I really wanted to say Reddit.

August 10, 2012 8:18 AM

Grantland again?

Don't get me wrong, I love reading Grantland. But this post probably wouldn't exist without Grantland.

I might as well link to MetaFilter. They always have cool stuff over there.

posted by theichibun to Etiquette/Policy at 8:18 AM (76 comments total)

I'm not sure I understand what you're getting at.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 8:21 AM on August 10, 2012

Not everyone reads the same sites you read.
posted by Rock Steady at 8:23 AM on August 10, 2012 [9 favorites]

Just don't read it if you don't like it.
posted by sweetkid at 8:29 AM on August 10, 2012

I actually had to google Grantland because I had never even heard of it before.
posted by phunniemee at 8:30 AM on August 10, 2012 [24 favorites]

This is funny. You're saying -- I think? -- that this piece of news wouldn't have made it to the Metafilter-required-FPP threshold without the wit of the Grantland piece. Some people would take the exact opposite view, that FPP's should be links to good reads first and foremost, and that newsworthiness should not be a criterion.
posted by roll truck roll at 8:32 AM on August 10, 2012 [2 favorites]

If I understand the complaint correctly it is, "Too many FPPs have linked to Grantland. We should cool it with linking to Grantland." (See also, "Enough already with the single-link NYTimes article FPPs"; "Stop linking to the Onion.")
posted by cribcage at 8:32 AM on August 10, 2012

All of the posts here come from somewhere else. Profound, eh?
posted by Burhanistan at 8:33 AM on August 10, 2012 [3 favorites]

But this post probably wouldn't exist without Grantland.

I don't know - the existence of Grantland generally ensures that there's going to be a halfway-decently written article about some major sports news that's decent enough to post to MetaFilter, but the whole Dwight Howard thing has been going on for quite a while. A trade finally went through, and for the sports world, it's kind of a big deal and I think a post might have been made about it anyway. I think it kind of works like this:

Grantland : ESPN :: The New Yorker : Time

So, Grantland being around makes it easier to make a quality post on the subject, but I don't think we're in the neighborhood of having too many links to Grantland just because it's Grantland yet.
posted by LionIndex at 8:35 AM on August 10, 2012 [1 favorite]

I have never in my life heard of Grantland, and would have never heard of it otherwise if it weren't for this post. For which I'm grateful, because now I plan to find the time today to read The Night Neil Diamond Whanged his Clanger.
posted by scody at 8:48 AM on August 10, 2012 [3 favorites]

I really wanted to say Reddit.

Orange you glad you didn't say banana.
posted by octobersurprise at 8:50 AM on August 10, 2012 [5 favorites]

Want a better post on which to hang a discussion of postseason NBA trades, moves and other hijinks? Then write it.
posted by Etrigan at 9:01 AM on August 10, 2012

This Grantland appears to be some kind of sports news site. (I Googled it and took a look at the front page. It's a lot of sports stuff. Against a white background.)

Given the massive amount of sports-related breaking news that forms the foundation of Metafilter, the user community, and the site's overall zeitgeist, I guess it's inevitable that there would be some overlap.
posted by Naberius at 9:09 AM on August 10, 2012

I'm also in the not-quite-understanding-the-post camp. I feel like people haven't been going nuts with the Grantland links or anything; certainly it's been a lot more laidback now that the site isn't brand new and shiny, compared to a year ago, so, I dunno. If you mean something more specific than "too many", can you elaborate a little?
posted by cortex (staff) at 9:10 AM on August 10, 2012

Also, this Dwight Howard fellow appears to have been traded to the Lakers.

They're a basketball team based in Los Angeles.
posted by Naberius at 9:10 AM on August 10, 2012

Also, this Los Angeles seems to be a west coast California town of some distinction.
posted by The Deej at 9:15 AM on August 10, 2012 [10 favorites]

I agree with the OP's title though. I don't like Metafilter being reddit's sloppy seconds.
posted by Talez at 9:16 AM on August 10, 2012

I might as well link to MetaFilter. They always have cool stuff over there.

Double.
posted by griphus at 9:18 AM on August 10, 2012 [1 favorite]

>>I don't like Metafilter being reddit's sloppy seconds.

I don't mind it so much. I read both all the time and it's always interesting to see how each site reacts to the same posts. (I know most people are somehow offened by repetition for some reason.)
posted by Blake at 9:18 AM on August 10, 2012 [1 favorite]

The Deej: "Also, this Los Angeles seems to be a west coast California town of some distinction."

