back in the day I would have suggested Livejournal or Everything2, both of which were basically MeFi analogues for the everything/nothing and "let me tell you about my life" strands of blogging rather than the "curated collection of links" strand that we're in here.

E2 is apparently basically dead, and LJ has turned into a weird shadow of its former self (unless you write fan fiction or speak Russian, in which case as far as I can tell it's still hot shit). Frankly, if I knew of a website that was like that, I would be there a lot of the time instead of here. But I don't, so here I am. If you find someplace that fits the bill, tell me about it!

One thing people seem to be doing instead now is starting group blogs on a particular theme. You could totally start a "music fans making well-researched posts on their favorite songs, with personal reminiscences mixed in" blog — group or solo, actually. I would read the hell out of such a blog. (I would be honored to write posts for such a blog now and again, if you had any inclination to make it a group blog and invite in Internet Strangers.) And if I wasn't writing for it, I would post a blog like that to the front page in a heartbeat, so even if you decide not to invite in the Internet Stranger Brigade as guest posters, you should definitely send me a link if you start it up at all.
posted by nebulawindphone at 12:06 PM on July 27, 2012 [4 favorites]

I think it's that a relatively small number of users hang out in MetaTalk reading administrative posts all day. It would be easy to miss just how loathsome self-links are considered and figure that there's some wiggle room.

Well, it is pretty predominantly displayed right there when you make a post.

That being said though, I do think some people miss that for whatever reason when making fpp's, and I think kindness should always prevail in responding.
posted by SpacemanStix at 12:12 PM on July 27, 2012

But really, I do miss the existence of big literate online communities where the posts are of a more personal nature. Isolated blogs are so, well, isolated; and MetaFilter and kin are nice and all but not the right place at all for sharing personal reflections; and Facebook and Twitter are communal and personal, but it's like they've been designed specifically to crush all traces of eloquence and thoughtfulness.

Having basically grown up first on BBSes in my teen years and then on LiveJournal in my early 20s, I really miss places like that. This seems like one area where the Web really just isn't living up to the promise that it had early on.
posted by nebulawindphone at 12:13 PM on July 27, 2012 [2 favorites]

@inturnaround because she's my child and us singing the song together was the entire reason i decided to write the post, and because a rule on a site with some people who i like to read things by but don't actually know is not a good enough reason to remove the entire context of the article.

It was your inspiration to write the article, but it's not really the context. I'm not bashing you for overlooking the rules, but I do think it has value outside of the value you saw in it. I just wish you hadn't have scrapped it entirely.
posted by inturnaround at 12:15 PM on July 27, 2012 [1 favorite]

I often hear the mods say that one thing they spend a lot of time on is removing SEO, marketing, and other posts that just use the community without adding much of anything. That's where there bright line rule on self-linking comes from.

But they do such a thorough cleaning job that many members don't understand the reason for the strictness of the rule.

luriete, I really encourage you to ask over at AskMe to find an appropriate site — not just for your use, but other people seem like they'd be interested in such a site. Once you've put it up there, let someone here know (I volunteer; memail me.) so we can link to it. I think I've already got the title: "She'll be posted on Live Journal when she comes."
posted by benito.strauss at 12:48 PM on July 27, 2012

The strict enforcement of the no self-linking policy is why Metafilter favorites are worth so much more imaginary internet points than Reddit karma, btw
posted by prize bull octorok at 1:12 PM on July 27, 2012

You really do think it should be reposted without that last link? I'm vacillating.

But could it be posted in the comments?

Hmmm :/

Not too keen on setting up a blog for things I intend to post only once every few years.

I guess I am just too emotionally close to this to make a decision on it. I felt very strongly about this last night but now people here (and the many messages sent to me) are making me reconsider. I guess I will have to find another way to close up the piece, tie it together. Hmm. Thank you for good advice everyone.
posted by luriete at 1:44 PM on July 27, 2012

Honestly, I'd love it if you'd repost it, put the self link on your profile and feel free to point to it in the comments [i.e. the post needs to stand without it but you don't have to pretend you never made it] Obviously, it's your decision, but I'd consider it.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 1:46 PM on July 27, 2012 [2 favorites]

Lacks soul? Mechanistic?

What metafilter do you read, luriete?

Sounds pretty narcissistic to me. Among others, flapjax and y2karl make awesome "folk" music posts here on a regular basis. You are not needed as badly as you think you are to save metafilter from itself.

This whole thread is weird. Luriete should definitely know better than to self link, then come here and try again, and offer a stream of disingenuous reasons why the rules don't app,y to him/her.

Weird.