Also, these towns seem to be organized agglomerations of human settlements, usually having some or all of the appurtenances of local government.

They provide for mutual defense and offer a center for commercial and industrial activity.
posted by Rock Steady at 9:20 AM on August 10, 2012 [2 favorites]

man what the hell is going on with granta these days? it's nothing but sport, sports, sports. did they get bought out or something?
posted by facetious at 9:21 AM on August 10, 2012 [9 favorites]

I don't mind it so much. I read both all the time and it's always interesting to see how each site reacts to the same posts. (I know most people are somehow offened by repetition for some reason.)

Carnac predicts: All the liberalism with added racism for extra flavour.

For every post. Ever. Until the end of time.

The main reason I hate reddit sloppy seconds is because reddit generally votes <GRAR AGAINST HIVEMIND UNPOPULAR SUBJECT> to the top of the page. The PayPal GRAR thread we had a few months ago reposted from reddit was bad enough.
posted by Talez at 9:23 AM on August 10, 2012

I don't like Metafilter being reddit's sloppy seconds.

I think this is sort of failing to take into account the basic logistics of how the two sites work. Reddit is very high-volume, very low barrier to post, so its userbase collectively throws a whole lot of shit against the wall to see what sticks, at more or less the earliest opportunity (and often several times). It's the community's content model: a thousand posts a day, if it's getting linked on the internet somewhere it's probably getting linked on Reddit.

Mefites post stuff the see on the internet. Stuff they see on the internet is stuff that's getting linked on the internet. Stuff that's getting linked on the internet is probably getting linked on Reddit. There's no actual causal link between a Reddit post and a Mefi post in the vast majority of these cases.

Assiduously avoiding anything that has a good chance of having shown up on Reddit just to make the point of not having overlap between the two sites would be weird and would not actually improve Mefi, considering how much good stuff on the net is likely to show up in some Reddit post or three.

"Sloppy seconds" here is an awfully misleading way to characterize the fact that Mefi and Reddit are both content-aggregation sites of some sort and that Reddit has zero established expectation of up-front filtering on their posts and hence tends to get FIRST!ies in a chronological sense.
posted by cortex (staff) at 9:28 AM on August 10, 2012 [8 favorites]

Also, these towns seem to be organized agglomerations of human settlements

Humans? Can you elaborate?
posted by Horace Rumpole at 9:29 AM on August 10, 2012 [2 favorites]

I suspect this Grantland site from which Metafilter gets all its content will be able to provide more detail.

About their sporting aspects at least.
posted by Naberius at 9:36 AM on August 10, 2012

Grantland produces original content. A lot of it is pretty good. This is kind of a lame complaint.
posted by El Sabor Asiatico at 9:38 AM on August 10, 2012

Tool-using apes. Despite these tools, they have failed to overtake bacteria in total bio-mass. I'd just move on.
posted by spaltavian at 9:39 AM on August 10, 2012 [3 favorites]

Hand wringing.
posted by dfriedman at 9:45 AM on August 10, 2012

Naberius: "Given the massive amount of sports-related breaking news that forms the foundation of Metafilter, the user community, and the site's overall zeitgeist, I guess it's inevitable that there would be some overlap."

Do you genuinely think that the foundation of MetaFilter is sports-related breaking news? Are you sure you aren't thinking of SportsFilter?
posted by Rock Steady at 9:46 AM on August 10, 2012

I think this is sort of failing to take into account the basic logistics of how the two sites work. Reddit is very high-volume, very low barrier to post, so its userbase collectively throws a whole lot of shit against the wall to see what sticks, at more or less the earliest opportunity (and often several times). It's the community's content model: a thousand posts a day, if it's getting linked on the internet somewhere it's probably getting linked on Reddit.

I don't doubt your assertion but I come to a different conclusion. Most of the shit that sticks at Reddit isn't really best of the web. It's populist outrage drivel a lot of the time. Reddit is like the Daily Mail of content aggregator. I might be going there as a guilty pleasure to see what stupid/angry/WTF thing someone is doing. I wouldn't want it to be on Metafilter at all.
posted by Talez at 9:48 AM on August 10, 2012 [1 favorite]

Dude, a ton of stuff that is popular here is on Reddit days or weeks beforehand. I won't deny that the comments in Reddit can be pretty shitty, and the upvote/karma thing is ruinous. Often, someone will repost it here and add some more backstory and generally write the post better, however.
posted by Burhanistan at 10:03 AM on August 10, 2012

Naberius: "Also, this Dwight Howard fellow appears to have been traded to the Lakers.

They're a basketball team based in Los Angeles."

Just be glad he wasn't traded to the Ultras of the Chicago Fire...
posted by zarq at 10:04 AM on August 10, 2012 [1 favorite]

I don't like Metafilter being reddit's sloppy seconds.

We're not. Also this term is gross.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 10:09 AM on August 10, 2012 [34 favorites]

Metafilter is so behind the curve. I saw all of today's front page links LAST week on Flipboard. Even the obituaries.
posted by crunchland at 10:19 AM on August 10, 2012

We're not. Also this term is gross.

My apologies then.

I saw all of today's front page links LAST week on Flipboard. Even the obituaries.

Pffft. I hack CNN and all of the obituaries are written years in advance.
posted by Talez at 10:22 AM on August 10, 2012

Reddit has this obnoxious and fervent belief that since every single thing on the internet ever gets posted to the huge behemoth that is Reddit, therefore every single site on the internet ever is stealing stealing stealing from Reddit when anything anywhere gets posted. I've been trying to keep an open mind to the whole Reddit culture lately, checking them out and whatnot, but this thing really bothers me – it's this constant insular fight over whether something is a repost, whether X or Y or Z gets credit, and while Reddit itself sometimes has the sense to look past reposts on its own pages often Redditors will not tolerate the fact that there's cross-pollination on the internet at large.
posted by koeselitz at 10:28 AM on August 10, 2012

Also, my sense is that very few Mefites who post regularly are actually Redditors. So it seems incredibly misguided to claim that Metafilter is just constantly copping links from Reddit. It's sort of this pride thing, where Redditors would really love to believe that there are other Redditors around every corner, and I get that, it's neat to recognize people from your community – but it is simply not always the case that links all came from Mother Reddit.
posted by koeselitz at 10:31 AM on August 10, 2012

While we're on it would a mod mind correcting "Angels" in the FPP? twitch.
posted by These Premises Are Alarmed at 10:37 AM on August 10, 2012

Cryptic meTas are annoying.

And didn't we have a huge meTa a while back in which someone (the OP of that meTa? Can't remember) basically accused people of being liars if they posted something here that had appeared on reddit but said they didn't read reddit, and therefore couldn't have seen it there?
posted by rtha at 10:39 AM on August 10, 2012 [1 favorite]

While we're on it would a mod mind correcting "Angels" in the FPP?

Ha, didn't even notice that. Done.
posted by cortex (staff) at 10:54 AM on August 10, 2012 [1 favorite]

None of this would be possible without the internets. I think I'll go link to a pillow and blanket now.
posted by infini at 11:05 AM on August 10, 2012

I don't like Metafilter being reddit's sloppy seconds.

That's a really, really poor turn of phrase. Especially here, of all places. This may be something you say when you're out with your friends or whatever, but it's really not appropriate here.
posted by kbanas at 11:07 AM on August 10, 2012 [1 favorite]

He already apologized.
posted by griphus at 11:10 AM on August 10, 2012 [1 favorite]

Why "especially" here? Are we standing on sanctified ground or something? It's a tasteless phrase, but not moreso because it was used here.
posted by crunchland at 11:15 AM on August 10, 2012

He already apologized.

Oops. Sorry for harping on harp.
posted by kbanas at 11:29 AM on August 10, 2012

Why "especially" here? Are we standing on sanctified ground or something? It's a tasteless phrase, but not moreso because it was used here.

No, it's not sanctified ground, obviously, but it's a tone thing. It's a level of discourse thing. This is not the boys playing hoops - this is, or aspires to be, somewhat of a more sophisticated conversation. It fails a lot, but, you know.
posted by kbanas at 11:33 AM on August 10, 2012

If you're just reading Reddit's front page (or whatever it is you get if you just go to www.reddit.com), it's about the same thing as going in to a Barnes & Noble bookstore, just buying the People magazine that's sitting at the front register, and complaining about them not having any good books.
posted by benito.strauss at 11:34 AM on August 10, 2012

Are people complaining about Reddit-specific thigns (Ask Mes, comment threads, bestof, etc. etc.) showing up on MetaFilter, or are they complaining about links that have been posted to Reddit also being posted to MetaFilter?