Also, there is no such thing as folk music.
posted by spitbull at 1:55 PM on July 27, 2012 [2 favorites]

The rules absolutely apply to me. I am sorry if I suggested otherwise. And yes, I should have known better. I will read ALL of the rules better before posting again.
posted by luriete at 1:59 PM on July 27, 2012

It's all good, you're clearly acting in good faith and the post is cool without the self-link. That's like two pretty huge steps away from ugly territory.
posted by lazaruslong at 2:15 PM on July 27, 2012 [3 favorites]

Nthing the suggesting that you repost the FPP without the self-link. The self-link really adds nothing to what is a pretty fantastic post.

Also, the final paragraph leading up to the FPP feels weirdly out of place in there (and would continue to feel out of place even if MetaFilter didn't have a "no self links" rule; the tone is so different from the rest of the post that it's kind of jarring).
posted by asnider at 2:50 PM on July 27, 2012

luriete: You're fine, we all love you here. Your apology is accepted and if anything we wish we could have the post back. Jessamyn just offered you a deal that I don't think has ever been offered before in a case like this: to repost without the self-link, put the self-link in your profile, and link your profile in the comments. Seriously, we love you and we love the post you made and we're willing to bend the rules as far as we can if it means that we can have the post back without the self-link. You are not in any trouble and nobody is mad at you.

I don't actually speak for MetaFilter of course, but I feel like that's the sentiment in the room right now.
posted by Scientist at 3:12 PM on July 27, 2012 [6 favorites]

i would love to see the post back up without the self-link. also, your daughter is freaking adorable.
posted by nadawi at 3:17 PM on July 27, 2012

I knew the post would get the axe the second I saw the youtube video. But I couldn't bring myself to flag it as a self-link because it made me feel like an asshole. And that takes a lot.
posted by Justinian at 3:54 PM on July 27, 2012

You are not an asshole. I broke the rules and Taz - very politely - let me know about this via personal email which I thought was very sweet.

OK, will rework the last para so it's not missing anything and will repost next week maybe, thanks everybody.
posted by luriete at 4:49 PM on July 27, 2012 [1 favorite]

But really, I do miss the existence of big literate online communities where the posts are of a more personal nature. Isolated blogs are so, well, isolated; and MetaFilter and kin are nice and all but not the right place at all for sharing personal reflections; and Facebook and Twitter are communal and personal, but it's like they've been designed specifically to crush all traces of eloquence and thoughtfulness.

I agree with this so much. Also, there's a trend for blogging to be a way to court businesses and make money via advertising or to blog as a way to get free stuff, and I don't want to be part of the 'blogosphere' in that way. I miss posting to LJ and then reading my friends list, and the little community that sprung up where everyone followed everyone else. i feel if i started a blog, it would have to be About Something.
posted by mippy at 5:08 PM on July 27, 2012 [4 favorites]

Other things to be aware of: people who talk @people are limiting the number of people who will respond sympathetically to them here.
posted by flabdablet at 9:54 PM on July 27, 2012

I guess I am just too emotionally close to this to make a decision on it.

This is the exact rationale behind the no-self-link rule, for what that's worth.
posted by flabdablet at 9:55 PM on July 27, 2012 [2 favorites]

Why is this in metatalk at all, then? What is there to discuss?
posted by spitbull at 3:28 AM on July 28, 2012

I'm always suspicious when I see anything labelled as "Metafilter's own" and it links to their personal blog site.

Can we start possibly cracking down on that as one of those blanket no things? Because it really seems like a one step removed runaround aforementioned MeMail "plz post my blog" of the rule.
posted by Talez at 9:20 AM on July 28, 2012

@luriete: "[I'm] not a very active user"
@luriete: "don't.... make fun of my not knowing the rules"
Join date: September 19, 2001.
posted by easily confused at 9:53 AM on July 28, 2012

maybe you are easily confused. just because someone has been a member a long time doesn't mean they are super active or know all the rules. a quick glance at his profile shows most of his time is spent in ask metafilter, a place where the no self-link rule doesn't come up a lot (and even when it does, it isn't a hard and fast rule like the blue is). even at that, another click or two shows he hasn't been particularly verbose on metafilter in years.
posted by nadawi at 11:37 AM on July 28, 2012 [1 favorite]

MeFi: 11 posts , 553 comments
MetaTalk: 6 posts , 23 comments
Ask MeFi: 125 questions , 1412 answers

Yeah, no way an 11 year user with 142 combined posts and nearly 2000 comments could have known metafilter wasn't his own music blog. Cut the poor noob a break!

And to boot, despite a widely advertised bright line policy that is known to any user of his vintage and prolific history, he posted a metatalk to complain about being deleted when the site *needed* his musical stylings to avoid sucking ass, which seems to be being ignored in the backslapping here, and one full of entitlement and criticism of the site without his performance of a children's song on the front page.

Agree on "mefi's own," too. A bit too Dale Carnegie all around.
posted by spitbull at 11:42 AM on July 28, 2012

Cut the poor noob a break!

We're doing exactly that. I'm sorry this is troubling for you, but I'd suggest moving on at this point. If you think there's a concrete thing that needs to get addressed or dealt with here, by us or by luriete or whoever, please feel free to let us know what that might be.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 12:19 PM on July 28, 2012 [2 favorites]

Other things to be aware of: people who talk @people are limiting the number of people who will respond sympathetically to them here.

Is this actually true? I've heard a few people say it in my few short years on Metafilter, but never seen any actual evidence of irritation, outside of people who make these broad warnings.
posted by stoneandstar at 1:06 PM on July 28, 2012

Is this actually true?

It annoys a lot of people. How many people "a lot" is and whether them being thus annoyed is a real practical obstacle to anything is the trickier question, and ultimately it seems to me to fall into "not a terribly big deal" territory toward which attitudes will continue to shift over time, but for now at least as a style thing it's certainly conspicuous.

I'm one of the people it annoys but I've done my best to more or less get over it, and I certainly don't refuse to respond to people just because they do it or whatever. People do all sorts of things that annoy me that they don't intend as annoyances. People are varied, etc., etc.
posted by cortex (staff) at 1:10 PM on July 28, 2012

There's quite a few of us who aren't exactly fond of the @user convention at all. Not sure how large a percentage "quite a few" is, but I've seen plenty of overt annoyance, and count myself amongst the mildly peeved.
posted by Devils Rancher at 1:12 PM on July 28, 2012 [4 favorites]

I too am peeved by @.
posted by languagehat at 11:49 AM on July 29, 2012

Chimes in with the chorus
posted by infini at 12:08 PM on July 29, 2012

Same.
But I do like the Dutch term for this symbol: "apenstaartje". Little monkey tail.
posted by likeso at 2:02 PM on July 29, 2012

I too am peeved by @.

I hear you, languageh@t!
posted by Devils Rancher at 2:58 PM on July 29, 2012

I hear you, languageh@t!

"languageh@", surely.
posted by cortex (staff) at 3:10 PM on July 29, 2012 [6 favorites]

If Devil's Rancher wants to spell the name with a double t, who are you to go all prescriptivist?
posted by flabdablet at 6:29 PM on July 29, 2012 [1 favorite]

Theodore Geisel's The C@ in the H@.

The original requires the reading level of a six year old, but I'm pretty sure we can dumb it down to fit the media.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 11:25 PM on July 29, 2012

What, is Hatt Hatt Baby down the memory hole just like that?
posted by Devils Rancher at 6:02 AM on July 30, 2012

r@-a-t@-t@.
posted by gman at 1:04 PM on July 30, 2012

Yes, reposted. Thanks everyone for their help!
posted by luriete at 1:08 PM on July 30, 2012

Also, reading the recent comments on the @ fiasco, I apologize and won't use that in the future here. We adopted this Twitter-like convention in our work intranet discussions and at The-Private-Site-Which-Cannot-Be-Named which many of you are long-time members of, so I've gotten very used to using it.
posted by luriete at 1:09 PM on July 30, 2012

Ahh, I didn't bother going to the original post when I saw it in RSS, as it didn't really tickle my fancy. But I was totally confused when I saw it again, as I didn't notice the self-link in the original. MeTa satisfies my curiosity yet again!
posted by antifuse at 1:37 PM on July 30, 2012

"languageh@", surely.

Wait a second...
posted by m@f at 1:54 PM on July 30, 2012 [1 favorite]

I figured out a while back that the key to blogging success is not how many pageviews or comments you get, but blogging just to make yourself happy. I have 2 blogs now and I don't have many visitors, maybe just a few of my friends. I don't care though, because my blogs make me happy. So I say start your own blog, even if you only post once every 4-5 years to it. Or make it a static webpage. You still get your content out there and it will make you happy.
posted by IndigoRain at 1:56 PM on July 30, 2012

The-Private-Site-Which-Cannot-Be-Named

Surely, you don't meant Metach@?
posted by Devils Rancher at 2:57 PM on July 30, 2012

I do hope you repost this. I've often done a post about something I've developed a personal passion for (I think it's why a lot of people make posts - obviously, your interest in the topic is often the prime motivator), and just used the first comment as the place to make the personal observations, editorial remarks, or self-links were I to use those. It's a great topic, interesting and something I'd love to delve deeper into. Please repost.

I think there's plenty of "soul" on MetaFilter. I'm routinely getting choked up by personal reminiscences and observations on this site. I would fully expect a thread about this post to contain lots of personal reminiscences. Nothing wrong with that, but I do like the standard of keeping self-linked content and extremities of edtorializing out of FPPs.
posted by Miko at 8:44 PM on July 30, 2012 [1 favorite]

I do hope you repost this

Reposted (minus self link) here
posted by antifuse at 8:16 AM on July 31, 2012