Because the first complaint, well, maybe. I don't think so, but maybe. The second complaint? Completely idiotic.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 11:38 AM on August 10, 2012

Naberius: "Also, this Dwight Howard fellow appears to have been traded to the Lakers.

They're a basketball team based in Los Angeles."

Basketball... basketball. Nope doesn't ring a bell.
posted by Splunge at 11:56 AM on August 10, 2012 [1 favorite]

If I wanted to read things first at the cost of having to wade neck deep through a mire of misogyny, racism, and other distasteful things, I would read reddit. The only part of the site that deserves anything better than to be summarily deleted is AskScience, and even there most of the questions are submitted by semi-literates and only the excellent replies and tight moderation policy keep the SNR favourable.
posted by atrazine at 11:58 AM on August 10, 2012 [1 favorite]

benito.strauss: “If you're just reading Reddit's front page (or whatever it is you get if you just go to www.reddit.com), it's about the same thing as going in to a Barnes & Noble bookstore, just buying the People magazine that's sitting at the front register, and complaining about them not having any good books.”

Yes, this is true. On the other side of the coin, pointing to obscure subreddits and saying "see, Reddit is actually completely awesome!" is like pointing to the US medal count at the Olympics and saying "see, we don't have an obesity problem in America at all!"
posted by koeselitz at 11:59 AM on August 10, 2012 [4 favorites]

Basketball... basketball. Nope doesn't ring a bell.

You throw a big orange ball into a net of string modeled on apple basket with the bottom cut out. My gym teacher used to make us play. Tall people cheat.
posted by maryr at 12:13 PM on August 10, 2012 [2 favorites]

I believe that's "football," or as they call it in the U.S. "hockey."
posted by griphus at 12:17 PM on August 10, 2012 [3 favorites]

.... pointing to obscure subreddits and saying "see, Reddit is actually completely awesome!" is like pointing to the US medal count at the Olympics and saying "see, we don't have an obesity problem in America at all!"

Thank god I didn't say that. And that no-one else in this thread said that. The complaint was that Reddit is all hive-mind shtick moved to the front. I wanted to point out that you can find value in there, you just have to look. Kind of like the Internet.

My main problem with Reddit is when it showcases its inner 14-year old boy. And I'm giggling over the fact that the poster in here who complained about Reddit is the same one using the term 'sloppy seconds'.
posted by benito.strauss at 12:32 PM on August 10, 2012 [1 favorite]

metafilter.com/m/shitmetafiltersays
posted by koeselitz at 1:44 PM on August 10, 2012

previous SLReddit MeTa
posted by the man of twists and turns at 1:58 PM on August 10, 2012

You throw a big orange ball into a net of string modeled on apple basket with the bottom cut out. My gym teacher used to make us play. Tall people cheat.

I'm 6'7" and about the worst basketball player you will find who grew up in a place with forced basketball playing. I don't know what this cheating you speak of is all about, but the rest of the tall cabal didn't clue me in apparently.

Anyway, count me among those who had never heard of Grantland and has never gone to Reddit. "This post on MeFi wouldn't have existed without site.com" could be said about any post here because by definition anything on the blue has come from somewhere else. Some of us only read a few sites, but read them very frequently. I see links here often that I've already seen on hackaday or Make but I realize it's likely just because I refresh those sites as often as MeFi. I don't understand the problem here.
posted by Clinging to the Wreckage at 2:18 PM on August 10, 2012

That's why it's cheating, Clinging. One of my best friends in high school was tall and made the girls frosh team without even trying. I ended up tagging along as manager (yes, that's how athletic I am - I *managed* at a JV level) and could easily defend against her in drills - at least, until she stopped dribbling and just held the ball over my head.

Tall = cheating.
posted by maryr at 2:37 PM on August 10, 2012 [1 favorite]

Splunge: "Basketball... basketball. Nope doesn't ring a bell."

It's the sport that shows up in Fletch.
posted by Chrysostom at 2:58 PM on August 10, 2012

Why are we talking about Reddit (yet again)? And why hasn't theichibun come back to explain this apparently pointless and definitely confusing post? I'm getting pretty sick of people doing that. Yes, yes, I know, maybe theichibun's internet connection went out or there was a family crisis, but until that's confirmed, my irritation continues. Don't post weird shit on MetaTalk and then wander off.
posted by languagehat at 3:21 PM on August 10, 2012 [5 favorites]

One day I shall post the most contentious possible MeTa and then immediately get on an 18th century replica full-rigged ship for a trip around the Horn.
posted by elizardbits at 3:37 PM on August 10, 2012 [11 favorites]

Or just go round and round the Isle of Wight until everyone gets dizzy.
posted by villanelles at dawn at 3:45 PM on August 10, 2012

It would be even better if it were about a certain obnoxious ESPN show that always seems to be on when I'm at the gym.

I think the poster saw the responses in the first 15 minutes and decided that discretion was the better part of valor.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 3:46 PM on August 10, 2012

I hear Mars is the new awesome place to go after you post a puzzling meTa.
posted by rtha at 3:50 PM on August 10, 2012 [2 favorites]

We'd all be sipping lattes on Mars if it wasn't for the crippling debt from Obamacare.
posted by Burhanistan at 4:05 PM on August 10, 2012 [7 favorites]

perhaps on the way i shall sink a dutch 74
posted by elizardbits at 4:19 PM on August 10, 2012

If you don't know what "Grantland" is: Grantland is named for Grantland Rice, a sportswriter from the 1600s who claimed in the face of all evidence that "it's not if you win or lose, but how you play the game," a sentiment beloved by cranky white sportswriters because it allows them to pass moral judgment on young African-American males while ignoring the fact that the "game" in question is a business venture which makes billions in profits for old white owners.

There's actually a lot of really good writing about basketball floating around blogs and twitter these days. Grantland tries to cop the style of these good writers but ends up being kind of a Huffington Post of sports. Gross.
posted by drjimmy11 at 4:28 PM on August 10, 2012 [1 favorite]

Oh and the missing context is that Bill Simmons is not only king of the cranky old white sports writers, but a rabid, absurdly-over-the-top cheerleader for the Boston Celtics (arch-rivals of the Lakers).

Going to Simmons for an opinion on the Lakers is like asking Fox News about Obama.
posted by drjimmy11 at 4:30 PM on August 10, 2012

apple basket

Please, peach basket.

Also, for better or worse, Simmons has pretty much cemented himself as the most recognized fan voice in sports writing. Sure, the poster could have linked to the various blogs following the different teams (for example, Round Ball Mining Company covers the Nuggets) to get the opinion of fans of each team, none of them have any of the instant name recognition of Simmons. For a non fan, his reactions are actually a pretty decent window into just how passionate and dramatic people can feel about sports.

Now if the Classical would get over itself and start writing about sports instead of shoe gazing, maybe we wouldn't need to have this discussion.
posted by Ghidorah at 5:31 PM on August 10, 2012

"Baskets-ball," you say?
posted by rhizome at 5:42 PM on August 10, 2012

I don't mind the Grantland links. I don't pay even the slightest attention to sports, so Metafilter in this way also acts as a Grantlandfilter for me as well.
posted by nevercalm at 5:55 PM on August 10, 2012 [1 favorite]

Y'know, I wanted to say peach basket, but it didn't seem New England-y enough.

(Amusingly enough, we spent half the day disparaging Springfield at work.)
posted by maryr at 6:02 PM on August 10, 2012

All the fashionable space-waitresses are wearing Internet Firstees.
posted by vozworth at 6:34 PM on August 10, 2012

I'm stuck in metafilter with those grantland blues again.
posted by Divine_Wino at 5:02 AM on August 11, 2012

That's why it's cheating, Clinging.

This I don't get. Even as the tallest person in school I couldn't have made bench warmer on the middle school JV team when I was a senior in high school. I am just so horrifically bad that no amount of cheating or height advantage was going to get me on a team. I don't like basketball, so maybe I was cheating my way out of it.
posted by Clinging to the Wreckage at 6:27 AM on August 11, 2012

"Sloppy seconds" here is an awfully misleading way to characterize the fact that Mefi and Reddit are both content-aggregation sites of some sort and that Reddit has zero established expectation of up-front filtering on their posts and hence tends to get FIRST!ies in a chronological sense.

MeFi is the gourmet remora riding the gluttonous Reddit Shark through the bountiful but polluted depths of the interseas?
posted by kengraham at 12:11 PM on August 11, 2012 [2 favorites]

Simmons was basically disowned by the majority of Boston fans the moment he moved to LA and got season tickets to the Clippers.
posted by nathancaswell at 1:14 PM on August 11, 2012